When The Situation Dictates

So you need to leave San Gabriel and do the Silverwood lake stuff. Then hit up Bisbee, Stellar camp, SF, storage, and to Vegas. Lotta pictures, keep length down.

So…many…miles. The last month has been a blur of bouncing around and taking care of different errands. While it’s hard to complain about being able to travel the US by motorcycle, having to knock out 500-mile days using the interstate highway system is not at the top of my want-to-do list.

It all came together while I was trying to actually relax. I posted up to the east of Los Angeles, very close to where I used to live. Silverwood Lake is only about 35-mi from where I lived in Victorville, but coming back as a tourist really allowed me to see things in a new way. The San Bernadino mountains are at the same time heavily populated and wild. All the people mean an extensive trail system, several mountain roads, small pockets that are set up for tourists, and even some of the Pacific Crest Trail.

The campgrounds are full on the weekends, but I found a site that had six nights open. I used the time to explore the area. Riding California trails isn’t something I’ve done much of. Living in the desert I could just use roads that wound their way through or out of town. The official trail system is well marked, but the sandy-instead-of-rocky nature of the mountains themselves meant hard packed earth with powdered sugar style sand laid over the top of it.

This meant several falls and a pretty sore body, but unique views. To the west is the famous Cajon Pass. It was a path and hunting area for Native Americans, then Spaniards. Eventually pioneers cut a toll road for wagons, which gave way to an auto-route that became part of Route 66. The railroad of course laid track in the pass, and rail only became more important as Los Angeles grew from a cow town to a port city, then into the metropolis it is today.

I got to view it from the spot an old watchtower had been erected. Now it was just radio antennae and seismometer equipment. Being so alone while hearing the din of traffic below and the low rumble of freight trains struggling up the grade is a unique feeling you can only get when you know the secrets of an area. Even with all my years in the high desert though, I hadn’t found this specific spot. I could see the old toll road, the remains of Route 66, and of course the rail lines and the modern Rte 66, Interstate 15.

Cajon Pass

The Cajon Pass

Old Watchtower Road. There is no watchtower.

Old Watchtower Rd.

Silverwood lake, from the NE corner.

During my time at camp though, things came together quickly. I suddenly had doctors appointments in San Francisco to get to. That meant I should get my other motorcycle and trailer so I could get to my storage unit. Suddenly a 2,500mi circuit was forming. And so off I went, overnighting in Avondale, AZ at a Bunk-a-Biker spot, then continuing on to Bisbee.

There I was able to– with much effort– pull my Indian Chieftain out of the cellar it had been sitting in. Fortunately it didn’t need anything but a little air in the tires, and I was off to pick up my trailer. That took some more wrestling to free it from its storage, but I was on my way to Las Vegas, a 515mi trip one-way.

It was hot– over 100F in Phoenix– and the heat coming off the engine was unbearable. It wasn’t until the sun set that I realized why. I was admiring the neon lights reflecting off the chrome accents on the engine, when I realized I didn’t have a neon light kit installed. Looking down, the rear cylinder’s exhaiust was so hot it was glowing bright orange! Son-of-a…

There was nothing I could really do. The upside of modern motorcycles is you don’t have to futz with them: they have computers overseeing everything from engine operation to making the turn signals flash. The downside is, if something is going wrong, it’s probably a computer or one of its sensors, and you can’t fix that kind of thing on the roadside.

Exhausts glow red for two main reasons. Either things are too lean (there is too much air or not enough fuel going into the combustion chamber) and things run hot, or the spark is firing too late, and the fuel/air combination is still burning as the engine pushes it out into the exhaust stream. Neither of those are adjustable without a computer and proprietary software that only dealerships have access to.

On the plus side I had installed an aftermarket EFI controller, which basically intercepts the fuel and spark signals and tricks the bike’s computer into doing things differently. The downside is I didn’t have the cable with me, so I couldn’t plug into it. All I could do was search for the wires that intercepted those signals, and they were all still connected perfectly and showed no damage or corrosion.

To hell with it: I had gone 450mi like this and not damaged the engine. What’s another 90? So I rode into Vegas, loaded up the trailer with a bunch of my stuff, and made my way back to Bisbee. Before going I decided my aftermarket fuel controller might be the problem, so I disconnected where it connected to the engine’s spark signal. It seemed to fix the problem: the engine was hot, but air-cooled engines are always hot when you ride through 100° weather.

Silverwood Lake, actually a reservoir built around 1970.

In Bisbee I found the cable and installed a new fueling map– one meant for an engine with modified intake and exhaust. Both those control the flow of air: more in and out means you can add more fuel and have more power. Even though my engine was as-delivered by the factory, more fuel makes engines run cooler. Basically, emissions wants the engine hot, so catalytic converters work better. But when the engine is between your legs and the catalytic converter is by your foot, emissions mean a lot less to a guy.

And so, with the bike seemingly happy now, I unloaded the trailer, re-loaded it with things that needed to go to storage, and settled in to help my friend Jenna with an event she was pulling off. It was called the Stellar Moto Camp and this was the inaugural year. Stellar Moto Clothes is Jenna’s independent apparel company, making protective gear and casual wear aimed at female motorcyclists.

Stellar tends to have a great crowd of women with interesting stories and unique attitudes. As a guy I saw much more support and far less cattiness than other social situations I’ve been in that are predominantly women. Plenty of brand-new riders were there and for several it was their first “big trip:” their first time leaving town on a motorcycle. It hearkened me back and warmed my heart to see young faces with that smile of accomplishment.

The event went well as inaugural events do, meaning I think Jenna may have broke even. For those not familiar with event promoting, that’s a big success for a first event. Word-of-mouth is still the best way to promote events despite all the modern channels social media marketing offers, and word of mouth doesn’t get strong until people have been to the event and have memories and emotions to share.

As for me, I was off. It was about 950-miles to San Francisco, and I had an appointment with…well, with a doctor. Not so exciting, but it was the best way to shut them up about how I’d deferred this procedure for five years.