A Raider 4th of July

The 4th of July 2013 for us was in Florence, Oregon... or... at least that's where it started and ended.

We dawdled around the rig, parked at the Three Rivers Casino for too long and let the wind catch up with us. Though the day had started off clear sky and calm, and the clear sky remained... the calm blew away.

Mid morning we climbed on Sonja... the Raider... and headed north along the PCH from Florence, buffeted by a stiff Ocean breeze.  :)

North of town a ways are the Sea Lion caves. We dropped the coin a few years back and took the elevator down in to see the place. It was ok... maybe do it again some day... today... I just rolled on by to pull in just a short way further north at the view point for the Haceda Head Lighthouse.

We'd stopped here in the truck, one stormy morning, on a trip a few years back to try and photograph what's claimed to be the most photographed lighthouse in Oregon...

That day it was raining, foggy, and the surf was huge... Over the sound of the crashing surf I could hear this sound that... sounded like barking... but couldn't for a bit figure out where it was coming from...

I finally realized that the beach, there on the right... was an odd color...

It was Covered... by Sea Lions... making it a rich, brown color... Covered, nose to flipper, shoulder to shoulder, with Sea Lions. Hundreds, thousands even.

There were rafts of 'em, 20 and 30 in a bunch going out to hunt and coming in to rest on their "haul out" beach.  In the rain and wind that day I failed to capture any photograph... except the one in my head. Altogether is was Pretty awesome.

On farther north on our run toward Newport, we found another wide spot to pull off and walk...

A grassy trail led down to the beach below a small river that dumped into the sea at this spot just a few miles below Yachats.

The beach itself is narrow, and pretty rocky in spots...

 ... a few small tide pools are hidden in the rocks...

More of those "Rock Pilers" we followed in Arizona and Utah... have visited the Oregon coast...

Couldn't go too far up the beach though... a short convo with a guy playing with his dog on the windy beach used up the time I had available... (that's shorthand for ~ I BADLY needed a lil' boys room!)

... it's a cold wind... morning coffee thing...

So, we walked back to the bike and continued on up the PCH to the Fishing Port of Newport.

Parked Sonja backed into the curb... and strolled non-nonchalantly down the street... trying desperately to NOT look like an old guy with something in his boot....  while I stood in line for the Grandmother and her 18 or 20 year old granddaughter??? to come out of the "one holer" public restroom after an 8 or 10 minute get-together... :-/

Then... it was find a nice lil' cafe along the bay for lunch... and make the run back to Florence in time to find up close parking for the riverside 4th of July fireworks display the Siuslaw Fire Dept put on in the Florence Marina.

All in all a real nice hundred+ mile 4th of July along the Pacific Coast Highway (U.S. Hwy 101)

Grab Your Handles and Ride
Brian

A Biker Caught Betwixt and Between

I've been on the road now for three years... Which fits pretty fine, since I've been a gypsy spirit since as long as I can remember. My only regret is that I didn't just change my life to this "way" of going a Long, Long time ago.

Buuuut... There's ALWAYS a but...

I also have a very big "scheming" gene that never rests. To many it carries a face that looks just like indecision or at best a short attention span. In reality, it's more akin to an open mind mixed with a hyper active curiosity and seasoned by a hunger to try a bit of everything; all compounded by the very strong realization that my scrawny ass sits on the shady side of the mountain.

It's a lot like one of those; "If I could" grunt, grunt "just get this" gruuuuunt! "pushed into pla.... Oh Look! A Butterfly!" Clank!! as the tool in my hand falls forgotten on the ground and I go wandering off following my new interest sort of mental meanderings. ;)

Too bad all those psychological deficiencies are financed by the wallet of a gypsy biker cowboy disabled vet! :)

So anyhoo, wandering across the country, riding roads all over the west and having a warm dry bed and a refrigerator for my beer in the fiver right behind me, is absolutely fine! If I get to not liking a neighborhood all I gotta do is hitch up and move my house to a fresh place. No shortage of new places to flicker past my wandering eyes.

