Over the years, I've done a lot of motorcycle touring. Figured I should get some thoughts down.
Those that know me know that I'm a fan of the sportier side of touring. I ride sport-touring bikes, and find them comfortable for 12+ hour days if my schedule demands it.
So far, these are the bikes I've ridden over decent distances:
1992 Suzuki Katana 750 (deceased)
The '92 Katana 750 was my first bike. I think I got it around July 2004 I think, had it for about 2 years.
It is a pretty heavy beast, but it was cheap, and widely available in the used market. I got mine for a steal, and it was the perfect bike to learn on. Maybe a little fast, but it was stable, fit me perfectly, and it could take a beating.
I commuted with this bike constantly from Oakville. I would often get up at 05:30 to check the weather, to decide if I wanted to get on the road before 06:45 and beat the traffic. I could just barely stuff the work laptop into my Joe Rocket Blaster tank bag, but this gave me the freedom of not having to wear a backpack.
Besides provincial rides, my first big ride was to Winnipeg for a week. Soft tail bags, tank bag. Perhaps about 4500km or so, no rain. The ride went excellently and in the end, I was hooked.
The Katana used a maintenance-required battery, and I had never experienced one of those before. When I got on the bike on the second morning in Bruce Mines, the bike refused to start. Nothing. Not even a rrrr-sound or a clicky from the starter. Oh crap.
It didn't take long to decide the battery was dead. Then it hit me, the battery had little screwtops over each cell, meaning it needed to be occasionally topped up with distilled water. I figured I had cooked the battery, but I happened to have a bit of distilled water in my tank bag. Poured a bit into the battery and it started! It worked fine for the rest of the ride.
One negative experience; I had a little electronic clock stuck to the bike's dash, and someone took it while I slept in Ignace (I believe). Left me a bit miffed.
Unfortunately, that bike didn't last long; I put about 40000km on it before I finally blew its engine. Not bad for my first 1.5 years though. Katanae are known to have soft cams. Also, it is air/oil cooled, and doesn't have an engine temperature meter. After a couple of oil boilovers that left the engine starved for oil, the cams were shot, the pistons were hitting the valves and one day, *bang*, a valve broke off, jammed the piston head, causing the connecting rod to explode out the side of the engine block. I still have the valve head on my keyboard at home, after pulling it from where it got embedded in my fairings after the explosion. :)
I also drained its battery a handful of times. I understand that motorcycles often don't generate enough amperage at idle to charge the battery, Toronto's rush-hour traffic causes a lot of idling, and my GPS is always playing something. I became quite intimate with bump-starting bikes.
GPS: Garmin Vista (useless), Garmin Quest (destroyed 3 through vibrations), Garmin Zumo 550.
Soft saddle bags: First Gear
Tank bag: Joe Rocket Blaster
Tires:
1998 Suzuki Katana 750 (deceased)
I went without a bike for most of a season, then got a beater Katana from a friend of mine around July 2006. It really was a beater; he had previously ridden it into a guardrail and had reassembled it.
I put maybe 8000km on the bike in the year I had it, and no really noteworthy trips.
The bike was never very reliable. I always had a fluctuating power delivery problem that drove me nuts. I kept pouring more and more money into it, but finally had to give up on it when I realized I couldn't trust it for long trips. I saw an opportunity for a ride to Winnipeg (and with vacation time, perhaps more) and had to sort that out. And thus:
2000 Honda VFR800FI (putt-putt) (deceased)
This bike changed everything. Fuel injected, water cooled, modern, good aftermarket support (including hard luggage options), excellent power (for me, at the time), etc. I picked it up in June 2007. It had about 14000km on it, and was about twice the price of my Katanae, but so worth it.
Within weeks of buying the bike, I did my first road trip. It was utterly random; I had little idea where I was going or what I was doing. I was still sporting soft bags, I didn't bring any rain gear, I was just "going east".
I ran into a couple friends at a couple service stations around Cornwall, and ended up following them on a "Chowdah Ride" to Bangor, Maine. Twice a day, Chiller, the lead rider, would ask "Are you going to stay with us or go off on your own?", to which I would smile and shrug. Stuck with them through the whole ride, though I admit part of that was because their route happened to miss a lot of rain through Eastern Canada.
The passion I felt for this bike was beyond anything I was prepared for. I HAD to ride. Every waking minute, I felt like I was letting myself down by not riding.
The big ride came in August; I lit out of home on August 24th, bound for Winnipeg. I had hard luggage by now. I was feeling a financial pinch, so I camped out roughly 50% of the time.
