Great narrative of your trip.The only trip I can imagine comparing to this one is the 2 guys that I met at my local HD dealer last week. They had come up from Columbia (!) and were headed to Alaska and back! Glad you had a great and safe trip.

 

We left Yakima about 8:15 am. We took I-82 to Richland and crossed the Columbia River one last time before turning onto Hwy. 124. 124 is a nice two lane that started out with fruit and then started winding through huge, hilly fields of golden ripe wheat. We picked up US Hwy. 12 and crossed into Idaho at Lewiston. Hwy 12 is the route Lewis and Clark took across Idaho. Just east of Lewiston we saw a Federal Highway sign that said “Curvy Road Next 199 Miles” I thought to myself, Ya, right. I wish we would have stopped and took a picture of that sign. The road follows the Clearwater River (and smaller rivers as the road worked east). It was a beautiful clear day. We had the wind at our backs, at least when the curves were going east. The traffic was light, especially for a Sunday. I love curvy roads and we hit this one hard. The first 50 miles were more open and then we gradually got into mountains and endless 180 degree curves. We’d come up on a left hand 180 and it went into a right hand 180 and then back to the left again, over and over and over. Not every curve was an 180 but there wasn’t 100 feet of straight road anywhere. The speed limit was 55 at the start and then 50 and then 45 towards the end. The road was very smooth almost all the way. We met an Idaho HP about 20 or 30 miles in (I was behind a couple cars, waiting for a chance to pass) and I knew the odds were there would not be another HP on that road on a Sunday, especially since it was one way in, one way out. So I ignored the speed limit and the solid yellow center lines for the rest of the way. I have to say after almost three hours, I was getting worn out. Absolutely endless curves. We gassed up at a lodge about 20 miles from Lolo Pass, rested a while and rode the last 20 miles or so of curves before getting over the pass and then into Lolo, then a little farther and we were in Missoula, Montana. We got on I-90 and high-tailed it into Butte. A little over 550 miles for the day. If you like riding curves, you’ve got to ride that road.

 

Thanks very much for the diary of your trip. Except for the rain it sounds great. I always look forward to your updates.

I am glad that you took Rt 12 through Idaho. I live in Portland and always take that route when I go east. I think it is one of the best roads in the Northwest.

 

Not sure,

Yes we took the Alaskan ferry back down to Bellingham Wa. from Haines. Road on that ferry from Monday night till Friday morning. We at least made two decent stopovers in Sitka and Ketchikan. We had never been through the inner passage before so that was interesting but to me, boring. I would have preferred to ride. Unfortunately I could only get a month off of work and had to fly back from Seattle. We still racked up about 9000 miles on the trip. We started out the begining of the year in Key West so we can at least say we have road from there to the circle. Glad your trip went well too.

Next year I may do the same thing with our bikes and have them shipped out to Seattle and take a few weeks tour through northern California, the northwest then catch Sturgis on the way back home. It's very hard for me to get more than two weeks off at a time. Reality is after 35 years of riding 500K isn't really that much. Never really thought much about that till lately. That's an average of less than 15K a year. 15K is still a lot but when I was younger we would do 30-40K a year! Just like years, after awhile they add up!

Tom

 

We did a 5400 mile trip covering most all the western states the first 2 weeks of May. That Lewis and Clark Trail -Hwy 12 was my absolute favorite! It's gorgeous and the whole thing was awesome! You're right, if you like riding curves, you've got to ride that road!

Have enjoyed reading about your trip. I hope to be able to make the Alaska trip one day too! Glad you had a safe one!

 

What a fantastic thread. Thank you for posting.

 

