The end

August 21st

I drove till 3 am and then Ty and Duane took over.  Breezed right through the border back into the good ol USA around 7 am.  Down through Michigan, through Ohio, and then back into PA.  Arrived home around midnight.  From Dryden, Ontario to Lancaster, PA was about 1560 miles and took 26 hrs to drive.  

It was a little disappointing to not be able ride the whole way home on our bikes but after putting over 6500 hard miles on our bikes we were alright with hauling them home.  Tylers bike now has over 50,000 miles and Duanes is well over 30,000 which is a lot of miles on a dual sport motorcycle.

From the burning hot desert of New Mexico to the high peaks of Colorado to the rolling cattle county and snow caped Tetons in Wyoming to the cold, wooded mountains in Montana we saw so much beautiful country that is it hard to remember it all.  It was a trip of our lifetimes and one that we’ll never forget.

Thanks to all of you that were praying for our safety as I know we made good use of those prayers.  I have lots of pictures and video to edit yet so look for more pictures, video, and facts about the trip that the GPS has been keeping track of the whole trip.

Thanks for following along, I hope you enjoyed it  :D

Not quite the way we planned

August 20th

After searching at cycle dealers and hardware stores for a metric nut that would work we came up empty.  So we started crunching numbers on which would be the best way to get home.  We figured renting a uhaul would be best because it would allow for us to get home in time for all of us to get to work on Monday morning.  The closest uhaul place that was open and had what we needed was four hours away in Thunder Bay.   So I jumped on the my bike and headed to Thunder Bay while Ty and Duane would head that direction towing Duane’s bike.  I broke my record for longest ride without getting off as I rode 210 miles before stopping at the uhaul place.  Threw the bike in the back and headed back towards Dryden to find Duane and Ty.  Ran into them about 60 miles east of Dryden, they towed that bike over 100 miles.   Loaded the other two bikes up and headed back towards Thunder Bay around nine pm.

Canada's not being very nice to us

August 19th

Found some grub at an A&W and headed for Winnipeg.  Arrived at around 1 pm and found some wifi and plugged in with home while Duane took a link out of his chain because it was out of adjustment and still stretching rather rapidly.  Rode another three hours and pulled over for quick break and guess what?  There was oil dripping out the bottom of Duane’s cycle.  Crap!  The plan of attack was to just add oil and make it to the next town and then see what we needed and what our options were.  Duane went first so we could watch for oil leaking out.  Went about half a mile and his back wheel got shiny black, so I pulled up beside him and got oil spritzed all over me because what I saw wasn’t good.  There was oil just dumping out the bottom of his cycle!  I hollered on the radio he better shut her off if he didn’t want a sized up drz 400.  The next town, Dryden, ON, was about 40 miles away so we got out the tie strap we took for just this situation.  Tyler had a heavy-duty clutch in his 350 so we used that as the tow machine.  I headed into town ahead of them to see what I could find out about any dealers in the area and find a place to stay.  The dealer in town didn’t open till nine the next morning so we stayed the night in Dryden.  That evening we determined that the nut came loose on the sprocket shaft which allowed the seal on the shaft to come out which allowed the oil to find its way out.  The nut’s threads were a striped out which was all we really needed to get it running again, so that was our first thing to do in the morning.

Homeward Bound

August 18th

Up at daybreak and on the road shortly after.  Hit up a Tim Horten's for breakfast and kept on motoring East.   Around noon time we pulled into a visitors center just into Saskatchewan for a quick break.  Turned out it wasn't as quick break as Tyler's cycle had a breakdown.  The rear wheel bearings hard gone out completely.  The closest suzuki dealer was 200 miles away and couldn't get any bearings till Monday.  Well that didn't really help us as we needed to be home by then.  We started looking into renting a uhaul for the rest of the trip back and the two ladies in the visitors center overheard what had happened and the predicament we were in.  One of them says she thinks there is a machine shop about five miles away that has lots of bearings.  Even though we didn't think  there would be any way they would have the correct bearing we though it was worth a shot to check.  So Duane and I threw the tire on the back of my bike and rode down to the shop to see what they had.  Turns out they had all three bearings we needed and even did the work to install them.  We were surprised and very thankful, as we very easily could be bouncing home in a uhaul right now.  So after our two hour delay we were back in the saddle again and rode hard till around 11 pm where we stopped in Carlyle, SK.  The campground was full in town so we made use of the dugout in the ball field next door.  In spite of the bearing issue we still managed to get just over 600 miles covered for the day.

Stage two: COMPLETE!

