RideForum.NET

Update October 13
Weather looks Perfect!!!

It appears that everybody can have kickstands up earlier on Friday morning so lets be ready to ride at 9:30AM Friday morning. With the weather so great, every hour of riding is precious!

Several of us are camping at Turner's Bend Thursday night. Everybody is welcome to join us.

Make sure to bring items for lunch. Very doubtful that we will be anywhere near anything resembling a restaurant. As we move East, the forest becomes even less commercialized.

The black friday ride on Saturday is about 80 miles without any gas availability. Plus, we have a 17 mile pavement ride from Clarksville to join the BF track. At the 10 mile marker of this 17 miles to the track, there is a gas station. I probably have the shortest gas range and will need to stop and fill up before hitting the track. I'm also going to carry 2 or 3 MSR bottles of gas. Anybody with a limited fuel range, make sure to plan appropriately.

The Friday tracks are not finalized but I tried posting what I had and for some reason it wouldn't let me. Something about exceeding capacity?? Regardless, I've posted Sunday with the thought that we take pavement to Oark for breakfast and then ride the posted Sunday track. Hopefully, we can finalize Friday's tracks on Thursday and I can share them Thursday evening or Friday morning.

I think we finally have most of the details figured out for the Fall ride. Friday morning on the 17th we will meet at Turner's Bend, 4 miles South of Mulberry Mountain. This puts us right in the heart of all the good riding so we won't have to waste time riding pavement to get to the good stuff. Turner's has agreed to let us park our vehicles for $3/day. They have camping right there on sight so an option would be to drive down Thursday evening. Turner's is close to our destination, Clarksville, so we can spend time riding the good trails without having to worry about making good time. We will spend both Friday and Saturday night at the Best Western in Clarksville.

Saturday I'm thinking we ride a loop that the locals call, "black Friday loop". While their wives shopped, they created and rode this last year the day after Thanksgiving. I had several locals from Arkansas tell me that it was a great ride.

On Sunday we work our way back through the forest and back to Turner's.

I will post tracks as soon as I get them developed.

When: October 17-19.

Where: Meet and have kickstands up by 9:30AM Friday Oct. 17:

TURNER BEND
20034 N. Hwy 23
Ozark, Ar 72949



Where stay:

http://bestwesternarkansas.com/hotels/b ... erwood-inn

We've stayed here a few times and it is always clean, reasonably priced, people are nice and within walking distance of two excellent restaurants.

This is the same weekend of the Mulberry Music Festival so there will be at least some additional demand for rooms. Currently, there are plenty of rooms but we should book in advance. With the Best Western best rate, single rooms are around $66 and doubles $75.

To help figure rides and rooms, reply to this thread if you are planning on making this ride and I will keep updating the list.

Rider List:

Randy(allkidd)
Andy(creekside) big bike
Scott_B
JamesB
Ryan?
Nick
Ward
Steve (bronco) big bike
Steve's cousin big bike
Kendall
Alissa?

Big Bike group: Anyone interested in riding bigger (650+) while down there? I plan on taking a 990 and doing most of what the track Randy is planning. Probably have to edit out the hill climbs, single track boulder fields and river crossings [kidding well not really, have to ride it home]. At this point I am thinking of riding down Thursday after work (3pm) and back Sunday probably starting around 2pm or whenever. Anyone interested? Hotel in Fayette, ClarksvilleX2 and home.

[Edit] Trailering down. We can get 1 in the back with the campershell off, 3 on Randy's trailer or two on my trailer. It will slow things down a bit if we need an extra bike in the back of the truck for loading/unloading, you can't put stuff in the back (of course), its on your bike or in your lap. But it works.

After getting a flat yesterday up in Holton KS, a close rescue vehicle with tools and trailer&ramp sounds nice.

Creekside wrote:Big Bike group: Anyone interested in riding bigger (650+) while down there? I plan on taking a 990 and doing most of what the track Randy is planning. Probably have to edit out the hill climbs, single track boulder fields and river crossings [kidding well not really, have to ride it home]. At this point I am thinking of riding down Thursday after work (3pm) and back Sunday probably starting around 2pm or whenever. Anyone interested? Hotel in Fayette, ClarksvilleX2 and home.

We should be able to easily edit the dual sport tracks to make a big bike track. Matter of fact, the black friday ride had a big bike friendly track so I will make sure to get that from them.

Count me "in".

-Scott

It's looking like I should be able to make this ride.

Count me in.

My cousin Scott and I are coming down Friday night and staying Sat. night as well at Hampton Inn. Scott just bought a XR650l so this is his first ds ride on the bike and as such he wants to feel it out before hitting the tougher stuff so we are both doing the BB track on Saturday, Sunday probably more of the same for a while before heading home. Would like to have supper Friday night w. the group depending on the time. Scott scrounged up a handheld Garmin and downloaded the track but if anyone else doing the BB ride has more experience using a GPS we'd be glad to let you lead with it.

Bronco Steve

Bronco wrote:My cousin Scott and I are coming down Friday night and staying Sat. night as well at Hampton Inn. Scott just bought a XR650l so this is his first ds ride on the bike and as such he wants to feel it out before hitting the tougher stuff so we are both doing the BB track on Saturday, Sunday probably more of the same for a while before heading home. Would like to have supper Friday night w. the group depending on the time. Scott scrounged up a handheld Garmin and downloaded the track but if anyone else doing the BB ride has more experience using a GPS we'd be glad to let you lead with it.

Bronco Steve

Creekside just bought a Garmin Montana and is riding the big bike on Saturday. So lets see....two new GPS being used for the first time in Arkansas? Yea, if you guys find your way back to Clarksville Saturday night you need to eat with us so we can hear your, "lost in Arkansas", stories!

