Thanksgiving 2022 Ride - We're taking three(3) 2012 Super Tenere to Baja!

~TABASCO~

RIDE ON ADV is what I do !
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Getting closer to the departure. It's super cold and it's been snowing a lot in Tahoe, so the first day is going to be a bit of an adventure...

2 of us are leaving for Reno, and one of us from San Francisco. We'll meet somewhere near the border. We're hoping to cross early Friday morning and catch the Baja race somewhere.

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This K60 make it the whole trip? How many miles already on this tire ?
Have an awesome trip ! ! !
 

2aroundtheworld

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I wore Bell for years and always with Transitions visors, day and night. I assume they say "day use only" for some legal reasons but I never had any issues with night usage.

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Thanks for confirming my suspicion. Transition lens it is.
 

2aroundtheworld

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This K60 make it the whole trip? How many miles already on this tire ?
Have an awesome trip ! ! !
No, my friend Jorge is getting a set of new Mitas in San Diego (actually bought from a guy on this forum). We have brand new K60 on the 2 other bikes, I actually just finished now mounting the wheels.

Interesting tidbit - both have the same mileage/same year (2012/~25000 miles). On the black one, the damper rubbers inside the hub were all separated (the little tab was broken). On the blue one, they were all still intact and tight, which made mounting the wheel back a lot more challenging...I don't know if that set was replaced at some point, or if the black back was more abused...
 

~TABASCO~

RIDE ON ADV is what I do !
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No, my friend Jorge is getting a set of new Mitas in San Diego (actually bought from a guy on this forum). We have brand new K60 on the 2 other bikes, I actually just finished now mounting the wheels.

Interesting tidbit - both have the same mileage/same year (2012/~25000 miles). On the black one, the damper rubbers inside the hub were all separated (the little tab was broken). On the blue one, they were all still intact and tight, which made mounting the wheel back a lot more challenging...I don't know if that set was replaced at some point, or if the black back was more abused...
Have a great trip. Those bumpers are pretty expensive to replace. Helpful hint- next time you have any trouble with those bumpers, mist them with a touch of silicon spray, they will slide right on with no trouble.
 

2aroundtheworld

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Working on the route now...it's been a while since last time we went through Baja and I don't remember which border crossing we took.

Any preference between Tecate or Mexicali?
 

2aroundtheworld

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Well I just realized that my cigarette lighter does not have power...is there a fuse somewhere for that plug? anything else I could check?

1 hour before departure...
 

Bill_C

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Well I just realized that my cigarette lighter does not have power...is there a fuse somewhere for that plug? anything else I could check?

1 hour before departure...
Yeah, there is a 3 amp fuse. Pull the right side cover. Should see two fuse boxes on the right side near the top.


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sheikyerbooty

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Have a great trip. Those bumpers are pretty expensive to replace. Helpful hint- next time you have any trouble with those bumpers, mist them with a touch of silicon spray, they will slide right on with no trouble.
You can extend the life of the cush drive rubbers by cutting strips of inner tube and slipping them between the segments. I also grease them. Seemes to extend life and makes everything stick together for reassembly. the 660 ate those things
 

2aroundtheworld

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We made it to Los Barriles!! It was an amazing trip! We are still here around for a few days. The only real issue we had is that the front fork seals blew on my bike. I need to come up with a plan to get the forks rebuilt somewhere down here.

I'll post a better update soon.

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2aroundtheworld

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All right time for some proper update on this fabulous trip! As I mentioned we left Reno on a Wednesday around noon, trying to make the best of the weather.

We made a quick stop for lunch in Gardnerville.

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My friend decide to practice tight turns in the parking lot with the result you can expect...the first drop of very many.
He is going to kill me for posting this image but hopefully by reducing its size he won't be as mad.

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The view over Mono Lake was truly out of this world. At sunset, the lake was pink and with the snow covered surrounding it feels like if we were riding on Planet Mars.

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By the time we reached Bishop it was around 27F!! It was a cold ride for sure over the 7500' pass around Mammoth...

:)

The next day was mostly uneventful as we rode all the way to El Centro. We arrived too late to cross the border that night. It was a chill but beautiful day riding and we got super lucky as there was no wind.

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We also reunited with our friend Jorge who was meeting us after riding from San Francisco to San Diego earlier that week.
He had a new set of tires (Mitas E9/E10) installed in San Diego through a fellow member on this forum (whom I unfortunately forget the name right now). Not only this nice gentleman sold us 4 brand news Mitas for an affordable price but he also even mounted them on Jorge's bike!!!
For my bike (Christian) and my friend JP' bike (also bought on this forum not long ago) , we had new Heidenau K60 Scout mounted. More on that later.

We filled up our bikes after dinner and went to bed, excited to be crossing into Mexico tomorrow.

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2aroundtheworld

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The next morning the real adventure started! We decided to cross the border at the East entry in Mexicali which turned out to be a great decision. The border agent who processed our FMM was super friendly and a rider himself which made the crossing one of the smoothest I have ever had. We opted to ask for a 6 months Mexican tourist permit ($30) so we could use it again in future trip.