August 17th

Cranked up the fire again this morning before we left and it felt great as it was a little chilly again.  Hit the trail around 7 and around noon time found some pavement which took us just south of Glacier National Park.  Took the road to the sun across Logan Pass in Glacier.  Very beautiful views of the mountains and a few of the remaining glaciers in the park.  Well worth the cost to travel through the park.  Popped out on the East side of the park and was only about 10 miles from the border between the U.S. and Canada.  So up to Canada we headed.  Went right across the border with out any problems and motored on up to Cardston, Alberta where we found a campground to spend the night.  As we crossed the border we completed the Continental Divide trail, which was what this whole trip was about.  It was an incredible ride through so many different landscapes and climates that sometimes it was easy to forget that we where in the same state or even country.  Our next leg of the journey we most likely be the hardest as we plan to be home by Sunday evening and have around 2500 miles to do in 4 days.

Haven't wrote this much since high school

August 16th

We awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of our bikes crashing to the ground and the sound of claws tearing apart the bikes.  As we lay there trembling in our little hammocks I realized that I shouldn't mislead you like this.

It was freezing cold in the morning, there was frost over everything, so we packed up as fast as we could and headed towards Dillion for some hot breakfast.  Found a diner and I drank more coffee in one sitting then I had  in all my previous years put together.  Weird what the West does to a person.  =)  When we hit the road again it had warmed up to 50 degrees and it felt wonderful!  Into the mountains we shot for the story of the day.  A big hill climb on Fleecer mountain.  What makes this hill challenging is it's length and the loose gravel the whole way up.  It really wouldn't be to hard without all the weight we had with our luggage and low offroad gears.  Duane headed up first and looked like a cowboy trying to ride a bronco.  The loose gravel had him flying all over the place.  He hung on though till just about the top, high enough that Ty and I could hardly see what was happening way up there, were he laid it over.  Ty tried next and puttered right up for the most part.  He had a low first gear and the best tire among us.  So that leaves me.  I didn't have a lot of confidence after seeing how the other bikes handled because my bike was geared higher and is much heavier making it hard to handle.  So up I went, about a third of the way, till the first real steep part, were the bike thought it knew best and started flying all over the place and ended up sideways on the hill and stalled.  Well anybody that rides motorcycle knows what happened next.  The bike and I started rolling down the hill, me first and the bike chasing me.  I managed to stop it after about three rolls and picked it up and nothing was broke at all.  These bikes are tough buggers for all we put them through.  Duane ended up coming back down and trying again and made it up about the same distance as before, but with Ty's help he got going again and made it to the top,  I headed back down the mountain and drove around and met them on the other side.  I wasn't going to push my luck and have something major break that would cost me the rest of the trip.

We carried on, on some nice dirt roads and make it into Butte MT(pronounced butt by Tyler :D) where we decided to change our oil again.  After riding around town for awhile we found a dealer and took care of that job in the parking lot.  Our GPS lead us into National Forest ground next were we found a nice place to camp and even had our first campfire of the trip on the last night of camping on the CDT.  We thought it best not to cook anything after last nights grizzly experience.  :D

Words really can't express, but I did try =)

August 15th

The motorcycle dealer we planned to get tires at opened at 9 so we showed up just a little after and each of us found a tire that suited us.  Till we got the tires changed and some lunch it was about 1 in the afternoon.  We headed up through Idaho to Montana and into some of the most beautiful country we’ve been through yet.  We did a little detour on a mountain called the Gravelly Range.  The road went up through the valley, then climbed up to near the top at 9500 ft and came back down the top of the ridge making a 75 mile loop of stunning scenery.  Sadly we don’t have many pictures of this because Duane’s camera’s battery went dead and mine and Ty’s died.  Tylers died of old age and the other day I dropped mine at 60 mph and it didn’t survive.  90 percent of my pics were taken on the bike while moving right along so I guess it was just a matter of time till it hit the pavement.    Anyway it was a awesome ride way up in the Rockies as the sun was setting in the west shinning amber rays down over the rocky peaks stretching into the sky.  It was breathtaking to see and it did literally take our breaths away because of the height and the fact that it was about 40 degrees and windy enough to blow you off the road.   I did manage to ride to an old snow drift from last winter and make an snowball.   Till we worked our way down the mountain the sun had made it’s journey down below the mountains in the west.  So we headed up the valley towards Dillion, MT.  As the moon started peaking up in the East we cooked some soup and ramen noodles for supper and then drove a couple miles down the road from our food to camp because apparently we are in grizzly country.  I’m not to worried about them but better safe then sorry, especially since none of us are packing any heat because of wanting to come home through Canada.