The Calistoga Mudbath

January's ride started at the Harbor 15, tucked away in San Rafael. "Don, your directions suck!" was the review from the East Bay contigent, and Don helplessly passed the buck to the absent author of said directions, who later appeared to accept the abuse in person.

Coming from the South Bay in the morning, the precipitation was threatening to dampen the day, only it was hard to tell if it was raining or fogging. Despite that, there was a reasonable turnout of 8 bikes when I arrived at the Harbor 15. The combination of bikes parked out front bugged me -something was missing. After breakfast, when we were preparing to leave, I connected what was wrong: where was Don's K-bike? And who is that person getting on - of all things - an R1100GS?? Well, it looked like Don, he had a beret like Don, he was last getting all his things together like Don, everyone was waiting for him like they would for the Lord of the Tour - but Don, a sworn K-rider, on a boxer, and a GS at that? It didn't compute.

Later, at lunch, Don explained that his K-bike was having some mechanical difficulties and that among the many kind offers of substitute rides, Rick Ellis lived the closest and it was most convenient to take him up on his offer of the gorgeous white R11GS. Don didn't regret it at all.

The roads were wet as we started off on Lucas Valley Road, a nice familiar place to start. This was my first NorCal tour since my hiatus in Virginia, and I am terribly rusty. I found myself feeling intimidated, something I hadn't experienced for a while, but that was moderated by the joy of being in a familiar place - riding behind Russ Drake and Don Allison, (or his lookalike on a GS, I still wasn't convinced), a place I've been so many times before. I felt very lucky to be riding with such good riders, and felt secure that they'd never judge me, or mind if I was riding slow today.

>From Lucas Valley road, we went to Nicasio to Petaluma Road, and then east toward Hwy 12 to Trinity Rd. to Dry Creek Road. There the going got twisty and trashy, my favorite type of riding, except the roads looked very slick. I was told later that they really weren't slick, but they sure *looked* that way. Still, I backed off when I found myself struggling to keep up -experience has taught me not to try . I mused that I'd never seen Don ride so fast, especially on this type of road. He was whizzing along like it was nothing, with complete confidence and no hesitation. Had I been away too long? I'd never seen Don ride that fast!

We took lunch at a ritzy yuppie Wine Country place called Mustards near Yountville. Tablecloths, even! Despite our trooping in and taking over the back room and perhaps offending the tastes of the other guests, they were very kind and we had a satisfying, upscale lunch. There we ran into Ray Trujillo, and Russ could complain directly to the source about the directions to Harbor 15.

The weather had cleared up somewhat, with on-again-off-again sun, drying out areas of the roads that weren't shady. Overall, the day was a spectacular variety of shades of gray in the sky and green on the ground.

At lunch, we lost Rick Ellis and passenger David, but gained Ray, so kept the number of bikes steady. We took Hwy 128 to Berryessa-Knoxsville road, one of my favorites. It's a nice long road with parts to satisfy all tastes - first with moderate winding curves, a narrow and trashy section, finished off with huge wide sweepers. I'd warmed up enough by now to keep the leaders in sight on the curves, though I'll admit to some serious demands on my R65's throttle in the straights.

I got behind when I stopped at what I knew was the last port-o-potty for 30 miles, and then spent the next 15 minutes hoping I could catch the last riders in the group, who I'd assumed had passed me. No worries - I soon came across the ride leaders at the other side of a water crossing, waiting for the group, and plunged across the crossing to join them. Don and Bill asked where the rest of the group was, and I was very confused. How could they be behind me, they'd passed me when I'd stopped! Or so I thought. Oh well, they all showed up, minus Ray who'd peeled off for gas and then took his own way from there.

Don and Russ commented on my no-holds-barred water-crossing technique, which I hadn't given much thought to. Yeah, I guess you should slow down, though most of my water crossing experience on BMW's is of the unpaved variety, in which slowing down can have disastrous consequences.

Well, I didn't account for the slime factor in paved crossings. In a later crossing, among the shallower and shorter of the day, about halfway through, I lifted my legs up straight, ostensibly to keep water off my boots, but really just because it's fun. This motion was just enough to upset the bike, and the rear end slid out to the left, starting a graceful 360° spiral slide with me on the bike the entire time. We landed facing almost forward on the road, out of the water, with the bike tipped over on its right up the hill. I hopped off, picked it up, pointed it forward and kept going. I'm told it was all rather pretty! (yeah, pretty stupid). Sorry, guys. Slow riding no one minds; stupid riding people mind.

Still, after that very benign slideout, I was feeling pretty good and stuck on Don's tail, task though that was, on the remainder of the bumpy part of the road. This was very much like the GS rides that are always my favorite kind, right on the tail of a terrific GS rider on a nice trashy road - but with Don?! He's been holding out on us! On the fabulous sweeper part of the road, I bowed to my superiors and Russ and Bill and Daryl took off, with Don still feeling no pain in the lead, even on the sweepers.

We took a break in Lower Lake, where at least one wanton voice was heard to cry out "look at my bike!!!," apparently in complaint about the dirt. Six or so water crossings does indeed take its toll on the shine.

Then we made the last leg to the meeting, heading south on Hwy 29 through Middletown and into Calistoga. I hate 29 into Calistoga - it's extremely twisty and fast with way too many cars, it always scares me. And I can never understand how it seems the curves are greater than 180 degrees. How does it go anywhere?

We arrived at the meeting in plenty of time, glowing and feeling good from a great ride. No one more so than Don, who by now looked completely natural on Rick's GS. "We bonded," Don admitted during the meeting. Well, so did I as I always do on these rides. What a great day to break my absence from this great bunch. Thanks, guys.

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