Two great restaurants in Clarksville, Mexican and Italian. Remember, it is a dry county so you may want to stop in at Daffy Deans!

I'm not sure what's going on with me for this trip. I've been planning on being there for quite some time. However I've had to cancel / change my last two weeks of plans. Then work declined my scheduled vacation, then just today may have re approved it. So I'm afraid to commit, but really want to be there.

Hope to see you,
Ryan

Andy (Creekside) and I are carpooling down on Thursday after work and planning on staying in Fayetteville Thursday night. We will be down Friday morning with time to spare to make the 9:30 "kickstand up" time and meet everyone at Turner Bend. Can't wait to hit the trail!

allkidd wrote:

Bronco wrote:My cousin Scott and I are coming down Friday night and staying Sat. night as well at Hampton Inn. Scott just bought a XR650l so this is his first ds ride on the bike and as such he wants to feel it out before hitting the tougher stuff so we are both doing the BB track on Saturday, Sunday probably more of the same for a while before heading home. Would like to have supper Friday night w. the group depending on the time. Scott scrounged up a handheld Garmin and downloaded the track but if anyone else doing the BB ride has more experience using a GPS we'd be glad to let you lead with it.

Bronco Steve

Creekside just bought a Garmin Montana and is riding the big bike on Saturday. So lets see....two new GPS being used for the first time in Arkansas? Yea, if you guys find your way back to Clarksville Saturday night you need to eat with us so we can hear your, "lost in Arkansas", stories!

Two great restaurants in Clarksville, Mexican and Italian. Remember, it is a dry county so you may want to stop in at Daffy Deans!

The good news is two redneck AR boys at a dry C-Store tipped me and Scott off to Daffy's place back in 2005 when we were into riding the twisties on our sport touring bikes. The old "need a cold one" GPS has never failed us so worst case scenario we'll be at Daffy's around 5 - 5:30 pm.

The good news is two redneck AR boys at a dry C-Store tipped me and Scott off to Daffy's place back in 2005 when we were into riding the twisties on our sport touring bikes. The old "need a cold one" GPS has never failed us so worst case scenario we'll be at Daffy's around 5 - 5:30 pm.

Bronco - If you've got room, I'll take a 12'er of Arkansas' finest canned brew. I'll gladly pay any delivery fees for your having to go all "Smokey and the Bandit"

rycomm wrote:I'm not sure what's going on with me for this trip. I've been planning on being there for quite some time. However I've had to cancel / change my last two weeks of plans. Then work declined my scheduled vacation, then just today may have re approved it. So I'm afraid to commit, but really want to be there.

Hope to see you,
Ryan

Sounds like work can't get along without you. I don't have that problem....they never notice if I'm gone!

Hopefully, it works out that you can make the ride.

Bronco wrote:

allkidd wrote:

Bronco wrote:My cousin Scott and I are coming down Friday night and staying Sat. night as well at Hampton Inn. Scott just bought a XR650l so this is his first ds ride on the bike and as such he wants to feel it out before hitting the tougher stuff so we are both doing the BB track on Saturday, Sunday probably more of the same for a while before heading home. Would like to have supper Friday night w. the group depending on the time. Scott scrounged up a handheld Garmin and downloaded the track but if anyone else doing the BB ride has more experience using a GPS we'd be glad to let you lead with it.

Bronco Steve

Creekside just bought a Garmin Montana and is riding the big bike on Saturday. So lets see....two new GPS being used for the first time in Arkansas? Yea, if you guys find your way back to Clarksville Saturday night you need to eat with us so we can hear your, "lost in Arkansas", stories!

Two great restaurants in Clarksville, Mexican and Italian. Remember, it is a dry county so you may want to stop in at Daffy Deans!

The good news is two redneck AR boys at a dry C-Store tipped me and Scott off to Daffy's place back in 2005 when we were into riding the twisties on our sport touring bikes. The old "need a cold one" GPS has never failed us so worst case scenario we'll be at Daffy's around 5 - 5:30 pm.

Are you taking orders?

Update.

http://rideforum.net/viewtopic.php?p=16539#p16539

Sounds like a great ride, wish I could do it. I'll be heading out on my excursion on the 21st, so the few days ahead of that are busy with packing, organizing and maintenance. Yeah, I'm a last minute kind of guy.

So is that what big bikes are for, hauling beer? I think last time I got a case of microbrews from Ozark. In bottles even. Place your orders! Mega swill might not get strapped properly....

I posted my pics from 4 days of riding on Google+. Hopefully, this link will take you to them.

https://plus.google.com/photos/11173889 ... 0LLm3vWpag

Great pics!! I'm jealous and wish I could have made the ride. Looks like the weather really worked out perfectly.

I have to ask...Why didn't you guys just bunny hop over the large tree that was on an angle? If I had only been there to show you how...

James - how did the 500 run??

Mike,

The weather, food, riding, and company couldn't have been better. Well, perhaps if you had been able to join us, at least the company would have been.

The new bike ran great for the most part. Once on Thursday, and once on Friday, it failed to start, and the Fuel Injection (FI) light started blinking. I let it sit for a few minutes, then it started right up and gave me no more problems. The dealer wants me to bring it back in to see if the computer can tell them what the fault was.

Its seat and handgrips were torture, though. Didn't have time to replace them before the trip, since the bike wasn't in my possession long enough to fully prep it. My brother and I traded bikes at one point, but he lasted all of 5 minutes before (understandably) begging for his DR-Z back.

Every time I fell, though, I was extremely grateful for the "weight loss." And it took a long time to get used to having to slip the clutch so much to get moving without stalling the engine (especially on a rocky hill). On the DR-Z, I could just let go of the clutch lever, and the bike would start moving (even uphill) without so much as a sputter.

James