When I was a kid I worked in a sweat shop with abusive employers. One day a tornado ripped through the east side of Aaaaadmontim where we lived. I worked on the north west end of town and our power and phones went out. When I heard about the tornado our manager told us to stay and work as much as possible with the power out. I just walked around him, jumped on my motorcycle and went home to check on my family. Others followed suit.
The Whitemud freeway was a parking lot. People lost their minds, accidents, traffic clogged up… At the time my ride was a Honda 250 XL street/trail bike. I jumped the curb, tooled down embankments, in the ditches and got around the clogged traffic with relative ease. It took me about an hour to get home. Others got trapped on the highway for hours. Just thinking about it… maybe a couple a these might make sense for you and the old lady?
A 250cc for you… maybe a 125cc for the wife?
When ya gotta bug out… and the roads choke with panicked morons
and chicken heads that can’t
drive… maybe a pair of these just might save the day…
Not liking the slicks (tires) on that east… you can get more capable AT tires that are well behaved on pavement too. I dunno… if I lived where weather related disaster preparedness were a bigger priority…I might have a couple of these.
When I got home the wife and kid were fine - they actually watched the tornado ripping along less than a mile away.
I remember the deadmonton tornado.
ReplyDeleteExile1981
Way back lived north of nyc but worked in the Bronx all the creeks and streams ran north and south and flooded out of their banks with any heavy rain my lifted blazer could ford ok but not get through the flooded traffic. So those days went to work on whatever motorcycle I had that was running the downside was squishing out water with every step and generally feeling cold and damp. Didn’t have miracle fabrics back then
ReplyDeleteIn all fairness the managers were the last ones out of the plastics factory. Still stupid.
ReplyDeleteGreat bikes the 250's. Currently have a KLR650 and going to downsize to a Honda 250 dual sport. Perfect for way out here in the woods of Central Oregon. The KLR is getting to be too much as I approach 70 yrs. Just too heavy. Been a wonderful bike though for the past 24 years. Spiro
ReplyDeleteEnduros were my bike of choice. I had a CB 360 for about a year and an XL 350 at the same time back in '77-'78. Had a KZ 1000 for two weeks in '79, sold that murder machine, BEFORE I killed myself. Other than an airplane, fastest thing I've ever been on, freaking thing would do something like 70 (ish?) in 2nd. I did one banzai acceleration run up to 130+ before I haired out, it might have done 160 or 170, but I wasn't going to find out. Enduros were perfect for San Diego County, 65 mph on the freeways (because everything is 5 to 30 miles away and it's not been settled that long, so freeways were nearby and went where you wanted to go, without L.A. congestion) plus there were fire breaks (the semi arid equivalent of logging roads) and game trails everywhere. Sometime in the early 90's, the sheriff dept. got all NO TRESSPASSY obsessed, even on private, non posted land. Since they had a helicopter air force, you could only escape if they ran out of fuel before a patrol car got to you. Ahhh, the good ole days...sigh. Sold my last XL 600 in 2014, to raise cash and jettison weight for our move to Tennessee. Now I can't afford another one.
ReplyDeleteCouple 4 wheelers oughta do the trick. Bigger useful load, stable, just a tad wider & easier to learn to ride (imo). I run a little 400cc machine, winch up front, hitch in back, extra gas on the front rack & a cargo carryall on the rear one. It’ll run summer & winter up here.
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