nklr apology to group

[Don Kime]

I went last year on my GL1500 w/ camper, wife and dog! We rode 14,300mi, every road accessible paved mile in Alaska, and about 600 unpaved miles through Alaska and YT. Had absolutely no trailer problems, and I'm not sure why Frazier recommends against it. A couple of friends took cargo trailers, and they did break some things due to the hammering but there are lots of creative souls along the way good at gluing things back together! Fortunately, mine was well seasoned and had no trouble. Hoping to go back this year on the KLR and ride the Dempster and Dalton - only got to the Arctic circle last year. We took the Alcan up, Cassiar back, and I wouldn't miss either. We did the ferry up there (Whittier - Valdez) & (Haines - Skagway). Pictures at: http://www.picturetrail.com/dkime Ride safe, Don Kime - VFR750F, GL1500SE, GL1100, KLR 650 OH - M/C Safety Instructor/RiderCoach dkime@... http://forums.delphiforums.com/MCTourer/ At 10:47 AM 11/12/03 -0600, Rasmussen, John A wrote:

>1) Take my GL1800, Trailer and Wife. > > 2) Take my KLR and leave previously mentioned 3 item(s) at home. > >I read Dr. Greg Frazier's book and he did not recommend pulling a >trailer. So...I would be interested in anyone else's thoughts or >experiences on that topic. I am also considering riding to Alaska and >taking a ferry back down to Washington and would be interested in any >feedback on that idea. TIA

[paulb_pcg]