From there, we had one and only one goal - to watch the Baja 1000. It was about 10:00 am when we left the border area, and we were aiming down for San Felipe to see the race, but we did not know exactly where. An American couple at the border with a house in San Felipe had given us some pointers. They said "Go to 'Zoo' road - the race passes right behind our house! - the road is just passed the Pemex".

So I put "Pemex San Felipe" in the GPS, and with our heads filled with excitement we hit the road.
We were passing many chase vehicles and other Baja 1000 spectators, and once we got to La Ventana we knew we were on track.
Not much however was happening there so we decide to keep pushing to this famous Zoo road where they had promised "trophy truck jumps"...

It's a this moment that my friend Jorge indicated to us that his fuel level was about 1/4 of a tank. It's also then that I realized that unlike JP and myself, he had not filled up his tank the night before...
We were riding pretty fast and I was hoping that he would be able to make it to the famous Pemex in San Felipe. Our main focus right now was to catch the race and nothing would stop us.

Well, despite my best motivation, he did run out of fuel. About 10 miles before San Felipe, just about where the road turns into 2 lanes highway in both directions. Not the best place to stop.
Jorge had 2 spare REI type bottles but both empty. One was 1 liter and one 0.5 liter. There was no time to waste, there was a race to watch. So I grabbed the 2 bottles and started my own race.
I was pretty sure that 1.5 liters would not be enough to carry him back to the fuel station but we did not really have many other options.

Luckily for us, there is a (I am guessing new) ARCO fuel station a few miles before town. It tooks about 10 minutes to get there, 10 minutes to fill up and another 10 to get back. Let's just say this was a good opportunity to test the Super Tenere in the 3 digits speed department. Remember we had a race to watch.

We emptied the tiny containers in the bike fuel tank, got back on the road and Jorge made it. On fume. Literally. The bike died again about 200 feet away and he was able to coast all the way to the pump.

This gas station was filled up with trucks, buggies, 4x4, etc - it was hard to tell which vehicles were in the race, chase trucks, or just supporters. But it looked awesome and got us even more pumped up.

We filled up all 3 bikes and head back to the infamous Zoo road, near the Pemex. Well, at least that's what we thought.

I started having some doubts when I realized that the GPS took me to the PEMEX station in the center of town. That did not seem to match the couple's description. Then we started asking about the zoo road and no one really seemed to know about it. And then I realized by looking at the map that we were actually quite far from the race course. And that at this pace, all the vehicles would have passed us by the time to get ourselves situated. I was not happy.

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That's also where Jorge experienced in first time riding in the sand with a big bike, and dropped it almost instantaneously.

While he was getting himself and the bike up being watched by the people at the local taco stand, I spotted someone who was watching something on his phone...and surely looked like someone who knew a thing about the race. He had the SCORE app and was following the race in real time. He had no idea about this famous 'Zoo' road but started mentioning the 'Dump' road and looking at the map with him, I finally realized that this was the road the earlier couple was referring to. And then I also realized that while they had said Pemex gas station, they in fact meant ARCO which is the same station I had been twice earlier to get gas. And that is also where there was so many Baja vehicles. DAMN!!!!. THAT'S WHERE THE ROAD WAS!!.
This is one of these moments when everything comes clear together in your brain.

So with that in mind, we forcefully pushed the taco from the same stand I mentioned earlier into Jorge's mouth and hit the road as fast as possible to backtrack to this Zoo/Dump/whatever road.

And sure enough, we found it. And that's where we had the first breakdown...
 
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2aroundtheworld

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At this point it was around 1pm and we were really excited/anxious to see the race. From the map it was not clear which portion of the road was paved, which portion was dirt and what overall condition it was going to be in. But the first couple miles were paved, and in excellent condition.

Except for a couple of dips...

I was following JP and I see him bottoming out in front of me. I slowed down as much as I could...but unfortunately not enough to avoid one of my cases breaking up and flying away.

***

This may be a good time to talk about our 3 bikes. I bought the first Super Tenere during Covid, while living in Boston. I wanted something just to cruise around New England and did not expect to like the bike so much. It was a fly/ride type of transaction. I found the bike on Cycle Trader, flew to Conway in South Carolina, got picked up by the seller and rode it back to Boston in 2 days. 900 miles and it did not skip a bit. I decided that for $6000, this was one of the best and undervalued motorcycles on the market. So a few months after that, I managed to convince my friend Jorge to buy one too.

That second Super Tenere was found on this forum. I forgot the exact price but it was around $7000 and came with every farkles possible, including a complete set of TouraTech cases. (Mine did not have any at this point)

Last year, I moved back to the Tahoe area and brought the bike with me. We bought another house and the budget for accessories was fairly limited, but I manage to find a set of OEM luggages. I was aware of the complaints about these but $400 was about the most I could afford at that time. One of the cases was broken but I figure there is surely a way to fix iit. Which I did. I used screws, metal plates and JB Weld all mixed together to recreate a nice sturdy bracket. It lasted for so long that I sort of forgot about it. I just rode the bike on all sort of trips.
A few months ago, another 2012 Super Tenere popped up on this forum. The bike had a set of Jesse James luggage and the price ($4900) was so good that Jorge and I decided to buy it. I figured I could use the cases on my own bike, and we would have another extra Super Tenere for when a friend wants to join us. Jorge picked up the bike in Las Vegas, rode it to Palm Springs and then rode it up here to Reno. Zero issue.

