Hubbard Motorcycle Adventures

Well we are now in Vancouver and almost ready to go. The flight up was the usual long haul so to lighten up we did put our helmets on - In case of severe turbulence! However I might add that we deemed it a good idea to take them off before we met land of Uncle Sam immigration and Customs in San Francisco even found that my lens cleaning cloth in my pocket was regarded as a suspect item! We have now cleared our bikes through Customs and got them off the wharf. Clearance through Canadian Customs was interesting. Because the bikes are classified as personal effects you have to front up in person at Customs head office in downtown Vancouver. This was an interesting exercise in itself! When we went in we were met by a receptionist who was wearing a bullet proof vest. In addition she had her can of pepper spray and a big truncheon hanging from her belt. And this was just the receptionist! Ken was intrigued. "Are you armed as well?" he asked as he tried his best to ch

                             CHAPTER 7 Well, it is now 24 hours to we head off to Alaska. Last minute preparations are all in a flurry. The next blog entry should be from Canada I have now got my riding gear all sorted out. I wanted a New Zealand theme that overseas people could relate to that also recognised my great age ( and also great wisdom !) So I will go forth to the Americas as "Dick the Grey" in true Lord of the Rings fashion.  Here we are all dressed up and ready to go ( on a borrowed bike).  Yes, that is really me under all of that. Should give the Alaskan bears a scare ! "DICK THE GREY" Anyway back to reality. We have also been doing some quiet planning on the Mexico leg. At Hubbard Foods Ltd we are fortunate to have Aaron Gazza as a Food Technologist. Aaron is from Monteray in Mexico and he kindly talked us through a route for us through Mexico taking in all the interesting bits. We had Aaron round and he  plotted a safe and interesting rout

                              CHAPTER 6 It is now down to one week before departure and final preparations are now on the way. Another trial pack has been done.  It is now definately 3 pairs of socks instead of 4!  Diana has weighed her clothing bag for the bike in at 4.7kg which me thinks is pretty impressive for 5 months. Perhaps I could put the rest of her clothes.......no, I won't go there! A number of people have asked about our proposed route down through the grand old US of A. Well, that still seems a long way off at this stage but below is the tentative route from Calgary south to Los Angeles. The aim is to incorporate as many of those iconic American National Parks as possible as we sort of zig zag down through the wider Rockies.  As we know the Americans , bless them, are very keen on and indeed pioneered the drive thru concept. It seems as much the same sort thinking has gone into National Parks so as a result you get some wonderful roads meandering right though th

                                                        CHAPTER  5 A number of people have asked me for details of the route we are to follow.  Well, here is the "North to Alaska" bitty.  We will probably do a side diversion to Anchorage or at least Denali National Park as well. Remember that this map of our route is interactive - you can blow it up with the keys on the side to see the details of the route.  Such technology !  Last night we used googlemaps to zoom in on a view of the 'hotel" at Coldfoot  in Alaska. As we zoomed in on the picturecam of the petrol bowser outside the hotel would you believe there was a yellow BMW GS parked in front of the bowser there that wasa the same as my one, albeit it that it was very muddy.  However a good sign me thinks. View Larger Map SOME BEAR FACED ADVICE FOR NOVICE TRAVELLERS Ken from Wellington sent through some interestiong advice on how to deal with bears on our trip through Canada and Alaska. It seems as if

                                                                                                                         CHAPTER 4  Well,it is now about two weeks until we take off to Vancouver.  There has been quite a lot of preparation going on and last minute details to sort out. Firstly the bikes are on the way. They got delivered to the Mr BMW bikeshop where they were serviced and both bikes got their full 10,000km service check. Both bikes have new tyres and the theory is that the tyres should get from Vancouver up to Prudhoe Bay and back down to Calgary before changing.  That should then synchronise with the need for the next 10,000km service. We should be due for a nice break by the time we get to Calgary. In Calgary we should be able to trade the bikes in for horses if we have to! Now Ken, exactly where is Alaska ?   Off to be crated. The journey starts ! Anyway back to shipping. BMW crated the bikes up in the packing crates that were used to ship new bikes out