Well - I just gotta say, I love living in the South. Here it is Dec 1st, and it was 63 degs today and sunny!! Awesome day for a ride. Of course, it hasnt rained in Georgia in about 3 years now.

Loaded the KLX in the back of the P/U cause I didnt feel like riding 90-100 miles of slab to get to the mountains which worked out good for me cause I wasnt even close to being awake for the first hour I was driving.

Parked at T.W.O.s (Two Wheels Only) resort - http://www.twowheelsonly.com/. It's atop Hwy 60 where it mets Hwy 180 (Wolf Pen Gap Rd). Both roads are popular for all riders. I was early, but someone has already beat me there.



Others were gathered over at Dales Gas Station (across the road) - so the rest of usride over and wait for the 'ride briefing'. We ended up with something like 12 or 14 bikes total. Only 2 other Kawas-a 96 KLX 650 and a 05 KLR 650.



We hit about 40 miles or so of federal forrest access roads along Blood Mountain - in the BlueRidge WMA area. We stopped at the top of some dirt trails - I thought 'why not' and followed the big thumpers down the single track. Mistake. Only me and one other (525 KTM) went down what turned out to be a freaking cliff!!! The KTM made it back up - but only cause he was able to get his speed up to Mach 3 before he hit it. I wasnt so fortunate. I made it about halfway up this boulder infestedtrail - you couldnt see the rocks for the leaves covering the entire ground. My bike finally gave the notice for me to get off - which basically ended up with both of us just laying over. Several re-tries didnt fair much better. The guys who stayed at the top - came down on foot and helped get my bike back to civilization. Thank gawd. Sorry - I wasnt thinking about snapping a pic while trying to catch my breath and drink water.

We trek'd past a Federal fishery - there's camping and such along the river. Cool spot. We got spread out as a group - soa fewof usstopped and waited for the rest of the group to catch up.



Stopping at a crossroads got boring and the next thing I know I hear someonesay,"I triple dog dare ya!!"-engines rev andabout 4 riders went ripping up this narly single track. I look around and ask, 'wassup with that?'- and everyone just laughed and explained the dare. Yeah ... uh, that's not a OHV trail ... that's the AT (Appalachian Trail) and motorcycles certainly aint allowed. The laughter went quiet and some started speculating what would happen if they were caught on the AT. We waited for more than a few minutes and they never came back. Few of us gave up waiting and made our way out to the slab and found the local market for lunch. This was a pre-assigned lunch stop - so we would wait for the others to meet us.

The Clarke tank held up great even tho I tried to bounce it off that rocky trail. We topped off fuel atour pitstop. I come back out of the store and see this puddle of fuel next to my bike. "ahhhh crap!" - quick search for a leak revealed I overfilled my tank too much and the fuel was running out the vent hole on the gas cap, "whew". Wipe that off and act like nothing happened.



The AT adventure riders never showed. After a hour past - another rider went back to check on them. Henever came back either. Without knowing the route that was planning or even having a map of the Fed Forrest Roads - I decided to head back to the truck and call it day. It was already getting late in the afternoon. Finished the day with about 11 miles of blacktop thru one of the curviest parts of Hwy 60. The KLX did j u s t fine.

 

Cool! Now you have us wondering what happened to the guys that went up the AT. [&:]

 

Wow!! Its sunny somewhere We have a couple of inches of snow here, and its supposed to turn to rain by tomorrow (fingers crossed) Nice pics, glad your tank wasn't leaking.

 

Hey that looks like a 2007 XT 225 in the picture, how did he do on that with you guys?

 

Your green tank looks great on that bike. Glad you had some help gettin back up that hill, sounds like a fun ride.

 

Well I gotta say I love living in the north a cool 22 degrees great day for a ride on Dec 1st!!!







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There were 3 XT 225s - I dont think that one pictured is a 07. I overheard them talking aboutit - saying itwas an older model with super low miles - and I completely forgot there was a sherpa riding with the group too. All but one were riden by females (including the sherpa)who were new to dirtbikes - so they were rather conservative. Even the guy ridingthe olderXT was new to dirt - and the bike had street tires on it.

When I find out what happened to the AT riders - I'll post it up.

On a side note, at the end of the day I stopped by at Dales and hung out for a few - there's always a HUGE number of bikes there and people sitting out front just chattin and such. As I made it back to my bike to leave - a guy who was riding a Suzuki 400SM was admiring my bike - shaking his head while asking, 'how do you like it and what does it weigh?' kinds of questions. He ended by saying, 'I wish I would have bought one of those instead of this' - point to the his 400 SM. Dunno ... causeI think those bikes are pretty darn cool rides.

 

ok - found out what happened - one of the two riders got stuck trying to turn around. It took them over a hour to get him "un-stuck". He was on a DR400. By that time - we had ridden a hour ahead of them.