In the past 3 years the western states I've ridden are UT, AZ, CA and AK. I used to live in CO and have ridden SD to Yellowstone. For a week-long ride, I never base out of a single place. To find lesser roads in the U.S., I found no better resource than a set of Butler maps. They have helped me discover roads in areas I've ridden for decades.

California has weeks of great riding. It also has all sorts of opportunities to see and experience motorcycle related events and destinations (e.g. The Quail, Scaramento Mile, Races at Laguna Seca) and of course has an incredible number of the country's best national parks. The southern end of the state doesn't offer a lot of remote area riding, while the northern end is mostly remote area riding. When the southern end of the state is the best temperature to ride, the northern end is too cold to ride and when the northern end is warm enough to ride the southern end is too hot to ride so it is best to divide the state into a northern half and southern half for ride planning. Global warming is wreaking  havoc on the state. Between torrential rain washing out roads, to forest fires, it has become increasingly tough to plan rides. I did 3000 miles in Northern Cal earlier this year. 105F inland and 55F on the coast, Crater Lake NP was still not fully open due to snow. The areas I rode in northeastern CA were engulfed in fire a week after I rode them. In southern CA, when I rode through PCH, Angeles Crest and some other routes had closures which made it impossible to ride their full length and Death Valley has some roads which have been closed for years. The southern end has lots of route options to get around closures, the northern section doesn't. Lastly, legalized lane splitting makes it easy to deal with traffic when you encounter long back ups, like at the entrances to National Parks.

UT/AZ has some great riding and national parks. Unfortunately the surge of visitors to National Parks has somewhat ruined the experience of these parks. Zion is now clogged with stop and go traffic end to end and access to the canyons requires taking a park bus. Traffic is so bad, they control access to the tunnel in the park, because it doesn't have adequate ventilation for people to be stuck in it. Reserved entry is increasingly required for the National Parks and the reservation system requires separate reservations for each motorcycle to enter within a two hour window. 2 years ago, the southern section of infamous 666 (Coronado Trail) was covered in tar snakes, making it less enjoyable than typical. If you want to ride UT/AZ you want to ride it before or after schools let out for summer break, when tourists overwhelm the parks and towns.

SD to WY is nice, but primarily about riding the area around Mount Rushmore to Red Lodge and then wide open road to Yellowstone. It is possible to make a loop ride through Northern Colorado, but the distances mean lots of straight open road riding if you want to do this in a week. Of course all the National Parks stuff applies doubly to Yellowstone plus when  tourists stop for Donkeys, Buffalos and other wildlife in the road, you face the challenge of how to get away from the animals as they will knock your bike down and trample you.

Colorado is a great ride. Typically I start out of Ft. Collins ahd head down the front range and then go west over to 550 and then north to Grand Junction before heading east. Heading north on 550 there are two ways to get to Grand Junction. If you veer west towards Naturita, you go through a Utahesque Canyon area. If you turn east toward Black Rock Canyon, you eventually can go north on 92 (AKA Black Rock Canyon Rim drive) which is considered by many to be the best road in Colorado. There are some easy dirt roads which can be used to connect some of the dead mining towns (which are now resort towns) to the next paved section without having to double back on the road you came in on. While the Rockies predominate, the western side of the state is one of my favorite areas to go through as the riding becomes Utah-like. I always make it a point to go through Colorado National Monument for this reason and if I want more of the Utah experience it is easy to swing over to Moab. Tourism is crushing Moab. Hotel rooms can be hard to get and tourist lodging has raised the cost of housing to the point where service workers are in short supply since they can no longer afford to live in Moab. The National Parks require reservations and I enjoyed off roading to see them more than I enjoyed doing the main paved roads.

Alaska is spectacular. Rather than slog up there through Canada. I did a fly and rent out of Anchorage and then a four corners tour of the northern part of the state (Anchorage, Valdez, Dawson, Fairbanks). In the first week of August, I only say temps above 60, on two days of riding and probably half of the riding was cold and wet with the worst moderately heavy wet snow going through Denali. To see the state fully you have to do some gravel road riding which is generally easy unless it rains. Some of the best views of the state are from the water and the ferry system is very good, so I planned a route which included a ferry from Whittier to Valdez. Although there is a fair amount of straight open road riding, it is always accompanied by spectacular views. The riding is remote and you want to make sure to plan gas carefully. The routes are largely single threaded so you may want to have a little schedule flex. The Top of the World ~80 mile easy gravel route to Dawson ends with a ferry. The week after I did this route the ferry broke down for two weeks. The detour around this requires about 500 miles of riding. I plan on doing a route which goes up and down the coast south of Anchorage, but this is clearly best if you use some ferries and the ferry schedule isn't published till May or June, so planning is tough.

