Road Trip 2006 Day 4

I spent far too long poking around Calgary before heading out today. After that, I
saw the most beautiful place on earth.

Before leaving Calgary, I stopped in at Blackfoot
Motorsports, the local BMW and Triumph dealer. These guys also sell every other
kind of motorcycle known to man. Blackfoot is far and away the biggest motorcycle
dealership I have ever seen. I got to meet some other riders and talk shit. It was
great. I rode one guy’s brand spanking new (2 months old) R1200GSA around the parking
lot. It sits lower than the R1150GSA. It is seriously an awesome bike.

While I was at the bike shop, I looked into some funny roller noise that I had been
hearing. I checked my front chain cog and it was wearing well, so I loosened my chain
a bit and that seemed to fix it.I have been oiling the chain frequently, but with
all of this weight on the bike, I think it needed a little slack. No problems since.

I finally got out of Calgary headed west on Hwy 1 ab out 10:30 a.m. and was almost
immediately rewarded with the most amazing scenery I have ever seen. I literally cannot
overstate the grandeur of the Canadian Rockies. And the twisties through the snow
covered rocks lasted ALL DAY. Over 250 miles of this and tomorrow it will still be
out there. I don’t have the words.

I stopped here to get a room in Revelstoke and ended up having dinner with another
rider who came out of Vancouver this morning riding on a BMW K1200R. I asked him how
the heck he can stay hunched over that thing all day, but he says that it is quite
comfortable. That bike is awesome, sex on 2 wheels at 160 mph.

I can’t post pics tonight, which is a damn shame. I took over 100 shots and every
dang one of them will be great. Why can’t I post pics tonight? Because while taking
my camera out of my tank bag at about 70 mph on Rt. 1A through the Banff park, I dropped
my camera bag. It had my USB cable in it and it was promptly run over by a car. Now
the tip of my cable is all mangled up and I can’t get it into the camera to pull the
pics off. I will try to find a place to pick one up tomorrow, but considering where
I am, it might be a challenge.

7 a.m. wakeup call.