Mic's Adventure

The Motorcycle Adventures and Projects of Mic

February Roundup

Mar 1

Posted by Mic in Roundup | No Comments

February has now come and gone, and we are now on our way to March! Spring is just around the corner, or if you are here in the Northwest, you have been enjoying a taste of it for some time now!
This month should be an exciting month!
We’ll have a look inside a KLR for a 685 Big Bore Kit, a 3 day weekend shakedown camping trip, and a new rider review as well as Research Overload coming up!

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Weekend Wrap-up: High’s, Low’s, and Somewhere In Between

Feb 22

Posted by Mic in The Breeze | 1 Comment

As February gets closer to its end, mother nature decided to throw us a curve ball. Instead of the typical rainy weeks of misery we tend to get around here this time of year, she gave us one beautiful week, and an absolutely gorgeous weekend.

Mid 50 temperatures, clear, cloudless skies, and beautiful snow capped mountains surrounding us. It really has been a wonderful time so far this year with our weather.

My weekend started early, due to putting in my 40 hours earlier in the week, and getting Friday off because of this.

Friday ended up being a great day.

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Weekend Wrap-Up: My First 500 Miles with Sara

Feb 17

Posted by Mic in The Breeze | 2 Comments

Breakfast in Napavine. Sarah waits outside.

Breakfast in Napavine. Sara waits outside.

So I am a few days late writing my weekend wrap-up, due to being overwhelmed with work.

The weekend was mixed with some parts of joy and some parts of frustration.

It ended up being a beautiful ride down on Saturday, minus the monsoon I rode through in Olympia. All I can say is thank god for my TourMaster Defender 2-piece Rainsuit!  It kept me completely dry through the whole ordeal.

After stopping in Napavine to top off the fuel tank, and grab some breakfast at BK, I pushed on down to Vancouver to meet up with GusGus, my co-rider for our Arctic Expedition Trip.

After Vancouver, I pushed on down the Columbia River Gorge towards Hood River.  The one thing I absolutely hate about The Gorge, is the wind.  Fighting wind gusts of over 40mph really can fatigue you, especially the neck.

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Rider Review: Helmets – Arai (Profile)

Feb 11

Posted by Mic in Rider Review | No Comments

Arai Profile - Carr Freedom Edition

Arai Profile - Carr Freedom Edition

I decided with spring just around the corner, and that time of year when Motorcyclists tend to start buying new gear, that I should probably get around to a Helmet Review.

Like many people, I have multiple helmets. Each one fits its own purpose, each one a different manufacture.

The range in cost of my helmets is anywhere from $150 paid, to $700 paid. So it becomes a surprise when people ask me, which one do I trust the most, and I respond with “All of them”.

The truth is, I’ve seen all of these helmets in action. One of them, I have seen personally one to many times in action, and I am thankful it did its job, as watching one of your best friends hit the pavement, head first at over 55 miles per hour, is one of those events you wish upon nobody.  The fact is, we wear helmets for this very reasoning, and without getting in to deep into the politics around whether or not we should be given the choice to wear them on our own free will, I myself would most likely always wear one while on a city street.  I have personally seen some strange situations happen at speeds less than 10 miles per hour, hell, I’ve been involved in those same situations.  And smacking your head hurts, regardless if you are seriously injured or not!

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And I call her “Sara”

Feb 10

Posted by Mic in The Breeze | 3 Comments

My 2008 KLR650 that I call Sara

Yesterday I picked up the bike that will carry me to the Arctic Circle and beyond this summer.

I call her Sara, as it is a name that is adventurous, and so it fits well with her intentions.

This bike, I have been interested in since last fall when a buddy of mine told me about it. It belonged to a friend of his, and I had always thought it was a pretty dang nice setup.  I really didn’t know how good of a setup it was until I went and took a peek at it on Sunday.

I have to say, that I am happy that I purchased it.  Not only was it an excellent deal, but the fact is, after I test rode a couple different KLR’s over the weekend, and got a feel for how well they handle, and how well balanced they actually feel underneath you, I was hooked.

Not to mention, the KLR has a huge fan base, with an extremely large selection of aftermarket bits and pieces.  It really surprise’s me just how much time and dedication is put into these bikes.  The loyalty that the community that rides these, have into the bikes is pretty amazing.  It reminds me a lot of the XT225 community which has very little aftermarket manufacture support, so the community stepped up and fabricated for it.

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A Productive Weekend (Well, kind of)

Feb 8

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New Oversized Footpegs

What a weekend!

The Weekend started on an up beat when I got home from work on Friday and my oversized footpegs were in the mail waiting for me.

The XT225 does not have a huge amount of aftermarket support, and one of the area’s that it really shows is in the footpegs.

A gentleman in Arizona makes these oversized pegs, and while I am ecstatic that I got them, I’m a bit sad that this is one of the final sets he will manufacture.

As you can see from the picture to the left, they are much larger than the stock pegs. Also, the stock pegs have rounded serrations on them, where as the new ones are pointed, given them much better bite into the sole of your boot.

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No Time to Waste

Feb 4

Posted by Mic in Adventure | 4 Comments

It is now just over 4 months until my departure from Seattle Washington up to Inuvik, Northwest Territories and I can’t help but look at the last couple months and how fast they really have gone.

It seems only a couple weeks ago I had finalized my route, spoke with Gus about it, and he agreed to come along.  So with that date coming closer, I have also realized I still do not really have the bike I would like to do this trip.

Before I purchase a new bike, I really need to get rid of one of my other bikes. Regardless if it is the Track bike, or my R6 Street bike, I need to get rid of them. I don’t have the room, nor the resources to just go out and purchase a new bike (oddly enough, I cringed when doing tax returns and realized my pay cut I took last year would have bought me a new BMW R1200GSA in full. Youch).

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Facebook and Twitter Pages!

Feb 1

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Throwing these out there… Way out there…

Become a Fan of Mic’s Adventure on Facebook!

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January Roundup!

Feb 1

Posted by Mic in Roundup | No Comments

Well another month has come and gone, and the new year is in full swing now!  Spring is just around the corner which will mean warmer weather, and more riding!

If you missed any of the articles in the last month, take a look, click and read! Hopefully they are as enjoyable for you to read, as they are for me to write.

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Research Overload: Multi-Fuel Stoves

Feb 1

Posted by Mic in Research Overload | No Comments

So here I am, finally getting around to getting a new Research Overload up!

Let me first start off by saying, that researching Stoves had to be one of the most arduous tasks I’ve done in a long time. I thought that researching a tent was hard, but it seemed like everyone loved their brand-x stove more than any other stove for xyz reasons over and over.

I stumbled across many articles such as this one that you see before you, of first time buyers who wrote up comparisons of their findings and continued on with information they found here, or there, and before long I realized after reading a million of them (ok, maybe like 20), that a lot of it was just terrible information. Information, that even myself, not knowing a thing about these stoves, knew wasn’t right.

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