TAT-2016 Post 8 – 27 Sep 2015

Once again I am convinced that buying a lighter bike (Honda CRF250L) compared to the heavier Kawasaki KLR650 was the right choice. Read the following trip report to know why.

On Sunday, 27 Sep two of us trailered our bikes to Mack’s Pines just north of Dover on AR Highway 7 to ride the ATV trails and anything else that we found interesting. Steve and Terry were unable to go for various reasons; Terry fishing of all things and Steve because of a leaking radiator on his KLR. Woodrow rode his bike over to my house the day before and we loaded both bikes onto my trailer to save time the next morning. We left for Mack’s Pines around 7 a.m. with a stop at Conway’s Waffle House for breakfast; only food we had all day.

I have ridden the trails at Mack’s Pines twice in the last 12 months but was on my Polaris 570 ATV. I remembered them being hilly, rocky and with several water crossings. I knew that some were more difficult than I wanted to take Woodrow on for this trip but I thought there were plenty of easier trails that he could handle. I was so wrong and I admit it was a bad idea going there for his first real off road dual-sport riding experience.

For those not familiar with Mack’s Pines it is right on Highway 7 and has plenty of parking for on-off loading plus a small café. The ATV trails are across the highway and are Government maintained; Forest Service I assume. Lots of trails but the terrain is very hilly and most of the trails are going up/down the sides of hills or going across the numerous creeks. There are several scenic overlooks and waterfalls with lots of challenging climbs and descents. The major problem for motorcycles are the steep rocky trails running along some steep drop offs. Not a lot of room to maneuver and any loss of control or climbing inertia results in an unpleasant experience of some sort.

Woodrow had up to this point demonstrated his ability to handle his bike on dirt and gravel roads and even some relatively steep hills. He got to use this experience as soon as we entered the ATV trail complex. The map below shows the area we rode.

As soon as we were on the trails we started climbing, but nothing very difficult at first. The trails on the hills in this area have been groomed to have intermittent bumps (like speed bumps) to help prevent erosion by heavy rain. In other words, you would ride up or down a trail for 50 feet and then there would be a bump and usually a short flat spot on the uphill side. I rode ahead expecting Woodrow would be a short distance behind. When I got to the top of one climb I stopped and waited for Woodrow; he never arrived at the top. I rode back down to find Woodrow standing next to his bike which was pinned against a small tree on the uphill side of the trail.

Woodrow crash number 1! I asked what happen and he said he was coming up the trail but the bike drifted to the downhill side and hit a soft spot of sand. It then immediately dug in and turned to the uphill side and eventually came to rest pointing downhill against a small tree. Hitting the tree had jammed the throttle wide open and he had to jump over to hit the kill switch. No damage to bike or rider. We lifted the bike, got it pointing in the right direction (uphill) and then started the climb again. This time I would slow down at each speed bump until I knew he was progressing steadily up the hill.

We continued riding the trails until Woodrow had another minor incident. Woodrow crash number 2! We were on another climb and I’m not sure what happen but I looked back and saw the bike on its side in the middle of the trail. I parked my bike on a small flat spot and started walking back to help but he had already picked the bike up and started remounting. No damage to bike or rider.

On another climb I encountered some large rocks, took a bad line and I dropped my bike on the downhill side, luckily in a soft spot. Scratched my plastic but no serious damage to bike or rider. See pictures I took of the trail from my resting position on the ground. Mike crash number 1! After getting my bike back up I showed Woodrow the better line to take and he made the climb with no problem.

We now came to the hardest climb yet. This hill was so steep and long that they had put down interlocking paving stones sometime in the past to prevent the trail from eroding due to rain and ATV use. It still had the speed bumps and lots of the paving stones had been washed away so that in places the trail was only a couple feet wide. It also had lots of grapefruit size rocks on the paving stones that had rolled down from up above. It was a sweeping left hand climb around the large hill so we could not see more than 40-50 feet of the trail at one time. I started up and as long as the paving stones were in place and no falling rocks in the way, it was an easy ride even though very steep. I hadn’t even gotten 100 feet up the hill when I encountered one of the speed bumps but it also had missing paving stones just before the bump. To make it worse the speed bump was very steep on the downhill side so you had to goose the power to get over the bump to the flat spot uphill.

I knew this would be a challenge to Woodrow so I stopped on the flat spot uphill of the bump to wait for him to catch up. I was on my bike pointing uphill and holding my handbrake to stop from rolling backwards. He was out of sight around the trail downhill of my position but I could hear him accelerating to start the climb. As he came around the bend he saw the bump, the missing paving stones and me all about the same time. When he hit the bump he applied way too much power and he shot past the rear of my bike towards the downhill side of the trail. All I remember was hearing a loud thump as I turned my head to the right and seeing him solidly hit an 8” tree. The bike ended up on its left side pinned against the tree just above the front fender and against his headlight. It was on the downhill side of the trail and the only thing stopping the bike from siding down into the ravine below was it being against the tree. Amazing the only damage to the rider was a scraped shin he received against the foot peg. I really expected to find significant damage to the bike based on the solid hit I heard and saw but at this point we hadn’t even looked at it to find out.

As soon as I knew Woodrow wasn’t seriously hurt I tried to park my bike but the hill was so steep it was not going to stay on the kick stand so I had to ride to the top of the hill and walk back down to help with his bike. From the point of his accident to the top was several hundred feet and the trail got even worse the higher I rode. I actually had a difficult time evading all the rocks and missing paving stone gaps but finally found a flat spot on top to park my bike. It was a long walk back down hill to Woodrow.