***

So that's how we ended up with 3 2012 Super Tenere, 3 different set of luggages and one case in the middle of the road in Baja. The combination of speed, weight and momentum had broken the repair and sent the right luggage (the one full of camping gear) flying away at 60 mph.

JP turned around, and we had a moment together. We paused and thought. Maybe we should slow down. Maybe this race is getting to us. Maybe we are taking too many risks.

Or maybe not. We came here to see this race! Let's just cobble something together as quick as possible and let's rush back to see the race!!!!
We got a couple extra ratchet straps, reorganized and redistributed the load and hit the road again.

The road quickly turned into dirt and sand. JP and I had Sena bluetooth hooked up so we could communicate with each other.
We could tell that Jorge was struggling to maintain the bike upright so we decided that I would go first to evaluate the road, and JP would follow him behind. This was our first real test.
There is a huge difference between riding a light dirt bike and a loaded adventure bike in the sand. JP and I had a couple close calls and Jorge managed to drop his a couple times.
I could sense that he was not having fun and was considering turning around. I could tell by the GPS that we had a few more miles to go...just a few more miles...

We stopped. We helped Jorge picked up his bike one more time and we started giving more tips. It's always a bit more touchy between middle aged adults to give advices. You want to help but you don't want to overstep boundaries...luckily I have know my friends for a very long time and we were able to boost Jorge's confidence.

We got back on the bikes again, hit the throttle and finally made it camp around miles 380. We had managed to make in time to still see some of the Trophy trucks, and the next 12 hours would become some of the best memories of my life.

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2aroundtheworld

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I had been told in the past a few times: "The best way to see the Baja 1000 is to camp in the desert and party with locals/staff/etc!!!".

Well, it looks like that's just what we were about to do!
The location we had found was a refill/repair station for many teams (including a giant BF Goodrich pit stop), and a place for Mexicans to watch the race.

It dit not take long before we made friends. It turns out that Side-By-Side, Jeep, Baja Bug, Trophy trucks - virtually everything is popular on that race, well, except for large adventure bike.
JP made a bit of a "faux-pas" and got stuck on the actual race course while looking for a place for us to pitch our tent, but luckily people quickly rushed in to help pushed the bike out.

It's at that point that we started assessing the usefulness of traction control in deep sand. ..let's just say that we quickly learned how to turn it off, which became almost a daily ritual after that.

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We eventually went to bed, but not before drinking all 3 bottles of wine that Jorge had miraculously managed to carry, countless beers and some excellent ceviche brought in by some new friends from Mexicali.
But to be honest, we did not sleep much that night partially due to the cold (luckily we had warm clothings from the previous days leaving Reno) but mostly because we had pitched our tent fairly close to the track and we had dreams of being ran over every time a noisy vehicle was passing by...

While most everyone was gone the next morning, some cars were still driving by (while mostly Baja Bugs - these guys are crazy).

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I had finally checked out one more things on my life bucket list.
 

Little Joe

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We stopped. We helped Jorge picked up his bike one more time and we started giving more tips. It's always a bit more touchy between middle aged adults to give advices. You want to help but you don't want to overstep boundaries...luckily I have know my friends for a very long time and we were able to boost Jorge's confidence.

So what is your advice to better handle these bikes in sand when heavily loaded??


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2aroundtheworld

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We stopped. We helped Jorge picked up his bike one more time and we started giving more tips. It's always a bit more touchy between middle aged adults to give advices. You want to help but you don't want to overstep boundaries...luckily I have know my friends for a very long time and we were able to boost Jorge's confidence.

So what is your advice to better handle these bikes in sand when heavily loaded??


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Short answer: Momentum.

Honestly, I have very limited experience in the sand with any motorcycle size. But what seemed to work best for us was to turn traction control off, stand up on the bike, look far ahead and make sure to keep a slight acceleration through the sand patches. Never decelerates.
Also be careful not to veer left or right on the road/track because the sand is being pushed on the sides and it's much deeper.

It may also help to deflate the tires but with 3 bikes and going from sand to dirt to pave multiple times a day it was just not realistically possible.
 

sheikyerbooty

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Sand/ deep gravel is probably one of the hardest things to master. You can't really teach/ be taught. It's just practice. I learned to do this on light bikes, then progressed to heavier machines. When I hit deep patches of built-up gravel on the insides of corners I pick a line, ass off the seat slightly, weight slightly rearward, keep bars locked straight, gently throttle through. If front starts to tuck, throttle on progresively to bring it back into line. Balance on your pegs (right and left) and throttle are key. Practice on a light bike, you're going to be picking it up lots. Have fun, be safe.
 
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