---
title: "DR650 rally in LaSal, UT"
date: 2019-09-05
vim: tw=80 fo+=a so=999
---

I decided to go to a DR650 rally at Three Step Hideaway in Utah that I saw on
the advrider.com forum.

# Day 1: East Palo Alto to Nevada

I left on Wednesday, Sept 4 at 4:30pm. I had to work that day so I packed my
camping stuff onto my bike and brought it all with me to work. First 2 hours of
the trip was pretty solid traffic that I lane-split through. Ate at McDonalds
near Sacramento. I spent many hours on the first day whistling this melody over
and over:

```{.abc syntax=abc_notation name=whistle_tune}
X:1
K:C
|: fed cde | fed cde | f_ed cd_e | f_ed cd=e :|
```

At Reno I hit a little bit of rain. While I stopped to get gas at 7-11 I
transferred the first few episodes of Westworld Season 2 to my phone and to the
server at home. Sarah and I had just finished Season 1, and since I wouldn't
have cell coverage at the Rally the plan was we would each watch 1 episode per
night starting at 11pm PDT (12am MDT for me in Utah).

At (39.2639,-118.3808) I hit a big rainstorm, and the rain stung as it hit my
exposed nose. Dang, desert rain drops sure are sharp. I took one of my July 4th
socks out of my pannier and stuffed it around my goggles. Luckily it was the
first day of the trip so the sock was clean. Roads are usually more slippery
after fresh rain, and I had been smelling the petrichor to determine which
areas were freshly wet and where I should slow down, but now all I could smell
was fabric softener.

image:IMG_2599.jpg

At (39.5023,-117.7812) I decided to find somewhere to camp off the highway. The
only vehicle I had seen for the last 30+ minutes was a semi that I passed a
few minutes prior. I try to make sure nobody sees me when I slip over to a
secluded area to camp, and I figured I had a good few minutes to find a hidden
spot behind some desert brush before the truck drove past. I pulled off the
road and almost immediately my front tire fell into a yoga-ball-sized pit and I
fell over. The first thing I did was to turn off the ignition key so my lights
would go out. Then I smelled gas leaking onto me from the vent hose on the top
of my fuel tank so I pinched the hose with my hand to stop it. I discovered
that my right leg was pinned between the bike and the edge of the pit and I
couldn't get it out. I laughed because I thought it was funny, but then I
realized that I was only a few feet off the side of the highway when I fell and
when the semi drove past it would look like I had had a serious motorcycle
crash. I heard the truck coming in the distance, but sound travels far in the
desert so I figured I had a few minutes to get myself out of the pit and
scramble into the darkness before the truck saw me. I tried a bit more
desperately to wrench my leg out from under the bike but it was no use. Just
before the semi reached me I figured maybe if I lay completely flat then
somehow the headlight beams will go right over me and the driver will ignore
me, so I laid down completely flat. Then I realized, now I look like a dead
body pinned under a motorcycle. As the semi was passing me I could see myself
and my bike completely lit up, and there's no way the driver didn't notice me.
Thankfully he was a terrible samaritan and just drove on past.

It took me a few minutes of kicking and wiggling to get out from under the bike,
and I stood up, tried to lurch my bike backwards out of the pit, and ended up
stepping into a deep rabbit hole with my left foot and the bike tipped over and
pinned me underneath again. Finally I got the bike away from those pits and
gradually lurched it farther forwards over a sandy hill and into a little
cluster of shrubs. I looked over the bike and saw that my right side pannier
strap had melted through from the heat of the exhaust pipe. I threw my tarp over
the bike to make it less reflective, set up camp, played Piffle on my phone and
went to sleep.

image:IMG_2616.jpg
image:IMG_2630.jpg

# Day 2: Nevada to La Sal, UT

Had some trouble starting the bike the next morning. It was really cold, and
when I got to Austin, NV I was shivering. Went to a cafe called Toiyabe Cafe.

image:IMG_2639.jpg

This was a long solitary day of riding. When I ride for hours with no outside
entertainment I tend to get pretty introspective. Sometimes my mind will pick a
section of a song that I know the lyrics to, and I'll sing that bit of song a
hundred times, then I'll do it again in an australian accent, then again in an
italian accent, then I'll sing it like I'm disgusted, then I'll sing it like I'm
trying not to burst out laughing, and again and agian and again. Sometimes 3
hours can pass by in what feels like 15 minutes, or sometimes a single song can
become half a tank of gas.

