Coop's Corner: JeffRide

Saturday, May 24, 2014

JeffRide

The JeffRide......that's how I named the GPS file for today's ride. We talked about doing this together two years ago and until today, it remained in the planning stages. He on his CRF 230 Honda and me on the TW200 Yamaha, our goal was to penetrate the best gravel in Wisconsin's Pierce and Pepin Counties. I'm going to call the result of today's ride a successful endeavor.

Jeff is in Minneapolis so we picked a Wisconsin town right on the border as a meeting point for breakfast. Prescott is just about exactly half way between our places of residence, so this morning we both had roughly a 45 minute ride for the 8AM sitdown to enjoy coffee and some eggs.

This is what we did, the Track (bread crumbs) pulled from my GPS. It for all intents and purposes follows the JeffRide Route that was planned. 140 miles give or take plus the 80 or so each of us had to and from Prescott, here in the upper left corner. We did the Route in a counter clockwise loop.

This is 450th Street......

Here it is with the GPS file included (Google Earth required)

And the moment that one of you was waiting for.......the modeling of my Cleveland Moto T-shirt.

Those of you that shop for or even worse, actually bring old bikes home have seen and heard this phrase many times. 3 'new' machines followed me home earlier this spring and one of them actually came with the above caveat, another one's status of the above was implied but not quite stated. The 3rd one ran when parked AND when I picked it up........yes, I do manage to bring some healthy ones home at least some of the time.

Jeff and I stopped on 410th St. in the above photo to stretch our legs and marvel at the roads that maybe shouldn't be in existence any longer but thankfully are for those of us on dirty two wheelers.

Once again, steeper than it looks......

The first part of 410th Street.....until we stopped for a leg stretching break.

410th with GPS data.....

Wisconsin Rustic Road #51.....ahead of us the 3rd water crossing of 4. The water spots weren't all that deep today and that really was OK.

We stopped for lunch at the Pickle Factory in Pepin, Wisconsin (lower right corner in map above). Lake Pepin and my Fair State in the distance.

After traversing Bogus Creek Road, Goat Back Road, Elk Creek Road and Gates Hill we arrived in Plum City and felt obligated to take a break at the Trout Pond.

Just as we arrived in town, we came upon a home that had a large circle of guys seated on lawn chairs in the front yard, all dressed in various uniforms. I yelled a "Thank You" as we passed and it was acknowledged.

As my old buddy Tom used to say...."Big Trout, Nice Trout"

Before we left, local graduates and their families started to show up for photos in the park, caps and gowns everywhere. Many graduates and their families. After leaving Plum City, the roads became more paved and straighter. We did find a few more dusty ones but no where near as many as we'd found on the first half of our loop. There are places in Wisconsin that actually have too much pavement. :)

The bad part about my leading a gravel ride with friends is that they get much dirtier than I do though as always, I honestly tried my best to stay in the hard-pack tracks. I hope that Jeff forgives me and will follow again real soon. It was a beautiful Spring-ish day to be on ~200cc motorcycles in the country. Trillium's (Jeff confirmed, he knows a lot more than I do, this isn't me just making it up) were everywhere, the apple and plum blossoms fantastic.

4 comments:

AnonymousMay 25, 2014 at 6:13 AM
.. any critters sightings... turkeys... Big Foot..?... :)
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JasonMay 30, 2014 at 8:17 AM
Lot's of pavement in that part of the world, thanks for sharing the dirty bits. The video/ GPS tracks turned out great. I'm kicking around some ideas for a new blog called Ride North and linked to your map, hope you don't mind. It's not really out in the world yet, I'm still working on format and getting my feat wet. Thanks for the good reads, I've enjoyed reading the "friends of the Intrepid Commuter" blogs over the years.
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Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)