After a week of work in Winnipeg, I took a couple west-coast friends up on their offers for places to stay. Rode across Canada along the Yellowhead highway, up through Grand Prairie AB, over to Mackenzie BC, then down through Hope BC and onto Vancouver.
After a couple days at one friend's place, I took the ferry from Tsawwassen to Victoria, then rode west to the Pacific Rim National Park and Tofino. Camped out in the park for a night, then headed back to Vancouver.
After staying at another friend's place in Vancouver, I took the Trans-Canada highway back home. Met with some cold weather through the Prairies and then some drizzling rain, and had to don the rain gear just to cut the wind.
I had a lot of things on my mind for that ride; though I had 4 weeks vacation available, I only took 3 weeks. I suspected I was going to quit my job soon after getting back, and knew with pro-rated vacation days and only 3/4rs through the year, I didn't really have the full 4 weeks to consume.
I got to think a lot about leaving my job during the ride, and the entire ride was an expression of selfishness; if I found myself thinking about my book while I rode, I pulled over and read my book (always handy in my tank bag). Then when I found my thoughts wandering to the open road while reading, I'd put the book away and got back to the ride.
By time I arrived home, I felt like I had achieved something significant. I had a spectacular ride, I saw things I had never dreamed of (Vancouver, Vancouver Island, the Prairies, etc etc etc) and I didn't feel like I NEEDED to ride again for a week. I felt completely calm and centered.
This trip was just the beginning.
- August 2007 - Winnipeg and west coast (as mentioned above)
- June 2008 - Orlando for my first Cisco Networkers
- August 2008 - James Bay Hydro Electric Project in Quebec
- September 2008 - PEI and Halifax
- June 2009 -
- San Francisco for Cisco Networkers Live,
- up to Fort Bragg and then down to Santa Maria,
- over to Arkansas, then home
- August 2009 - PEI and St. Johns Newfoundland
- June 2010 - Cisco Live ride
- Las Vegas for Cisco Live
- down to San Diego
- every inch that I could of coastal highways (1, 101, etc) up to Vancouver
- Vancouver Island, then the Sunshine Coast
- back across Canada
- September 2010 - Chowdah and then random ride
- Bar Harbor Maine,
- down along coast, then the Blue Ridge Parkway, Deals Gap,
- Atlanta, then home.
- July 2011 - Cisco Live ride
- Las Vegas for Cisco Live
- beeline up to Hyder Alaska,
- back down into the US, finish off my 49 States
- visited Aerostich in Duluth Minnesota
- home through Michigan
At this point, I knew the VFR was getting a big old; it now had over 160000km on it, and I expected its maintenance was going to start hurting.
It should also be mentioned that I had countless drained batteries with the VFR as well.
I had always felt an attraction to the Honda CBR1100xx Blackbird, and I found one for a good price out in Cobourg Ontario. Once I brought that home though, the VFR was just collecting dust, so at the end of 5.5 years, I parked the VFR at a logistics joint in Orlando in February 2012 to get it ready for my European love affair.
Now things start to get complicated, as I have two bikes on two continents.
GPS: Zumo 550, quickly replaced with the Zumo 660.
Luggage:
- Givi Wingrack II,
- 2 x Givi 21l cruiser side boxes,
- Givi 33l Trekker side boxes, (final)
- Givi 45l E45 top box,
- Givi 46l Trekker top box, (final)
- Joe Rocket Blaster tank bag (worn out)
- Rapid Transit Big City magnetic tank bag (final)
Tires:
- Bridgestone BT020 I think, didn't like them.
- Metzeler Z6 for touring
- Metzeler M3 for sporting it up
2003 Honda CBR1100xx Blackbird (deprecated)
In late 2011, I bought a used Blackbird. I lusted over this bike for years, and my driving record was finally clean enough that I could afford insurance on one.
One of my first trips was probably a Deals Gap run for the May 24 weekend 2012. The ride back was brutal; my seat broke my butt. I promptly bought a noname "touring seat" online, and it made a world of difference.
Then the problems started with the bike. There is an electrical fault somewhere on the bike that was causing the engine to cut out and the battery to drain all the time. I never really figured it out.
I was faced with dead batteries so often on the Blackbird that I resorted to carrying a spare fully-charged battery in my top box.
On one ride down to Deals Gap, the bike completely died in the middle of nowhere in Virginia. Whatever electrical fault I'd been having, it was now completely killing the bike to the point that it couldn't even start. My GPS searched for nearby shops with "Honda" in the name and their phone numbers, and the first one I called dispatched a pickup to come and rescue me.
