My friend and fellow long-time NAXJA member Andy Steiner passed away, the natural memorial run to honer his life was Mojave Road. A group of us got together and had a good time on the trail.
See more below:
For this trip the plan was to meet my dad on the way, team up, and have him drive the Jeep while I rode my DR350. It seemed like a good idea and would give me some more moto miles for 2015. I loaded up and left my house Friday afternoon for the long slog out to the Eastern side of Mojave Road.
Loaded up for the freeway run.
As expected we arrived to the east side of the trail late. We had a couple beers with Derek and Josh then crashed out for hte night, I opted to sleep in the Jeep with the kids. We met the rest of the group at the Avi Casino in the morning to start the trip.
Lined up and ready to go.
Ready to ride.Now it’s time for dirt. Not many pictures out of the gate since I was being the awesome dirt bike of the group. I made it a whole 13 miles into the trail before the DR350 quit on me. Damnit.
The slow pace of the group caused the bike to get a bit warm, this allowed me to blow out the intake tube gasket causing the bike to run lean. I adjusted the fuel mixture screw to try to compensate for the leak but it was still running like crap. When I pulled into Fort Piute the idle spiked to 2000 rpm just as I committed to a full lock turn. Off went the bike out from under me, it was quite spectacular! No injury to bike or myself, I was just mad that I didn’t have my GoPro.
Since it was still running poorly I decided to call it. In order to save potential for melting down the head I opted to load it up on the trailer and finish the trip with air conditioning. Off road trailers rule.
My father leaving a donation in the can.
There are many things to see along Mojave Road. It is impossible to see everything on a simple two day run. For this trip we explored Death Valley Mine (which is nowhere near Death Valley), an area I had not visited before. This is a great spot with a lot of recent history mining relics.
House and office.
Sebastian actually bent down and asked me “Daddy, what are these?” I couldn’t resist laughing.
Sean and Danny inspect an old winch.
After about an hour we got back on the road as we had some serious miles to make.
My dad signing in at the flag pole.
Exploring a mine loading station near Afton Canyon.
Dropping into Afton Canyon.All in all it was a great time on Mojave Road and a great way to remember Andy while having fun. I need to get out there again and spend more time exploring at a slower pace. There are more photos available here.