PDA

View Full Version : First Vacation with the VTX


TheKronic
05-24-2009, 11:12 PM
Howdy All,

Just got back from our first vacation with the new motorcycle and wanted to pass along some pics of the trip. We went down to Harrison, AR for 5 days and put on over 500 miles just riding around the mountains. Harrison is located in the North, central Ozarks so it was an ideal location to start. We ended up trailering the bike down as the drive time as around 10hrs and there was no way we would have made it on the stock Honda seat (it's almost more comfortable to ride on a bare seat pan) cause it SUCKS. Anyways, we ended up getting a brochure from the Visitors Center in Harrison and it had riding routes already drawn up with points of interest already marked so we just picked a different route every day. The riding was awesome and by far, the most fun I've ever had on two wheels. The pictures do not do the roads justice and there were a lot of curve, after curve stretches for miles. One section (HWY 123) had first gear, 10mph switch backs all the way up the side of a mountain and was the hardest riding I've ever done. It is going to be boring riding around here now cause everything is so flat! Even got to test the performance limits of the VTX and scared my wife to death. We were just cruising along and got overtaken by a group of BMWs and they obviuosly knew the roads cause they were hauling ass. Anyways, I decided to try and keep them in sight and was able to actually stay right with them. We were hitting over 80mph on some stretches and I wore down the heals on my boots from dragging them through the turns. I'm sure if they really pushed it they would have buried me but it's amazing that an 800lbs cruiser could even keep up with sport-tourers and I could actually eat them up on the straights. The VTX has amazing power and torque. The group was suprised to see me when we all stopped at the end of the stretch. We are already looking forward to making the trip down there again in the future. I'm trying out this Flickr thing so just follow the link and it should take you to the photo album.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/robkrivanek/

Enjoy,

Rob K

Links to Harrison Riding Routes and Misc

http://harrisonarkansas.org/motorcycling.htm (http://harrisonarkansas.org/motorcycling.htm)

http://www.cruisetheozarks.com (http://www.cruisetheozarks.com/)

Bikerv2
05-25-2009, 07:09 AM
Very cook Pics. Glad you had a good time. Thanks for sharing.

Lee

Smoken'JOE
05-25-2009, 09:09 AM
WTG Bro...........nice ride and great pics. Looks like you guys hade a good time. Tough gal you got there to do this ride on the stock passenger seat. :thumbup:

iron pony boyz
05-25-2009, 10:08 AM
Great story, good pix. Double your fun with a seat mod or after market saddle.

Milkmaster
05-25-2009, 10:19 AM
The pics look a lot like middle and east Tennessee. Beautiful countryside! Sounds like you had a nice vacation. Glad to see your X perfomred well.

You didn't mention if you ride a 1300 or an 1800. I was curious if it is a 1300 and if the carbuerated bike reacted much different at higher altitudes? I am not familiar with the altitude of the Ozark mtns. They may not be high enough to cause a difference.

TheKronic
05-25-2009, 11:12 AM
The pics look a lot like middle and east Tennessee. Beautiful countryside! Sounds like you had a nice vacation. Glad to see your X perfomred well.

You didn't mention if you ride a 1300 or an 1800. I was curious if it is a 1300 and if the carbuerated bike reacted much different at higher altitudes? I am not familiar with the altitude of the Ozark mtns. They may not be high enough to cause a difference.


I have an 06 VTX1800C. I orginally looked at the 1300 but got too good of a deal on the 1800 to pass up. Glad I did, fuel injection is awesome. Met a guy there with a 1300R who rode down from Ohio and he didn't seem to have any problems with the carbs at altitude. You needed all the performance to could get to get up some of those rodes.