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Bike Ride? Absolutely!
by Dale Brown, 2007

ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED AT TheBigFiveOh.com Blog @ Yahoo.Com, 01/20/08

I was invited by my friend Michael to dinner at his home in South Lake Tahoe last night. Michael was the guy I rode with to Sturgis in the summer of 2006, and we're always talking motorcycles and destinations (we're thinking about going to Laughlin's River Run in April), and I mentioned that I had triked my Gold Wing with a Champion conversion kit.

Now I'm sure I asked his opinion about whether or not I should do it when we rode to Big Sur and Santa Barbara last summer, but I guess I hadn't told him I actually did the conversion, so he HAD to see it.

Yes, it's mid-January in the mountains around Lake Tahoe, but I said sure, I'll ride it over.

Most of the roads here in town are OK except for the smaller side streets, like the one I live on, so the trike is down in Minden, NV in the (currently empty) airplane hangar. NV-28 and US-50 from town to Minden were clear with a few icy patches here and there. It's relatively warm for this time of year, sunny, maybe mid-40s in Minden and mid-30s up here at Tahoe--great skiing weather, but good riding weather? At night?

I wasn't going to go US-50 back to Tahoe from Minden, though, but over Kingsbury Grade, a steep, winding highway between Minden and South Lake Tahoe. I hadn't driven that road in years, and never on a bike. I remember the spectacular views from some of the hairpin turns and the beautiful Ridge Tahoe Resort at the summit, perched at the very peak. But off I go.

Turned out to be a great ride. No problems there and back. Michael was impressed not only with the trike but the fact that I had ridden it that night in below-freezing weather. I wish I brought a pair of chaps for a little more protection from the cold, but everything else stayed fairly toasty.

It's amazing what your mind can concoct sometimes. I wasn't sure if I was going to do the ride even after I was suited up and got the bike out of the hangar. The roads were OK. It was cold but clear and not snowing. The last snowfall was last weekend, and that had been cleared out. But I still had images of me spinning out, getting frostbite, and getting stuck in a snowbank somewhere. I doubted whether the bragging rights of riding a three-wheeled motorcycle in winter in Tahoe would be worth even the slightest accident.

But everythig went great. I claim the bragging rights! I rode a bike in Tahoe in the winter at night and lived to tell the tale.

Triking the Gold Wing was a good move. I've always been a nervous rider (just as I am a rather overly cautious pilot) and was never totally comfortable aboard a big cruiser like a Gold Wing. Now it's completely stable. Turning the bike at slow speeds is an effort, because the bike wants to go in the direction that those two big rear wheels are pointed, but at freeway speeds it feels just like a two-wheeler. The riding season has already been lengthened and I never thought I'd ever be riding in January in northern Nevada!

It's OK to be cautious and wary, but don't let it get in the way of living your life. Your mind can play tricks on you sometimes. Don't give in to unreasonable fear. Don't be content to play it safe all the time.

But if it turns out that your fears are coming true, don't be afraid to recognize the danger and take action. If I had encountered snow or ice on Kingsbury Grade, I think I'd have the brains to turn around and the courage not to let my ego get in the way of resolving a dangerous situation.

It's one thing to not allow your mind CREATE a danger, and quite another to ENCOUNTER a danger and not do something about it!

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