The lead technician at the shop checked things out, and discovered a bad wiring job by the previous owner; when he cut the old rear signal leads to put on the Givi Wingrack, he did a pretty bad re-splicing job. Whenever the brake and/or signal lights were used a lot, it would warm up the wires, cause a break, corrupt the ground, and that caused the engine's tilt sensor to believe the bike was upside down, thus shutting down the engine. He resoldered the connections and ran a clean ground back to the lights, and I was on the road again.
Throughout, the Blackbird has enjoyed lighting up its FI (fuel injection) fault light. That has not gone away. It might take 4 hours before it comes on, or it might take as little as 2 minutes. Restarting the engine might make it go away for 4 hours or 2 minutes. Every minute that light is on, I expect the bike to die miserably.
This was no way to live.
Then one fateful December 2012 day, I rode the Blackbird to the manufacturer motorcycle show once hosted at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Of course, I had to swap batteries before that ride. Then, in the last 2km or so to the show, the bike died. Once on the Spadina off-ramp, once along Lakeshore, and once just as I was turning left into the ringed driveway in front of MTCC South, with hundreds of motorcycle enthusiasts taking note of the Winter rider with the dying bike. I was angry.
Walking into the show, just a little to the right of the entrance, was a new 2013 black BMW K1300S. I threw a leg over it, and the bike felt just like my Blackbird. It was wonderful. It was a sign. It was hurting my wallet.
I wandered in a somewhat zombie state for about 30 minutes until it hit me; I didn't remember hooking the custom ground wire for my rear signals when I put the battery back in. That was very likely the reason the Blackbird was so miserable. Whew, I was saved from a spontaneous purchase! For a while, anyway; bought that K1300S 8 months later in July 2013, because I never forgot how good it felt to sit on that BMW with a warranty.
In November 2013, I rode the Blackbird down to Orlando as the next European bike.
But I'm getting ahead of myself, because the VFR story was far from over.
GPS: Zumo 660
Luggage:
- Givi Wingrack II
- 2 x 46l E460N boxes (rarely use, came with the bike)
- often used the 21l cruiser boxes
- 1 x 52l E52 Tech top box
Tires:
- Metzeler Z6, didn't feel right
- Michelin Pilot Road 3
- Michelin Pilot Road 4 (current)
- Continental TKC80 (winter)
2000 Honda VFR800FI, the continuing saga (deceased)
The place I worked has a cool policy; after every 4th year with the company, you get an extra 4 week "sabbatical" to use. I banked all the regular vacation I could, and planned a 7 week vacation of riding around Europe. Then I had to sort out my ride. Do I rent, buy, or ship a bike over?
For note, buying a bike in Europe is very difficult. In general, you need insurance to buy a bike, and insurance requires a permanent address.
Wheatwhacker from Ireland can help buy a bike for you, if you like.
However, I found a company called
Knopftours in Germany. Many people on online forums had raved about Stefan Knopf. They take care of shipping, storage, maintenance, shuttle bus service from Frankfurt airport, insurance, roadside assistance, bed&breakfast, and everything else motorrad. My VFR was collecting dust, and this seemed utterly perfect.
Over the 2012 family day long weekend, I rode the VFR down to Orlando Florida to have it floated to Europe in April by Stefan. Flew back to Toronto, and waited for my vacation to start.
Stefan has a shipping container in Orlando that he fills with bikes every spring and floats over to Heidelberg around April, then floats it back in October. His rates are excellent, about USD1300, as long as you understand you aren't getting your bike back any time soon. In my case, I was going to leave the VFR over there until it finally died. He then charges a piddling USD300/year for storing your bike.
(edit. as of 2018, his rates are USD350/y for bikes under .. 1200cc I think, and USD400/y for larger bikes)
(kit, fitment summarized in putt-putt description above)
So in July 2012, I flew to Germany to give my VFR some more love. And much love was given.
In approximate order:
- Germany
- Switzerland
- Germany
- Switzerland
- France
- Switzerland (to visit CERN, got into an above-ground tour)
- France
- UK (went for a group ride with Charley Boorman, visited Misha and Basia)
- France
- Belgium
- Luxembourg
- Germany
- Austria (visited Michael)
- Italy (little ride through the Alps)
- Austria
- Germany
- flew back to Ontario for a family reunion weekend, 2 days
- Germany
- Denmark
- Sweden (visited Jorgen)
- Norway
- Denmark
- Germany
- Czech Republic
- Austria
- Slovakia
- Austria (visited Michael again)
- Hungary (visited Barna)
- Croatia
- Slovenia
- Austria
- France
- Spain
- Andorra
- France
- Germany
- and after about 16000 km, flew back home in September 2012.
