Posts
394
Joined
10/20/2011
Location
Honeoye Falls, NY
US
Edited Date/Time
4/9/2018 10:27pm
Last week my son and I made our spring break a dirt-bike spring break. We were driving from NY to Arkansas to visit my mom, so we brought the trailer packed with dirt bikes and mountain bikes, and made some stops along the way.
Our first stop was at Mega Cavern in Louisville, Kentucky, for underground mountain biking. Yeah, that's right, underground mountain biking. Over 320,000 square feet including over 45 trails, Jump Lines, Pump Tracks, Dual Slalom, BMX, Cross Country and Single Track all in a former limestone cavern 100 feet sub-surface. A little pricey, but pretty cool.
Our next stop was the next day at Wooly's Offroad in Tennessee.
Some folks here ain't never heard of a 'lectric motorsickle before
It was a very cool place to ride. You pay $15 per person and you can ride all day. I rode the Alta and my son rode his Kawasaki KX85. Most of the people there were on quads and side by sides, but there were a couple other dirt bikes there.
All went well and we were having fun... until the "sippy hole" incident. I get the term "sippy hole" from one of my (redneck) friends who uses it to describe big mud holes. My dumb-ass son, who had been riding well all day, decides to go through a 6" deep puddle that a bunch of Jeeps have been playing around in all day. The only problem was that it wasn't 6" deep. It was about 4 feet deep! He hit it and went over the bars, and for a second he and his bike were completely submerged! He popped up out of the sippy hole, gasping for breath. One of the Jeep owners was very nice and he used a tow strap and his Jeep to pull the bike out of the sippy hole.
Before sippy hole
After sippy hole
Not good. We continued on to my mom's house in Arkansas, and when we got there we started taking the bike apart. After pressure-washing it, I pulled the tank off and flipped the bike upside down, and took out the spark plug. A bunch of brown sludge came out. Yikes. Here is what the air box looked like:
I think it is good for one more ride...
Not good, but my mom has a Yamaha TTR-125 for the grand-kids to ride, so we were still in business. While we were in Arkansas, we went to the Ouachita Forrest Wolf Pen Gap to ride:
Out in the middle of nowhere
The cost for this? Free! Miles and miles of trails. One nice thing about the Alta is that when I am riding ahead of my son, I can hear him behind me, I don't have to keep looking back constantly to see if he is keeping up, or lost in a sippy hole or something.
TTR-125 Substitute
Note that in the above photo the bent clutch lever is from another grand kid.
Our last riding stop was on the way home, at Switchback MX in Butler, Pennsylvania. This place is awesome! I wasn't doing a few of the bigger jumps, because I had forgotten to pack my balls, but it was still fun.
Indoor mx... no sippy holes
Cade Clason (a very fast pro) was riding there too, a quick stop on his way to or from some Arenacross races. A couple times it was just me and him out on the track at the same time. I like to think I helped him work on his passing skills. I was impressed, watching him put together jump sections that never even occurred to me.
Here is a video my son put together from Switchback MX. Some of the footage is from a drone that my mom gave him when we visited:
https://youtu.be/NBRfIEv5Ktw
(Note to self - I gotta speed up the footage somehow!)
I now have 1103.1 miles and 91.1 hours on my Alta, and she still runs like new. I am glad it is relatively maintenance free, because now all of my efforts will have to go towards my son's KX85!
Our first stop was at Mega Cavern in Louisville, Kentucky, for underground mountain biking. Yeah, that's right, underground mountain biking. Over 320,000 square feet including over 45 trails, Jump Lines, Pump Tracks, Dual Slalom, BMX, Cross Country and Single Track all in a former limestone cavern 100 feet sub-surface. A little pricey, but pretty cool.
Our next stop was the next day at Wooly's Offroad in Tennessee.
Some folks here ain't never heard of a 'lectric motorsickle before
It was a very cool place to ride. You pay $15 per person and you can ride all day. I rode the Alta and my son rode his Kawasaki KX85. Most of the people there were on quads and side by sides, but there were a couple other dirt bikes there.
All went well and we were having fun... until the "sippy hole" incident. I get the term "sippy hole" from one of my (redneck) friends who uses it to describe big mud holes. My dumb-ass son, who had been riding well all day, decides to go through a 6" deep puddle that a bunch of Jeeps have been playing around in all day. The only problem was that it wasn't 6" deep. It was about 4 feet deep! He hit it and went over the bars, and for a second he and his bike were completely submerged! He popped up out of the sippy hole, gasping for breath. One of the Jeep owners was very nice and he used a tow strap and his Jeep to pull the bike out of the sippy hole.
Before sippy hole
After sippy hole
Not good. We continued on to my mom's house in Arkansas, and when we got there we started taking the bike apart. After pressure-washing it, I pulled the tank off and flipped the bike upside down, and took out the spark plug. A bunch of brown sludge came out. Yikes. Here is what the air box looked like:
I think it is good for one more ride...
Not good, but my mom has a Yamaha TTR-125 for the grand-kids to ride, so we were still in business. While we were in Arkansas, we went to the Ouachita Forrest Wolf Pen Gap to ride:
Out in the middle of nowhere
The cost for this? Free! Miles and miles of trails. One nice thing about the Alta is that when I am riding ahead of my son, I can hear him behind me, I don't have to keep looking back constantly to see if he is keeping up, or lost in a sippy hole or something.
TTR-125 Substitute
Note that in the above photo the bent clutch lever is from another grand kid.
Our last riding stop was on the way home, at Switchback MX in Butler, Pennsylvania. This place is awesome! I wasn't doing a few of the bigger jumps, because I had forgotten to pack my balls, but it was still fun.
Indoor mx... no sippy holes
Cade Clason (a very fast pro) was riding there too, a quick stop on his way to or from some Arenacross races. A couple times it was just me and him out on the track at the same time. I like to think I helped him work on his passing skills. I was impressed, watching him put together jump sections that never even occurred to me.
Here is a video my son put together from Switchback MX. Some of the footage is from a drone that my mom gave him when we visited:
https://youtu.be/NBRfIEv5Ktw
(Note to self - I gotta speed up the footage somehow!)
I now have 1103.1 miles and 91.1 hours on my Alta, and she still runs like new. I am glad it is relatively maintenance free, because now all of my efforts will have to go towards my son's KX85!
Great post, motorcycle trips are the best!
The Shop
I brought my 240v generator with me in the trailer to charge the Alta, but I never used it. Trail rides don't drain the battery too much, and I just plugged the Alta in at my mom's house to recharge it.
At Switchback MX, I did four 15-20 minute motos, three on the Alta and one on another bike, and I had enough battery to probably do another moto on the Alta, but my own personal human battery was spent.
An outdoor motocross track, with higher speeds and hills, drains the battery a little faster. I also usually use map 3 for a fast outdoor motocross track, while I preferred map 2 for the indoor track.
Junior has ridden the Alta, and he loves it. He wants me to get a 2018 Alta Redshift MXR so he can have the 2017 Alta Redshift MX, but I think he needs more quality time (more riding/racing with less sippy hole) on the 85 before that happens.
Post a reply to: My 2017 Alta Redshift MX - Spring Break