I’ve spent the past good while stressing a bit about the house selling stuff. We went through having an offer and deal on the table, to it falling out in a weeks time. We’ve also spruced up a few things around the place, which should help with moving it. All that stuff has kept me busy the past few days, and I wanted to take a day and go get a ride in.
I talked to my brother Saturday evening to see if he was interested in scooting out with me on Sunday. He was tentatively in for leaving at 7am. Unfortunately Saturday night, my dog decided to start absolutely freaking out about some fireworks going off. My wife had to be up at 4am for work, so I took the dog into the living room with me and cozied up on the couch. This was fine except for some neighbors having a big bon-fire just up the road. The dog was quite worked up for awhile….leaving me to not sleep so well. My wife woke me up at 4 when she got up, at which point I headed back to bed….promptly waking up at 730.
Not a big deal, as I saw I had a message from my brother at 12:30, who had a failed 3D print, so was dealing with that on Sunday. I was moving a bit slowly, but wanted to really get out for my ride. The dog seemed plenty chipper in the morning….darn thing. 
So that said, I had a rough idea of what I wanted to go ride. Rustic Roads 90 & 27 were within a decent distance from me. Straight line, they are only 63 miles away. Basically they are a couple of the last “close” rides for me (that could be done in less than 1/2 day). Their descriptions & rough outline looked appealing enough:
Tentative route:
So the plan I had was to get on the road, tell the Garmin 60CX to just point me in the right direction towards the 1st waypoint on RR90. I was excited, as I had a nice new hardwired power on my KTM 350. I plug everything in…..and the unit shuts off as soon as the unit shakes. I say to hell with it, and toss my solar charger & phone in my tank bag, plug in the waypoint and off I go.
Loaded and ready to go:
Now I gotta say, I got a whole crap ton going against me on this right now. First of all…..I’m running a 350 race bike, on a front knobby that has 4 races, 600+ Moab miles, many local road miles, that is chunking like no other, with a rear tire that I got used from a friend (that I swapped in Moab as well), that is rapidly degrading to oblivion. On top of that, neither wheel is balanced, my front rotor has a tiny bend in it (pulsing brake lever), an OEM seat that is like sitting on nails, and now I added that silly stupid tank bag….all so I had room to hold something to drink. But hey….I was ready to go riding, and I really wanted to get my use out of them tires.
So kickstands up, and of course, I may as well top up with fuel right away. From here, it was my standard route of getting from home to Highway B in Wisconsin. My phone\GPS is telling me God only knows what way to take to get out to the first road. I know B heads West, so I’ll just go by feel. A couple miles into B, and I find that I’m running into some sort of triathalon going on. I end up passing bicycles for a couple miles….they all looked miserable as I easily motored by (reminded me of Moab). I end up taking a few “wrong” turns, and managed to find myself cruising on a lonely State Line Road.
Wisconsin and Illinois….well you gotta love and hate em. At least in my immediate vicinity, things are flat, straight, and full of corn. It’s OK though, as I find that when I go out riding….I’m just enjoying the riding. State Line Road, as the name suggests more or less splits Illinois & Wisconsin, just about from Lake Michigan all the way to the Mississippi in Iowa. It’s pretty cool, and while it is flat, and straight, you kind of feel as if you’re heading down a road that was used long ago for important things. There’s that sense of history as you cruise down the roads, which twist and turn as you into and out of IL\WI.
As always my days start though, I end up with myself full of coffee on an empty stomach, which prompted my first stop.
I think I can….I think I can…
This was looking South (bike facing North). You head South here for 1/4 mile, and then back West shortly ahead. If you keep heading South, the road turns to gravel. I wasn’t looking to hit that road, so continued on my way. I meandered along and ended up finding myself back where I got back into competition with motorcycles; Blackhawk Farms Raceway.
Long story short, in 2008 I was road racing an R6. My bank account was draining quicker than I could fill it. I then had this 100mph lowside……right in front of my (future) wife, mother, father, grandpa, etc:
Suffice to say, I switched to trials shortly after. Much cheaper, and the risks of crashing were exponentially reduced. I’m very grateful for this, as I learned so much riding trials, that I continue to tell friends and those I meet that I could NOT do what I can on a dirtbike now, if it weren’t for the years on a trials bike.
There was some racing going on at BHF, but I had places to be and didn’t want to pay a pit fee, so I continued on. The roads around here are older feeling, and many find you beneath well covered tree canopies. They aren’t all that much, but I find the more I ride these roads, the more I grow to appreciate what is around here. I ended up on Highway 81 in Wisconsin for a good 15 miles. This T’s into Highway 11 just South of Brodhead, WI, and a mile or two from RR90.
I had no idea that this was gonna be a gravel road:
The road appears straight, but if you get closer, it has a couple fun little sweepers to it. I rode the road to the end, and backtracked to the start where I snagged this panoramic:
I snagged another of the rear knobby….this was about 80 miles into the ride:
But what can I say…..it was a nice stop (bio break out in the open as well )
From here I found my way to the start of Rustic Road 27. A short 10 mile jaunt, and you’re at the start of a really beautiful section of road:
OK, so it appears to be one straight road, but you can’t complain. Again, this is an older portion, which winds slowly around through some old subdivision of some sort. The entire area is covered in trees, and the road has a very nice flow to it. I highly recommend this one. Even the roads all around this area are pretty solid. Had I of had more time, I would have scouted around a bit.
From RR 27, I wanted to get myself home without hitting a highway (on a KTM 350 remember….). I ended up in downtown Brodhead, WI. I stopped in at a gas station, got some fuel and gatorade. I look up and saw there was a park right across the street. I saw a silver truck parked there, so I rode over and sat down in the Veterans Memorial Park to snack on my gatorade & candy bar. I saw a guy get out of the truck and put something on a tank they have on display there. I finish my snack, and head back towards my bike. I end up chatting with the guy a bit. 91 year old WW2 vet who takes care of the park. He was quite excited about the park, and hoped that the local kids with nothing to do wouldn’t steal the flag he hung on the tank. I would have liked to have gotten more info, but as my wife can attest, I am far from a details person….and given my preference, would be quite happy in isolation. The man & I said our goodbyes, and I hopped back on my bike to get on home.
I ended up following a similar route home, following State Line Road. My bike hummed happily around 60mph the entire way, not missing a beat. At one point, I may (or may not have) made sure that the bike still understood how to ride on it’s rear wheel…..oh how good that feels. It reminded me of a fellow in the gas station who asked me about the KTM earlier in the morning. He asked if it were street legal, to which I replied….Yes, though they should be illegal. They are far too fun. He seemed a bit perplexed, but wished me safe travels.
I made it home about 4.5 hours later. My trip meter confirmed that I’d have a sore behind:
That KTM 350 never ceases to impress, though I did note that I have a leaky fork seal. The Seal Doctor will fix that right up. All in all, a very good day. It helped clear my head, and continued my bond with this bike (that I thankfully never had with the Ducati).
Until the next one….
Andrew