I started reciting some lines from the movie The Birdcage (1996) and then I
started practicing shocked falsetto gasping like Nathan Lane's character. I
found that if I do it too fast it sounds like a little dog yapping, and if I do
it too slow it sounds sexual. For some reason I had a particular jet of air
pointing up into my helmet right at my mouth that I've never noticed before, and
if I opened my mouth then it made a sound like a dentist's suction tool. Then I
found that I could modulate the frequency by changing the size of my mouth
cavity and I used that to perform some sound effects: police car, European
ambulance, 1950s UFO sound. Then I found that the jet stream was able to sort of
inflate my bottom lip so it would hang down and flap around. I felt like Tony
Clifton licking my lips and singing. I practiced doing major and minor scales
using the dentist suction sound for a while. Then I sang some more songs:

- Prince - Strawberry Beret (my own remix)
- CeCe Peniston - Finally
- Gillette - Don't Want No Short Dick Man
- Cake - The Distance

There was a bit of road work so traffic came to a stop. Two BMW bikes pulled up
behind me and we started chatting. They were a husband and wife from Quebec who
had ridden up to Alaska, and were on their way to Yellowstone.

A storm followed me for a few hours and I hit some hail. I had to pull over and
cover my exposed nose with a sock again, but this time the sock was dirty so
it wasn't so pleasant.

I pulled into La Sal at around 6pm, checked into the rally, had some dinner and
set up camp. Lots of little burrs in the dusty ground. Met some folks camped
near me and went to sleep.

# Day 3: First rally day

My air mattress sprung a leak during the night. Talking with some other campers,
it sounds like the same thing happened to quite a few people. I met up with a
group of riders who were going to ride a LaSal pass loop, and I figured that
was a good match for my current riding skill level. Their names were Alan,
Chris and Hippie Kip, from Michigan. Had a blast riding with them. We took a
shortcut through "Hell Canyon" at (38.4276,-109.2786) that was even more fun. I
was hoping to really give myself a challenge during this rally so as we were
going downhill I was intentionally picking hard lines and trying to make things
harder for myself.

image:IMG_2667.jpg

We took a break after hell canyon for some snacks. A rider named Yan rode up to
us on a nice Husqvarna 701, he said he was riding the UTBDR with some friends
and they had gotten separated. He had a 360° camera mounted to his handlebars.

On our way back we stopped at a gas station in Moab for some snacks. Chris had
to do some maintenance on his bike and we were all thirsty and hot.

image:IMG_2669.jpg

Then we went to Gearheads Outdoor Store and I bought a patch kit for my air
mattress and a replacement strap to tie down my right-side pannier that had
partially melted. 

Got back to camp and started fixing my air mattress. I found a big flat rock to
do my repairs up and away from all the burrs and prickles. I mixed up some Dr
Bronners with water in my Nalgene and poured it on the air mattress, then I
folded the air mattress over and found a spot that was bubbling and applied the
patch there.

When I took the air mattress out of my bivy sack I found two dead spiders had
been crushed under me while I slept. Camp dinner was delicious steak. I talked
to a couple from Virginia who had run into Yan and a Canadian guy earlier in the
day. They said Yan and the other guy were separated from their group and looked
pretty worried, but then a car pulled up, the Canadian went to talk to the
driver, and Yan took off, so they weren't sure what was going on.

After dinner everybody gathered together for a rally photo. They gave prizes for
youngest rally participant (22 years old), oldest participant (Terry, 89 years
old), and another prize for the person who had ridden in the longest distance (I
don't remember the guy's name but he was on a mad max DR650 and he rode in from
northern BC). Then two people who had installed 790cc big bore kits on their
DR650s had a drag race.

image:IMG_2694.mp4[Drag race]

Later in the evening I chatted with Lynn and Terry who had been riding together
for 45 years, and they used to repair VW engines in Anchorage in the 70s.
Lynn said he had a Chinese bike but the manual wasn't translated in to English,
and he asked me to help him translate the buttons on the app and help him tune
it. Then I went back to my camp area and sat down in my fancy new REI camp chair
and had some beers with Alan, Chris and Hippie Kip.

