Our Bike Trips                                                    

                    

       

 


The open road, ... the relaxing camp sites,... fishing, ...site seeing,..... the smells,... some good...... some bad. The adventures of motorcycling, its a way of life that is becoming more and more appealing to a great many people. It's all in what you want to make of it. The following pictures show what we make of it.

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My Wing at
 My Wing at GoldwingCountry.com
www.GoldwingCountry.com/donfortin

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Members of  GWRRA



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Summit Lake 2009

 Summit Lake July 2009

 Summit Lake weekend trip near Nakusp B.C.  Camp is set up. Time to kick back!


      
    

 

 

 

Summit lake July 2009 campsite

Our Bunk house

Tent Trailer

 

Click on link to go to Bunk house site

Bunk house Tent trailer with 10 ft awning

Summit Lake 2009 

http://www.bf-specialties.com/

 Home away from home

 
click on image to enlarge   click on image to enlarge
 

A day at Summit lake is a day in paradise. and its only three hours away from home

Stop to rest in shade in the Monashee's

 

 

I quick stop in the Monashee Mountains for a cold drink

Yamaha 950 Tourer

 


Stop at a small lake on the side of the highway to Kaslo

One of our favorite stops  on our way over to Kaslo B.C.

 

"Billings Montana Wing Ding trip 

in 2007"

 


Click to enlarge

 

The Trip to Billings was a lot of fun. This is the first Wing Ding we have been too. It was a relaxing three day ride there. We traveled with one other member from our chapter.  The weather was perfect the whole time we were there .Well it was a little hot it would have been nice to have air conditioning in our TENT.  We camped at the Yellowstone Campground, however they had a swimming pool to get out of the afternoon heat.

This trip I used the video camera and I did not take very many still pictures The pictures you are about to see are taken with the video it is not as clear as I would have liked. 

   



Our home before we bought the Tent trailer

 

     



 On our way back we would stay in hotels , motels , cabins. 

 

 

Me putting on the windshield cover  getting ready to turn in for the night. we put on 747 klms. today a long ride  put it was mostly flat prairie  country.  Left billings in the morning and arrived at St Mary's around dinner time. We are going to go over Glacier Park in the morning.



 

  Glacier National Park in Northern Montana this is the Mountain we are heading for in the morning 

Glacier Water , cool crisp and clean


The view was spectacular in the park we climbed up to the snow line  just beautiful.

 





The ride down was slow but  scenic  

Pulled over for a rest and to take in the view

 

" OH SH.....,we hit a Deer"......

  Later on that day we made it over to the other side of Glacier Park. Stopped for a bite to eat and then headed off. We thought we would take the back roads so we looked at the map and found a road the would go to Yakk Montana. a little off the beaten path .  We did end up in Yakk after a beautiful ride through the mountains again. We stopped for an ice cream and water. The town of Yakk was not much more that a general store and a pub across the street that was closed. 

After finishing our ice cream we mounted up and headed off towards Bonners Ferry Idaho.  I  brought the bike up to highway speed, 110 klms per hr and set the cruise control, when all of a sudden out of the corner of my eye I saw what I thought was a large bird flying out of the right ditch.  Not until it was in front of me when.... Whammm! it was a deer  it hit the bike on the left side, I yelled to my wife  in a startled voice through the intercom.. "OH Shit we hit a deer we hit a deer.!" The bike did a little nudge at impact. I saw and heard glass breaking, I then started to apply the breaks, I looked over my left shoulder and saw what seamed like slow motion a deer flying through the air, head over heels over and over.  I brought the bike to a safe UPRIGHT stop. Yes thats right, we did not go down . After getting off the bike the adrenalin started to flow Monique and I looked at the damage to the bike in disbelief. Boy that sure says a lot about Goldwings !  Monique headed back up the road to see how the deer was doing . I took out my video camera and started to film the aftermath.  I walked back up the road  to where my wife was standing looking down in the ditch where the deer was lying. The little white tail doe was no longer with us. Good thing for it looked like its neck and back were broken.

We went back to the bike and started to assess the damage. the left side of the bike took the hit  the lower cowling where the driving lights are was broken, including the light as well. ( that was the glass I heard) The left fairing was cracked and the radiator air intake was broken and needed to be taped on as to not flap in the wind. There was deer hair wedged in the fairing I left it in there so I could show the insurance adjuster. ( Good thing I did because the adjuster was surprised at what little visual damage was done to the bike but the deer hair proved that I did indeed hit a deer.)   Total damage came to $4300.00 it turned out that I needed a new radiator, as it started to leak after we got home. The top of the radiator was bent and  develop a small crack that caused it to leak. Once again the reliability of the Goldwing proved itself  to me as the 2002 GL 1800 held together long enough to get us both safely home to Lumby,  British Columbia.

We talk about this to many people and to this day are still thanking our lucky stars that we recieved not even so much as a scratch on us. I often thought that it may have been an advantage that we had a trailer on the back. I feel that the trailer helped keep the bike stable.

I also found out that my Auntie Helen  who is so worried about us riding a motorcycle, was saying a prayer for us every night while we were gone on our trip. It makes you think, .......seams like someone was watching over us.

My first Goldwing was a brand new 1979 GL 1000 and I have been riding them ever since. I am a firm believer in the Goldwing and always will be, for they have never let me down yet. 

 


broken driving light and cowl ( click to enlarge )

 

Broken side fairing (click to enlarge)

Broken driving light and cowl this was the glass I heard on impact.

The radiator side inlet cover broken 

 

Deer hair  (click to enlarge)

 

The tape I used to hold together (click to enlarge)

Here you can see the damage to the inner fairing and the deer hair 

But from a distance it is hard to see that it came to $4300.00 in damage

 

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DWF Gallery Fine Woodworking

Don's Woodworking Site See what Don does when he is not riding is Illusion Red GL 1800 Goldwing

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2002 Illusion Red
GL 1800 Goldwing

"Illusion Red"