The Mobius Trip

[DR. Rock]

just to hang out 'till he had to fly home,



they had already done the bicycle ride along the coastal trail, so we decided to take a hike around Lake Spenard and check out the aviation museum. You know these guys were into that.



big wheels



there weren't as many planes out as before, probably 'cause the season's just starting,





and hardly any were taking off and landing unlike last summer where it was non-stop.

[DR. Rock]

Website here,



is definitely worth checking out, as much for the cool hardware (early boxer-quad),



as well as the human stories of the early aviators, explorers, bush pilots and others and learning about their crashes and exploits.

[DR. Rock]

as they were knocking off for the day. Mostly just to say "hi" since we wouldn't be prepping the bikes 'till the next day. We got to introduce Jim to the crew, and show him first-hand how our last corporate sponsorship ended:



We picked up some pizza and beers and climbed up onto the roof with the crew...









If we had been thinking about it, we'd have put the batteries on the charger while we were there... but we weren't. and we didn't.

[DR. Rock]

where LDF and Jim demolished a massive amount of crab legs:



LDF likes crab legs.



and then we hung out some more, regaling of past exploits and dreaming of future ones.

[DR. Rock]

Sunday morning we showed up at Motoquest, and started our bike and gear prep ritual. I had a couple of things to do, which I didn't think would take long, and we expected to be on the road by early afternoon.



of course, everything takes longer than you think. I had to replace my tail-light assembly. The control board of the acerbis led's had corroded, and I'd bought and brought a new one to swap. It's just cumbersome to work with the bags and rack still on.

When it came time to fire up the bikes, Honeybee sputtered and started, but Buueberry was deadder-N-adoornail.



The batteries had been left connected, I can't remember the logic of that... and the speedo clock on blueberry had killed the battery. (Honeybee has a trailtech which only draws bike power when the engine is on).

We were able to quickly charge her battery,



but then it only read 4V and wouldn't even light the headlight. We tried charging it a few more times, and while waiting, I installed the loobman oilers:



it was fairly easy, though kinda ghetto-looking.

[DR. Rock]

and in retrospect, we shoulda just bought a new battery and started rolling, but I'd read that when a battery is deeply discharged, you sometimes need to fool the charger by connecting a good battery in parallel and leave it to charge overnight and sometimes it could be recovered.



So that's what we did. Only now it's starting to drizzle, and the prospect of starting out the next morning wet and cold was not appealing. So we get a hotel room across the street for three times what the new battery ended up costing.

The good news is that we wouldn't be pressed for time in getting to Edmonton, though I kind of wanted to hustle along as the dirt-riding options only emerged on the last 1/4 of the trip. The other good news is that we got to hang out with our friend Brenden, who took us to a local club where there was good beer, and live music.

[DR. Rock]

'bout sums it up.



I'd forgotten about the dawson ferry mini-drama. That was the other reason we weren't in such a rush... we had to wait for the top 'o the world highway to open in order to pick up the Campbell highway, otherwise our route would be straight-up AlCan highway much of which we'd ridden before.

But by mid-day, we were finally rolling:





Anchorage to Tok



click on image below for detail:

[DougZ73]

Another leg. Good stuff. Looking forward to reading it.

Dead battery: Worst thing for a battery is to let it run completely dead. Shortens its life dramatically. Hopefully it gave you no other trouble before you replace it.

[Klay]

[DR. Rock]

and interstate aside, it felt good to stretch the bikes.



We rode for an hour or so, and stopped to rearrange ourselves, and take in the views.



this overlook was at a pretty steep cliff that seemed to be eroding away even as we sat there.



yadda yadda yadda, yak yak yak.

[DR. Rock]

they started to clear,



It certainly is a pretty stretch of road.



The leaves not quite into bloom yet.





We tried to stop and smell the roses, anyway. We were just a bit early.

[usp45]

looks like were gonna get some more awesome pitchers

wondering how you liked the loobmans? ugly but versatile

[DR. Rock]

the Matanuska glacier -- see ya' later, aliglaciar.



We're headin' east and south.





Looking at the photos, I now know why I thought that stretch looked so good -- it was the only 10 minutes where we had sunshine!

[DR. Rock]

we don't care how much you cost, how full our tanks are... if we see gas, we fill up. Period.



The sun and color of the mountains reminded me of Nabesna road from M6.



really majestic.



but still a lotta snow out there.

[DR. Rock]

just after I shot this clip, commenting about how we're in the middle of nowhere, with nothing around...



We spy a rest area, and pull in for a rest stop. This guy pulls in from the opposite direction, and after a second, gets out of his car and walks over. He starts talking to me, but I can't hear a thing. Since LDF is in the bathroom and we're not in a rush, I take my helmet off, and start talking to him. He's asking about the drz's, and says he has one himself, and that he rode it across the country... and it dawned on me. I know who this is.



this is how: I was at work, and someone asked about our ride report, because porn and ADVRider are blocked at work, I tried to pull it up on my cell phone, but when I googled "mobius trip" the first ADVRider hit was a ride report by a guy named Baise that opened with the line:

Just me and the DRZ, my first motorcycle tour

---

The following report is of my solo trip I'd taken in the summer of 2010. This was a low budget trip so don't expect to see pics of hotels and restaurant meals. I had lost my job a while back so it was the perfect opportunity to take a trip like this since I would never be able to get the time off if I was working. I've had my DRZ for a while and only used it mostly for riding trails and dirt roads close to home in upstate NY and a few multi day trips down into PA. The thought of touring with it never crossed my mind until I seen the mobius trip ride report so I'll have to start by thanking them for the inspiration. I'm writing this report hoping it will inspire someone else to take their DRZ out for the long haul.

I ended up reading his whole damn ride report, it's that good.

I said "I know you." and proceeded to describe his exploits. He then said he'd figured out that we were riding the mobius trip, and we had a little mutual admiration moment just as LDF emerged from the outhouse and scratched her head wondering what the heck?

But I had showed her his ride report, and she'd read it too, and we were just dumbstruck that the only person we'd run into on the ride today was someone who's writing we'd read, and felt like we practically knew.



For all that open space, it really is a small world, huh?

PS: he is also my inspiration for changing out all our wheel bearings when we got to Edmonton ;)