When I went to bed I saw that ants had eaten the two spider corpses and all that
was left was a few legs.

image:IMG_2689.jpg[Before]
image:IMG_2696.jpg[After]

I lifted up my bivy and used my boot to scrape away the top layer of prickles
and burrs in the dirt and create a sandy area to sleep on.

image:IMG_2697.jpg[Burrs stuck to bottom of bivy]
image:IMG_2699.jpg[Prickles in my finger]

# Day 4: Second rally day

Air mattress popped again during the night. Got bothered by a little cat during
breakfast.

image:IMG_2718.mp4

My riding group from the day before told me they were going to take it easy
today, and I said I'm hoping to push my limits today so we split off. I joined a
group led by the rally organizer Julio. I told him I was worried about holding
the group back, and after I told him that I had ridden Lockhart Basin and he
said I should be fine. The full line-up was: Julio, Rick from Cogent Dynamics,
Dave, Ron, Lynn, Terry, James, me. Everyone was on DR650s except Terry and Lynn
who were riding DR200s. Suddenly everyone took off in the direction of the
Colorado border. Thirty seconds in I hit a bump and my spare tube sproinged off
my fender and went flying. I cinched it onto my tail rack with my water bladder
and continued on. I almost bailed a couple of times but I kept it together.
After 10 minutes we stopped to regroup and I noticed that Terry wasn't wearing
any armor, he was just wearing a sweater. He said that this kind of riding was
easy peasy for him. James said that he had accidentally joined the wrong group,
but he was going to try his best to keep up with everyone.

The singletrack turned into rocky scrambles and steep washes and I was really
enjoying myself. We came across a guy sitting on the side of the trail with an
injured ankle. He said someone had gone back to camp to get him medical help,
and we didn't pass anybody on our way over but I guess there are multiple
routes.


The trail got tougher and we started riding faster and James started having
trouble keeping up. I think he fell a few times on some tricky uphills and had
exhausted himself trying to manoeuver the bike back down the rocky hill for
another attempt. While the group was resting he apologized for slowing everyone
down and I told him I really appreciated him coming along for the ride because
he was distracting everyone from howpoorly I was riding.

Part of the group took a wrong path and sort of got split up, and at one point I
was in the rear group and I wanted to let the front group know that there was
someone behind me still. The rider behind me was Lynn who has 100x better
offroad riding skills than me, but I still wanted to make sure they knew. I was
riding along a mostly flat dirt road and I saw the group stopped ahead at
(38.1295,-109.0274). They started leaving just as I was approaching, and I
wanted an opportinuty to tell them about Lynn, so I was riding faster than
normal as I approached them. At the last minute I saw a big diagonal rut running
across the road. I tried to hop my front tire over it but my tire came down on
the far edge of the rut, slid to the left, and I crashed onto my right side. My
right foot hit the ground as I was falling and got twisted backwards and pinned
under the exhaust. I yelled toward the group but they were accelerating away so
they couldn't hear me. I could feel my ankle getting hot through my boot from
the heat of the exhaust pipe, but I didn't have any leverage to kick the bike
off of me with my other foot. I panicked a little bit from the sharp burning
heat I could feel so I started pulling my ankle harder, but I could tell that I
would probably cause more damage to my ankle if I just yanked it while it was
pinned backwards. I started yelling and panicking and trying to drag my ankle
out, and finally with one last kamehameha scream I managed to wrench my ankle
free. I was still winded from the crash so I took a minute to catch my breath,
and then I turned off the ignition key and rested my head on the ground. A few
minutes later Lynn showed up and grabbed my water bottle from my bike and gave
me some water to drink.  Then he help me slowly limp me over to some shade by a
nearby tree. Then Lynn said he would catch up to the group and tell them to go
back to camp and get medical help and then he would come back and wait with me. 

image:IMG_2724.jpg[Lame]

Lynn came back with Rick and we chatted for a while. I joked with Rick that I
should have upgraded to Cogent suspension. 




