The next morning consisted of prepping the bike by washing off the plethora of bug guts, eating a bite of breakfast, loading the bike to make it road ready.  It also meant a review of the weather – ugh, not looking good.  There was rain and potentially snow heading up over the pass to make it into the Jackson Hole area.  Lovely…  We selected our final route, fired up the bikes and headed out.

The first part of the trip was not too bad.  From Casper west on US 26.  There is nothing in this part of Wyoming – flat, desert-like, nothingness.  We passed this one area called Hiland that had a population of 6.  First stop was in Shoshoni, WY.  About a 100 miles down the road.  Continued down 26 towards Riverton, but bailed off at Hwy 134 as a shortcut back to 26.  26 goes south to Riverton and then back northwest.  Rather than following the pointy part of the triangle, we took the shorter route.

Along 134, we encountered road construction.  Had to stop for the pilot car – same as on Day 5.  Luckily, it didn’t take long.  I did talk to the guy holding the sign.  As you would expect, he was fairly “weathered” from having worked outside most of his life.  I asked him if he was born in Wyoming or moved here.  Born and raised about 90 miles south of where we were.  He looked the part.

Once past the construction, the wind started becoming a problem.  Gusting quite a bit from the south, southwesterly direction.  We were heading west so this made for a very tough cross-wind.  Cross-winds are explained on Day 2 so I will not go into details here.  Suffice to say, we were a bit miserable on this part of the trip.

Back on 26, we started heading northwest.  Wind was awful, but the outside temps were not too bad – high 50’s, low 60’s.  We continued on to the next stop at Dubois, WY, which is just before you start heading into the mountains.  We checked the radar again and the situation was turning worse.  We saw plenty of snow on the radar moving up and across the pass where we needed to go.  I called my wife who had already made into Jackson Hole the day before and she said it was cold and wet up there, but not snowing.  Given our need to push on, we loaded up and headed out.

Almost immediately after leaving Dubois, the outside air temperature starting falling.  We started around 52 degrees (f) and it quickly dropped to about 46 and started raining.  As we continued to climb, the temps continued to fall and the weather worsened.  We encountered snow pellets at one point.  Balls of snowy ice bouncing off the bike and the helmet.  I cranked the heat up on my heated gear!  Shout out to the guys that encouraged me to buy it and a big Thank You!  The jacket kept my body warm, the seat kept my butt warm, the grips kept my hands fairly warm and the heated socks definitely kept my feet warm.  I became a big believer of heated gear at this part of the trip.  Tucked in behind the big fairing on the bike, I was very comfortable as we continued to climb.

As we started to get close to the summit, the outside air temperature reached 36.  At this point, a snowflake appeared next to the temperature as a warning that we were getting close to the freezing point – as if I didn’t already know that.  If it reached 32 or below, then things would really get concerning as two wheels on black ice makes for a very bad combination.  35 degrees….34 degrees…still climbing.  At this point, we saw two other bikes going the other way.  They appeared to be more of the adventure bike variety – maybe a BMW R1200GS or a Suzuki VStrom.  I did note that they had larger knobby tires more designed for off-road, than on-road.  They passed with a wave…33 degrees…32 degrees.

32 degrees, the road is wet, it’s snowing…the only good news is that we had reached the summit.  Here’s some pictures of what that looked like from the bike.

We carefully made our way past the summit and began heading down.  The temperatures began to rise.  This segment of the trip was one of the most nerve-racking parts because you just didn’t know if you were going to encounter black ice, a snow storm or what.  We persevered and made it through on wet roads only.  Very cold, but only wet.  We felt fortunate and continued on down into the Snake River valley.

And then it happend…our first casualty.  We had pulled over once for my buddy to put on some different gloves.  He didn’t have heated grips nor did he have any kind of heated gear and the only complaint that he had was that his hands were cold.  We pulled over to allow him time to put on some different gloves.  No problem.  Here’s a couple of pictures of that.

As you can tell, the roads are wet and it is very chilly, but we continued on.  When we pulled over again to adjust some rain equipment, disaster struck.  My buddy is behind me and we are chatting about where to pull over.  We decide to pull over along the side of the road as that’s about all there is in this part of Wyoming.  We still have the intercoms on and as I pull to a stop and put the kickstand down, I hear him yell “Oww…dammit” and hear a crash.  I turn around in time to see him and the bike laying about halfway into the lane.  Not good.  I make sure my bike is secure and then go help.

Luckily, he is ok and not hurt.  Maybe a pulled muscle here or there, but just stands up and starts bitching.  I would too in that situation.  His bike has never been dropped and so he is pissed that it had to happen now.  I flag over a couple of pickup trucks and the two guys that stopped helped us get the bike upright.  With all of the gear and luggage, it probably weighs close to 800 pounds.

We get the bike upright and look for damage.  The mirror on the left is damaged and, well, that’s about it.  On his FJR, there’s a bit of rubber on the side case that helped prevent damage to the paint on the rear and the sliders he had installed up front helped prevent any further body or engine damage.  All in all, he walked away fairly lucky from what turns out is a fairly common occurrence with the FJR.  The kickstand doesn’t go all the way down and the bike just rolls right on over as you start to lean on it.  I didn’t have the heart to stop and take photo’s of him and the bike laying in the road.  Probably should have.  🙂

Here’s a picture of the damage:

That now made two tense moments on this day.  Dang, if we can only get to our condo.  From that point, it was another hour and a half to make our way down to Jackson, WY and then back up into the Jackson Hole ski resort area where we were staying.  Rained on us practically the entire way and the traffic through Jackson is terrible.  But, we finally made it.

Here are a couple of pics of where we were staying – a very nice two bedroom condo.

The rest of the day we spent unpacking and finding some lunch and then dinner.  We did do a little shopping that afternoon and found a cool place called Wool & Whiskey.  If you have a chance to stop in for a drink, you should.  I bought a few items and had a few Pendleton whiskeys literally on the rocks.  They don’t offer ice cubes there, but do have frozen rock cubes to put in your drink to help chill it.

After the harrowing experiences we had encountered and endured, we were very much ready for some R&R.  We made it back to our rooms and promptly crashed.  A good day in that we survived and would be ready for the next part of our trip over the next few days.

Here’s the map for this day: