I had a plan to fly to SK and ride south - I’m no Snake Pliskin, but was hell bent on getting her outta Canuckistan. But with a cracked frame, a split//dangling rear fender, the occasional seize/lack of compression - it seemed completely irrational to expect a reliable trip. So, a clean US ‘78 that made at least two trips was also “stuck” in SK since 2017.
Flying has been a hassle lately, so when combined with other opportunities, I asked the owner of the ‘78 what his plans were. He wanted it, but neither of us could find a cost effective/easy/quick means to extract the bikes. It’s not a quick jaunt from CO (work) to SK, but it’s a far cry closer than GA (home). No direct flights either. So he made a gracious, almost mafia offer and I jumped on it. Clean and mostly stock, it should make it just fine.
My hope was to find a perfect window of sunny and warm Canadian summer weather to ride - my first ride since 2018 (the Tuk trip). Potential friends to ride both bikes back that had (1) time, (2) passport and (3) acceptable vax status quickly dropped to zero. Desperate, a multi-segmented plan was hatched to get my truck to Denver from Savannah in order to set up a weekend dash and grab for both bikes.
First, a trip to Pittsburgh (struggling the last two hours as my truck went into limp mode due to a sensor plugging issue):
Caught a cool bike show outside Cleveland courtesy of Low Brow Bike shop. Cool bikes - I liked this one:
Eventually get to CO and take in some sights (Tincup Pass):
But the real effort was the Goldwing/Cannonball Run. At 4am on the 12th, I left Denver and arrived in Saskatoon some 17.5 hours later. Not too much trouble at the border (no guns sir
) Saturday was for a little R&R by way of skidoos on the Saskatchewan River followed by a night loading of the bikes for the return trip on Sunday. Wanna see how deep the river is?
Time to get serious. When trying to squeeze two GL’s on a 1500, it’s nice to have an overhead crane (Jekylll approves):
Both bikes tucked in for the ride:
The poor, poor tailgate….
Plan is to take the goodies off the ‘77 (Webers, Biltwell exhaust, Dyna, braided lines, threaded oil filter, LED h/l) and graft into the ‘78. Then tear down and fix frame, transplant the 1200 engine and build from there on the ‘77 (my precious). In the meantime, ride the ‘78….
Z
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Touché Sagebrush
