down came the rain

As Saturday morning came around, I was geared up and on my way north to Monroe, Wa to meet up with Brian from Adventure Rider for both our first dirt real riding experiences. The plan was to meet there, then continue up Hwy 2 over Stevens Pass, then take forest roads the rest of the way to Lake Wenatchee. Supposedly there's a big system of 150+ miles of forest roads around the lake. The first attmept stopped us about a mile into the forest road; apparently there had been some catastrophic even in the last few weeks that downed about half a dozen trees right across the road. Assessment: impassable. So we tried a couple more roads that were thought to take us to the lake, and never really got there. There was plenty of dirt riding to be done, though. Both of us progressed markedly by the end of the day; going from a timid 20mph, to a little over 40mph with much more confidence. In fact, we both commented that perhaps by the end of the day we were bordering on cocky.
The reward for the day was here, at the somewhat-summit of one of the forest roads-

The Strom performed very very well if you ask me.. at the level of my riding skills, Brian and his Strom were right there with the GS.

I would imagine, though, that there aren't a whole lot of bikes that feel as confident and capable as the GS in this stuff. At one point we both splashed through what seemed to be a regular old mud-puddle, but turned out to be much deeper and difficult than expected; almost throwing Brian off the bike. The GS got a little squirrelly when I got in there and hit the ruts, but remembering the words of the germans: (spoken in a german accent) "Use the power of the motorcycle!"- I got back on the throttle instead of the brakes, and the beast just powered right out of there.. In that case I was pretty much just along for the ride on the GS.. My goal is to learn enough and develop my skills so as to feel like I'm riding it, not being taken for a ride.


No action shots this time, but I'm planning on doing some more shooting when it's not raining, and when there are a few more riders to shoot.

The let-down of the day was returning home at the end of the day with a clean bike.. It rained pretty much consistently all day long, and with 100 mile pavement ride back home in the rain, the dirt had all but washed away. Oh well, there's always next time! I had to remind myself all day that if I'm going to live in the Pacific Northwest and ride a motorcycle, I'd better get used to being a little wet...and in the end, it just wasn't all that bad.. you get to a point that you can't get much wetter, and resign yourself to having fun regardless!