Motorcycle travel through Utah - Motorcycle Mojo Magazine

In the Ups and Downs of Utah

What do you do when you’ve spent your long winter nights planning a glorious summer ride, only to discover two weeks before takeoff that the rear hub of your Honda NC700X is irreparably damaged and the replacement is back-ordered for at least a month? You could cancel or postpone your trip, or you could do the only reasonable thing a responsible adult would do: buy another motorcycle—say, a 2006 Suzuki V-Strom DL650 off the showroom floor. I left the Honda in the shop and took the V-Strom on surely one of the world’s longer test rides. When I returned, I would decide which one to keep, since I had neither the room nor the resources for two bikes.

My target was northern and central Utah, where I hoped to avoid the kind of drenching I had previously received on the Atlantic coast. After several full days on the road, I crossed the Utah state line and pulled into Dinosaur National Monument near Jensen. By then, the V-Strom was already endearing itself to me. The windscreen was wider and sturdier than the Honda’s, deflecting airflow around my head and insects away from my visor. The mirrors were bigger, providing a wider rear view. And the Givi side cases with Suzuki trunk were a full third bigger than Honda’s OEM models. Perhaps best of all was the range – both of the fuel tank and the seat. I always loved the fuel economy of the NC700X (3.75 L/100 km). But the smaller tank reduced its range to 275 km; and the uncomfortable seat had the same effect on my range – I was always happy to get off when it was time to refuel. The V-Strom may use a little more gas, but it also covered almost 400 km fully loaded. With my tent strapped on like a backrest, I could ride the stock seat all day.

Perfectly Preserved

I was glad to arrive, however, just before nightfall at Green River campground, having narrowly avoided several thunderstorms all around me. It was a beautiful display of dark and light in shifting curtains of rain and sun, and I was grateful to still be dry. In the early morning, I was awakened by the rustling of a golden-mantled ground squirrel under my bike cover. Perhaps he just wanted to check the brakes for me, but snapping his photo was a challenge, as he was never still for more than a millisecond. After breakfast, I visited a dinosaur quarry at Dinosaur National Monument, where, in 1909, Earl Douglass discovered the tail vertebrae of a giant dinosaur, the Apatosaurus, in plain view. This led him and his excited team of paleontologists to excavate the remains of 10 other species, including stegosaurus and allosaurus. The concentration of so many fossils in one location would indicate a rapidly rising and falling river that washed the bones into a kind of logjam, where they have remained for millions of years. After retrieving several specimens for Carnegie Museum, Douglass and his team left a wall partially excavated to reveal 1500 bones, many still visible as complete skeletons. More recently, the National Park Service has built an exhibit hall right over this wall. Outside trails lead to many other exposed fossils.

I then followed the winding gravel road to an unusual ranch within the park. In 1913, finding herself divorced and her children grown, Josie Basset Morris moved to Cub Creek, where she began homesteading. On her own, she built a log cabin of several rooms, with a fireplace and chimney. She raised cattle, which she kept in the box canyon nearby and she herself butchered for food. She also kept chickens for eggs and meat, and canned what she grew in her own garden. Living alone for almost 50 years, she rode a horse and herded cattle until she was 90. Somehow my “roughing it” in a campground suddenly seemed like child’s play.

Looking for the Salt

Duly humbled, I set out for Salt Lake City, soon donning rain gear; apparently, the storms I had outsmarted so far came looking for me with a vengeance and an uncomfortable drop in temperature. As I rode through Heber City and Summit Park, the scenery turned to open meadows and stands of bristlecone pine before I descended into Salt Lake City and the evening sun began to reappear. I chose Camelot Hostel (US$19 per night) for its proximity to Addictive Behavior Motor Works, where I had scheduled maintenance and installation of new 50/50 on-/off-road tires. The new Mitas Enduro E07s would turn out to be both surprisingly quiet at speed on the Interstate and very effective in the loose gravel and powdery sand of the Utah desert. The shop owner, Candice Davis, and her team were very helpful and professional. Meanwhile, I visited the State Capitol buildings and the surrounding neighbourhoods, where I could see efforts are being made to revitalize the downtown and adjust to the phenomenal growth of the area.

The Home of Speed

Picking up the V-Strom from Addictive Behavior, I headed west on I-80 toward Wendover and the Bonneville Salt Flats. As I was nearing Wendover, the rainstorm I had been watching began to obscure the mountains in the distance, and I knew it was time to seek shelter. Fortunately, I had made it to exit 4 – Bonneville Speedway and the Salt Flats Café. I avoided a soaking while I took a short tour of the café walls covered with the photos of riders and drivers who have set and then challenged land speed world records here. I chatted with a waiter who told me he had recently shot a 160-pound mountain lion and a 400-pound bear with his crossbow in the nearby Bear Claw hills – the same Bureau of Land Management land where I planned to camp, and where I would meet nothing more dangerous than a light rain. The thunderstorm that passed overhead did not really let loose until it was out over the flats, where it became a sensational voltaic show.

