Colorado Back Country Discovery Route 2015

[bamamate]

I had planned on riding the Colorado Back Country Discovery Route next year to celebrate my 50th birthday. A friend I’ve done day rides with a couple of times, he rides a BMW F800GS, called me up in July asking if I could go for a trip at the end of Aug. He is an ER nurse and also going to school to become a nurse practitioner so getting time off is rare for him. We talked about riding the continental divide route in New Mexico but since I’d already been collecting info on the COBDR we decided to go ahead and ride it. Brad had met another F800 rider, from Washington State, Eric, on FaceBook and asked him to join us. Brad nor I had met Eric in person let alone ridden with him so we were a bit nervous about it and after seeing a pic of the NC Eric was also a bit nervous about riding with us. Short version we all got along great with similar skill levels and Eric now has a new appreciation for the NC.

We decided to meet in Steamboat Springs, CO and ride down to Delores, CO. That cut out the northern most part which, from reports, is all good gravel county roads and the southern part to 4 Corners which is all paved roads. Our only real mishap happened on the way out when Brad got a flat tire and the rim strip thingy that protects the tube from the spokes exploded into a hundred pieces in Kansas. We found an independent shop that thought he could make 2 of the narrow strips he had on hand work so I loaded up the wheel and took it to him leaving Brad on the side of the Interstate. The shop owner was great. He checked for damage, made sure the spokes were all tight, installed the spare tube and mounted/balanced the tire all for $35. I gave him $5 extra for dropping everything to fix us up. He was currently working on a sweet 1983 Honda Magna V65. He also gave me tips on tube installation which I greatly appreciated. I arrived back to Brad and after he installed the wheel we took off only to have Brad pull back over because his ABS light came on. On inspection Brad noticed the axel spacer wasn’t there and the ABS sensor had gotten eaten by the ring. So I went back to look at the previous stopping location and Brad got on the phone to the shop. After digging around in the weeds I went back to Brad to find out that the spacer was at the shop right where the owner had worked on the tire. It didn’t look like the bearing was damaged so off to the shop I went again to retrieve the spacer. Upon returning I found a friendly state trooper making sure Brad didn’t get ran over. Brad installed the tire again and as it was getting dark we decided to get something to eat and decide on what to do. After a very needed meal we decided to continue on until we were tired. We dropped our pace down to 55-60MPH and around 1AM grabbed a hotel room in Colby, KS. The next day we made it to Steamboat Springs without any more issues.

The actual COBDR was a blast. It rained on us at some point every day which this is normally their dry season. Packing a wet tent became the norm along with wet and muddy roads. We only had one section where dust was an issue and that was on a night run into Lake City since we couldn’t find a good camping spot. We arrived after 9pm to find the town had rolled up the sidewalks. After asking a local we found an Inn that had an attached restaurant. The owner took pity on us and gave us $10 off on the rooms and as he was also the chef for the closed restaurant whipped us up the best chicken sandwich I have ever had. We dropped some bikes but no real damaged was had. Riding in Arkansas is good training for the COBDR. The terrain is similar with Arkansas being on a smaller scale and Colorado having more and deeper ruts. They actually have dirt on top of the rocks where the Ozarks only has a thin layer for the most part.

We spent a couple of nights at a camp ground in Ouray, CO which had a mother bear and 2 cubs come roaming through the night before and while eating dinner I watched a buck in velvet come running down the main road (Hwy 550). On the way back Brad and I rode late into the night and decided to keep going so we wound up doing an impromptu Iron Butt with me arriving home at 9:30 AM which was about 23hrs for about 1,100 miles.
I’m thinking about doing a ride report on ADV but for now here are some pics. Videos will come later.

Overlooking Telluride, CO






Bridal Vail Falls



This is my favorite pic I took





This was labeled as impassable when wet section. It rained on us while on it and we had to wait out the rain for an hour and then 2 more hours for it to dry enough to continue.








Eric slid out going down this pass. I found a spot I could stop and go down to help him. It was so steep and at over 10k, I had to stop 3 times to catch my breath walking back up to my bike.



I'll add more pics tonight.

 

[L.B.S.]

Soooo cool!

Sooo envious!

Awesome adventure and great memories I bet, eh? That mud looked like glue, lol

 

[2brnut2b]

OMG ! My next big trip for sure...

 

[bamamate]

That mud instantly caked in the tread and was very slick. Couldn't walk down the road. Has to walk in the ditch on the side which had some vegetation in it.

It was a great trip. This was my first time to the Rockies. didn't realize so much of it is high desert. Sage was everywhere. I'm used to the Appalachians and the Ozarks which are lush with trees so this was a very different experience for me. Parts of it reminded me of Arizona. The views were awesome and constant. Every curve I wanted to stop and take a pic. I want to do it again south to north because each side of the passes is different so it would be like a different ride.

