Thus. 6 Sept., I drove to Greenwich, Ct. and picked up Carlos Escudero at his shop, Solo Moto, and we drove to Newburg, N.Y. to the base hotel of the 2012 Cannonball run,  a ride from there to San Francisco over 16 days for pre 1930 motorcycles.  Carlos had been hired by one of the participants to be part of his support crew.  When we got there, they were just finishing up replacing a tappet and pushrod that broke.  I cruised the lot and smoozed with several competitors I knew.  I had race with Norm Nelson many times back in the '90s and now he was riding a 1929 R11 BMW 750 flathead with a team based in Jacksonville, Fl.  There were two other BMWs entered: a 1928 R52 and '28 R62.

I also race with Art Farley regularly.  Art is from Michigan and was doing the Cannonball on a '28 Harley. 

Also Harley mounted is Buzz Kanter, who I often see at Moto Giros.  Paul d'Oleans, who I know through the Velocette Owners Club of N.A. and his Vintagent blog, was on the only OHC machine, a '28 KTT Velo.

 Joe Gardella had an extra ticket to the official kick-off dinner which he gave me and all he ask in return was to take a 'tour' of his 1914 Harley.  This is the same bike he rode on the first Cannonball in 2010, when machines were limited  to 1916.  His internal mods were extensive, but externally the only mods were a later fork and a front brake.  These are considered safety modifications and are allowed and even encouraged.  I chatted with a fellow who brought his Harley from his native South Africa, and he had cleverly attached a disc brake rotor to the spokes, rather than the hub, of his front wheel.

 I wondered if that would put undue stress on the spokes, but he said he had done 400miles of shake down and was quite confident in it.  But, there were quite a number with no front brakes, as original; brave.
Carlos and I returned to his house in Greenwich for the night with the intention of getting up early and making it back to Newburg by 7 am for the start.  But, when we got to his house, he got a text message from his rider saying the bike had seized and they were coming to Greenwich to work on it.  So, Fri. morning, I drove back to Newburg to the Motorcyclepedia Museum for the start.  There was quite a big crowd of fans and well wishers, some who came on interesting bikes themselves, like this 1930 Scott 2 speed.

And a Hesketh.

It was a truly wonderful scene as the rider took off through the crowd into the street amid much cheering and applause.  Some of the bikes looked dubious to make it out of town, let alone 3800 miles to S.F.

You can follow the Cannonball's progress at:  http://www.motorcyclecannonball.com/
After the participants had left, I went into the museum to check out the new exhibit of Japanese M/Cs of the '60s and '70's and the new acquisition of a replica of Sylvester Ropers first steam cycle, the 1867 'boneshaker'. 

This was made by William Eggers of Goshen, Ct. and someone told me he might be at the museum as they had seen him the day before at the base hotel.  I call him, but he was home 'up to his elbows in mud and grease working on his tractor', but he invited me to visit sometime.

Larry Lawrence has posted a picture of me at the 1990 WERA GNF on his blog the Rider Files.
https://riderfiles.wordpress.com/2012/09/12/bsa-vs-harley-davidson-25-years-later/ As I commented, the bike is a BSA B-50 that belonged to my friend, the inimitable Dick Miles, and the legendary Dr. John Wittner had previously 'laid hands' on it.  I stated that it came with Dunlop K81 tires, which Jim Allen, Dunlop's race tire chief at the time, told me were at least 20 years old.  Upon reflection, that seems like it must be an exaggeration, as twenty years previous to 1990 was before the B-50 went on sale.  But, in any case they were old, and I learned that while they maybe hard, they're not unpredictable.  So, as with any tire, sneak up on them and find where the limit is.