I rode Copper Canyon Mexico a couple of years ago and it is another western ride worth looking into. Although this riding area used to be raw and remote, it is increasingly possible to ride this as a lite mostly paved ride as the Mexican government has been investing in the area to open it up to tourism.There are essentially two approaches to this area from the U.S.. From the east you go through Chihuahua and from the west you go through Baja. The Chihuahua approach gives you Mexican culture, the Baja approach gives you the sea to mountain effect.  Internet access is now widely available, making it easy to use Google translate to get past the language barrier. In addition to pavement, there are off road opportunities ranging from really challenging to easy and there is a great opportunity to see and discover the area while it is largely unspoilt by tourism.

Hope this helps you figure out what you're going to do.

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and
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Pags, Sean and Ray-thanks for your feedback! Based on Ray’s amazing

In the past 3 years the western states I've ridden are UT, AZ, CA and
AK. I used to live in CO and have ridden SD to Yellowstone. For a
week-long ride, I never base out of a single place. To find lesser
roads in the U.S., I found no better resource than a set of Butler
maps. They have helped me discover roads in areas I've ridden for
decades.

California has weeks of great riding. It also has all sorts of
opportunities to see and experience motorcycle related events and
destinations (e.g. The Quail, Scaramento Mile, Races at Laguna Seca)
and of course has an incredible number of the country's best national
parks. The southern end of the state doesn't offer a lot of remote
area riding, while the northern end is mostly remote area riding. When
the southern end of the state is the best temperature to ride, the
northern end is too cold to ride and when the northern end is warm
enough to ride the southern end is too hot to ride so it is best to
divide the state into a northern half and southern half for ride
planning. Global warming is wreaking  havoc on the state. Between
torrential rain washing out roads, to forest fires, it has become
increasingly tough to plan rides. I did 3000 miles in Northern Cal
earlier this year. 105F inland and 55F on the coast, Crater Lake NP
was still not fully open due to snow. The areas I rode in northeastern
CA were engulfed in fire a week after I rode them. In southern CA,
when I rode through PCH, Angeles Crest and some other routes had
closures which made it impossible to ride their full length and Death
Valley has some roads which have been closed for years. The southern
end has lots of route options to get around closures, the northern
section doesn't. Lastly, legalized lane splitting makes it easy to
deal with traffic when you encounter long back ups, like at the
entrances to National Parks.

UT/AZ has some great riding and national parks. Unfortunately the
surge of visitors to National Parks has somewhat ruined the experience
of these parks. Zion is now clogged with stop and go traffic end to
end and access to the canyons requires taking a park bus. Traffic is
so bad, they control access to the tunnel in the park, because it
doesn't have adequate ventilation for people to be stuck in it.
Reserved entry is increasingly required for the National Parks and the
reservation system requires separate reservations for each motorcycle
to enter within a two hour window. 2 years ago, the southern section
of infamous 666 (Coronado Trail
https://www.google.com/maps/search/666+(Coronado+Trail?entry=gmail&source=g)
was covered in tar snakes, making it less enjoyable than typical. If
you want to ride UT/AZ you want to ride it before or after schools let
out for summer break, when tourists overwhelm the parks and towns.

SD to WY is nice, but primarily about riding the area around Mount
Rushmore to Red Lodge and then wide open road to Yellowstone. It is
possible to make a loop ride through Northern Colorado, but the
distances mean lots of straight open road riding if you want to do
this in a week. Of course all the National Parks stuff applies doubly
to Yellowstone plus when  tourists stop for Donkeys, Buffalos and
other wildlife in the road, you face the challenge of how to get away
from the animals as they will knock your bike down and trample you.