Hi Ed: Stuart took his 98 up, and wrote this: http://dualsportnews.com/fl_to_ak.htm Then I bought the bike and took it up, below is my write up, which was previously posted. Paul Trip Report on AK: My Background: - 50 year old, former HD FXRT owner, now with a K1200LT that has 58k since May of 2001, got into KLR in late spring, bought the bike from Fred Hink and began learning about dual sporting (thank you List!). - Average 750-800 miles per day on road trips, biggest day is 1247 and best two day total is 2297. - Solo rider - good in groups only on short rides - Understanding family that lets me do these long rides Bike Setup: - 98 KLR - as set up by Stu Heaslet - http://www. dualsportnews.com/fl_to_ak.htm, about 61,000 miles. My additions: - Helen 2Wheels Bags - tent, small and large duffle, drying bag - Headlight cutoff switch - LED Voltage Monitor, mounted in the spare idiot light space - Wolfman Tankbag - wired to charge cell, MP3; with mounting for MP3 and earphones; rain cover - Wolfman Tank Panniers - great to hold Platypus and spare tubes and fire extinguisher, breaks the wind on the knees What Worked: - Russell Day-Long Seat: never thought there could be that much difference in a seat (having had custom ones before) - never, never had a butt-ache!! - Happy Trails Stuff o Mounts, panniers o Highway Pegs - lifesaver on long days - First Gear Solo Expedition, bought on closeout - still clumsy to get into, but great protection! - Gerbings Suit - toasty, as needed! - Snowmobile Helmet neck cover - kept the rain, bugs and draft from inside the helmet - Wolfman tank bag - loads of space, tough as nails! - Using debit cards to get cash at each change of country - kept the exchange rate hosings to a minimum What did not: - Stock headlight for running at night - Aluminum Sprockets, no matter what the manufacturer claims - Drying clothes on the bike, on rainy muddy roads - Camping - trying to average 600 miles per day was too aggressive to allow for camping in unfamiliar areas - Trying to average 600 miles a day means all I did was ride. No sight seeing, and forced rest in Fairbanks looking for parts! What worked some: - GPS - Streetpilot Monochrome, wired to the bike power: antenna only worked in one location, but was really convenient in changing to kms in Canada. Failsafe when the speedo cable broke. Took the beating on the Ram Mount just fine, except for the antenna problem. - My Memory - forgot bike cover and Slick helmet liner at various spots - duh. Lessons Learned: - Replace all cables at the start, carry spares - No more than 400 miles a day on Canada/Alaska roads - Arrange ahead of time for tires (I know, I know, Stu did!) - Only lug-tires really work in mud. Put up with the street noise and wear but have them for mud! Next time, will change to them in Fairbanks and ride them home - Ibuprophen, 3 every three hours - Radar detector was dead weight if you cannot go over the speed limit! - Same with using an MP3 on most of the 2 lane roads - too active of riding for messing with the tunes! - Carry a spare shield, but not a tinted one, like I did! Trip Details: **Sandy, UT to Tri-Cities, WA Fairly uneventful, except for wind, settling in with the bike. Stayed in a nice city campground right on the Columbia in Kennewick. Uh, except for running out of gas and having to thumb it with my empty gas can! Realized the bike was only getting about 35mpg, had a useable capacity of 4.7 gallons, with about a .33 gallon reserve! Got a second 1gal gas can and kept them both full the rest of the trip. Stopped by Happy Trails in Boise, where they fixed my broken Highway Pegs (new ones!!) and I could drool over all the new stuff they make there! **Kennewick to 100 Mile House, BC Slow going through central WA, uneventful border crossing. Things got really hot (103 deg.) in Cache Creek, BC - southern BC really is Canada's summer resort area! Camped at an RV park in 100 Mile House BC. **100 Mile House to Hyder, AK Weather changed to rain, fog as I started up the Cassier. Raining fully by the Hyder turn off - Ma Grizz and her cub wandered out on the road, not far from Bear Glacier! Pouring by the time I got to Hyder - got Hyderized, wondered why they don't fix ANY potholes, stayed at the Sealaska Inn. Why does Canada maintain a 24 hour customs station but the US side has a Welcome sign?? **Hyder to Teslin, Yukon Rain the whole way - mixed pavement and gravel/mud. Rear tire slipped a lot (Gripsters) - kept speed to 35mph - mud covered everything, had to clear the radiator by the end of the Cassier. Took the Alaska Hwy to Teslin, caught a hotel room to dry everything out. I hate 7 span metal grated bridge decks. **Teslin to Fairbanks @700 mile day -- stopped in Whitehorse to look up some friends Stu recommended - no luck on either the way in or out! - Road conditions not that bad, but accumulated 1000's of potholes and frostheaves wear on the bike and the rider. Got in to see the mechanic in Fairbanks at 10pm - stayed open for me!! **Fairbanks, down for repairs Pete Bailey of Fine Tuned Wheels (907 451 4389) - again, referred by Stu - looked over my bike, showed me that the back tire was bald on 1/3, at the wear bars on 1/3 and had good tread on 1/3!! Can you say - out of balance?? And I checked each night, so obviously I need to fully rotate the wheel! And, the high-tech aluminum back sprocket looked like spikes after the Yukon/AK carbon-silica dust got done with it! And, by the way, your fork seals are blown (happened in the last run into Tok)!! To quote Pete - "That's why they call it Adventure Touring"! So much for a quick oil change! Pete proved to be a master of finding things that no one has: sourced back and front Trailwings (including rooting in the tire storage area of one of the mc shops!), fork seals that fit, from a different dealer, the last O-ring chain in Fairbanks. And he put them all on with help from his nephew, John! To be fair, Pete