After getting back from Ca. at 11:07pm Wed. night, I left for the Salt Lake City at 7:15pm Thus. to compete in the AHRMA 'Bonneville Vintage GP' at Miller Motorsports Park.  I was to ride the same two bikes I rode at Portland three weeks earlier: Gary Roper's '51 Velocette MAC and Mike Bungay's '72 H-D Sprint.  You'll recall that the Velo dropped it's intake valve seat almost immediately at PIR and Gary worked non-stop to get the head repaired, the cylinder bored for a 0.040" over Triumph piston (which has a different wrist pin diameter, so the small end bush had to be re-sized), and get everything back together and tested.  But, his trouble didn't end there.  On the way to Miller, his van died outside Winnemucca, Nv.  Gary and his wife had planned to go to a BSA rally in Ca. after Miller, so he had his BSA A-10 with him.  He pulled this out of the van and rode it back to Winnemucca to get a tow back to town.  They checked into a motel and called their son back in Medford, Or.. and asked him to drive their pick-up to Winnemucca so the pile could be transferred from the van.  They waited for him to arrive, not knowing he was calling the motel repeatedly, but the desk wasn't picking up.  Hours later, he finally got through to tell them he couldn't find the key to the pick-up and wasn't coming.  The U-Haul dealer in Winnemucca didn't have a truck, so Gary had to ride the A-10 two hours on the interstate to Elko, pick up a truck, return to Winnemucca and transfer the pile.  They arrived at Miller about 5 am Sat. morn.

Gary Roper's 1951 Velocette MAC

In the mean time, I got in a couple of practice sessions on Mike's Sprint, and it seemed that the 'ignition' problem we had at Portland was a fuel flow problem after all and was now cured.  We did gear down once and decided we had to gear down again.  That evening, we picked up Mike's son Brennen and his motor guru, Karl Engellenner, at the airport.

Mike Bungay's 350 H-D Sprint

Sat. morning, both the Velo and Sprint worked well in practice.  There were only three Class 'C' entries.  In addition to me on the Velo, was Fred Mork on his rigid 500cc OHC pre-war Norton. and Ryan Ambrose on Big D's rigid 500 pre-unit Triumph twin.  They gridded us behind the CB160 class, which had a LeMans start.  After these riders ran across the track and bump started their bikes, we were flagged off.  Ryan quickly disappeared and I pulled well clear of Mork.  The game then became how many 160s could we pass before the end of the 6 lap race.  In my case, it was nine and in Ryan's case it was 21, only failing to catch former Word Speedway Champion, Billy Hamill.

Tom Marquardt's 492cc Honda four, a Formula 500 class bike

There was a bit of a gap until my 350gp race, so I got a chance to check out 'Motorcycle Classics' concours.  Pre-unit BSA twins seemed to be most plentiful, but I think my favorite was Fred Mork's unrestored Excelsior.

Fred Mork's Excelsior

A 250cc Norton Jubilee, the smallest Norton ever made

An Egli Vincent

A BSA B-50 powered streamliner that had just set a record at Bonneville

After seeing the lap times from the 250gp race, where Paul Germain finished a very close 2nd on his extremely well developed DT-1 roadracer. I knew I had my hands full, as Paul was 'bumping up' to the 350gp class.  Paul got the jump on me at the start and I followed him the first lap.  I managed to get by him on the 2nd lap but, about half way through the lap, my motor cut out and my race was over.  I suspected the same ignition problem we had at PIR had reoccured but, in fact, it was a different ignition
problem: the set screws on the rotor of the Dyna 'S' system had backed out and the rotor had shifted, going out of time.  The set screws were red Locitited and the rotor retimed, and we were ready to try it again the next day.
The bike ran well in the 1st Sun. practice, but I was getting some chatter.  It seemed like the front, but I decided it could be originating with the slightly out of round rear tire, so we switched the rear wheel to one that had a used, but good, tire.  I just did 3 laps on the Velo as it seemed good, then went out again on the Sprint.  On the 2nd lap, the motor cut out again.  This time, the rotor hadn't shifted and it wasn't clear what the problem was other than that it was ignition.  So we installed a self generating electronic magneto that we had used on the bike previously.  This had been replaced by the Dyna 'S' because the new analog tach we had installed, to replace the digital one I found hard to read, wouldn't work with the original ignition.  So we left the Dyna ignition on with a sparkplug grounded to the frame, just to work the tach.

The Aermacchi naked, before the stator for the electronic magneto was installed

The Jim Belland frame.  N.B. the coil for the magneto

A good view of the Belland frame and here you see the magneto stator

Sunday's Class 'C' race was pretty much a repeat of Saturday's, except this time Ryan caught and passed Billy Hamill for the overall win.  I passed a dozen 160s for 11th overall.
In Sunday's 250gp, which Paul Germain won, his fastest lap was three seconds faster than I had gone all weekend.  I had to step it up.  Again, Paul got the jump on me at the start of Sunday's 350gp, but I got by him on the first lap.  He came back by me on the 2nd lap and I got back by him on the 3rd.  Concentrate.  I was starting to get a bit tired, but beat him to the line by less than 3/4 of a second.   It was a satisfying finish to a weekend of challenges, and especially gratifying to Mike and Karl, who had worked so hard.
But, my admiration for Paul increases, as he does it alll himself, from building and develpping a superb 250 that runs with the 350's, to riding to the limit, to driving himself from Winnipeg, Manitoba to and from the races.

