 | After laying in bed for at least 30 minutes debating the intelligence of going on another ride, I bit the bullet and got out of bed and on the road again. I was late (surprising I know) but there was some maintenance being done on a KTM carb so I got to the meeting point in plenty of time. I missed the memo that this was a little bike ride! Oh well, I didn't want to load up the Jetta anyway. |
| It was the same route as Saturday but with a right at the ck rock. I'd ridden this a year or so ago on the 990. It was much more enjoyable on the 690! We all gathered up here in the shade and waited... One of the bikes was having starting problems. Eventually after a pull start we were on the trail again |  |
 | The technical level of this section of trail was similar to the route from Saturday, possibly easier. However the last three miles of the route are suppose to be the most trying. |
| I was third from the end of the group and I hadn't seen the tail end for awhile. I stopped for a potty break and still no bikes... might as well back track, the group in front should miss three bikes just the same as two. And this is what I came upon. It's never a good sign when you have to get this far into a bike. X-Challenges didn't have a great run of luck this weekend. |  |
 | Seamus, the owner of the non-starting X-Challenge, hit a bump in the road and the bike died, not to begin again... After putzing and wrenching and general head scratching we decided to wait till noon for a kind 4-wheeler with a truck bed. Noon came and went so we hid the bike. Jim is modeling the lovely side panels from the stranded bike, very in this time of year. The group in front didn't appear, they assumed that we had decided to take a bypass to miss the last three miles. |
| So now we were down to two bikes and three riders. Guess who has buddy pegs? Added benefit of carrying an Irishman, I can touch the ground on both sides! We made our way up to Crown King (because it and food were closer that way) carefully. There were some walking sections for Seamus, the rock gardens. He was a good sport through all of it and Jim had plenty of entertainment watching our antics on the way back. Of course we did bypass the last three miles, instead we chose the 10 mile bypass that had a minimum of rocks. |  |
 | By the time we rolled into Crown King we were more than ready for food and drink. There's a reason I stand a lot when I ride, it's uncomfortable to sit over rocky terrain! There was a tip over or two but all in all we made it unscathed. Seamus tried to drum up a tow from someone local but there were no takers. |
| Gas in Crown King, it's a classy affair. You should notice my luggage ended up on the XR650R to give use more room on my bike. It's nice having that flexibility to toss it on almost any bike. |  |
 | With no other options left open, we headed down the front side back to Lake Pleasant. Thankfully this time there was no flat tire on the route. As it was we didn't get back to the staging area at 6pm. After two days of eventful all day riding I fell into bed that night completely spent. Filling in the rest of the story, I'm still waiting for the diagnosis on the bike issue but it was retrieved by a towing service on Monday. |
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