The ONLY drawback is there are things I want to do, things that really grab my imagination, that just don't fit into that gypsy living.

I have in my head a vision of a one of a kind camp catering specifically to traveling bikers. Keeping that company are visions of several versions of a "vintage/hot rod/classy "rat ride"/survival" sort of a bike... I'd like to carve the tooled leather seats for those bikes with my own tools... since I used to make my living doing custom leather for several years.

...then there's several, looooong... Rides I want to make that a wife, two dogs and a fifth wheel just don't fit well with... especially a wife that enjoys the occasional 200 mile day with me... but not 40 300 mile days in a row... or longer!

All of those are nestled amongst plenty of other schemes that float around behind my eyes when my vision clears after just a few miles out there on the two lane. 

So... though I am as happy as a biker with new tires with the life I have... I am one of those lonesome souls that's never fully satisfied. I'm always pushin' for the horizon... reachin' for the stars... and dreamin' way beyond the world I'm in.

Ain't that what it's all about in the first place? Dreamin' the dreams... and then seein' how many of 'em we can chase down before our odometer ticks its last mile... Living Life and Chasing the Wind!

Grab Your Handles and Ride!
Brian.

Bucket List of Motorcycle Touring Rides

I'm thinkin' I might could have shoulda started clickin' off the Longer Rides of the Bucket list... a lil' bit BEFORE my odometer clicked over 60 summers! ;)

Aw hell, I guess it'll keep me young trying to get 'em all accomplished on a pikers wallet huh?

The top three of my Motorcycle Touring Rides bucket list are... OK... cuz I can't say any one of 'em is lesser than the other... my top four would be;

1. The Pacific Coast. Finding every road to stay as close to the shore as possible... from The Mexican Border to Canada... starting from where ever I'm at.

2. The Four Corners. Finding the closest spots you can get on a motorcycle to the four extreme corners of the Lower 48 in Maine, California, Washington and Florida. Either Riding the perimeter roads of the country to get there or Criss Crossing the interior in a giant Figure Eight. A good special part of the ride could be... taking the footpath to actually take my bony butt to the exact farthest spot on the map.

3. A Return to Alaska Ride... or three! One; Ride my Raider one way and load up the other direction to coast along on the Marine Highway, the Alaskan Ferry System. Another one both ways on the road again. This time some little while longer and taking in the Cassiar Hwy and a few of the other alternative parallel routes to staying on the a traditional Alaskan Highway through British Columbia and the Yukon...

Give me a bit and I'll think up a good variation for a wished for fourth scooter ride to the land of the midnight sun.

Hell, that was easy! The Just Because Alaska by Motorcycle Ride! ;)

4. Bag every Mountain pass west of the Mississippi that rises higher than 7,000 feet in a few endless weeks of curly cues, twisting roads and crossed trails, trying to gather them all in.

Then... there's a nearly unlimited number of other ideas that fill my head if I let 'em... let's see...

1. The Great Perimeter ride... following every road I can find to keep me as near to the land perimeter of the lower 48 that I can find. Especially if the Four Corners was ridden in the figure 8 version! ;)
2. State Capital buildings... Every state in the west?
3. National monuments of the West?
4. All the National Parks in a big wide circle.
5. Hwy 287 from end to end.
6. Hwy 89 from end to end.
7. Motorcycle Touring Route 66 from start to finish... or ... finish to start!
8. The Motorcycle Camp in every National Forest in the west Ride! ;)

... and maybe the sweetest of them all, and juuuuust might could be it shoulda been named #1... Two wheels in the Wind May through October.

Start each day where I ended the last. Free on the road and knees in the wind.  Just following that ribbon of asphalt... as long as I feel like twisting the throttle.

No maps. No time tables... No schedules or goals... just fill the tank each morning, pick a direction and ride... where ever my nose and my scooter takes me. Turn when the road does and see where it leads. Aw it's a joyous and sweet dream.

Grab Your Handles and Ride
Brian