1939 Red Hunter tour...

[SEDoan]

Thought you might find this picture essay fun - taking my '39 Red Hunter on a 2 week tour to a Norton rally (been trying to convert the Nortonista for 22 years!)
(back story is that the '47 ate its big end bearing late last summer and easiest solution was to get the 1939 garage queen ready.)

Riding from Bellingham (near Canadian border) to Quincy California - about 1,000 miles).

First night Seattle at my brother's

Best to leave the Seattle metropolis by ferry. Ferry dock - the guy in the riding suit is an ex-pat Brit Boeing engineer. His parents dated on an Ariel!

Beautiful riding through farm and forest land but didn't stop to take pictures. Eventually made it to the Columbia river to take the last remaining Columbia ferry west of the Cascade mountains. Approaching the Oregon shore.

[SEDoan]

Should have mentioned that my brother is riding his 1950 Norton Dominator model 7 that he bought as a basket in 1998 and restored. He and I do almost all our own work.

After crossing the Columbia we spent the night in Clatskanie and the morning found clouds and the wonderful road to Mist - Oregon 47. Smooth pavement with lots of curves. Mostly 3rd gear climb on the Ariel. Even took some video but I've not yet figured out how to get a proper picture from it (or post it), but this will give you an idea.

Edit: Here is a link to the video - https://youtu.be/o6xox8fYS58

After following the Nehalem river for a few miles we took the Vernonia-Scappoose hwy back down to the Columbia. On the way into Portland we took the St. John's bridge - an old a beautiful suspension bridge with a fantastic view - and crossed the north side of Portland without too much delay.
Not my picture!

After a stop for lunch we followed the Clackamas River road through the national forest to Detroit, OR. This a beautiful route with good pavement despite being a forest road.

picnic spot - probably great fishing

Daft Punk on tour

[SEDoan]

Volcanoes and twisty roads

Got to Detroit after 60 miles of forest road and had to join the highway where everyone runs 65-70mph. Turned off for Mckenzie pass after 30 miles. Makenzie pass runs through lava fields at 5300' (1600+ meters) but it was still closed for snow removal! It was scheduled to open 2 days later! So had to turn around and run over Santiam pass with the traffic at 4700'. Lots of straight roads.
Mckenzie pass road before the turn-around

Backtracking added about 50 miles to our day - but it all seemed worth it with a dinner and a pint.

[SEDoan]

Traffic on the north-south highway through Oregon (hwy97) runs 65mph so we took the Cascade Lakes scenic route out of Bend and around the north of Mt Bachelor. It cuts off about 70 miles of hwy 97. Very little traffic, good pavement and beautiful scenery.

We only had to ride about 15 miles of hwy 97 before turning off for Crater Lake national park. The plan was to ride the rim road from the north entrance to the south, but the crater rim is over 7,000 feet and still closed with snow. We elected to ride around the west side of the park and stopped for a picnic at the south west entrance. It added miles to the day but avoided the busier and impatient hwy 97.

See the snow in the parking lot - this was about 6,000' (1800 meters)

I recorded video of the ride leaving our lunch stop - wide pavement and gentle curves make it pretty dull.

Edit: here is the video - https://youtu.be/VCTsIE00Jiw


We then dropped into the Klamath valley to ride around the remote west side of Lake Klamath.
Edit: video of riding in upper Klamath Valley. https://youtu.be/h_fpBvNjbqM

Picked up burritos dinner in Kamath Falls and stopped for the night in Dorris, California. The Ariel's odometer indicated about 900 miles (1450 km) so far.

[SEDoan]

There is a little-known paved road around the east side of Mt. Shasta that cuts off about 70 miles of highspeed highway and freeway. I've never been on this road and it is very remote so required some plastic breakfast courage with the gas stop.

Mt. Shasta.

About 15 miles in we found a repaving project so had to do about 10 miles of adventure riding.

The shuttle buggy was followed by about 10 miles of new asphalt in the oncoming lane, but the only traffic was a few asphalt trucks for which we dodged off the edge for.

Eventually the road turned back to old, full width pavement as we crossed a pass between Little Glass Mountain and Pumice Stone Mountain.

[Julian Murphy]

Hey.

Reading your adventure, and upset that there are no roads like these in the UK.

Onward.

[SEDoan]

We only had a single private vehicle pass us on about 60 miles of road (lots of asphalt trucks tho ). The road dropped into sugar pine country so w stopped to taste them.

Our plan had been to ride through Mt. Lassen national park but found the road was still closed by snow. This caused a diversion up over a volcanic plateau that reaches over 5900' (1800 meters). The plateau is so flat and extensive that there is no sense of being at that elevation except the diminished performance of the machines. This snow diversion added roughly 40 miles to our day - there seems to be a pattern here! Mid June is apparently too early for a mountain tour.

Eventually we got to the south side of Mt. Lassen and stopped for a picnic at Lake Almanor.

Descending down toward Quincy at 3500' (1066 meters) the temperature rose from chilly to sweltering. We were delayed by a couple significance road construction projects to repair slide damage.

We also stopped to take a picture of the world famous Keddie wye. The bridge crosses the Feather river and punches straight into a tunnel right under the outside lane of the road. One track heads to the San Francisco bay area and the other to Reno, Nevada.

Finally arrived at the motel in Quincy.

[SEDoan]

Hey.

Reading your adventure, and upset that there are no roads like these in the UK.

Onward.

Thank you Julian. It is remarkable how capable these old bikes are. The Ariel handles very well in slow and mid-speed corners and has been reasonably comfortable as long as the road is not too rough and it is not pushed too hard. Cruising speed has been 55-60mph - a little slow on the highways but where it shines is in the twistys.

[john.davies]

Hey.

Reading your adventure, and upset that there are no roads like these in the UK.

Onward.

I am also very jealous of the wonderful roads you are traveling and thank you for the updates, they are very inspiring. As Julian says, onward!!

[Vincent.vanGinneke]

Thanks for this story and the wondefull pictures !