Every year my wife and I take our vacation on Motorcycles. Do any other riders do this? We spend from 12 to 17 days on the road and we enjoy every minute. We meet the greatest people in the country on motorcycles and off them. We start planning the next vacation almost the day we get home. Wondering if any of you are some of the great people we meet out there?

My wife and I travel some on our bike. We haven't gone on any really long trips yet. It is in our plans. I have to replace the stock seat and lower the passenger pegs and replace them with floorboards. Spending $300-400 on the Cobra passneger floorboards isn't thrilling me though. HaHa. Haven't run across many Roadie riders away from home.

Hi Zo I was hoping this thread would take off so we could all compare notes. You know like what is essential to take on trips. Would like to find out how other people pack for long or short trips. We camp mostly, but like to stay in motels at least every 3rd night. Love those long hot,hot, showers after a days ride. How about tool kits? We have both found that the not knowing where we will be the next night makes us both enjoy the experience much more. Its never the destination, its the journey that we love.

You know the best thing I've ever bought for the motorcycle is a vacuum food sealer. Take your rainsuit, first aid kit, toolkit, whatever, and put it in the vacuum sealer and it's compressed and fits better. We leave the barrel bag empty in case we actully have to open everything. If we dont, we stuff souvenirs in there.

Thats a great idea. What you dont need right away would stay air tight and dry too. Every year because of how long were on the road we try a different way of packing. We used army duffle bags one year for clothing and small stuff. Was ok but if you packed wrong in the morning and you needed something on bottom you had to unpack whole bag. There wasnt enough room for all our stuff in the regular bike bags available now. As of right now we use tank bags for small stuff that you need to get at fast and the zip open duffle bags for clothing and other stuff. The gear we take usually consists of cheap sleeping bag, 4 man tent from wal-mart (needed if taking wife) self inflating foam mattress. I added small single burner stove this year because I cant function without coffee in the morning. The one big lesson Ive learned is most things are available on the road so if you do forget something dont worry you can stop and buy it when you need it.

Good morning (at least for me). Here's a link to an interesting website with some pretty neat info (and some strange opinions). http://motorcycleinfo.calsci.com/Packing.html
In the past 5 years I have made 4 major road trips: two on an HD with a buddy, two on my R* with my wife. In the back of my mind is an Alaskan ride. I wonder who has done this on a R* and would be willing to share infomand experiences?
Larry

Hi desertroadie glad to see a new poster. Ive never made the alaska trip but would really like to. Check out this site for some interesting travelogues and a lot of information (http://www.zomd.org/category-166998.html). Ive actually only ran into 2 people on the road riding roadstars. They were a father and son from British Columbia. Most often seen bikes (by us) were Harleys. Noticed that most of long trip riders were in 30 to 40 year old age bracket. Not as many younger people as I would have thought. Us older geezers were difinitely a minority on the long hauls.

Hi<br><br>Post edited by: desertroadie, at: 2004/12/06 23:01

Hi DaGlassGuy,
Ive actually only ran into 2 people on the road riding
roadstars. Ditto that. One couple was in Idaho Falls, the other was on Vancouver Island. These were it on a road trip from Banning, CA (where we live) up through Utah, Idaho, Montana,Calgary, Banff, across Canada to Vancouver, then back thru Washington, Oregon and home. Phew!
I have put together my Travel List that I would like to share with all of you. As always, I open to suggestions and comments. Hopefully I can figure out how to upload the Excel file.
BTW, where do you live, etc.
Regards,
Larry

PS I'll have to convert the file to Word, so I'll get back to you.<br><br>Post edited by: desertroadie, at: 2004/12/06 23:08

Here's my Travel List of stuff and tools. Finally.
Regards,
Larry

PS No luck yet. I keep getting &quot;your file must contain alpha numeric...no spaces.&quot;
That's what I thought a Word doc was. Oh well.<br><br>Post edited by: desertroadie, at: 2004/12/07 09:08