Colorado is a great ride. Typically I start out of Ft. Collins ahd
head down the front range and then go west over to 550 and then north
to Grand Junction before heading east. Heading north on 550 there are
two ways to get to Grand Junction. If you veer west towards Naturita,
you go through a Utahesque Canyon area. If you turn east toward Black
Rock Canyon, you eventually can go north on 92 (AKA Black Rock Canyon
Rim drive) which is considered by many to be the best road in
Colorado. There are some easy dirt roads which can be used to connect
some of the dead mining towns (which are now resort towns) to the next
paved section without having to double back on the road you came in
on. While the Rockies predominate, the western side of the state is
one of my favorite areas to go through as the riding becomes
Utah-like. I always make it a point to go through Colorado National
Monument for this reason and if I want more of the Utah experience it
is easy to swing over to Moab. Tourism is crushing Moab. Hotel rooms
can be hard to get and tourist lodging has raised the cost of housing
to the point where service workers are in short supply since they can
no longer afford to live in Moab. The National Parks require
reservations and I enjoyed off roading to see them more than I enjoyed
doing the main paved roads.

Alaska is spectacular. Rather than slog up there through Canada. I did
a fly and rent out of Anchorage and then a four corners tour of the
northern part of the state (Anchorage, Valdez, Dawson, Fairbanks). In
the first week of August, I only say temps above 60, on two days of
riding and probably half of the riding was cold and wet with the worst
moderately heavy wet snow going through Denali. To see the state fully
you have to do some gravel road riding which is generally easy unless
it rains. Some of the best views of the state are from the water and
the ferry system is very good, so I planned a route which included a
ferry from Whittier to Valdez. Although there is a fair amount of
straight open road riding, it is always accompanied by spectacular
views. The riding is remote and you want to make sure to plan gas
carefully. The routes are largely single threaded so you may want to
have a little schedule flex. The Top of the World ~80 mile easy gravel
route to Dawson ends with a ferry. The week after I did this route the
ferry broke down for two weeks. The detour around this requires about
500 miles of riding. I plan on doing a route which goes up and down
the coast south of Anchorage, but this is clearly best if you use some
ferries and the ferry schedule isn't published till May or June, so
planning is tough.

I rode Copper Canyon Mexico a couple of years ago and it is another
western ride worth looking into. Although this riding area used to be
raw and remote, it is increasingly possible to ride this as a lite
mostly paved ride as the Mexican government has been investing in the
area to open it up to tourism.There are essentially two approaches to
this area from the U.S.. From the east you go through Chihuahua and
from the west you go through Baja. The Chihuahua approach gives you
Mexican culture, the Baja approach gives you the sea to mountain
effect.  Internet access is now widely available, making it easy to
use Google translate to get past the language barrier. In addition to
pavement, there are off road opportunities ranging from really
challenging to easy and there is a great opportunity to see and
discover the area while it is largely unspoilt by tourism.

Hope this helps you figure out what you're going to do.

To get the links and updates on all today's Ducati news:
http://www.ductalk.com/
and
https://www.facebook.com/ducnet

Ducati mailing list -- ducati@list.ducati.net
To unsubscribe send an email to ducati-leave@list.ducati.net
Mailto: %(user_address)s

In the past 3 years the western states I've ridden are UT, AZ, CA and AK.
I used to live in CO and have ridden SD to Yellowstone. For a week-long
ride, I never base out of a single place. To find lesser roads in the U.S.,
I found no better resource than a set of Butler maps. They have helped me
discover roads in areas I've ridden for decades.

California has weeks of great riding. It also has all sorts of
opportunities to see and experience motorcycle related events and
destinations (e.g. The Quail, Scaramento Mile, Races at Laguna Seca) and of
course has an incredible number of the country's best national parks. The
southern end of the state doesn't offer a lot of remote area riding, while
the northern end is mostly remote area riding. When the southern end of the
state is the best temperature to ride, the northern end is too cold to ride
and when the northern end is warm enough to ride the southern end is too
hot to ride so it is best to divide the state into a northern half and
southern half for ride planning. Global warming is wreaking  havoc on the
state. Between torrential rain washing out roads, to forest fires, it has
become increasingly tough to plan rides. I did 3000 miles in Northern Cal
earlier this year. 105F inland and 55F on the coast, Crater Lake NP was
still not fully open due to snow. The areas I rode in northeastern CA were
engulfed in fire a week after I rode them. In southern CA, when I rode
through PCH, Angeles Crest and some other routes had closures which made it
impossible to ride their full length and Death Valley has some roads which
have been closed for years. The southern end has lots of route options to
get around closures, the northern section doesn't. Lastly, legalized lane
splitting makes it easy to deal with traffic when you encounter long back
ups, like at the entrances to National Parks.

