With the weather finally looking like summer (we have had a very wet spring), my buddy and I decided to get in a good ride. We decided on leaving from British Columbia, Canada, and heading up to Winthrop Washington for lunch. The distance is approximately 300km each way (185 miles). Giving us a 600km (370 mile) day.
We left around 8:00am, crossed the border, and made it up to Winthrop by 12:30pm. Lunch consisted of a cold pint of their finest (just one) and a Mexican meal. The restaurant was situated bedside a nice lively little river. We gassed up before we set out. We topped up at Sedro-Woolley. I remembered there was a decent gas station at Marblemount and one up at Winthrop. We figured we had enough fuel to make it up to Winthrop and back down to Marblemount. We ended up cutting it pretty fine. Both of our low fuel lights came on a fair distance before we made it back down to Marblemount. The manual for the ZX-14 indicates that it has a 5.8 gal (US) tank. When I filled up at Marblemount I put in 5.37 gal (US) and my tripometer indicated 352 KM (218 miles). I had 0.43 gal (US) remaining.
The ride started out easy on HWY 9, extremely low traffic, back country roads kind of thing. Pavement quality was good, roads clean, some corners.
Hwy 20 starts out as a bit of a yawn. You pass through a series of small towns (I swear in the States wherever a horse stopped and took a dump they named it and made it a town back in the day). Once you get past the town of Concrete the road develops more twists. As you start to head up into the Cascade mountain range you quickly understand why this ride is so popular. The pavement quality is good, road is clean, lots of corners to sink your teeth into. There are not a lot of dual passing lanes, There are some pull outs (nice if RV`s are thoughtful). The passing sections are odd at times, short, and not always offer great oncoming visibility. This is not a problem for our machines as we have more than enough power to make the pass. (funny to watch the Hardly Dangerous crowd whipping their mounts like a rented mules and having to bail on some passes - the ultimate in humiliation.....so much for their screaming eagle upgrades - LOL)
Winthrop is a tiny dry old dusty cowboy town (wooden board walks, rustic wood framed store fronts, and gears for the tourist. My favorite watering hole is the School House Brewery, where you can sit and enjoy a nice beverage on their lower deck next to the river. Winthrop can be an end destination (lunch, or over night), or part of several longer loops. Most cars seem to understand that this road is a motorcycle playground and seem to play along.
Spyglass
* Last updated by: spyglass on 7/8/2012 @ 5:45 PM *