I want to push myself today. suddenly everyone takes off down a single trqck
trail, headed towards Colorado. 30 s in and I hit a rut and my spare tube flies
off. hmm, ok. I strap it with my water bag on the back of my bike and continue
on. after 10 minutes we stop to regroup and it turns out Lynn and Terry are on
this ride on their dr200's, Lynn had a riding jacket but Terry is just wearing a
sweater and jeans. one member James says he accidentally joined the wrong group
but he's going to try his best. it turns into some Rocky scrambles and some
really fun stuff. we come across a guy sitting on the side of the tail in the
blazing sun, he says someone sent back a few mins ago to get help for him but we
didn't pass anybody. we assume he took a slightly different route. we help move
him to some shade under a tree. trail gets funner and funner, and hired and
hotter, James goes down a few times and is getting pretty tired, James takes
Lynn's dr200, Lynn takes Ron's mostly stock dr650, and Ron takes the 790cc bike.
Ron has previously raced KTMs but this is his second day on a dr650, so he's
learning very fast.  I took a wrong turn and got separated from the group for
bit. we all took a wrong turn and had to backtrack a bit. I went down on a steep
downhill and bent my clutch lever. met up with everyone at a fork in the road.
readjusted clutch and it was good. Julio said the left path was easier and the
right path was harder. I said I was interested in the harder route but we sort
of took a vote and decided we wanted to stay together and take the easier route
which was totally fine with me since we were so hot and tired. the easier route
ended up being a dirt road with long straight sections so we were all going very
fast. at one point I was second last with Lynn somewhere behind me. I saw the
group stopped up ahead and add I ride up they took off. then I saw a big rut
across the road and add their were talking off I tried to hop my front tire over
it  but the front tire jumped to the left and the bike fell to the right and I
was laying chest down with my right foot twisted backwards pinned underneath the
hot muffler. I yelled for the others but they had just rode off.  I smelled the
familiar aroma of my gas tank leaking gas onto me from the breather tube. I felt
my ankle getting hotter and hotter so I did a Dragonball z scream and kicked the
bike with my left foot to pivot it a bit and used all my might to yank my right
ankle out from under the bike. my able felt pretty sprained but not broken. I
laid down in the dust and caught my breath. after 3 minutes or so Lynn rode up
and asked me if the bike was okay. he gave me some water to drink and helped me
get my helmet off. after a few more minutes he helped me hobble over to under a
tree with some shade. them he brought me my water and my phone and rode out to
get help. damn, no signal. so I played piffles for a while and then found that
my kindle app had a cached copy of the Lord of the rings in Chinese, so I read
that for a while. then I opened up Google maps and took a look at where I was.
after maybe 30 minutes Lynn came back and told me he had relayes the message to
Rick that there was a rider down and Rick said he would ride out and come back
with a truck and a Polaris SxS.  shit, that's a lot of commotion for a twisted
ankle. I jokingly asked Lynn to pick up a rock and hobble me so I'd have an
injury worthy of emergency rescue. 

TODO: finish writing this


[All photos](./photos/)



<!--
played whistled Melody (nutcracker triplets). tried to find spot to sleep, keg
trapped under bike, gas spilled, trick coming, laid flat, pretended to be dead,
finally got foot out, stepped into another hole, bike feel onto other side,
finally slept, played piffles, bike wouldn't start, got it started, went to
tasty Cafe, zoning out, 3 hours can be 11 minutes, or a song can turn into half
a tank of gas, road work 30 mins 10 mins, talked to Quebec couple, Alaska, wife
riding 3 years, going to Yellowstone. found I can whistle like dentist suction
thing in mouth, police car, European ambulance, 50s UFO sound. bottom lip
flipped down, felt like Tony Clifton licking lips and singing. did scales music.
singing songs, strawberry beret, don't want no small dick man, 

email Destin about waymo collaboration.

air mattresses popped, good bfst, met up with a group doing la sal pass, Alan
Chris hippie kip, very fun, took shortcut thru hell canyon, we meet up with a
guy named Yan on a Husqvarna 700? who was doing the utbdr with friends and got
separated, had 360' camera on bike, 

we went to Moab and got patch repair kit and extra bit of strap for panniers,
came back had dinner, fixed my mattress, photos, dead spiders in tent

late at dinner meet up with couple from Virginia who had run into Yan and A
Canadian guy, looking very freaked out about finding rest of group, but then a
car pulled up and when the Canadian went to talk to the driver Yan left by
himself, so they were pretty confused.

took group photo, guy who ride in from northern bc got prize, mad Max bike, some
more dr650s with 790cc big bore kits had a drag race.

