Earache

Remeber: chicks dig scars. Get well soon and hang in there!

Basics routes.... After taking I-70 from Columbus to Black Hawk, Colorado, we'll do this to get to Ouray, Colorado... Then on to Santa Fe, New Mexico... After Santa Fe we head north and then east to Dodge City, KS... Dodge City to St. Louis, MO ... And finally on to Columbus... Look okay to everyone? Additions? Deletions? Suggestions?

Basic itinerary for the trip with mileages... Westward Trip 2009 Itinerary September 4-13, 2009 Friday, September 4 Columbus to Columbia, Missouri – 530 miles Saturday, September 5 Columbia, MO to Black Hawk, CO – 739 miles Hotel – Black Hawk, CO Sunday, September 6 Central City – Rocky Mount Nat’l Park – 200 miles Hotel – Black Hawk, CO Monday, September 7 Black Hawk, CO to Ouray, CO – 345 miles Hotel – Ouray, CO Tuesday, September 8 Ouray area – 150 miles Hotel – Ouray. CO Wednesday, September 9 Ouray, CO - Santa Fe, NM – 285 miles Hotel – Santa Fe, NM Thursday, September 10 Santa Fe area – 300 miles Hotel – Santa Fe, NM Friday, September 11 Santa Fe, NM to Dodge City, KS – 590 miles Hotel – Dodge City, KS Saturday, September 12 Dodge City, KS to St. Louis, MO – 590 miles Hotel – St. Louis, MO Sunday, September 13 St. Louis, MO to Indpls.,IN – 243 miles St. Louis, MO – Columbus, OH – 417 miles Total mileage – 4,146

I was really suckin' wind at the top - air was really thin!

Trails leading up the mountains were great fun in a Jeep...

On these long trips it's important to take a day off from riding. It's easy to do 700 mile days but difficult to string a bunch of them together. The longer the trip is, the shorter amount of miles you can do each consecutive day. In Colorado, we rented a Jeep one day ($150 a day + fuel) and did some old mountain pass trails that go past old mining sites. Never went over 15 mph and had a blast! Great way to get off of the bikes for a day...

Tons of cool stuff that you'll not see anywhere else...

Hotter than shit here though. Temps in the 115F range are common...

Some more pics because I'm bored... We could skip Santa Fe and do Moab, Utah. Some really good riding in the area and secenery like no where else in the World. Almost looks like Mars....

Dunno if it'll be that relaxed. There's a lot of highway miles to do and most of that will be done at 80 mph or so. You could always catch up to us, but most cruisers won't haul on the freeway all day at elevated speeds. Once you're out there, you'd have no problems keeping up. I'd also make daily route sheets with the routes and stops on them. Easy enough to find us.

Answered you - let me know some of the dimensions and I'll figure up a cost.

I'll make you one out of aluminum if you want. Could do steel as well, but I like to work with AL better. And I'd never want to bolt a steel subframe to an aluminum frame - that's really asking for trouble. I'd need your OEM subframe to use for mounting dimensions and some better pictures or descriptions of what you want. The rest is pretty easy. Although I live in Indy, I drive through Troy once every couple of weeks. Could easily pick it up and drop it off. Let me know if you want me to give it a go.

Yup, that'd pretty much be it. Costs can vary widely depending on your eating and spending habits, but it should be in that range somewhere.

Westin Downtown 50 S Capitol Ave Indianapolis IN 46204 (317) 262-8100

Start a list of those that wanna go on the first post of the thread. We can add / delete them as things develop.

There's an Embassy Suites across the street from the Champp's in downtown. Is that the one? Also a Conrad, but that's gonna run $500+ a night Conrad 30 S Meridian St Indianapolis IN 46204 (317) 638-3658 Embassy 110 W Washington St Indianapolis IN 46204 (317) 236-1800

Can always park trailers at my house - no worries there. Better start looking for hotels now to get a good location. Hampton Inn Downtown 105 S. Meridian St. Indianapolis, Indiana, 46225 317-261-1200 Country Inn and Suites 5630 Flight School Dr Indianapolis, IN 46221 (317) 821-1100 This will be the cheapest downtown hotel (Hampton) and a a cheap, close to the track and downtown place (Country).

Staying at the same hotel as last year or soemthing closer to town?

Tell me about it. Last week I was in Key West, wearing shorts, sweating my ass off and drinking beers in sidewalk bars all week. Now I'm sitting in my office, sweatshirt on and freezing. Sucks. And I wanna ride.

I'm in Columbus once or twice a month for work and will let you know next time. I'll be there Monday, but only for a couple of hours or so. Have plenty of time yet. Rooms: I usually make reservations, but don't have to. We'd need to make them in Santa Fe for sure as the area often sells out. Same with the Columbia, Missouri hotel. Ouray also sells out all the time, so we'd need them there as well. We'll have to figure out where you want to stay and what you want to see and go from there. Lots of these places are kinda remote and don't have a lot of hotels. Hate to pull into town late and have no room waiting. But reservations make you keep a schedule - just depends on what the group wants to do.

September it is then.

My only constraint is that I can't do it the last full business week of any given month. Forgot all about MotoGP - oops. September 4 - 13 works well for me. Lots of others will say they;re gonna go - and then bail at the last moment. This happnes time and time again on these things. Plan to go when you want to - not when others "might" go.

I could do September, too. But we had better do it in early September, as you suggest, as it'll be cold in the mountains anytime later than that. So, wanna make those the o-fish-all dates then? Leave Columbus on Friday, August 28 and retrun on Monday, September 7th?

And some more roads as we ride outta town...