After making my reservations to fly Thurs. 30 Aug. to Salt Lake City to race at the AHRMA event at Miller M/S Park, I was asked at the last minute to fly to SoCal to assist Thad Wolff when he rode a Matchless G-50 CSR at a dirt oval in Simi Valley for a Motorcyclist Magazine photo shoot.  It sounded all too much and unnecessary, and I suggested alternatives but, in the end, knuckled under.  I tried to change my reservation so I would fly to SLC from L.A. rather than NYC, but found that that's not so straight forward these days.  After spending more than two hours on the phone, much of it on hold with 'customer service' in India I found every sensible option was denied by arbitrary airline rules, and I gave up.  The next day, it was suggested that I could fly to Ca. and back, then fly to SLC on my original reservation.  I resisted this, but in the end caved in.

So Sunday I went to the annual bike show at Works Engineering in Williamsburg.  This year's was bigger than ever and, in addition to seeing a lot of very nice bikes,  I got to catch up with a  bunch of friends.  

Mon. morning, I was supposed to fly to Burbank, via SLC ironically, but my flight out of JFK was delayed and I missed my connection in in SLC and was put on a flight to LAX.  Thad was able to pick me up there at the height of rush hour, and our trip north and west to his house in Newbury Park wasn't too bad because an accident south of LAX reduced the traffic for us.

The bike that was the subject of the test and photo shoot, is a '62 Matchless G-50 CSR.  This is one of 25 made as a homologation special to enable the G-50 to be raced in the AMA GNC.  This particular bike was raced in TTs by Cal Rayborn, as an amateur before he had become famous.  I was involved in restoring the bike at Team Obsolete and it was felt that someone familiar with the bike should support Thad to make sure every thing went alright. 

Thad had everything well under control, but was a little concerned by a low RPM stumble/hesitation.  This he had largely overcome by fiddling with the pilot screw, but the 'matchbox' float was pissing gas out at certain rpms and we spent Tues. morning futzing with the float bowl, never completely curing it.

In the afternoon, we took the bike to a small private oval in Simi Valley, opposite the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.  The track was superbly groomed by Thad's friend Randy Marsh, an ex-Speedway racer of some note.  A photographer and videographer set up and, after doing many static and detailed shots, photographed Thad doing laps, crossing it up and roosting  dirt.  Gill Vallincourt and his wife, of Works Performance Shocks, who live about 5 miles away, stopped by to smooze.  It all went fine and the photographer was happy with the shoot.

Wed., we left well early for the airport in Burbank and Thad took me first to Gary Swan's house, home of Toad Town Racing.  Thad wanted to visit Skip Van Leeuwen as Don Emde had told Thad that Skip was one of the established Experts who would have been competing at El Cajon when Rayborn was riding this bike as an Amatuer, along with Eddie Mulder, Dick Hammer, Dusty Coppage, and others.  This worked out well, as Gary needed a battery picked up at Skip Van Leeuwen  Enterprises.  Skip had no memory of Rayborn riding the Matchless' which is not surprising as it was 60 years ago and Rayborn was just getting started.  Skip gave Thad the phone number of Dick Hammer and another racer who might remember something of Rayborn and the Matchless, and we went on to Burbank.

There we stopped at Jay Leno's garage and Bernard Jhutli gave us a quick tour of the motor cycles before we had to drive around the block to drop me off at the airport.  It was a somewhat frenetic trip, but Thad and his wife Jodie made in more than bearable by being great hosts.  