In the morning, I visited the long-anticipated Bonneville Speedway. It was test ’n’ tune week, and I was excited to watch the trials, wander the pits and talk to the crews. But the flats were mostly covered in water, and even where they weren’t, they were too soft for most vehicles. All activities had been cancelled – for the second year in a row. Discussion in the café was all about the changing climate and the damage being done by local salt-mining operations. I did get some photos and took advantage of the five-mile strip of asphalt that leads out onto the flats. The V-Strom DL650 tops out at 180 km/h, if anyone asks.

I then toured historic Wendover Airfield, which currently houses a small museum on the still-active U.S. Army Air Base. The base is most famous (infamous?) for its role in World War II when the Enola Gay, the B-29 bomber carrying an atomic bomb, departed for Hiroshima. It was sobering to view the hangar and the replica of the bomb know as “Little Boy,” and I was glad to have happier places to visit in the days to come.

Crossing the Line

Wendover straddles the Utah–Nevada border, and the clearest indicator of the state line, aside from the white strip painted across the highway, is the row of casinos that are pressed up against it on the Nevada side. It even appeared to me that one of the casinos’ foyers crossed the line into Utah, but perhaps if no gambling occurs in the foyer, it’s all legal. On a tip from a local couple out front, I followed I-80 a few miles farther west to the hills overlooking the town, and turned back east for the view. The Salt Flats are one of seven locations around the world where the curvature of the Earth is purportedly visible to the naked eye. With a little imagination, I could see it. I think. I then continued east on I-80, and although the speed limit was 130 km/h, it was nevertheless a long two hours back to Salt Lake City, where I followed the GPS southeast to Timpanogos Cave National Monument.

Arriving after dark, I collapsed in my bivy and slept like a petrified log. Up early, I got my National Parks passport book stamped (the second stamp of the trip), and rode Highway 92, Alpine Scenic Drive. Winding in the shadow of Mt. Timpanogos (elevation 3581 m), the 32 km route leads through rugged canyons of the Wasatch Range and up American Fork Canyon past Robert Redford’s Sundance Ski Resort. I had hoped to stop and tell him how much I had enjoyed Brubaker, but alas, he was nowhere to be found. As I travelled south, the mountains became less green – the bristlecone pines giving way to sagebrush, and the earth becoming a deep red. At Parowan, I took Route 143 past Brian Head, a ski resort and village, and arrived at Cedar Breaks National Monument, where I was eager to attend a “Star Party.” At 3155 m elevation, and secluded from the light pollution of civilization, Cedar Breaks offers some of the clearest skies in North America. As darkness fell, I joined a small gathering just beyond the visitor center at Point Supreme.

Two guides trained their computerized telescopes on Jupiter and its four moons, Saturn with its rings, and even the deep-space nebulae M8 and M13. I was thrilled to try my hand at star photography, and was pleased beyond my expectations at the results. Well after midnight, in the falling temperatures, the bike and I nestled into my Redverz Series II Expedition Tent. With room for a queen-size bed and a vestibule in one half, and a garage for the bike and luggage in the other, it all packs down to 6.5 kg and 22 x 53 cm: too large by backpacking standards, but most acceptable for motorcycle travel. I snuggled in and fell asleep to the sound of coyotes calling across the high meadows. A Sight to Behold Morning was bright and cold – about 5 C – and I packed up while eating the last of my fresh fruit and vegetables for breakfast.

Overlooking Point

Supreme in the daylight, I was amazed at the view. The “amphitheatre” is over 600 m deep and 5 km in diameter, a gigantic spectacle of extraordinary formations in bold, brilliant colours of red and white, pink and orange.

The Cedar Breaks high country was no less brilliant as meadows overflowed with larkspur, lupine, columbine and scarlet paintbrush. And the ride down Cedar Canyon was spectacular. Highway 14 was a paved, winding road that followed a riverbed between towering cliffs, increasingly the colour of deep red brick. Turning onto Hwy 9 led me toward beautiful Zion National Park where, suddenly, towers of rock were before me, dazzlingly large, and then surrounding me as I followed the Virgin River. A ribbon of green in the desert marks the river’s course, the sole source of water for plant and animal. In fact, 500 times more species are found in this strand than in all the arid country around it. And for thousands of years, humankind has sought this place, a sanctuary in the dry reaches. The very name Zion means “promised land.” O Zion! I had arrived. Despite the Honda hiccup that nearly grounded my summer travel plans in a service bay, things were rolling along quite nicely. I was eager for the adventures to continue. And in case you wondered about the test ride, at the end of the season, I traded the NC700X. The V-Strom had stolen my heart.

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