In May of 2018, my buddy Dylan and I took off on a 8,000 mile cross country trip. This was our second trip together after doing Atlantic Canada the prior year, but it was my first long trip on my Triumph Tiger and my first long trip involving long distance off-pavement riding.
On this trip I was on my 2017 Triumph Tiger Explorer XCA. The bike is fairly stock, but notable mods include: Barkbuster VPS hand guards, SW-MOTECH crash bars, and an Altrider luggage rack. For luggage, I was using the factory hard panniers (Triumph branded Givi cases), a Wolfman Expedition duffle and Rollie drybags, Givi Tanklock tank bag, and Rotopax fuel & water containers for long desert sections
Hartford to California
We started with an Iron Butt ride from Hartford, CT to Chicago, IL (adding some mileage in Michigan to hit the required 1,000 miles). After a day of rest in Chicago, we bombed across the continent on I-80 through Omaha, NE; Cheyenne, WY; and Provo, UT to Elko, NV. We took used Section 5 of the NVBDR to ride off-road from the snow-capped peaks of the Ruby Mountains down to the desert floor.
The highway slog was real, but the Tiger did great on the long stretches of superslab. While I definitely don’t enjoy doing that many long-distance days in a row, it was the only way to make it across the country and have any time left over to explore once we got west of the Rockies.
Both bikes did great on the NVBDR. I was still very new to off-road riding, and the combined weight of the Tiger plus all of my luggage was probably close to 700lbs (not to mention my own substantial size at the time). Despite a few drops on the first day we made it through pretty much unscathed. The only exception was a high-speed crash I had in a section of deep sand; the front tire washed out and I ended up going down hard. My Sidi Adventure boots likely saved me from a break, but I ended up limping my way through San Francisco (and on-and-off for the next several weeks).
Our next leg took us through Reno, NV and across the Donner Pass in California, where we stayed in San Francisco for a few rest days before riding down the PCH to Morro Bay (after a quick stop at Laguna Seca).
Death Valley and Moab
After some emergency welding to fix a crack in Dylan’s pannier racks — caused by an unfortunate run-in with a barrel at the race track — we carved back across California through the Kern River Canyon and did a few days of camping and off-roading in Death Valley. The Panamint Springs Resort was a phenomenal place to stay, and we killed a keg of local beer while making friends with a traveling French couple we met at the watering hole. We filled two days there with exploring the easier of Death Valley’s unpaved roads, but our experience on the BDR took our confidence levels down a few pegs so we kept away from the more daunting routes.
From Death Valley we headed through Las Vegas to Zion National Park, and parked set our sites on Moab for camping and more off-road riding. Moab gave us a bit of our confidence back, but we only did one night of camping and were fully loaded up with gear. Even with the heavy loads, we were able to make some passes around a few groups of Jeeps, but we were passed in turn by riders with more confidence and experience on more appropriately sized bikes. The Schafer Switchbacks are remain one of my favorite riding memories.
Going our Separate Ways
In the last leg of the trip we headed due-East to southern Colorado and hit the Million Dollar Highway after a night in Ouray. Southern Colorado narrowly beats out the canyons of Southern California in my mind for the best pavement of the trip, but Dylan was feeling a bit rough after a night out with the bartender in Ouray.
We stayed on night at a friend’s house in the high desert of Alamosa, and after that we went our separate ways. Dylan took a longer route home while I bombed East on I-70, logging long days and staying in roadside motels before spending a day with my family in Pittsburgh.
Playlist
This was the longest motorcycle trip I’d ever taken and taught me a lot about long-haul travel and living off a bike. The lessons in packing, pacing, and risk taking while far from home are foundational to how I’ll approach adventure touring going forward.