chatted with a bunch of people, Terry and Lynn who used to repair VW engines in
Anchorage in the 70s. good miners used VW engines to rig up machinery. Lynn said
he had a Chinese bike but the manual was poorly translated and he asked for my
help with it. got back to tent, ants had eaten the spiders. sat in my new REI
chair chatted and had beer with biker guys from today, not sure what plan is for
tomorrow.





also: Lynn and Terry known each other 45 years, Met in Alaska, super nice guys,
love vw. 


woke up late, mattress still leaking some air, groundsheet working well so I
suspect the patch didn't hold. ate breakfast, annoying cat, called it
butterbeard. meet cyberdos organizer and he said he was leading a ride with Rick
from cogent suspension and a few other guys. he asked my skill level and I did I
did Lockhart basin a few months ago, he said ok this will be easier than that. 
other members are Julio, Rick, Dave, Ron, lynn, Terry, James, me.
James flew down from Anchorage to SLC and borrowed procycle Jeff's 790cc big
bore wide transmission test bike.
 ok, I want to push myself today. suddenly everyone takes off down a single
trqck trail, headed towards Colorado. 30 s in and I hit a rut and my spare tube
flies off. hmm, ok. I strap it with my water bag on the back of my bike and
continue on. after 10 minutes we stop to regroup and it turns out Lynn and Terry
are on this ride on their dr200's, Lynn had a riding jacket but Terry is just
wearing a sweater and jeans. one member James says he accidentally joined the
wrong group but he's going to try his best. it turns into some Rocky scrambles
and some really fun stuff. we come across a guy sitting on the side of the tail
in the blazing sun, he says someone sent back a few mins ago to get help for him
but we didn't pass anybody. we assume he took a slightly different route. we
help move him to some shade under a tree. trail gets funner and funner, and
hired and hotter, James goes down a few times and is getting pretty tired, James
takes Lynn's dr200, Lynn takes Ron's mostly stock dr650, and Ron takes the 790cc
bike. Ron has previously raced KTMs but this is his second day on a dr650, so
he's learning very fast.
I took a wrong turn and got separated from the group for bit. we all took a
wrong turn and had to backtrack a bit. I went down on a steep downhill and bent
my clutch lever. met up with everyone at a fork in the road. readjusted clutch
and it was good. Julio said the left path was easier and the right path was
harder. I said I was interested in the harder route but we sort of took a vote
and decided we wanted to stay together and take the easier route which was
totally fine with me since we were so hot and tired. the easier route ended up
being a dirt road with long straight sections so we were all going very fast. at
one point I was second last with Lyn somewhere behind me. I saw the group
stopped up ahead and add I ride up they took off. then I saw a big rut across
the road and add their were talking off I tried to hop my front tire over it
 but the front tire jumped to the left and the bike fell to the right and I was
laying chest down with my right foot twisted backwards pinned underneath the hot
muffler. I yelled for the others but they had just rode off. I smelled the
familiar aroma of my gas tank leaking gas onto me from the breather tube. I felt
my ankle getting hotter and hotter so I did a Dragonball z scream and kicked the
bike with my left foot to pivot it a bit and used all my might to yank my right
ankle out from under the bike. my able felt pretty sprained but not broken. I
laid down in the dust and caught my breath. after 3 minutes or so Lynn rode up
and asked me if the bike was okay. he gave me some water to drink and helped me
get my helmet off. after a few more minutes he helped me hobble over to under a
tree with some shade. them he brought me my water and my phone and rode out to
get help. damn, no signal. so I played piffles for a while and then found that
my kindle app had a cached copy of the Lord of the rings in Chinese, so I read
that for a while. then I opened up Google maps and took a look at where I was.
after maybe 30 minutes Lynn came back and told me he had relayes the message to
Rick that there was a rider down and Rick said he would ride out and come back
with a truck and a Polaris SxS. shit, that's a lot of commotion for a twisted
ankle. I jokingly asked Lynn to gram a rock and hobble me so I'd have an injury
worthy of emergency rescue. 


Ephraim EMT and Tim (hurt ankle)


```{.dot name=day_flowchart}
 digraph G {
  hungry -> eat -> full;
  full -> sleepy;
  tired -> sleepy;
  riding -> tired;
 }
```

-->