My latest read was Ken Sprayson's autobiography "The Frame Man"(Panther Publishing Ltd.), which just came out this year.  Ken was famous to me for building many roadracing frames for some of the greats and for providing a welding repair service at the TT races on the I.O.M.  I had the pleasure of meeting him there when he had a shop set up in a maintenance shed in Nobles Park, just outside the paddock.  But, I had no idea of his wide ranging interest and accomplishments until I read this book.
Ken followed his father and grandfather in the metal trades and includes in the book a copy of his grandfather's membership card in the Amalgamated Society of Engineers from 1878.  Ken grew up in Birmingham and relates his school days where he resisted the academic path.  Born in 1927, he was 13 when Birmingham was being bombed nightly.  He was in the Boys Brigade and, after the nearly nightly air raids, he would bicycle 12 miles to Hospital to get the casualty lists at 7am and bring them to a central office in the City Center, where others would distribute the lists to various police stations so people could check on the fate of their loved ones, negotiating the craters and bombed out buildings in the dark.

Despite  qualifying for exams, Sprayson left school at 14 and started working for a sheetmetal company making components for aircraft.  He relates a story of one of the old-timers observing him work and asking him "who taught you how to file like that?"  He hadn't been 'taught'  by anyone; it just came naturally to him.  It was a different time and he writes of spending a day cutting a 10" X 1" piece of steel with a hacksaw.  "And so I learn that wonderful things could be done with the simplest of tool, something that stood me in good stead in future years."
Ken was called up for National Service just as the war ended and never left Britain.  When he got out of the Army, he got a job with Reynolds Tube, maker of the famous '531' tubing. He worked in the Welded Assembly Dept., which took on one off projects as well as production work. One of Ken's jobs was to make the first example of a production run and this included the Norton 'featherbed' frame which Reynolds had a contract to produce for Norton.  There he got involved in a number of M/C projects, from the mundane fabricating and testing a moped frame, to making one off road racing frames for the likes of Geoff Duke, John Surtees, Arthur Wheeler, and Mike Hailwood.  Initially, he bought a bike, an ex-WD 350 Ariel,  merely for transport.  He eventually took a couple of holidays on the Continent, two up with his wife and luggage.  I find it amusing that now-a-days few would consider doing any touring on a bike smaller than 1000cc by themselves, armed with credit cards, cell phones, and GPS.  Sprayson rode this mid 40's, girder fork, ridge frame 350 1800 miles to Switzerland and back.  By  1956, he had up graded to a 350 Ariel with telescopic fork and swingarm and this took Ken and his wife 3000 miles to Italy and back over two weeks.
Reynolds established a free repair service at the I.O.M. TT races in the mid-1950s which was initially run by one of Sprayson colleges but, when he died in '58, Ken replaced him.  Reynolds eventually abandoned this, but first Shell, then Air Products, and finally the ACU sponsored Sprayson to continue this service.  He did this up through 2008, 51 years of continuous service.
Ken got friendly with Jeff Smith, 500 World Motocross Champion in 1964 and 1965.  In 1966, Smith invited Sprayson to accompany him and his mechanic to the East German, Czech, and Russian rounds of the Motocross world championship.  Ken gives a fascinating account of life behind the Iron Curtain near the height of the Cold War.  This is the dirt version of the Continental Circus, with competitors driving themselves through Europe towing their bikes in a trailer behind their sedans, in Smith's case a Wolseley 110.  This is also a period of transition as Smith's domination on the four stroke BSA is eclipsed by East German Paul Fredricks  on the two stroke CZ.  On  this trip, Sprayson got drafted into being an FIM Juryman.
Sprayson got involved in a British effort to break the land speed record, building a frame for the 'Thrust II'.  Work started on this in 1978, but it didn't run until July, 1980 on a runway in England, and it wasn't until 4 Oct, 1983 that Richard Noble set the land speed record of 633.468mph at the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, a record that stood for almost 14 years.
Sprayson's  wide ranging interests are reflected in his getting involve in organizing primitive retreats in Wales for senior Reynolds management  in an effort to build team cohesion.
In the early '70's, Sprayson acquired a 1923 Ariel powered by a 1000cc Motosacoche when a neighbor died.  It was in quite a derelict and much modified state and, after restoring it, he started participating in vintage events, like the Banbury run.  After he was made redundant at Reyonlds Tube, he did a number of consultancies with a Korean bicycle manufacturer, Goodman Engineering making the H-D powered Featherbed, a revived BSA making a moped, but increasingly working with vintage and classic bikes, some of which he helped make originally.
For someone who eschewed the academic path. Spryson is an amazingly good writer.  And, the photographs are superb.  This book was a real unexpected pleasure and I highly recommend it.
The book is available in the U.S. from www.MotorsportX.com; outside the U.S.. check directly with www.Panther-publishing.co.uk