 

[Therapy]

Looks like fun.

I'm not tough enough though.

 

[belrix]

Awesome trip! Green with envy

Sent from my XT1030 using Tapatalk

 

[bamamate]

Ruts like this were frequent. Not an issue when dry but challenging when wet





We rode all of the passes on the route. The 2 BMWs also did Imogene. I was too tired that day and elected to ride around on pavement back to the camp. I found Hagerman to be the hardest as it was rocky going up and down. Corkscrew was also hard going down since it is very steep.






This is ridgeway, CO where the movie True Grit was filmed.





Aspen groves were fascinating







Camping above 10k. Had to take breaks while packing up

 

[2brnut2b]

Oh man I almost wish you never post pics...I can't stop jumping on the couch everytime i look at it...

 

[Old Can Ride]

A wonderful adventure. Wish my bones were not so old, I do miss wonderful adventures.

 

[drdubb]

Looking forward to more....you need to talk about how the NC handled things....what you would do different, what worked, must do's etc.
I've been following some riders who've explored Col. on TW200's, so I guess I can do it too. One of my dream rides.
I did the TAT to Ark. last year on my DR650, of course the ARk. Section was the best.

Thanks for sharing....revs up our dreamometers.

 

[bamamate]

How’d the bike do…….It did great. The COBDR can be done on a stock NC with protection added and proper tires. I’ve done some upgrades on mine which do make it better. Racetech Gold valves, Nitron fully adjustable shock, 1 inch fork extenders which allow the front fender to be raised and give a little more ground clearance. Since the more off-road oriented tires are taller I added 2 teeth to the rear sprocket which gets the ratios close to stock. Next time I’ll probably go with 3 teeth which is a tad lower than stock. After the first day I dropped the front sprocket a tooth. That really helped at high altitude where you lose power.

The 17” front tire………I have to go slower in rough places. Some of the water ruts running perpendicular to the road were deep and wide enough that I had to slow way down for them otherwise I was getting huge jolts and bottoming the forks. I had to pay more attention to the line I took with half buried baby head rocks which meant I was weaving around a lot. Basically I think I was more focused on what line I was taking constantly switching between looking far ahead to up close vs the F800 guys. A 17” tire doesn’t roll over stuff near as easily as a 21” tire. With full load I also had to slow down going over humps in the road or I would bottom out the rear. Cranking up the preload helped and I probably should have increases the slow speed damping on the rear shock but that tends to negate how it does on washboard. For me, I’d rather slow down on the humps and have a smoother ride elsewhere.

Brakes….I know a lot of people think the NCs brakes are not good but I like them. I have to hit them hard to get them to lock up which to me is good. The F800s going down some of the really steep and loose passes were constantly locking up the backs and sliding where I was able to creep down as slow as I wanted. I could easily use the front and rear without much fear of locking up. The low COG also helps as I could slow down to barely moving and steer around stuff.

Seat height…….while the NC is a bit short for me that is also an advantage. One of the F800 riders is on the balls of his feet at a stop. That caused him to drop the bike many times basically because he couldn’t reach the ground and the F800 isn’t as easy to balance at really slow speed. Slick mud, blind slick switchbacks where you need to stop and look for a line were a lot easier for me.

Engine………The F800s are around 84hp as compared to the NC at 52. That was evident on the road like going through the mountains on I-70 west of Denver and also when we hit strong headwinds. I was dropping down to 5th and barely able to keep 60mphs at times. I spent a good bit of time at full throttle battling head winds and hills. In the dirt it didn’t seem to matter. I do recommend dropping the front sprocket a tooth. Before I did that she was struggling a bit on steep up hills. The F800 is considered to have good low end torque but it doesn’t compare to the NC. Those guys were revving and slipping the clutch at times where I just motored up. I’ll see if I have it on video, there were a couple of times where I needed to go very slow to negotiate something, the RPMs dropped below 2k, and then I had to climb a steep rock or hill. With no clutch usage the NC would bog down and then pull right out of it. Another time we had a wet, slippery hill to climb. Those guys spun their way up it sliding from one side of the 2 track to the other. I spun a little at the bottom, dropped the RPMs and then motored up it with no issues. Both of them just stared at me cause the NC made it look easy.

Side note on my philosophy………from 4 wheeling and from reading how trials bike riders do it, spinning is not good. Yes there are times you need speed and wheel spin but the vast majority of the time spinning is not good. You want to keep the rear tire just below the point of breaking lose. That is hard to do with 2 strokes and high revving 4 strokes. They don’t make power low in the RPMs and will bog down and kill the engine so you have to keep the RPMs up to get into the power band to keep from stalling and using the clutch to keep from sending too much power to the rear. With the NC and its long flat torque curve it is way easier to have enough torque to climb without so much you are overpowering the available traction. I rarely slip the clutch on the NC. It is either fully in or fully out and I let the wonderful low-end grunt do the work. Yes there are exceptions like getting started in deep sand, paddling through mud and large rocks, etc were you have to slip but the majority of time she will pull through from below 2k with no drama.

