Sunday, May 27, 2012

Berkshire Big Adventure 2012

Last Sunday I participated in the Berkshire Trail Riders spring ride.  I have been wanting to do this ride for four years but something always got in the way.  This year I cleared the date months in advance.

A number of my friends did the ride but I rode primarily with Craig on a GS1200 and Bill on a Triumph Tiger 800.  I got separated early from a couple of other friends, Beemer Jim and Dr. Mike.  Two others, Andy and Chris, were concentrating on the hero sections.

I got in with a group of four other riders.  Besides Craig and Bill, I rode with Neil, whom I'd never met before, and Tom, who I'd corresponded with on KLR650.net.  Tom came up to do the ride from Delaware.

We stuck to the main route (no hero sections), which was about 115 miles.  About 75-80% of it was dirt, but the paved roads were nice too.  There were only a couple of sections that I would consider challenging for bikes without knobbies.  These had mud, ruts or rocks.  The rest of the route consisted of gravel/dirt roads in isolated areas of the Berkshires.

By the end of the day we were pretty tired, but "good tired."  The bikes did great and there were no mishaps.  I made a couple of new friends and have some stories to share with the old ones too.

Here are some videos of the day:

 This is a 17 minute video of my entire day.

Getting Passed by a Pack of Enduros

Fighting through the Mud

Bannis Road, one of the best sections

I want to thank Vince, who laid out the route, and the rest of the Berkshire Trail Riders for putting on a first class event.  It was well organized and put me on roads I'd never been on before.  If you like adventure riding I highly recommend it.


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