18-19 Aug., 2012 I raced at Mosport, Ontario, Canada in the V.R.R.A's flagship event.  I entered my '46 Moto Guzzi Dondolino in the Pre-50 class, but unfortunately I was the only entry.  Usually there are three or so Rudges entered led by Ingo Reters and his son, and I was looking to mix it up with them.  Because the Pre-50 class ran concurrently with the Period 1 350, I entered my H-D Sprint ERTT in the bump up class, Period 2 Lightweight.  I also entered the P1/P2 Master's race for riders over 50 years old.

My pit; Dondo on the bench, ERTT in the backround

The VRRA just runs a single round of practice  Sat. & Sun. mornings, having had practice (and a 2 hr. endurance race) on Fri.  Both my bikes went well in practice and didn't need any adjustments before their five lap heat races Sat. to determine starting positions for Sunday's eight lap finals.  The Dondolino was up first in a race combining P1 Open, pre-65 500, P1 350 with Pre-50.  Even though I was the only Pre 50 entrant, there were plenty of people to dice with as there were 27 entries overall and, starting from last on the grid, I finished 10th overall.  A few of the CB350 Honda guys were surprised by the speed of the old can.

The '46 Dondolino in turn #10; Paul Pace photo

The P2 Lwt. class had, by contrast, 23 entries and there were 37 overall in the heat which included P1 500, pre-65 350 and P1 200.  Shortly after the heat started, my bike started intermittently cutting out, then running fine.  This got worse and on the 3rd lap the bike finally stopped at turn #5, Moss's Corner.  I had to wait until the completion of the next race to get picked up and then had one race to figure out what was wrong before the Masters race.  The tank was low on fuel and I put more in, though I though it should have run on that.  I cleaned and checked the points, but when I fired it up, it was still cutting out.  I noticed the ground plug for the battery was loose and tightened that up, but still it was cutting out.  Out of time and in desperation, we disconnected the kill button and that seemed to cure it.  We had 14 starters in the Masters, 10 of which were P2.  This race has no heat, only the 8 lap final.  Peter Hurst quickly cleared off on his Rickman Triumph Trident, and I scrapped with Stan Nicholson on his TD-2 Yamaha and Doug Forbes on his 750 BMW.  Eventually, I was able to shake Stan and, after harassing Doug, he eventually pulled away.  After,  I took the kill button apart and found nothing wrong with it, so I don't know if that was the problem in the P2 Lwt. heat, or if the alien were just messing with me.  Big thanks to Ivan Messina for helping me with the frantic thrash to get the bike running again.

The ERTT in turn #10, Paul Pace photo

In Sun. morning practice, the Dondolino had some high rpm misfire and I checked and cleaned the points in that and put a new sparkplug in.  The ERTT seemed fine.  It's final ran first.  Stan Nicholson had won the heat and I hadn't finished, so he started on the front row and me on the back.  But, I had beat him in the Masters so the question was: could I catch him?  I did catch Stan in a lap or two, but he stepped it up from Sat. and pulled away, eventually catching and passing early leader Tim Voyer on his 350 Honda.  My bike seemed to run fine, but my fastest lap was a second slower than Sat.

Paul Pace photo

The pre-50 Final was the 2nd last race of the weekend and that high rpm misfire was still there, but despite that, my fasted lap was 1/2 sec faster than Sat.  Go figure.  There were a couple of more entrants Sun. than Sat. and I finish 13th out of 38 overall.

Paul Pace photo

It was a great weekend with fine weather (a little cool at night), good entries (other than pre 50), lots of spectators, and an impressive concourse.  Mosport is a challenging, high speed track, and it's new owners are putting money into it.  And the event was very well run by the VRRA without any red flags on Sat. or Sun., to my knowledge.
Some rare bike in the concours:

TX750 Yamaha Cafe Racer

A 1935 Phanomen M27 98cc 2 Stk., 2 speed, from Germany

a 250cc Royal Enfield Continental GT

Less rare, but beautiful CB 450 Honda

From the sublime...

Nev Miller's replica of Alec Bennett's 1923 TT winning KTT Velocette

to the ridiculous...

a diesel powered Honda.

