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2020/01/14 update

No entries for a bit :(

I missed the new years ride due to some bike trouble. I _thought_ it was another case of oil in the gas, but my current guess is dirt in the carb, most likely the pilot jet passages. I thought an oil change had fixed it, so I also missed the next ride with James (5th). But I did take the trials bike out to VMC on both the 5th and 12th.

Spent a little time trying to work on wheelies. Can’t really say I’m getting much better. Should get back on the mountain bike too.

I still haven’t ripped the carb out of the bike, as I’m waiting on a new float valve and seat, which should arrive shortly. I don’t believe that’s the problem, but pulling the carb out of the DRZ isn’t much fun, so I’d rather not do it twice (and it’s an old carb with a manual petcock, so maintaining the float valve is probably a good idea).

(Snow on the ground here!)

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2019/12/29 – West Shawnigan with Kory, James, Devin and co.

A great ride, mostly single track, long. Started out with Paul leading, and ended with Devin leading. Seven riders (Kyle and Tonow being the other two).

I can’t say my cardio is currently great, but I do ride enough that I felt like I lasted better than many of the other riders. I started as one of the weaker riders, and played it fairly cautious… so many/most of the other riders picked up their bike more often than I did… and as a consequence I wasn’t dragging my arse at the end of the day.

That said, it wasn’t a fun ride home in the dark and wet. Chris and Jordan and I were faster on the frozen road than our exit was. Visibility sucked… which reminds me I need to clean my helmet. There are pix and video, will try to find a moment to add/edit them.

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2019/12/01 – West Shawnigan with Chris and co.

Another quick ride up in the Shawnigan area. Touched on the ITSC area and ran north.

Big event was dropping the bike on Kapoor, hitting the gearshift and popping the circlip, which resulted in the shift lever shaft not engaging with the shift drum. End of day for me. If I’d had X-ray vision, we could have fixed it on the trail. Limped home in 2nd or 3rd gear. It hasn’t been a good few months for me mechanically :( .

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2019/11/24 – Oliphant with a bunch of DRZs.

Six in fact. Six DRZ’s, a DR-350 (the predecessor bike), and a WR-250R.

Chris took us up to see a hang-glider launch site that most/many of us did not know about. That included a chunk of new ATV trail I hadn’t seen before. I tried to connect some of the old single track runs, but there is so much new falling that my routes weren’t working out all that well.

Anyhow, a good day!

Colin, myself, Devin, Chris, Brendan, James, and Gerry. Rob T not shown as he’s taking the picture.

I missed last weekend, as apparently the float valve in the Mikuni is leaking, and I had it on Alex’s bike for a week or two with the manual petcock… which I must have left on. Anyhow, I suffered the classic “will not idle hot” symptom and had about 2.1 liters of mixed oil/gas in the crankcase. My main bike is still down from the broken subframe maintenance, as the linkage bearings only showed up today (sunday!?).

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2019/11/09 – Oliphant with Trent from Wanduro

Trent posted in dualsportbc, looking for a Nanaimo guide. I took him up into the Oliphant area the next day, while he was heading from Victoria to Nanaimo.

It wasn’t the longest ride, and the forecast was lousy. We lucked out and didn’t really get anything other than 110% humidity, but by the same token, there were no great views to show him.

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2019/11/02-03 Sunset Dash (2nd annual)

A return to Heather Mtn for some more sunset shots.

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2019/10 Moab Day 3 (Gemini Bridges, Shafer Trail, and exploring off Long Canyon)

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