Fall in West Virginia

[Dirt_Dad]

I'm fortunate to live so close to West Virginia that I can ride there almost every weekend. The state has fantastic roads and in the fall it really gets spectacular. The wife and I took a nice 500+ mile ride around the state this weekend.

Road to Snow Shoe Resort

From the top of Snow Shoe

Morning in Elkins

All went well until this morning when I turned us down a dirt road. My wife's Spyder has almost no ground clearance. A brief dirt road is tolerable, but this one went on and on, and got rougher and muddier. Not something the Spyder is cut out to handle. About 9 miles in I had to have her to stop while I blazed ahead to see if it would get better...it didn't. It basically turned from a normal state maintained dirt road, to a pretty good ATV trail. So we turned around and limped the Spyder back out. My wife gets a lot of credit for not damaging the Spyder and keeping a relatively good attitude.

On the plus side this was my first experience slipping around on the S10 in some slick mud. I was pretty surprised at how well the Battlewings performed overall. Not surprisingly there were some spots where they didn't hold so well, but still completely predictable. I was pleased that even when they were sliding around the fully loaded S10 easy to handle and never gave me any cause for concern.

Few pictures from the dirt road

My wife survived the road, but was really missing either a good dirt capable bike, or her ATV. We discussed buying her another little dual sport after this one. Maybe next year.

Good weekend. Colors are really showing if you're in the right place.

 

[eemsreno]

Great pictures your wife needs a " Adventure Spyder"

 

[GrahamD]

Beautiful pics there Dirt Dad.

Lovely stuff. ::008::

Cheers
Graham

 

[Venture]

Great pictures your wife needs a " Adventure Spyder"

::026::

I never thought about how low the Spyder sits. It's kind of a bummer that a machine that is ideal for bad roads (3 wheels, can't fall over!) can't really handle them.

 

[rem]

Nice color and nice country. When I read the title of the thread, I figured you had dropped your bike. Let's be careful out there. R

 

[Dirt_Dad]

Great pictures your wife needs a " Adventure Spyder"

It would be nice to have a dual-sport Spyder. I taught my wife to ride motorcycle 24 years ago when I got her a Yam XT350. She's a pretty good dirt biker and an aggressive ATV pilot. The Spyder was really holding her back and frustrating her at times. The traction control and stability control keep it from doing anything fun...which is probably good, cause it just can't take it.

The Spyder is an experiment. We bought it after she totaled her DL650 earlier this year. It has good and bad points. One other bad one is I'm sitting here in the barn at the moment pulling error codes off the damn thing. Let's just say it's not as reliable as a Yamaha.

 

[justbob]

Nice pictures, yes autumn is here and the trees are starting to get some color in them. I did 1100 miles this weekend thru eastern Ky, Virginia ,western N Carolina and Tennessee. It was a great weekend for riding.

 

[spklbuk]

Great pics. ::008:: Looks like a great ride. I think I like fall better-n-spring for riding.

 

[roy]

I worked in our charleston office for a few months back in 2003 but never had a bike while there. This makes me want to ride up there. Nice pics thanks.

 

[Dirt_Dad]

Most everywhere is past peak at this point, but still makes for a beautiful ride. This may be the last weekend I get out before all the leaves are gone.

These are from today's ride around the eastern panhandle of WV.

 

[colorider]

Beautiful!!!!!

Thanks for sharing!

 

[Mike Sisson]

WOW!! Beautiful pics! ::012:: Thanks!

 

[eemsreno]

::026::

 

[Dirt_Dad]

Thanks. I agree it's pretty nice for past peak. Also happy with the new camera. It's a pretty big improvement over the camera used for the first group of shots up above.

 

[dcc46]

Great pics ,Thanks

 

[Dirt_Dad]

The colors west to here are pretty much all gone. This is what riding will look like for the next 5 months.

There is still color to be found farther east of my location. Spent the weekend in Newport News, VA and visited The Mariner's Museum. In addition to a great museum the complex has a spectacular nature trail. The Noland Trail is 5 miles around a water inlet that is pretty colorful right now.

 

[Tremor38]

Thats perty ;D

 

[wmbrlkride]

Nice pix. This is what I miss about living here, we do get some color changes here but not like what I expenenced when I was a kid growing up in up state NY. I have a friend that live in Charlestown. Pretty area for sure.