When I finally reach the Woodrow crash number 3 location, I found Woodrow standing in the middle of the trail but his bike had slid down about 10 feet towards the bottom of the ravine. I asked, “how did your bike get down there”??? Woodrow said he had pulled the bike away from the tree to see if it was damaged and it started sliding down the slope but finally came to a stop where it now sets. Now we really had a problem; how were we going to get that bike back up the slope to the trail?

We worked our way down the slope and I said I would hold the front hand brake while we lifted the bike onto it wheels and Woodrow would push from the back to stop it from sliding any further down the slope. We did this and were able to stabilize the bike on its wheels facing up the slope. I started the bike (I love fuel injection) and put it into first gear while I held the brake and clutch. With Woodrow pushing and me revving the engine while slipping the clutch we worked the bike back up the slope to the trail while throwing rock and dirt from the spinning rear tire.

We then inspected the bike for damage. I really expected to see a busted headlight and maybe more damage in that area but the only thing we found was a severely bent gear shift lever where it must have hit a rock. Both mirrors were loose, slightly bent turn direction lights and some scratches on the plastic but nothing else. I told Woodrow his bike now looked like a real dirt bike. Even with the bent gear shift lever the bike could be ridden and even change gears. I told Woodrow that we were not going to the top of this hill and would go down instead and start back to Mack’s Pines parking. He didn’t put up much of an objection.

Our ride back to the parking lot was uneventful even though we had some serious hills to climb. We did go by a neat Waterfall spot even though it was so dry there wasn’t any water running.

When we arrived at the truck we got some tools and bent out the gear shift lever as far as possible without breaking it.

Even though we had just gone through a pretty good workout with three Woodrow and one Mike crashes, we weren’t ready to stop riding. We asked the lady in the office if there were any other trails that were a bit easier and she gave us directions on how to use the roads to get on the back side of the area closer to the Big Piney River. I’ve kayaked the Big Piney many times and was familiar with the roads so Woodrow and I geared up and took off. The ride around the ATV trail area finally got us onto a gravel road that runs parallel to the Big Piney Rive but on top of the ridge line. We stopped for pictures at the Big Piney overlook and then continued on this road down to Indian Creek Low Water Bridge. Lots of gravel riding practice on this road including one area on a sharp switch back where about 3 inches of new loose gravel had been applied. Woodrow took it all in stride; this guy is getting good.

At Indian Creek the water was too low to be an issue but I did get Woodrow to ride through the water and even some mud so he could say he had done both.

We finally started back up the gravel road to the top overlook area. Along the way I spotted a side road I knew would take us back onto the Mack’s Pines trails but I remembered them being easier than what we had previously been riding. The ride down the hill wasn’t too bad at first; mostly logging roads through cleared forest. We then started getting into the rocky trails just like before. Another stupid decision on my part was to continue just a little further. I knew there was an intersecting trail close to the bottom that would take us back to the gravel road and it should be an easy ride; I thought. We finally got to a section that was getting even harder so I said we were turning around. Neither of us was looking forward to riding that same trail back up the hill. It is much easier going down than going up if you didn’t already know that.

We had ridden about 50 feet back up the trail when I spotted the intersecting trail through the trees and brush about 40 feet away. I told Woodrow that was the trail I was looking for and it would take us back to the gravel road and would be easier than the trail we had just came down. We bushwhacked through the trees until we were on the new trail and headed uphill. This trail is pretty good except it has several sharp switch backs and at these spots they were steep and deeply rutted by rain runoff. I would stop at a flat spot and wait for Woodrow to make the same run. He was getting pretty good by now and even though a few stretches were not at all easy, he did great. One stretch in particular had multiple layers of rock shelf on a steep incline and some of the layers were 6 to 12 inches high. I just pointed the bike uphill and hit each ledge head on and the bike kept going even on the 12 inch ledges. I was concerned that Woodrow would not be aggressive enough or be too slow to make it over these ledges but he came up the hill like a pro.

We finally reach the gravel road then head back to Mack’s Pines to finish up the days 25 mile ride.

In retrospect, it was not a good idea to go to Mack’s Pines and I take full responsibility for making that decision. These trails were harder than I remembered but my only experience riding these trails was on an ATV; definitely not a valid comparison. In addition, I forgot that Woodrow has zero experience to draw from and the techniques I take for granted were learned by me over 50 years of riding. On the up side, this day’s ride kicked Woodrow’s riding ability up several notches. He gained much needed confidence and learned how to ride these kinds of conditions. His major problem is not keeping his bike in the power band on climbs. These small 250cc bikes have a narrow RPM range where the bike produces the best power and using the throttle to maintain that RPM while changing gears and slipping the clutch is mandatory. I kept telling him during the whole ride that I could hear his bike lugging in too low an RPM while he tried to make a climb. He gradually got better but needs to improve in this area. All in all he did exceptionally well considering I did my best to kill him taking him to this spot.

As far as the Honda CRF250L, as I stated in the first sentence, I made a good decision. The bike can climb anything I want to attempt and never even hinted that it had reached its limit. As long as I kept it in the right gear and kept the engine in the power band it did all I could ask. In addition and most importantly, it was light enough for two of us to drag back up a steep slope where a heavier bike would not have been successful.

Sorry for such a long winded report but I didn’t want to leave anything out.

One more side note. We must be contagious because another work friend of ours (Dale) bought a used KTM 530 yesterday and says he wants to ride week-ends with the TAT team and even possibly go on some sections of the TAT in 2016. I did inform him that we have high standards for those that ride with us and I wasn’t sure he could qualify. He heard about the trip I just wrote about above so he knows that was a bluff. His bike pictures are below.

Now to plan for this week-ends ride.