and his brother John have just opened their shop and are in the building phase - most of their work is with the classic Harleys, Urals, etc. They are a classic "local" business that will do anything to get you back on the road - and a fun group to work with! Stayed at the North Woods Lodge (907 479 5300, www .AlaskaOne.com/northlodge), during the season, for $50 a night in a cool log cabin! Beats the heck out of $100 motel rooms! Friendly, eclectic group of folks! **Fairbanks to Arctic Circle Got out late in the day, with Pete and nephew riding the first 75 miles with me, to make sure the maintenance all worked out! Great homemade pie at Hilltop Truckstop outside of Fox, road is paved to Livengood, 77 miles! Camped at the Arctic Circle campground - saw a couple of GS's with German plates, but got in after they were in bed and left the next morning before they were up! Pete and crew advised to slow and stop when meeting or being overtaken by the trucks that dominate the Haul Road - Great advice! Rain, sun, dust, you name it, the truckers slowed and passed as far off from me as they could, once they saw me stopping. Slowed down the day, but sure made for a nicer ride: had no rocks or debris and minimal dust and mud spray. Yukon River Bridge - Timber surface - very slick in the rain - took it slow and made sure there were no trucks coming either way! **Arctic Circle to Deadhorse Left in the rain, stopped at Coldfoot (road is paved for 85 miles into it!) - had a great breakfast, learned from some of the truckers that the Antigun Pass snow was melting (gone when I got there) and that it was raining most of the way to Deadhorse. Rest of the trip was slogging through the mud, broken by one 25 mile paved section, all the way into Deadhorse. Stayed at the Prudhoe Bay hotel ($110/nite, but includes 3 full buffet meals!) - dead tired, gassed up, looked around - looks like most oil towns in the middle of nowhere, did my laundry and hit the hay! Saw caribou, musk oxen (didn't know they were in AK!), an arctic fox and lots of frustrated hunters! **Deadhorse to Fairbanks Left the next morning in brilliant blue sky - the same roads that were slick, gray, syrupy mud were now dry, veritable freeways!! Ran 55-60 on the gravel sections, 75 on the paved! Still pulled over for the trucks and they slowed and kept the dust to a minimum. Bicycle guy - German - visited for a few minutes - I had seen his tracks in the mud on the way up, but did not see him (he was getting water in a creek) - and I told him he was The Man for doing it on a bike! He said that he really respected the 70 year old guy that he met on his way up that was bicycling it!! Met first bikes on the way back - Roland from New Zealand, on a F650 Dakar, completing a run from Tierra del Fuego(sp), with a buddy on an R80 - talked briefly about the rest of his trip and were off! Got into Fairbanks late evening, crashed at Northwoods and met Pete for dinner at his second job - DJ at a club! **Fairbanks to Whitehorse Good run, kept playing leapfrog with two other bikes: "Iron Butt" Paule from Georgia, on her 1100 Virago, and Tom from Florida on his R1100RT (well worn after a Deadhorse run and some late night trail riding in Girdwood!). Tom was 80-90 mph, Paule was 65-70, I was 75-80: after nearly four days of leapfrogging one another, were all at Edmonton at about the same time! Tortoise rules the Hare!! Crashed in downtown Whitehorse, did maintenance in the town square and forgot my bike cover in the morning!! **Whitehorse to Ft. Nelson Rain, cold, rough roads, seemed like I could never get any speed up! Lots of elk, saw my first free-range buffalo! Did the last 100 miles in with Paule in the dark, trying to make both our headlights function as one capable one, to not much avail! Motel crash and got set for a hard next couple of days home! **Ft. Nelson to Red Deer, AB Finally got through to some higher speed roads! MPG went down, speed went up, got happy, and pushed through to Red Deer, about halfway from Edmonton to Calgary. Would have gone onto Calgary, but the weak headlight, scratched shield made seeing details of the road very tough! Motel crash, got the bike ready for final push! **Red Deer to Sandy Out the motel at 7am - got tied up in Calgary rush hour - picked up a stiff wind south of Calgary, bike started running warm (mid- gauge). Got through the border with no problem, and picked up speed on I15 south. Winds picked up even more and spent the afternoon in thunderstorms through most of Montana! Bike seemed to get it's second wind about 4pm and wanted to run a little faster (although still warm) - so we pushed into Idaho at dusk, back into familiar ground of northern Utah and made the exit of I15 at 12:30am after @950 miles. BUT, the adventure was not over: two blocks off the freeway, the clutch cable broke!! Chugged into a parking lot, unloaded to get the vise-grips, reconnect the cable, hooked up the pliers, reloaded the bike, chugged, speedshifted home, about 1:30am! Adventure done!

[Svantwuyver]

I did an Alaska trip on my KLR in 2000. There is a length writeup at: http://users.tns.net/~stevevt/pics/alaskatrip.txt and a few expandable thumbnails photos at: http://users.tns.net/~stevevt/pics/alaska.htm I also did a detailed writeup on gear that worked and didn't at: http://www.advrider.com/Wisdom/Gear.html -svt- __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree

[sulman]

For Ed: svt wrote in his trip report: " I had to cut it short after barely getting into Alaska. For the first time in 40 years there was snow on the Tok Highway in August!" I repeat my warning about late summer trips to AK. Been there, done that.

[powermonkey35]

someone just kindly pointed out to me my posting of the ENTIRE digest, insted of a clean,single message. obviously this was in error and out of ignorance. sorry to clutter things up. it seems i forgot to delete the previous topics when i hit reply. g