Have been riding on occasion, but it has been so long ... since I posted.

My friend Doug rode with me today. He is teaching me how to ride in the dirt and gravel. We only did a small section of dirt, and the V-strom did pretty good in that gravel - the perfecto signal from Doug at the end of the dirt section was all I needed to see!
The rest was goat trails. It was a perfect day to ride - just what I wanted and needed to forget about work for a day.. Work has consumed me. Trying to set boundaries has been difficult, I care too much about my customers, but it has been consuming me..  

On the bright side - I am lucky to have friends like Dougie to ride with. Real lucky! 

Here are some pictures from the day.. 

Near Iowa Hill. Yea, she is my red-headed b****.. 

Had to pick up a fallen tree and move it out of the way to get here. Up a steep path covered with pine needles. The Strom rear-end danced a LOT, but kept on the gas and made it up. 

Deadwood cemetery. Used to be a gold mining camp - in the days of the California Gold Rush. 

We had rode smack in the middle of beautiful nowhere-ness.

Tried to head to Robinson Flats, but were stopped by ice. Well, I was stopped by ice. Dougie wanted to ride-on. He turned back because of me. 

We turned around and headed further up the mountains. This time even Dougie had to turn back. Somewhere just under 7000 feet I believe. 

Dougie pointed out - You can see all the way to the Sutter Buttes from up here, from not quite atop this mountain, looking out at the smallest mountain range in the world. It was good to be above the haze of the valley. 

Good day to be riding. Thanks for the dirt/gravel lessons Dougie! Let's do this again soon!

Thanks for reading folks. It has been so long. 

...and So long!