Tank logo on a Norman moped

After racing at Portland Intl. Raceway last weekend, Courtney Olive organized a three day road ride to eastern Oregon.  Courtney is the president of the Sang Froid Riding Club and we met last year in Peel, IOM during TT fortnight.  Courtney and the Club were instrumental in making the bike show happen at the Graeter Art Gallery and getting me out there to race at OMRRA's vintage weekend.
Five of us left Courtney's house in Portland around 10 Monday morning.  Tom Bright, a sixth grade science and math teacher was riding the oldest bike, a 1973 Moto Guzzi V-7 Sport.  Brett Edwards, proprietor of Glass From the Past, was on the other 750, two valve, aircooled twin, and '78 Triumph

Courtney and me in front of his '63 Falcoon Ranchero with his Honda 919 and Gary's Aprilla Falco

Special, which he describes as his rolling billboard as it sports bodywork (fairing, tank and seat) he makes and sells.  I started on the next oldest bike, Courtney's 1981 (the first year) Kawasaki 550 GPz.  Courtney, a lawyer for the Bonneville Power Authority, rode his '91 Suzuki 400 Bandit.  And, Gary Roper, a physical therapist and the guy who fettled the '51 Velocette MAC that I rode all too briefly at PIR, rode his '99? Aprilla Falco.  Tom's Guzzi was the only drum braked bike of the bunch and Brett's the only kickstart one.
We gassed up, then went maybe 10 miles south on I-5 and exited on US 26 east.  This took us through Sandy, ZigZag and Govt. Camp to the base of Mt. Hood where we stopped at a rest area.  I was enjoying the GPz; it was comfortable with great ergonomics and a good seat, and had decent power, brakes and handling.  Courtney was concerned about it because it the spring it had an ignition issue with two cyl.s dropping out.  The stator or pick-ups had been replaced and it was vastly better.  But, he had experience a couple of very subtle glitches on a subsequent ride and wondered if it was really fixed.  After we got on Rt. 216 and stopped in Maupin for gas and drinks, I reported to Courtney that I had experienced a couple of very minor hiccups, but didn't think it was a big deal.  We decided though, that maybe he and I should switch bikes so he could evaluate it.

Me taking over the Suzuki 400 Bandit in Maupin 

Before we got to Shaniko on Bakeoven Rd. (very appropriate as the temp was in the high 90's),  Courtney pulled over and said the GPz was getting worse and he felt it made sense for him to head back home, get his 2002 Honda 919, and meet us in Heppner in the evening.  Tom and Brett had gone on ahead and Gary and I found them waiting in Antelope, where we notice a fairly dead Honda CB450 at a yard sale.  At this point Gary peeled off to head for his home in Medford, Or. via Bend and around Crater Lake.  Tom, Brett and I headed to Fossil for a late lunch.

Brett Edward's '78 Triumph, Tom Bright's '73 Moto Guzzi V7 Sport and the Suzuki 400 Bandit.