I’ve got to talk about the sand. My only experience with sand was with street tires and a 10yrd long section of deep powdery sand that didn’t go very well. On the COBDR is a ~1/2 mile section of sometimes deep sand so I was dreading it and the guys I was with knew I was dreading it. Read many reports of how hard deep sand is, multiple drops and crashes, etc. Lots of people say you need skinny 90 or 100 tires while a few people say a wider 120/130 is better. All said 21” is way better than 19” so I’m figuring 17” is going to be terrible. We met some 1200GS riders that had just gone through it and they talked about how hard it was and axle deep spots. When we got to the really deep section I stopped and took off some layers of cloths. The sun was out, it was getting warm, and I figured I’d be picking up the bike multiple times, maybe carrying luggage, and sweating my butt off. I’d read a lot on technics for sand and tried to follow them with no practice and them not making total sense. Stay on the gas, umm how do you stay on the gas without gaining a bunch of speed and having to shift up?......So the F800 guys went ahead of me while I stripped. I’m trying to pump myself up……..you can do this, remember the videos, weight to rear, stay on gas, let bike float around and don’t fight it, worse case all 3 of us can push it through, 1200GS land yachts just made it through……….I took so long getting ready that the other guys had stopped ¾ through and were walking back figuring I was down. Made sure my video was recording and started out. Attach position, my skinny butt as far back as I can get it, first gear putting on the gas. Made it around the first curve OK and then there are boulders to negotiate through. I try to slow down a bit while not dropping the throttle, made it between them and the sand got deeper. More gas, keep the front light, bike is darting left and right…..don’t dump the throttle!!! Made it up to where they were and I was still going. Bike darts to the side and have to stop to catch it. Start back up again……rear digs in, front is trying to plow, can’t get on the pegs and don’t want to bury the rear to the axle…..try again and finally get up some speed and on the pegs. Sand is really deep now but I’m staying back and on the gas. Look there is the end with firm ground. Made it without dumping the bike!!!!! They gave me the name of “sandwalker” after that.

Staying on the gas now makes sense. You’re not giving it tons of gas. The sand is constantly trying to slow you down and the back tire is spinning some and digging in so you keep a moderate level of gas which keeps you moving and keeps the front light along with getting your weight back. If you can slow down but have to gently. If you drop the gas weight shifts forward, the front tire instantly drops, and starts digging in. I’m no sand rider after that short section but I’m not as afraid of it as I was before. It now rates along the same lines as wet muddy conditions.

 

[Old Can Ride]

Like you said, sand has always won with a 17" front tire. It is hard to breath when you are riding in the dirt at higher elevations. It is a work out. Did you wear back fall proof armor? It sure can save a lot of pain with the drops that come in the dirt. The older I get, the more it hurts.

 

[drdubb]

Thanks for that insight. I've only been in deep sand once and I went down. That was on my DR.

 

[itlives]

Great write up, Matt! You are the best off road NC'r I know!

 

[Ed Up]

Another great ride report. I really enjoy reading about your adventures. Thank You. If you ever want to practice sand, and some real deep, there's about 100 acres or more just across the state line (Arkansas / Oklahoma). I would recommend the 250 for starters, the sand will wear you down fast on the bigger bike.

 

[bamamate]

Had a friend back in Huntsville, AL that made a yearly pilgrimage with his 4 wheeler and another guy with a water pumper buggy to the OK sand dunes. Loved watching his videos. Always wanted to try it on a 4 wheeler.

I hope I didn't make it sound easy cause it wasn't. I was EXTREMELY surprised I made it through without taking the luggage off and packing it out. When I made it to the end I pulled out my camcorder to record the other guys. My arms were shaking so much I had to find a post to rest on to keep the camera from shaking too much. One day I should get proficient at riding in sand. Right now I'm happy with I survived.

 

[drdubb]

Live to ride another day.

 

[Nofear2trek]

1 inch fork extenders which allow the front fender to be raised and give a little more ground clearance. Since the more off-road oriented tires are taller.

Thanks for the great report and photos, now that was an adventure! Could you say which tires and sizes you were on, explain about the fork extenders, and where you got the front fender riser?

Ray

 

[OldJeff]

Awesome report Matt! I enjoyed it very much, even tho I have absolutely no desire for that kind of workout

 

[searsboy]

Nice pics and write up! Thanks for sharing