UT/AZ has some great riding and national parks. Unfortunately the surge
of visitors to National Parks has somewhat ruined the experience of these
parks. Zion is now clogged with stop and go traffic end to end and access
to the canyons requires taking a park bus. Traffic is so bad, they control
access to the tunnel in the park, because it doesn't have adequate
ventilation for people to be stuck in it. Reserved entry is increasingly
required for the National Parks and the reservation system requires
separate reservations for each motorcycle to enter within a two hour
window. 2 years ago, the southern section of infamous 666 (Coronado Trail
https://www.google.com/maps/search/666+(Coronado+Trail?entry=gmail&source=g)
was covered in tar snakes, making it less enjoyable than typical. If you
want to ride UT/AZ you want to ride it before or after schools let out for
summer break, when tourists overwhelm the parks and towns.

SD to WY is nice, but primarily about riding the area around Mount
Rushmore to Red Lodge and then wide open road to Yellowstone. It is
possible to make a loop ride through Northern Colorado, but the distances
mean lots of straight open road riding if you want to do this in a week. Of
course all the National Parks stuff applies doubly to Yellowstone plus
when  tourists stop for Donkeys, Buffalos and other wildlife in the road,
you face the challenge of how to get away from the animals as they will
knock your bike down and trample you.

Colorado is a great ride. Typically I start out of Ft. Collins ahd head
down the front range and then go west over to 550 and then north to Grand
Junction before heading east. Heading north on 550 there are two ways to
get to Grand Junction. If you veer west towards Naturita, you go through a
Utahesque Canyon area. If you turn east toward Black Rock Canyon, you
eventually can go north on 92 (AKA Black Rock Canyon Rim drive) which is
considered by many to be the best road in Colorado. There are some easy
dirt roads which can be used to connect some of the dead mining towns
(which are now resort towns) to the next paved section without having to
double back on the road you came in on. While the Rockies predominate, the
western side of the state is one of my favorite areas to go through as the
riding becomes Utah-like. I always make it a point to go through Colorado
National Monument for this reason and if I want more of the Utah experience
it is easy to swing over to Moab. Tourism is crushing Moab. Hotel rooms can
be hard to get and tourist lodging has raised the cost of housing to the
point where service workers are in short supply since they can no longer
afford to live in Moab. The National Parks require reservations and I
enjoyed off roading to see them more than I enjoyed doing the main paved
roads.

Alaska is spectacular. Rather than slog up there through Canada. I did a
fly and rent out of Anchorage and then a four corners tour of the northern
part of the state (Anchorage, Valdez, Dawson, Fairbanks). In the first week
of August, I only say temps above 60, on two days of riding and probably
half of the riding was cold and wet with the worst moderately heavy wet
snow going through Denali. To see the state fully you have to do some
gravel road riding which is generally easy unless it rains. Some of the
best views of the state are from the water and the ferry system is very
good, so I planned a route which included a ferry from Whittier to Valdez.
Although there is a fair amount of straight open road riding, it is always
accompanied by spectacular views. The riding is remote and you want to make
sure to plan gas carefully. The routes are largely single threaded so you
may want to have a little schedule flex. The Top of the World ~80 mile easy
gravel route to Dawson ends with a ferry. The week after I did this route
the ferry broke down for two weeks. The detour around this requires about
500 miles of riding. I plan on doing a route which goes up and down the
coast south of Anchorage, but this is clearly best if you use some ferries
and the ferry schedule isn't published till May or June, so planning is
tough.

I rode Copper Canyon Mexico a couple of years ago and it is another
western ride worth looking into. Although this riding area used to be raw
and remote, it is increasingly possible to ride this as a lite mostly paved
ride as the Mexican government has been investing in the area to open it up
to tourism.There are essentially two approaches to this area from the U.S..
From the east you go through Chihuahua and from the west you go through
Baja. The Chihuahua approach gives you Mexican culture, the Baja approach
gives you the sea to mountain effect.  Internet access is now widely
available, making it easy to use Google translate to get past the language
barrier. In addition to pavement, there are off road opportunities ranging
from really challenging to easy and there is a great opportunity to see and
discover the area while it is largely unspoilt by tourism.

Hope this helps you figure out what you're going to do.

To get the links and updates on all today's Ducati news:
http://www.ductalk.com/
and
https://www.facebook.com/ducnet

Ducati mailing list -- ducati@list.ducati.net
To unsubscribe send an email to ducati-leave@list.ducati.net
Mailto: %(user_address)s