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Los Cincos
Pasos
My friends had a great idea...a 5-day moto
trip based out of Sonora, California. This put us in the heart of
California's Gold Rush country, and in the middle of some outstanding
roads (Highways 49, 89, 108, 120, and others). We spent a couple of
days riding through Yosemite, and then we rode the five passes across the
northern Sierra Nevada mountains. The weather, the roads, and the
scenery were awesome.
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Four of us traveled together on
this ride..Dave, Bob, Marty, and yours truly. This is Dave's BMW GS,
with several mods to make it more street-oriented. This is a very
fast motorcycle, and Dave is a very talented and safe rider. |
| Marty took his 1997
K1200RS. Marty has finished two 3 Flags and three 4 Corners rides on
this bike, as well as quite a few other trips. The bike looks like
it's brand new, but it has over 100,000 miles on it. |
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My Triumph Tiger. I love
this bike. It's sort of built along the same design lines as Dave's
BMW GS. These adventure-style bikes are great touring machines, they
are comfortable, and they handle well. Because of their increased
height, you can lean them waaaay over in the corners. |
| Bob grabbed a Police RT-P for
this adventure.
It's great having this bike on a
trip. Everyone gets out of the way when they see a police
Beemer.
Bob is easily the most gifted rider in our
group. He can really make this bike move along.
On paper, my Triumph produces 30 or 40 more
horsepower then either Dave's or Bob's bikes, but there's no way I could
keep up with them in the corners. |
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Dave on the GS, just prior to
entering Yosemite. |
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Dave grabbed this shot of me on
the Tiger somewhere along either Ebbett's Pass or Sonora Pass. Normally
the Tiger is leaned over a lot more, but these roads were so tight I took
it easy. Or, stated differently, some of the roads scared the hell
out of me. This must have been one of those moments. |
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Another Tiger shot in Yosemite,
at Temayo Lake. |
| Temayo Lake. Shortly after
leaving this area, Bob had to make an emergency stop.
Seems a
bee got into Bob's jacket and stung him, and then he could feel it crawling
around.
Bob said he wanted to see who would win the
contest...would the bee sting him before he could get it out?
Bob thought it was pretty funny.
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Half Dome. Nearly all of
these shots used the Tokina 12-24 with a Hoya polarizer. |
| Another Yosemite shot.
This might be the back side of Big Dome. There were so many
interesting and scenic places it was hard for me to remember which was
which. |
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I spotted this guy at one of our
photo stops. |
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Marty, Bob, and Dave.
These are great guys. |
| Bob and Buck. This guy let
me get within about 10 feet. I shot this photo at the Ahwahnee Lodge
in Yosemite, where we had an outstanding lunch. |
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Taking a break at Sonora
Pass. We're up at nearly 10,000 feet here. |
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Bob and Marty planning our
route. |
| A cool shot of the Tiger at
Sonora Pass.
My Tiger consistently averaged between 48
and 51 miles per gallon.
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It's hard to imagine people
doing this on horses and wagons. |
| Yep, it was steep. I saw a
sign on the way up warning of a 26% grade.
Our bikes were parked back up the
hill. Walking down to this sign was no problem. Hoofing it
back up at this altitude really beat me up. I was huffing and
puffing by the time I got back up to the bikes. |
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Highway 108 was great. |
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After Sonora Pass, we stopped in
Bridgeport for coffee and pie. I think this is their courthouse. |
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this was going into Monitor Pass. I had never seen signs warning of
grades this steep before. |
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We had great weather on all 5
days. The roads were all like this.
Well, maybe not so straight as you see
here.
Ebbett's Pass, which we hit shortly after
this, was not much more than a paved goat trail with one switchback after
another.
I'd never seen roads like these. |
| A cool shot of Bob's RT-P and
Dave's GS in the hotel parking lot. |
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One of my favorite gals in
downtown Sonora. Every dinner we had there was excellent. The
Italian food at Pasta Fool was outstanding. |
| Me goofing around doing a
self-portrait with Dave's GS. |
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One of our final shots, just a
few miles south of Lake Tahoe. |
| This was another great
trip. Great roads, great weather, great bikes, great food, and
great traveling companions. The roads are easily the most impressive
set of twisties I've ever encountered. |
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