I am so sorry to hear about your friend RC, god bless.

geeze, that's terrible. sorry man.

Thanks guys.
Here's the article honoring him:

http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/art...in%20spirit%92

I'm afraid I'm going to miss his service, being stuck here, deep in the heart of Texas for work.

Hey finepooch, I was born and raised a texan, but spent most of my adult life in the military. I traveled to alot of cold and warm places and lived in many as well. I did a "winter survival course" in Antartica. Now that was cold. The warmest day we had was -40*f below zero and the wind blew constantly about 50 - 60 mph. I spent the whole 3 weeks wearing every piece of clothing I had and never got out of my sleeping bag. I walked around with my feet in the corners of it with just the barrel of my MP5 and my nose sticking out. Worst time of my life!
Nothing was down there. Never saw anything that lives, not even a Penguin. I'm sure they have them but never saw one. Oh yeah, it was 88*F this afternoon when I rode to work and it will be around 70 when I leave to go home in about 30 minutes. Sooo, I am very thankful for the weather, although July and August will be miserably HOT!

my neighbor knows what he's doing. moncton april to oct, florida nov to march!

after i pay another 30 years of dues i hope to go to arizona or california for the winters. hopefully i'll still be riding and enjoying the mountains and weather in the south west.

For all you frozen tundra types:
http://www.motorcycle-usa.com/394/26...le-Review.aspx

saw that at the bike show. looks interesting. there are videos of it on youtube

I am off to Colorado next week for four days of testing the new 2010 snowmobiles. Yep, snow is fine with me :)

P.S. sorry about your pal RC

I'm in Texas right now. 85 degrees in February just seems wrong.
Everybody has their air conditioners running. Gotta get these gas-turbines balanced for the peak load season that starts in a couple weeks I guess.

I LOVE winter!! Let it snow!!!

Can I go home now?

thanks, mikstr.

Everybody's been geting too complacent lately. We have a snowpack that tends to stabilize quickly. People have been pushing the envelope for a long time now. I've been saying someone is going to get caught. In fact I'be been a little lax in my assessments, too.

Unfortunately, it was a long-time friend. I have to thank him for the wake-up call.
I hope his sacrifice will prevent others from making the same mistake.

This is way late on this post but
#1) Skokie, am I blind or do you too not have a location on your avitar?
#2) I cant believe something like the weather got this many responses.

P E A C E O U T

We lost 8 snowmobilers within minutes in a couple of avalanches in BC in early winter. Despite our heightened knowledge and awareness, Mother Nature can lash out at any time. As I head off into the Rockies next week (we'l be testing mountain sleds for the first time), it'll surely be in the back of my mind.

Yes, I'm well aware of that tragic event.
We've been planning to make a ski trip to that area, but haven't made it happen, yet.

Around here, we talk about the weather a lot.
Yes, we vacation in the snow, too!

Motorcycles are good when the skiing is over. They compliment each other well.

Toys for every season... ahhhh, the good life :)

yup, my little weather thread has got legs!
we're getting our first thaw of the winter. yesterday, today and tomorrow all above freezing. unfortunately winter has more punches to pull. more snow coming sunday and monday.

Hey finepooch.

Speaking of legs. I haven't been to New Brunswick, but my wife and I went on a bicycle tour all around the south end of Nova Scotia, last August. It was a great trip and the people were really friendly. NS was nice because it's expensive for all the bloody Americans to get their cars over there, so traffic was really light.

We had beatiful cool, cloudy, warm, sunny and some foggy weather. No rain. What a great trip!

That would be some great motorcycling country. I'd like to get to NB some time.

rcvtr,

ns is ok, nb too. i live here and think the grass is greener on the other side! i do like the light and relaxed traffic here though. i've been to la, lv, pheonix, sf, fresno, etc..., but not tahoe. i love the sw.

the south shore of ns is nice. the bridgewater/lunenburg area is very nice. one of my old college buddies and a customer live there, both bikers. i visited them a couple years ago and we rode some nice roads, #331 & #332.

another road in ns, closer to nb, is #209. it's really good, twisty and hills overlooking the bay of fundy. this road has very, very light traffic.

come to nb and make sure you let me know you're coming. i'll let you use my snow blower!!! hahahahaha!!!

More on the way...

http://northstarsnow.blogspot.com/

Sure glad I have my trusty Honda...


snowblower!

My wife and I were in NS in August of '04. We went up to Cape Breton Island after staying in Halifax a couple of days. The road around Cape Breton is great, with no cars when we were there. Unfortunately we were driving a rental Explorer, and that was a year before I got my VTR.

I'm here to tell you, if you haven't ridden the mountain roads in Northern California (and there are a lot of them), you have no idea what you are missing. Light traffic and f'in' miles of twisties. Pick a spot to start, by throwing a dart at the map and you will need a face shield to keep the bugs out of your teeth. If the dart hits the (ughh) central valley, you'll have to unzip your leathers and take off your gloves for a while, but other than that you really can't go wrong. Mountains everywhere.

Most of California has nothing to do with SF and LA.

If any of you come to the Reno-Tahoe area, I can hook you up. And provide guidance for a lot of Nor-Cal. But it's a BIG place. I haven't ridden all of it.

RCVTR,
Sorry to here of the loss of your friend. My wife lived in Bishop from '85 through '89, and did a lot of back country skiing and climbing on the East Side. She feels your pain. A friend of hers died years ago with 3 or 4 others on a 14,000er outside of Bishop.

Thanks!
She probalby new Alan Bard. My wife knew him. I never had the pleasure.

It's easy to lose sight of the inherent dangers, because it's so much friggin' fun.

I'll be ragin' as long as I can!

Yes, she knew Alan Bard and his wife at the time. Good mountain vibes, she says.

One more thing, then Im shutting this thing off.

I made it sound like Northern Cal was better than So Cal for riding. When I mentioned the dart on the map, I was picturing the whole California map. Some of my most memorable riding has been in the Sierra and Coastal mountains of (northern) So Cal.

So many roads, so little time...

the roads in california are amazing. i remember # 9 through saratoga. #1 of course. other roads, but not north of sf. i've been to one other place with roads as good or better than ca - smoky mountains and blue ridge parkway.

i hear what youre saying about california not being la and sf. i was in la in dec. what a dump that place is.

cape breton! my grandparents are from there. youre talking about the cabot trail. i've never ridden it. a year ago there was talk of going there summer '08 but it didn't happen. maybe this summer.

i'm surprised how many of you have been to ns.

honda... snowblower! they throw snow!!! i've got a bcs tractor with the blower attachment. it's gear drive with no belts to slip. i think the honda blowers are similar.

got my blower worked over. found a local truckinduc type. he fixed things up real good. more snow coming monday.

Northern gentlemen, please note the photo.........THIS IS YOUR WINTER SPEED/ MOTION SPORT IN NORTHERN CLIMES!!

Here in the Republic of Massachusetts we also share the gift of much snow. Further, it's frequently embellished with large doses of slush, ice and then we make it as destructive as possible to bikes and riders with enormous quantities of gravel and salt on the roads. You can wear your most awesome snowmobiling one-piece and heated underwear and gloves, but your ass is still going down on the sand or ice and your bike is still gonna be digested by the salt!!

So my advice is take the boards, wax em, sharpen em and head for the hills. Believe me when I tell you there's all the rush you could look for flying down a mountain on your feet at 50MPH!!

Pretty soon mud season will allow us to pull out the bikes and get them ready for a season that's all that more special for it's brevity.

just finished snowblowing the driveway again. now off to hockey, with considerably less energy.