After we rode the Rat Dog together last fall on a Ural GearUp, Vince bought Uncle Blasto's Ural Patrol. We called Uncle Blasto up to see if he wanted to join us. His response was not simply "no" but, "Hell No! That's why I sold the thing!"
I knew he had been up all night with a house full of teenaged girls-every man's dream and every father's nightmare-so I didn't take the rejection personally
We headed up Fir Mountain Road, towards the junction with Huskey Road. The snow got deeper and the road turned steep and winding. The Tiger soon lost its footing and I was forced to stop and chain up. Vince came back to see what had happened to me and found the road surface too slick even with two wheel drive. He was going nowhere until Amy climbed aboard to help him gain enough traction to drive out of the low side of the corner. Once I chained up the Triumph just steamed right up the hill!
It was beautiful up there. A fine crystaline snow was blowing off the ice encrusted trees, which loomed through the fog. The road was a ribbon of white, unspoiled by traffic.
On Huskey Road, I stopped again, to check my chains. Vince came back to make sure I was OK. Just as we finished our palaver a couple of ATVs caught up with us- the only other people we saw out there . They had snow boards strapped to the rigs; we rode together for a ways, until they found a spot to get around Vince.
We dropped off Huskey Road onto Wilson and down to Mosier Creek. We climbed back out of that canyon up the Eastside on Digger Road. We followed Vince along a maze of snow covered cutoffs to his log cabin outside of Mosier proper, near Rowena Dell. Vinces girlfriend, Cindy was there, and thier friends, Trish and Chuckie, had come over to make sushi. I am not big fan of sushi, but I had some oyster, and some soup and a bit of "Hawaiian steak" wrapped in some rice and seaweed. There was also some excellent smoked wild turkey, washed down with warm saki and a can of PBR.
The light was fading when Amy and I made our good byes. We headed towards Mosier and were almost taken out by a ditzy soccer mom who ran a stop sign at the bottom of the hill. Wet snowy roads covered with gravel on a steep down hill makes for an interesting panic stop on the big Tiger. Thank god I have a training wheel!
We climbed South west, out of Mosier canyon on Huskey Road. I had taken the chains off and didn't want to stop to put them back on. It was raining in Mosier and the road was clear until we got quite a ways out of town. It got pretty slippery, but by standing on the rear pegs I could get enough weight over the back wheel to keep climbing. I would lean on the handlebars to get the front tire to bite in the corners. We did OK until just below the summit of Huskey, when I lost it and fishtailed sideways off the road. Amy got out of the sidecar and climbed on back of the bike and we were able to continue without chaining up. Putting all the weight on the bike made the rig a little unstable. The sidecar had a tendency to pop off the ground in corners and over bumps so Amy had to shift between the passenger seat and the sidecar, neither sitting on the bike nor in the hack. When we cleared the top she moved back into the sidecar for the trip back down the other side...
The Fog got quite thick and it was getting dark. The steep descent down Huskey and then Fir Mountain Road was extremely treacherous. We turned back down Swyers Drive, towards home. It was raining again, and most of the snow had melted off the road. We drove through a logging show, the idle equipment emerging from the fog like some kind of alien craft.
As the last light faded we got down off the mountain and pulled into our driveway.
We shed our muddy riding gear and headed for a nice, hot bath!
Sounds/looks like a hoot!