Today's adventure camping tips!

[Merfman]

1) Use flip top toothpaste containers to keep your panniers minty fresh!

2) I'd you have a new dry bag and Yamaha OEM panniers, be sure to pack the bag so it covers the plastic corner pieces to give it that road tested and leaky look.

Brought to you by Merfman: Facilitator of Murphy's Law since 1957.

 

[MikeBear]

Try to buy all your camping gear from chain retailer ( Walmart , REI, and so on) . Take all your receipts with you so you can exchange it if anything fails.

 

[bloodline]

I think MikeBear is serious.

 

[sail2xxs]

Carry dried camping food meal packs that require large amounts of water to dehydrate, and bring an 8 0z cup as your sole water container. Better yet, bring only a fork to eat the resultant mush.

Chris

 

[Mellow]

Setup your tent WITHOUT a rainfly on a nice clear night in an RV type campground....... next to the 2am Sprinklers...

 

[sail2xxs]

Bring your tent, which you carefully repacked prior to a hasty departure, and stop congratulating yourself on how much more efficiently you packed when you realize that the poles are sitting in the garage 800+ miles away.

Chris

 

[dcc46]

Leave your tent home and bring your hammock, only to find your campsite has no trees ::005::

 

[MikeBear]

I think MikeBear is serious.

I was. Shouldn't I be? ::025::

 

[Checkswrecks]

New equipment is so good that you don't need to try it out till you hit the road.
New stuff is so good that it will all work perfectly, right?
:

 

[tomatocity]

Try to buy all your camping gear from chain retailer ( Walmart , REI, and so on) . Take all your receipts with you so you can exchange it if anything fails.

::026::

 

[GrahamD]

1) Use flip top toothpaste containers to keep your panniers minty fresh!

Sorry, I'm a bit late to the party but ......Been there done that...

 

[Merfman]

Thought I'd drilled a dry hole here but you guys found the spirit, thanks for playing!

I should have mentioned this trip contained:
1) My first fully-loaded-at-a-gas-station drop the morning I was to leave. Thankfully a kind gent came over and mentioned he'd been in that exact
situation and would I like a hand?
2) As I was leaving, my helmet fell off the bike and landed on the shield, producing scuff marks EXACTLY in line with my left eye.
3) I lost a water bottle somewhere...

Oh, the good news: A bridge collapse on a road I'd decided to take had the road closed but rumors of a Friday PM re-opening
found me hoping it'd be open by the time I arrived. It wasn't. I pulled out my topo maps and decided I could find a re-route if I
couldn't poach the closure. This is highway 12 from La Veta to Trinidad, one of the nicest roads I've ever ridden. I had it entirely
to myself, nobody in front nor behind. NOBODY, I literally had the road to myself. After cresting Cucharas summit, I met a CDOT
truck pulling a big programmable sign and the bed of the truck was full of road closed signage... YES! It was a great ride!

More camping tips to follow I'm sure!

 

[merchant]

After a long day of running the Dragon, I pull into the gravel parking spot at our cabin. I proceed to dismount without putting the kickstand down. Of course, the first reaction is to look around and see who was watching. :

 

[tomatocity]

Rural roads are the best. I put that on GoogleMaps and flew it in 3D and used Street View through the Z part with lakes. Very nice. Think I will add this to the CO roads to ride. Thank you.

Do you have any information on Bosque del Oso Road? Looks interesting.

 

[Merfman]

Rural roads are the best. I put that on GoogleMaps and flew it in 3D and used Street View through the Z part with lakes. Very nice. Think I will add this to the CO roads to ride. Thank you.

Do you have any information on Bosque del Oso Road? Looks interesting.

Definitely add this road, the north side of the pass was especially nice, just watch out for the deer, they're thicker than flies around there. 12 basically
runs between Spanish Peaks to the east and the Sangre's to the west.

I don't know anything about BdO, sorry. Looking at where the SWA is, I'm guessing it's pretty interesting. I was headed just over
the ridge to the NRA Whittington Center in Raton and was already running later than expected so I didn't have much time for
exploration. Next trip!

 

[Ishirock]

Synthetic car shammies from the local autozone used to dry off your freshly washed car also work great as a camp towel on your body. After you get used to drying off with something taht feels like wet rubber intertube on your body they work great. My wife swears by how it removes the moisture from her hair to keep her helmit from turning into a sauna. Buy the ones that come in the reusable plastic tube so you can keep the rest of your gear dry after stashing the used towel.

 

[Merfman]

Back from a recent trip and of course, I learned something new!

My "pack" overlaps the tops of my factory panniers by about 1/2 the width of the lid, making it hard/impossible
to open the pannier without removing the pack. Discovered that it's really easy to pop the pannier off, add/remove
whatever contents I needed, then put the pannier back on. Worked like a charm for me!

 

[Mellow]

Back from a recent trip and of course, I learned something new!

My "pack" overlaps the tops of my factory panniers by about 1/2 the width of the lid, making it hard/impossible
to open the pannier without removing the pack. Discovered that it's really easy to pop the pannier off, add/remove
whatever contents I needed, then put the pannier back on. Worked like a charm for me!

 

[Merfman]

I had Jesse's on my Strom and didn't have this issue thanks to the side opening beveled lids. I like running my bag sideways so I can lean on it and not get poked in the back by my Kermit legs.

 

[BadKarmaPa]

Packing a previously opened bottle of oil in the same pannier as your clean clothes will provide you with water repellant socks and underwear.

A word about de-hydrated food.
My brother and I took some for the first time a couple years ago.
Night 1 :
I boiled some water dumped it in, sterred it a bit and started eating. My brother being much more anal than I am, sat and carefully read the instruction on the back. Measured out two cups of water and timed it per the directions. He thought his was pretty good, mine was nasty, I tossed half of it in the trash.
Night 2 :
This night my brother sat and just kind of absent mindedly read the direction out loud
Him, "Open pouch and remove desicant bag"
Me, "WHAT!?!?!? There's desicant in these????"
After that I found that these things are actually pretty good ::010::