In the following year, I managed to accrue another 7 weeks of time off. Off to Europe I went again!
- July 2013 -
- Germany,
- France,
- England,
- Scotland,
- Wales,
- England,
- France,
- Belgium,
- Germany,
- 2 weeks
- Sept 2013 -
- France, Spain, Portugal, 2 weeks
- Germany, Oktoberfest
- Germany. VFR died, put to rest. Rented a 2008 BMW R1200GS
- Switzerland, France, CERN OpenDays
- Germany. GS died. Rented a 2013 BMW 318D Diesel.
- 4 weeks total
- December 2013 - rented a 2013 F800GT from IMTbike.com
- Spain
- Portugal
- Gibraltar
- Spain
- 1 week.
2013 BMW K1300S (Raven) (now in Europe)
In
July 2013, I took delivery of a new black 2013 BMW K1300S from
Budd's Motorrad in Oakville. It
only took about 6 weeks to come in, and that was because it was already booked to land at a Canada dealership.
Due to my self-inflicted unemployment, I hadn't had the time or the finances to do many big trips in Canada. The only epic trip I did was San Francisco in May 2014 for Cisco Live, though I did a couple runs of the Blue Ridge Parkway, once through Deals Gap, and once to RTP, on which the return ride earned me a charge of a Class 1 Misdemeanor (on par with a DUI) for doing 82mph in a 70 zone. (I sent a lawyer to successfully fight that charge).
The K1300S is a wonderful bike. Powerful, stable, smooth.
The stock front wheel is really soft, and quickly developed a couple flat spots. And when I had new rubber put on the bike at 10000km, Rider's Choice forgot to balance the rear (being so distracted by the flat spotted front), causing my 10000km San Francisco ride to be 7500km of ridiculous vibrations, I had
Woody's Wheelworks in Denver tend first to the front wheel, then to the rear when they discovered the misbalancing.
I can't say my experiences with the typical BMW service agency in Canada has been spectacular either; Budd's Motorrad was seriously under-staffed and under-spaced; when I called in for my 20000km mandatory maintenance in May 2014, they told me they were taking bookings for end of July at that point. Since I was already over 20000km, they were basically telling me not to ride the bike for 2 months through the summer. Fortunately, Wolfs BMW in London Ontario only had a 1 month wait on bookings, so I had the bike taken care of there.
Otherwise, I've been using the bike for commuting, and lots of runs around Ontario. It loves getting tickets.
GPS: Garmin Zumo 660, replaced by Zumo 590LM, replaced by Zumo 595LM
Power Distribution Module: PDM60
Luggage:
- SW-Motech top box mount and Givi adapter aluminum plate
- Givi removable tubular sidebox mounting kit
- Givi 52l E52 Tech top box
2 x Givi 21l cruiser boxes- Givi E22 22l side boxes, would suit the bike better.
- BMW large fitted tank bag (not what I wanted, Budds screwed me.)
- Bags-Connection Electric Quick-Lock EVO Daypack tankbag, excellent (final)
- electrical mount for tank bag, not so excellent.
Tires:
- Michelin Pilot Road 4's (nice)
- Metzeler RoadTec 01's (current, best)
In 2016, I flew the K1300S to Dublin, and it started its European indoctrination.
- Chapter 1
- Ireland (started in Dublin)
- Northern Ireland
- UK (Wales, England)
- France
- Belgium
- Germany
- Poland
- France
- Italy (stored in Milan)
- 1.5 weeks I think
- went home for family reunion
- Chapter 2
- Italy (all over the boot)
- Austria
- Germany (stored in Heidelberg)
- 1.5 weeks I think
In 2017, I reintroduced it to Germany, Belgium, France, UK, and Ireland. Glorious. 2.5 weeks, last week of June, first week of July.
2007 Suzuki DL650 (Snowball) (winter beater GTA)
I used my K1300S for the 2013winter2014 season, much to the dismay of my BMW Motorrad service department. I also noted how rubbish the K1300S is on snow, which in my mind is due to the non-linear rotation of the universal joint in the shaft drive. So I needed a winter solution.
I briefly looked at KLR650's, but they're all carburated (or were, anyway), and I swore off carburated engines for winter. Too bad, really, because I found the balance on a KLR650 to be astoundingly perfect.
