Call Me Sparky
Posted in Uncategorized on Apr 6th, 2008
I’ve been pretty busy with a career change and assorted generalized fucking off, so I haven’t posted an entry in awhile. Oops. I’ve been riding back and forth to Fontana (about 60 miles each way) during the week for truck driving school and riding for fun on the weekends. Two of the longer rides I’ve done lately are:
First off, I’ve been kicking around an idea for a poker run for my club, so I decided to pre-run the route to make sure it’s a good one. It’s about 100 miles from the start point at Glendale Harley to where it ends at a VFW in Canyon Country, and it has stops at three popular local biker destinations along the way: the Hidden Springs Cafe on Angeles Forest Highway, the Rock Inn in Lake Hughes, and the Big Oaks Lodge in Bouquet Canyon. I got together with a few of the prospects from my club last weekend and we gave it a shot.
It was a fugly day at the start: overcast and threatening rain, and the clouds were so low that we were riding through them as we climbed Angeles Forest Highway. We stopped about a mile into it to don raingear, and as we continued visibility got so bad that you could hardly see 20 yards in front of you. It got so bad that I started considering canceling the ride for safety, but then we broke through into the sun and it was clear and beautiful for the rest of the day.
The final assessment: this will make a great route for a poker run — if the weather is clear. Here’s the route:
…and then yesterday I did one of my favorite local rides: take the 5 North to the 14 North, exit Sand Canyon and turn left, over the hill to Sierra Highway and turn right, turn left on Vasquez Canyon, then right on Bouquet Canyon (my favorite local road). Up Bouquet to Spunky Canyon to Lake Elizabeth, stop for lunch at the Rock Inn, then down Lake Hughes Road to get to the 5 to head for home. Check out the good non-freeway parts:
In maintenance news, my right footboard is starting to get ground down to nothing in the turns, so I recently bolted some steel brackets to the bottom so I’d grind down a 25-cent bracket instead of the $50 footboard. It worked — sort of. I was definitely grinding the brackets — until I ground them completely off. It’s a good solution, but it looks like I’m going to have to use thicker steel next time.
What’s really cool is that the guy riding behind me said I was throwing up showers of sparks as I scraped through the turns. Ya gotta love that…
