From Brian Wood:
Another great trip this year! For choice, twisty roads it's hard to
find a better staging location than Porterville. And while we had some
"interesting" weather (lows in the 50s with rain and hail, highs in the low
90s), overall the weather was good and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. Thanks to Rich Mample and Glenn Giardinelli for planning the event, dealing with
logistics, and leading the ride; and to Leonard Lloyd for helping with
communications, social planning, providing raffle prizes at dinner Saturday
night, etc. We pulled together a great group (13 bikes, 16 riders
including passengers, and a car!), and enjoyed everyone's company. Good
stuff.
Kellie
and I got all packed and ready to ride Friday morning and headed out
before it got too hot. Unlike last year I had fresh tires on my
new ST1300, so no worries this time around! Once again, we didn't want
to simply take freeways up to Porterville so we took San Francisquito
Canyon Road out of Santa Clarita to the boring straight stretches through Lancaster on up to
Tehachapi. From there we took the wonderfully twisty Caliente Bodfish Rd. to Isabella Lake.
Heading west, we took Highway 155 (very chewed up due to re-paving
activities) to Jack Ranch, White
River, and Mountain Roads through to Porterville. All told, about
185 miles of twisty, out of the way, incredibly scenic riding.
Once again, we arrived at the Best Western Inn right as others riders
were showing up, so the tire kicking and bench racing started up pretty
quickly. Someone showed up with some beer in the lobby so we could
welcome everyone as they arrived. We didn't have any specific
dinner plans so we all went our separate ways for food. There
are several places to eat within walking distance of the hotel, so most
of us wound up stuffed on pizza, burgers, or Chinese food. Good
stuff -- carb loading for the next day's ride, right?
The next morning
everyone met up in the hotel parking lot to finalize our intended route
(lots of choices) and last minute instructions from Rich. Glenn
took the lead as we headed up to Highway 245 (north of Woodlake) past
the top of Dry Creek Drive and Dunlap Road to Highway 180 and the
entrance to Kings Canyon. This particular 33 mile stretch of 245
is twisty, very scenic, lightly traveled, and incredibly fun --
definitely a road you can take over and over and never get bored.
You'll need to see the pictures and video (links below) to appreciate.
After getting everyone through the entrance to the park (many thanks to
the "seniors" in our group who could get many of us in for free), we
stopped for a break in Grant Grove Village to stretch and grab some
food. Unfortunately, the entire park was without electricity, so
food consisted mainly of energy bars and sodas. Oh well.
Saddling up once again we headed down into Kings Canyon with the intent of riding
all the way to the end of Highway 180 (Kings Highway) road before
turning around and taking an alternative exit through Hume.
We stopped briefly at the Kings Canyon Lodge for some in our group to
gas up at their antique pumps (old gravity fed pumps dating back to
1928). The pumps may have dated back to the 1920s, but at over
$6/gallon their prices didn't!
Some of us headed all the way to the end of Kings
Highway as planned, while others stopped a bit short for a visit at
Boyden Cavern. We reconnected with a handful of riders on the way back and
some of us continued on to Lake Hume while others looked at the
threatening weather and headed back on a more direct path. Lake
Hume is where the weather
turned crappy (the first time really being cold all day), as we encountered
a fair amount of rain and remnants of a hail storm. Fortunately,
it was a brief ride out to Generals Highway (190) and back to the
Mountain House (at the intersection of 245 and Dry Creek Drive) where we
collected up with most of the rest of the group, warmed up in the sun
with a cup of coffee and prepared for the last stretch of fun twisties
on the way back to the hotel.
Dry Creek Drive is another marvelously
twisty and scenic road heading back down toward Woodlake and the roads
leading back to the hotel. Unfortunately, Drive Creek did not live
up to its name as it starting raining heavily as we headed down the
road. While we got pretty wet riding down Dry Creek Drive, the rain let
up at the end and we had a warm, dry ride back to the hotel and were
fairly well dried out by the time we arrived. No problem.
After
getting cleaned up and ready for dinner, consensus was reached that we'd
all meet at a nearby Thai restaurant for a group dinner. Aside from
ordering too much food (which was, by the way, very good), Leonard
surprised us with some gifts that were raffled off. It was great
to have everyone together for dinner.
The next morning we said our goodbyes and headed back to Santa
Clarita. We still didn't want to succumb to freeways on the way
home so we took more twisties back most of the way (Hot Springs Road and
old Highway 50) before running into Guy Simmons and Tom Conley again on
Caliente Bodfish road. Unfortunately, the road was closed mid-way
due to a brush fire so we headed back out to Isabella Lake before
heading our separate ways -- Kellie and I taking 178 west toward I-5 and
home, while Guy and Tom headed east to 14 and their homes.
All told we enjoyed around 665 miles of great, twisty,
scenic roads, and thoroughly enjoyed meeting up with new friends as well
as old. We'll definitely have to do this again next year (right,
Rich?). Thanks to everyone for coming out to play: Rich Mample,
Glenn & Caroline Giardinelli, John Button, Jeff Smith, Tom Conley, Les Katz, Mike Sleeman,
Guy Simmons, Chris Klute, Bill Brownell, Dennis Elliott, Bill & Chris
Deviny, and of course, Leonard Lloyd and Iris Preece. We'll look forward to seeing
more of you again on future rides!
If you're interested in a few pictures and a video, point your browser to:
https://picasaweb.google.com/105042563192692597839/2011090911Porterville
- and -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf9SaTNyCgU
Brian (& Kellie)