The DL650 seemed like a decent next option. Found a high mileage 2007 on Kijiji that came with a good number of options already. It was pretty "experienced" and had plenty of character-building dents and scratches, perfect as my couple-of-winter-seasons winter beater (not that I told the seller that before the sale).
Bought in November 2014.
The bike survived its first winter, but it didn't survive its first heavy spring rain; huuuge short that allowed the bike to stay running even without the key in the ignition. I kinda left the bike at Rider's Choice for the summer while I made love to my K1300S.
Rider's Choice offered to do me a deal; I supplied a used wiring harness, and they offered to swap the harness for a decent flat rate. But after that, the problem is still there, though not terribly (yet). (I now think the problem is really in the left bar control wiring harness, due to the raised bars stretching the stock cables too far.)
No epic rides, but plenty of runs around Ontario and a bit around NY state.
As of fall 2018, the DL650 is still running, though it seems like the short is starting to rear its head again. One more winter, maybe two please!
Luggage:
- SW-Motech top box Givi aluminum plate
- Givi tubular sidebox mounting kit
- Givi 52l E52 Tech top box (shared with R1200RS)
- Givi 33l black Trekker side boxes
Tires:
- Heidenau K60 Sport M+S
- They weren't bad, long lived, but not aggressively snow-digging.
- Anlas Winter Grip Plus, the only winter-certified (mountain with snowflake) tires
- Meh. 80% road tread, not confidence-setting on snow, front felt loose in snow
- Continental TKC80 (current)
- Fantastic even on black ice, bites into snow too. Never let me down. They might not live that long, but best for winter unless you REQUIRE winter certification (like Quebec or BC Interior)
2001 Honda VFR800FI (Angel) (west coast North America)
Once I got a taste for having multiple bikes, I came to appreciate "spare" bikes. And I found that though I was LOVING my K1300S, I thought there was room in my life for my beloved gen5 VFR. In early May 2015, I started looking. 2000-2001 VFR800 (the best years), and I had my price I was looking for.
I had just started at Cisco in Feb 2015. In May 2015, I went to our internal product update conference in San Jose, and ran into a Cisco friend from Ottawa. Started talking bikes, and found out he was selling his old bike, now that he spends all his discretionary funds on flying. VFR800. 2001. Blue. Wingrack II (which was impossible to buy at that point). Two weeks later, I hopped on the train to Ottawa, bought it, and rode it home.
The VFR800 geometry is pretty close to the K1300S, close enough that if I'm not paying attention, I forget which bike I'm on until I twist the throttle.
GPS: Zumo 595LM, shared with DL650 and K1300S.
Luggage:
Angel has seen some great trips.
- Flew with Air Canada Cargo to Calgary,
- rode up to Whitehorse, Yukon,
- down to Vancouver,
- stored with a lifetime friend of my mother's.
- rode from Vancouver to Las Vegas for Cisco Live
- Vegas to Toronto
- battery died during the ride, a lot of bumpstarting, sigh.
- Flew with ACC to Vancouver,
- rode down to San Jose for work stuff
- stored in Belmont, California
- still seeing several San Jose and Las Vegas trips
- Still stored in Belmont, CA
Tires:
- Michelin Pilot Road 4
- (next: Metzeler RoadTec 01)
2017 BMW R1200RS (Bessie) (main North America ride)
Having rented a couple R1200RT's from Barcelona IMTbike over a couple NYE breaks, I realized how awesome a true cruise control is; lock in a legal speed and relax, maybe look around a bit now that your shoulder muscles aren't tense with speedlimit-fright.
In mid-2017, I bought a new RS. Where the K1300S' electronics are dated, the RS was leading-edge, including the all important cruise control. I have a lengthy discussion at
http://planet-dosadi.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-new-bike.html. Suffice it to say, it is a great bike, but it isn't a K1300S.
I haven't done anything really epic with the RS yet, though I did fly it to Vancouver for an extended Labour Day weekend, 2018, ending in Calgary. Now I'm doing two weeks of work in Calgary, and I expect to be riding to Toronto over an extended Sept 28 weekend, leveraging my birthday for some extra time.
Luggage:
- SW-Motech top box Givi aluminum plate
- BMW integrated side boxes
- Givi 52l E52 Tech top box (shared with DL650)
- Bags-Connection Yukon 9l Fluo Yellow waterproof tank bag, shared with Angel
Tires:
- Michelin Pilot Road 4 (OEM)
- (next: Metzeler RoadTec 01)
