Trail vs Road

With more and more of my friends and family members having knee problems ive really tried to make an effort to run more off road. Today I ran up City Creek Canyon again but this time avoiding pavement as much as possible. I got onto a well maintained trail for a short bit on the way up but must have taken the wrong route at a fork in the road cause before i knew it i was right on the creeks edge and the trail was washed out every few meters as well as having many obstacles(trees etc) it was great fun. Then i met up with the Bonneville Shoreline Trail that just rocked me. It was pretty intense and involved a bit more hiking than id like to admit. I went up for about 40 minutes or so util the switchbacks got the best of me then turned around for the descent. Going down was great. Not too steep and still full of fun rollers. Definitely a route i will follow in the future. Next time ill push on a bit farther and see where the trail goes. Oh yeah there are a lot of old ruins an monuments that i really enjoyed as well.

Bagging The IronHorse

So Ive been registered to do a bicycle race in Durango over Memorial day. Its basically a 50 mile race straight up. But as it so happens after putting some money into my bike to make it worthy of this race it actually is worse. I cant for th elife of me get the front derailer to shift into its climbing gear while on a ride. Eery time i work on it or friends or a shop it works fine. On a stand it works, and in the parking lot it works. While climbing a steep grade is does NOT FREEKIN work...and with eh race a month away and no intentions of putting any more money into this bike i give...im not going to do it. With all the time lost not being able to train properly it would have been miserable anyways.

My back up plan is to do a little motorcycle trip to Durango instead (still gotta get that jersey i aid for). Ill stay in Moab a night and do some off road stuff then press on to Durango. Then on the way back go through Silverton and other back roads and enjoy the scenery. I guess well see what happens.

Regresando a Colombia

So for a long time Ive been planning this motorcycle trip to the east coast and back. Its all i would think about. I have vacation in August and that was it. Im going to Buffalo to visit my sister and hit everyone else of the way.

At least that was the plan until a few weeks ago. Ive been toying with the idea of returning to Colombia where I served my mission for a long time as well, but it never went further than an idea. While sitting in the Conference Center listening to The Priesthood General Conference I just felt like now was the time to return. So to days later after clicking confirm with the mouse I am going to Colombia for the first time since 2001. I leave August 19 and return Aug 26. Not a lot of time and I wont be able to see all I would like but if not now I dont think it would ever happen. Ill be staying part of teh time with a guy and his family who I baptized and who is also now a Bishop. Im extremely excited to see them.

So thats that...

From Street to Dual Sport

For a long time now Ive wanted to travel on my motorcycle. Unfortunately my Honda 599 was not very comfortable for more than a few hours or so at a time. So in March 2010 i sold the Honda and found a great deal on a 2006 BMW F650GS. I had been leaning more towards the Kawasaki KLR cause it rather cheaper. But thanks to KSL classifieds I found the perfect bike with the perfect price and already equipped with the side boxes to start traveling.

I admit a lot of my influence to do more adventure type riding came from Ewan McGregor and Charlie Boormans' "The Long Way Round". I cant wait to get going. I need to learn to ride off road so thats the first goal. Then a few over nighters and eventual trip from SLC Utah to Buffalo NY in August 2010.