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10th Annual High Sierra


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10 Years!  I am very proud of my friend @Eric Hall for putting together this event and hanging on strong for the past 10 years.  No doubt it has had its ups and downs due to unforeseen circumstances such as fire bans, closed roads and covid.  But let's not talk too much about that stuff and focus on this great community.  I have probably been to at least four of these and have met many friends and continue to meet new one's too.  If you are a new rider to the adventure community you will find this rally to be a great place to stretch your legs because there is so much variety out here that you will be tested.  

We all know mental and physical fitness is a must when riding big bikes.  Prep your bike for the unexpected, prep yourself with a good knowlege of the area, gps track/routes and your chosen gps unit.  All of this will come in handy.  (more on this later)  You will be rewarded with an awesome experience if you keep your mind open and it will leave lasting impressions.  This is what has kept me coming back for more year after year.

The weather this year was wow!  It was super cold and crisp in the mornings but it has been colder in the past!  Wake up early, the sunrises are breathtaking, plus you get to get first crack at the hot showers.  Brown's  Owens River campground is very popular among families and fishing so trekking around the campground even for a short walk is so relaxing.  My pup "Dodger" enjoyed his time meeting the cow's and listening to the howling coyote's in the middle of the night.  He was actually quit calm listening to them near by!  

Bob, Jason, Greg, Shane, John, Westen, and Barry were the riders up to the challenge this year in blazing some uncharted tracks. Hope we can add these to the already existing tracks of the past year's.  We had to be pretty creative on where we went this year.  Greg pretty much closed his eyes and plotted some way points on Google Earth.  Have I mentioned to "never follow Greg yet?" Like I said if you keep an open mind it will leave you with lasting impressions and experiences.  

All of our tracks are preserved in either the Rever app or on our Trail Tech Voyager Pro sd cards so we can definetly share them if you would like.  

Crowley Lake is also known as the "Raster Loop"  it is a great place to warm up the dirt legs and let loose.  Where else can you ride on a beach? Such a mix of terrain of soft silty sand, berms, whoops, hill climbs and decents.  Gets the juices flowing for what the High Sierra's has to offer.  

A sure hit for a good meal is Copper Top BBQ located in Big Pine so do put this waypoint in the GPS, worth the journey.  Death Valley Root beer and the tri-tip is one of my favs.  

I hit some axle deep ruts this year a couple of times and one actually got me pretty good.  Westen and Jay helped get me out of the rough and we moto'd on.  

Bob and Jason looking sharp on the Harley Davidson Pan America's.  I was surprised they had enough energy to test ride after all the riding we did early in the day.   

At a gas stop I noticed some "grease" on my right inner boot.  At a closer look it happened to be my rear brake reservoir sight glass has burped some brake fluid.  After much back and forth on what to do I decided a little duct tape and a zip tie would do the trick  and my ride was back on.  It held up ok with no loss in brake pressure.  Oh well one more thing I'll have to repair when I get back to my garage, all part of the adventure.  

This year I actually stopped to see the petroglyphs near Fish Slough.  Pretty incredible to see and great to take a much needed break after some very long hauls through Casa Diablo.  We made our way up through Chidago Canyon and this place is always a blast.  

Some more pics below of camp antics and friends.  Shane is offering Tacos next year while Greg drives his truck around the campground, so wait for it.  

Paul did a great job as always meeting and greeting riders as well as selling raffle tickets for Motarrad Angels.  Such a great cause!

See you next year!

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Sorry for the delay with the recent site maintenance and professional photos shot by MotoLady.

The site thing was actually my fault. We did a platform upgrade but since I’d deleted our Twitter feed last January without telling our tech person (oops) he had to manually fix everyone who’d joined using their Twitter login credentials. Really sorry.

MotoLady said “a week or two” with some teaser pics first for social media purposes. It’s been a week so let’s wait a bit on those. She’s been traveling and had two funerals to attend to so it’s been a bad week.

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I can’t take credit for the event because the entire community helps make it happen.

I would like to thank our many sponsors because they have helped us continuously and like the feeling the funds raised go to a good cause. Harley Davidson and GIVI dug deep this year but also: Sena, Klim, Marlondo Leather, Dunlop, DoubleTake Mirror, Maxima Racing Oils, Rigg Gear and new this year: KTM USA!

On the community side, we had a few who really stepped up to the plate.

As he has consistently for both High Sierra and Mojave, know that Paul Costello works his butt off to help get people checked in and is responsible for selling so many raffle tickets.
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Arwi Odense and his lovely wife Maria also helped out with drinks and ice

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Photos by @motolady are up!  Click here

Use them how you like but please attribute photo credit to MotoLady/Alicia Elfving.  She worked hard for us and this is her livelihood.  Let's help her out.  hashtags: xladvhighsierra2021

Here are a few examples

 

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