We left Butte around 8:15. The weather was cool and clear. We took I-90 past Bozeman and then caught US Hwy. 89 south towards the north entrance of Yellowstone. I was surprised at how light the traffic was that close to the Park. We had been to Yellowstone five times previously but never had entered through the north gate. It was clear, windy and cool as we passed Mammoth Hot Springs. Between Norris and Madison Junction we ran into road construction. The traffic was backed up for a mile or two but we finally got through and made it to the Old Faithful complex. We stayed an hour or so and heard there was construction towards the South entrance so we decided to get going. The last 15 miles towards the South Entrance and been chip-sealed but was worked in and swept clean. Still, the posted speed limit was 25 mph. A couple miles from the South gate, the traffic stopped again due to freshly done chip seal and we waited for about 20 minutes for our turn to go. This fresh chip seal lasted another 7 or 8 miles into the Teton National Park. When we finally got out of this fresh gravel, the traffic was heavy, all of us going only as fast as the slowest cars and RV’s up front. Still, we enjoyed driving past the Tetons and finally got to Jackson. We ate at Mountain High Pizza Pie, which was our only reason for going to Jackson. The plan that morning was to go through Yellowstone, drive by the Tetons, eat at Jackson and then backtrack to go out the east side of Yellowstone. But we didn’t want to drive back up through that construction again so we changed our plans. We decided to head south out of Jackson on Hwy. 191 and try to make Rock Springs, Wyoming, which sits on I-80. The first 50 miles or so of this route was a nice ride and then the road straightened out into the high plains. Going this way meant missing going through the Black Hills, but we’ve been to Sturgis 15 times over the years and decided to head for home, via the world’s most boring highway, Interstate 80. We got to Rock Springs around 8:00 pm, having done about 490 miles for the day.
The next morning, Tuesday July 20th, we got on I-80 and rode the 614 miles to Grand Island, Nebraska. We are now a little over 315 miles from our home. My cam chain tensioner was a little noisy as we drove from the lobby to the other side of the hotel. Hope it gets us home.
We haven’t ridden in any rain since that cold day in Alaska, the day before we started back. I may have whined a little about the weather on this trip but I expected that we would experience wet, cold weather and we did. We were prepared for the rain and cold and the only day I really didn’t have fun was that part of the day we drove from Anchorage to Cooper Landing in the rain, on the way to Homer. Other than that three or four hour time period that one day, there was no place that we would have rather been (every minute of every day) than where we were, on our Harley, on the best ride of our lives.

 

We arrived home around 1:00 pm on Wednesday, July 21. Twenty seven day trip, our longest ever. 9663 miles, about 1000 more than I had estimated we would ride before we left. We are a little overwhelmed with 'catch-up' work here on the farm. My daughter tried to keep up on the lawn mowing, but with all the rain here and her job, she got behind. We have a diesel mower with a six foot deck, but nine acres to mow. Also I didn't get the electric fence up around our sweet corn patch before we left and the raccoons have already eated half of our sweet corn. I planted about one-third of an acre of sweet corn. The fence is up and electrified now. The stack of bills and letters is nine inches high and I had over 250 emails.
The cam chain tensioners got us home but they surely must be close to metal to metal, although there is no unusual noise. I pushed the last oil change longer than I wanted or intended, 3500 miles, but our good old Ultra doesn't appear to have used a drop, by the dipstick. I haven't taken the time to get the pictures downloaded on the computer yet. I want to post some in the next couple days.
We were fairly worn out Wednesday night after we got home. That night, we both dreamed we were still on the trip, on the road, in Hermann's game room, at Thumpers cabin, in motels. We are both sad the trip is over.

 

My cost estimate for the trip was:
24 nights motels @ $100.00 $2400.00
24 days food exp. @$50.00 per day $1200.00
8500 miles of gas $1250.00
Misc. $500.00
Total Estimated cost.........................$5350.00

I was a little high on the motel cost. We split rooms with Chriss for four nights. Of our 26 nights on the road, five were with friends or relatives. So we paid for 21 nights total. Because I paid for a lot of rooms with cash, I can't say the exact amount we spent on lodging but the average must have been around $75.00 to $80.00 per night. Before we left I figured we would get 30 mpg average for sure, and it ended up that most of time we got 40 mph. My gas estimate was a little high even though we went more than the 8500 mile estimate. We bought about $200.00 worth of t-shirts, etc. and the $189.00 tire. The fishing trip in Homer and the cost of shipping the fish was about $450.00 total. We took $2000.00 in Travelers checks, and $1100.00 in cash. I bought two $500.00 Visa gift cards and used them up on the trip. (I like to know how much we're spending versus charging everything on a charge card.) We were down to just a couple hundred in cash by the time we left Prince George. Total charged on our regular credit card was $1475. I had about $40.00 in cash left when we got home. That makes the final cost $5535.00. I don't think that is so bad. We ate a couple $100.00 meals in Homer and probably at least 10 $50.00 meals, plus all the ones less than that. We stayed in nice hotels every night except the one in Burns Lake, BC. We ate continental breakfasts in motels if we could, and usually only two meals a day total. We had some beef jerky and snacked on crackers, cheese and granola bars.
Other costs not included above:
Two new HJC full face helmets....$400.00
Two heated vests....................$250.00
HD Passenger headset (eBay)....$100.00
New stock windshield (eBay)......$60.00
Kuryakn Tail bag (eBay).............$115.00
Wal-Mart beaded seat cover......$9.00

I have about 10 new rock chips in the fairing and a couple new chips on the front of each saddlebag. I have a rock ding in the chrome front fork cover. I think a guy with a new bike he plans on keeping might want to get a fairing bra (bro?) before he goes to Alaska.

 

We went across Canada to the east coast and back through the USA in 08. We were on the road 38 or 39 days. When we got home we felt the same. It was hard to head the bike northern direction after leaving South Dakota. Hopefully we can do a few more trips like that, there's lots more country to see