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On The Road with Lou!
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Location Date Mon, 15 August 2016 1471300980 Fri, 06 August 2004 
1091754360
Day 5 found me driving from Whitehorse to Dawson City, a distance just under 500 km, a typical daily mileage total that was well under the miles I ride today. Back in those days I was on my venerable 1988 Suzuki Intruder 1400, a mighty V-Twin stylized after a Harley FatBob, also known as a metric cruiser.
Trudy, as she was affectionately known, was 16 years old at this point, I had bought her new in 1988 for the princely sum of $5500.00 from Alberta Suzuki and she had served me well over the years, only stranding me maybe 50 or so times over the years! (The 1320 cc twin was solid, though temperamental in the spring) I had made good use of my AMA membership over the years. All kidding (or not) aside, she was a good bike and we rode all over North America together. I had racked up about 98 000 miles on her prior to leaving on this trip.
I have always eschewed windshields on motorcycles, I had experimented with a few smaller ones early in my riding career. I remember one called a 'Fly Screen' that I had mounted for a July 4th trip to Couer d' Lane, ID with a buddy Rod Shykowski. For obvious reasons we called him The Cow. He had a buddy named Kamel who joined us, they were both on sport bikes.
During our rest stops I kept adjusting the windshield trying to find an effective angle; it either deflected the wind onto my visor, or my collar or my chest. Eventually I found an effective setting; in the ditch, I uninstalled all the hardware and left it at a roadside stop. I even included the Allen wrench!
I had saddlebags, leather ones made by a famous horse saddle maker (I forget his name but he was the lead guy at Welsh's Saddles) who later committed suicide. I would also put items in a gym bag and bungee cord that on the rear seat, or pillon. This allowed me to lean back on a, somewhat comfy, back rest.
I had my buddy Paul Slevinsky, of Fort Lauderdale fame, weld me up a custom set of highway bars back in 1990, with foot pegs mounted on them way out front. I used them exclusively, even in town, having taught myself to shift gears from that position. I didn't use the rear brake back in those days. Combined with the laid back seating position it was, essentially, the Pap Smear position, a crude but wholly accurate description.
While somewhat comfortable, 500 km days were about the best I could do. Anything above 120 kph and the balanced V-Twin became quite buzzy, it only had a 6500 rpm redline and a buck twenty was 4500+ RPM. Not like the Rocket 3 these days that will do 140 kph at 3200 RPM all day long.
Trudy, as she was affectionately known, was 16 years old at this point, I had bought her new in 1988 for the princely sum of $5500.00 from Alberta Suzuki and she had served me well over the years, only stranding me maybe 50 or so times over the years! (The 1320 cc twin was solid, though temperamental in the spring) I had made good use of my AMA membership over the years. All kidding (or not) aside, she was a good bike and we rode all over North America together. I had racked up about 98 000 miles on her prior to leaving on this trip.
I have always eschewed windshields on motorcycles, I had experimented with a few smaller ones early in my riding career. I remember one called a 'Fly Screen' that I had mounted for a July 4th trip to Couer d' Lane, ID with a buddy Rod Shykowski. For obvious reasons we called him The Cow. He had a buddy named Kamel who joined us, they were both on sport bikes.
During our rest stops I kept adjusting the windshield trying to find an effective angle; it either deflected the wind onto my visor, or my collar or my chest. Eventually I found an effective setting; in the ditch, I uninstalled all the hardware and left it at a roadside stop. I even included the Allen wrench!
I had saddlebags, leather ones made by a famous horse saddle maker (I forget his name but he was the lead guy at Welsh's Saddles) who later committed suicide. I would also put items in a gym bag and bungee cord that on the rear seat, or pillon. This allowed me to lean back on a, somewhat comfy, back rest.
I had my buddy Paul Slevinsky, of Fort Lauderdale fame, weld me up a custom set of highway bars back in 1990, with foot pegs mounted on them way out front. I used them exclusively, even in town, having taught myself to shift gears from that position. I didn't use the rear brake back in those days. Combined with the laid back seating position it was, essentially, the Pap Smear position, a crude but wholly accurate description.
While somewhat comfortable, 500 km days were about the best I could do. Anything above 120 kph and the balanced V-Twin became quite buzzy, it only had a 6500 rpm redline and a buck twenty was 4500+ RPM. Not like the Rocket 3 these days that will do 140 kph at 3200 RPM all day long.
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