More and more SNOW!!

I can't believe it's almost May and I haven't been out on the moto once this year! I am a grumpy grumpy girl. Hmmm.

Yes, it is snowing yet again. For the 3rd week in a row we've had winter storms starting Monday afternoon or evening and dumping white stuff through late Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. What the heck?! Where is spring?!

I am grumpy. It doesn't make for good running weather either which is the other thing I enjoy doing.

Grrrr.





This has been the norm for the past three or four weeks now. Folks are getting cranky, myself included.

The Intro To Adventure Camp

The more I think about this the more I really want to do it.
http://www.rawhyde-offroad.com/intro2adv.html

"Intro to Adventure" training will include:

• An introduction to dirt riding techniques and the top mistakes people make.
• Body position for effective off-road riding
• Throttle, brake and clutch techniques
• Weight-shift techniques for steering
• Balance techniques
• Turning technique using counterbalancing
• Obstacle avoidance
• How to control front and rear wheel skids
• Hard Acceleration technique on dirt and gravel
• Hill Climbing
• Descending steep hills in a controlled manner
• How to ride in Sand and Gravel
• How to recover from a stall on a steep hill.
• How to turn around, fully loaded on a steep hill.

Adventure Camp also provides hands on technology overviews, opportunities to learn about the tools and equipment that are available for the adventure rider, plus demonstrations about such important things as tire repair "on the trail".

When I first learned to ride a motorcycle, it was as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Senegal. We did a lot of this type of off road training. We even learned how to clean the carbs, change a tire, and some other maintenance stuff. It was a 6 day class, the first 3 days being the MSF Beginner Rider Course and the last three days being maintenance and trail stuff. It was so awesome! I think we may have been one of the last PCVs to have motos. The bikes were Suzuki TS125s. 

My 1st bike in the terrain I traveled more often than not.

I inherited this red TS after Kristen completed her service. It was brand new when she got it. :-)

Pretty amazing to think of my time there and how fortunate I was to have that experience. :-)

I'm sure not much of what I learned back then, or even experienced on the little TS125, transfers to the 650GS with side cases and a trunk. :-) Even fully loaded, I'm sure the 125 didn't weigh as much as the GS. But, I know the GS is quite capable of being an off road monster. And I want to test that out on mine. Maybe I can convince the hubby to take the class as well. They have rental bikes. There's a class just a couple of weekends before our anniversary. Hmmmm.....

Trapped in the Garage

So, there has been some water main work going on in the neighborhood that finally made it's way to our block about a month ago. I don't actually remember when it started but it sure feels like it's been at least a month. We got a notice saying not to park on the street between the hours of 7am and 5pm. You may remember that we have quite a collection of vehicles at our house. So, we've parked the F-250 in the driveway next to the Chevy S10 (which my hubby drives on the weekend). We also have my step-daughter's Subaru. She parks in the driveway behind the S10 because she works the morning shift at Starbucks. When there is a big pile of dirt in front of our house, I park behind the F-250. Usually, hubby, who drives an Escape for work, and I can both park on the street because we are usually not home between 7am and 5pm. But, the F-250 remains, which means, I can't get the motorcycle out of the garage.

We can't really move it because we can't park it on the street. And even if we could, and I took the moto to work, I'd then have to find a place to park the Forester during the day. It's just not worth the trouble for a project that we hope will soon be over.

In the meantime, we've been enjoying watching this little one grow and learn. :-)

I also recently learned about this class being offered in Colorado!
http://www.rawhyde-offroad.com/intro2adv.html
I am seriously considering spending some of my savings on this. How cool would that be!?!

Hope everyone is enjoying their spring time weather!