From Fossil we headed to Heppner where we got a drink and waited for Courtney to arrive from his superslab burn-up.  When he arrived, we decided we couldn't get to Ukiah before the restaurant closed, so we decided to have dinner and stay in Heppner.  We camped by a stream in a little campground run by the local motel.
The next morning, we had a leisurely breakfast at the bowling alley and waited for the next member of our party to arrive.  Tim Webb, who works for a security company and another member of the SFRC, arrived on his 1987 VFR 700 around 10a from Milwaukie, just south of Portland.
I was assigned Courtney's 2002 Honda 919 to replace the balky GPz.  We gassed up and headed to Ukiah, got gas again in Granite and stopped for lunch at the Elkhorn Saloon in Sumpter.  The 919 was a bit of a revelation.  A 'Naked bike', it handled very well, had great brakes, an excellent seat and gobs of torque.  Forget about shifting.  Through just about the tightest hairpin, I left it in 6th and just rolled on.  This was a type of riding I'd never done before: fast.  Speed is relative and I certainly had ridden fast on narrow, bumpy back roads in New England or crowded, bumpy urban expressways.  But, now we were on superb, smooth, empty roads with excellent traction, that varied from high speed sweepers to tight switchbacks.  Perhaps most of our riding matched MPH for degrees temperature with a few forays over the ton.  But, it didn't feel hairball to me at all.  All of our group were excellent riders and everyone went at their own pace.  I, for the most part, didn't know the roads or where we were going, but I was encouraged to take the lead from time to time, being on the newest and most powerful of the bikes, and I'd just wait at the next intersection.  It was never a long wait and it was impressive how well a '73 Moto Guzzi or a 400cc Suzuki kept up.  One did have to stay alert for deer and cattle, but that was mostly an evening problem, and we did very little riding in the evening.  And, depending on the type of shoulder, one did have to pay attention to gravel in the switchbacks that the damn cages kick onto the road hanging their inner wheels over the edge of pavement.  Eastern Oregon is motorcycling heaven with terrain varying from high prairie to steep woodlands.  And, did I mention empty roads with excellent surface?
After lunch, we met up with the last member of our party, Mike Wantanabe, proprietor of Union Motorcycle Classics in Nampa, Id.  He rode from there on his beautiful Ducati 900SS (which he had extensively modified after bending the frame in a crash) and met us in Salisbury, as far east as we got on the trip.  We stopped at Unity Lake S.P. and several expressed interest in going for a swim but the water was deemed to cold/funky and I was easily talked out of it.  Brett had a small problem with his bike he wanted to deal with and Mike, Tom, and Tim decided to just chill there with him then head back to Sumpter.  Courtney and I were up for more riding.

Mike,  Brett, and Tom at Unity Lake

We headed to Bates to gas up, but found the station was closed Tues. and Wed., so we left a note for the other four and went 17 miles down the road to Prairie City.  Gassed up,  it was back to Bates and up Rt. 7 for maybe a mile, then off northeast on this fabulous little County road 20 that Courtney knew.  It was getting late, so we turned around just short of US 395 and started back.  The cattle that had been grazing by the side of the road were now in the road and the young ones seemed to want to race a bit before finally getting off.  In the last stretch before Sumpter it was dusk and we did see a few deer, but none did anything stupid.  Dinner and a beer at the Elkhorn, then camping out right in the empty lot between it and the laundromat .

The bikes in front of the Elkhorn.

The next morning after breakfast, we headed back:  Mike heading east to Idaho, and the rest of us west towards Portland.  Back through Granite and Ukiah, Tom and Brett decided to go the shorter way we had come to Heppner, while Tim, Courtney and I went the hard way via Rt. 74, another great road.  We gassed up and had lunch in Heppner and Brett and our waitress got to compare notes on their identical avulsed right index fingers (he: car fan belt; she: corn cobber).
On to Condon where Tom decided to split off as he needed to get back.  Tim, Brett, Courtney and I headed first to Fossil to get fuel, then on to Antelope to the yard sale with the dead CL 450.  I picked up a couple of nice wrenches (one of which TSA confiscated at the airport because it was over 7" long).  The CL 450 was a bit intriguing as it had one high pipe on each side rather than both on one side.  None of us recognized that, including Tim who knew 450 Hondas well having roadraced one for years.  Evidently, after they got home, Brett and Tim researched it and found it was a rare dealer installed option and they and Courtney decided to buy it together and Brett drove back a few days later and picked it up.

The rare CL450D at the yard sale in Antelope

It was getting late and we had a ways to go, so we jammed pretty hard to The Dalles.  While it was impressive how well Courtney kept up on the 400 Bandit, it did suck the fuel as it was constantly over 10K rpm.  It easily got the worse fuel mileage of all the bikes.  The 919 indicated about 40mpg, but it's speedo/odo were quite optimistic.  Courtney got a little nervous about making it to The Dalles and we did some drafting to make it.  After gassing up, we got on I-84 for a ways, then one last side trip up some switchbacks on US 30 to the Rowena overlook for a spectacular view of the Columbia River Gorge.

The road up to the Rowena overlook

 Courtney and I said good bye to Brett and Tim there and jammed back to Portland on I-84.  It was a bit of a slog into a headwind, but we did get a peek at Mulhomah Falls on the way.  I grabbed my stuff and Courtney drove me to the airport to catch the redeye back to JFK. 

About 1000 miles and 26 gallons of gas over the three days.  Fantastic roads, scenery, bikes, but most of all, a great bunch of guys. I look forward to doing it again.
More photos by Mike and Brett at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/caferacingparts/sets/72157630988462756/