My first try

[olderthandirt]

My wife went camping with me yesterday, or I should rephrase and say the first time on the bike camping in 40 yrs. We started out on a bike and it wasn't a pleasant experience and it was a long time ago. Since then we've camped in tent trailer a 29' travel trailer and a 38' motor home. All have been good but had draw backs. So it was time to go back to basics.
I have a Harley E glide and she has her own bike but we did the trip 2-up
My tent is a Coleman giant 10x14' a huge sleeping bag, a lantern, queen size air bed and small cooler. I also use a Nelson Riggs tour pack bag. Then I had all her "stuff" and she did have a lot of "stuff"
We went to a state park only 30 miles from home as a shake down overniter trip. The bike was loaded heavy when we left and didn't include any food or beverages.
After setting up the tent I realized that I need another more manageable size tent so we went to the local sporting good store and I purchased a Eureka Tetragon 9 [I need a little room] and a couple of stuff pillows to replace the bed pillows we brought :eek: I also bought a collapsible water container and a 1 burner Coleman dual fuel stove.
We made it through the nite OK but it was raining this morning and no let up predicted so we broke camp and packed everything on the bike including the new equipment. We had more than a few strange looks coming home because it looked like a pile of equipment coming down the road, as we were hardly visible. I have a lot to learn about bike camping but I have the packing thing down pretty good :D

Great forum and thanks to all that have posted cuz I've learned a lot
Mac

[Trailace]

We need to see some pic's of your set up with all your gear. Sounds like you were loaded to the max. How did you get all that stuff to fit on one bike?

Did you enjoy yourself and what are your plans for the next trip?

[olderthandirt]

We need to see some pic's of your set up with all your gear. Sounds like you were loaded to the max. How did you get all that stuff to fit on one bike?

Did you enjoy yourself and what are your plans for the next trip?

Since it was raining I didn't stop to take pics but I can tell you how it was strapped on.
Top tour pack held the tent and lantern and the pump for the air bed 1 saddlebag held our leathers and a mess kit and coffee pot. The other saddle bag we stuffed the pillows in. The Riggs bag held most everything else with the exception of the sleeping bag which was bungeed on top of it. The poles stakes and cooler were all held together in the cheap little plastic bag they came in and Zip tied to the saddle bag guards on one side and the "new tent" and extras were held together with bungees and Zip tied to the other saddle bag guard rail. I wouldn't want to go across country like this but for the 30 miles home it worked ;)

I had a great time, my wife is not as passionate about a tent. But thats OK because she doesn't mind me going alone :D My next trip will be in a couple weeks to Michigan, for a weekend. then later on in the month another weekend somewhere in that state. July will be local trips and Aug. I'm going around lake Superior. By then I'll have went around the other four lakes but we'll be staying in motels.
I still have much to learn about how to pack but have picked up some great Ideas from the forum IE. PCV to pack tent poles. So it will get better as time goes by.
2010 is a trip to Alaska for the summer, so the learning curve is short :tent6:

[Jetfixer]

Hahah! That's great! Looking at the bright side, it can only get better! I'd love to get my wife bike camping, but she'll only go if we take the 5th wheel. With the gas prices so high now, we won't be going too often.

[ChipSTer]

I have really good luck looking at the camping gear used by back-packers... they have to travel light AND small.... Most of the stuff is expensive, but of a high quality... I've got a back-packing tent and sleeping bag (and pad)... Packs really small... :D
:cool:

[voyagerrider]

Part of motorcycle camping or just camping in general is figuring out what works for you. Try something, if that doesn't work, try something else. You would not believe the evolutions we have been through, and all of the camping gear we accumulated over the years.
Right now we have 3 tents of various sizes, 4 different types of sleeping pads, 2 different types of bags for transporting our gear, and the list goes on.
I am about to get all the extra together and get rid of it. I will let the folks in my CMA chapter have first shot at the stuff, but I am sure I will posting some of it here for sale.
I also have Tetragon 9, it is a older one it still works well. Just the right size 2-up camping or even just by myself.
Marty:D:tent1:

[bluepoof]

Part of motorcycle camping or just camping in general is figuring out what works for you.


It's one of the most fun parts, too! :D:D (or at least it is for REI and my credit card company ;) )

[voyagerrider]

It's one of the most fun parts, too! :D:D (or at least it is for REI and my credit card company ;) )

+1 on that especially the credit card!!:eek:

[vannooch]

Get a trailer, when my wife goes with me I have to take it, solo I'm fine without it. It's nice because when we take off during the day, I just chain it to a tree and lock up whatever I need to. I have a bushtec Turbo 2 and it tows great. I talked my wife into taking the bike motocamping for our honeymoon through the New England states. She took stuff we didn't even use, but that was her first trip of that kind.

[bigdoghd]

I don't know about this camping stuff the more I read about it. The alst long trip I was going to take solo, I was loaded down. I pack a bike cover so cleaning supplies and then a T-bag on my luggage rack. Then you have your jackes etc and I'm jammed. Now your talking tent,lantern, water jug, cook stove and you have to run out after camos set and buy food? Thinking roll up to a hotel, hot shower. Bike is all covered up. Ride for diner and the sleep in a nice kozy bed with a wash room your not sharing with the bears? Don't bet me wrong, with a four wheeler you have no issue of packing what you need to make it enjoyable? Jury is still out!

[G wizz]

Well Sir ... We wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't FUN. P^

G wizz

[TrainBagger]

Well Sir ... We wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't FUN. P^

G wizz

What he said!

[Firenailer]

Some how, some way we HAVE GOT TO SEE THIS! Please load it up again and post a picture. I mean to tell you, I have got to see this set up!

Bob
04 K1200GT

[Mellow]

Idon't know about this camping stuff the more I read about it. The alst long trip I was going to take solo, I was loaded down. I pack a bike cover so cleaning supplies and then a T-bag on my luggage rack. Then you have your jackes etc and I'm jammed. Now your talking tent,lantern, ater jug, cook stove and you have to run out after camos set and buy food? Thinking roll up to a hotel, hot shower. Bike is all covered up. Ride for diiner and the sleep in a nice kozy bed with a wash room your not sharing with the bears? Don't bet me wrong, with a four wheeler you have no issue of packing what you need to make it enjoyable? Jury is still out!

It's obvious pulling into a parking lot and walking into a hotel is easier and less effort.

However, you have to look at it like it's two great trips. A riding trip and a camping trip. vs A riding trip and a stay at a hotel.

There are a lot of 2-up campers. If you target backpacking gear you'll get the smallest stuff out there. You also don't try to buy everything at once and try to pack it... you start with the bare essentials. Tent, Sleeping Bags, Sleeping Pads... and that's it, you go into town for food and you give it a try..

You'll learn what works for you as you add little things to make the experience better... and you see how YOU like to pack things. I can put everything I need for camping in one bag if I have to and I would have extra space. Most of us end up bringing stuff we never use on a single trip but might use on one of those trips.

There's lots of good advice here from the members, take a look and ask if you have some specific questions, someone will jump in.

[Timmer]

Another resource is a book by Tom Mehren called, "Packing Light, Packing Right" which gives all sorts of good suggestions about packing and what to pack. It's available at www.soundrider.com.

[vannooch]

Well Sir ... We wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't FUN. P^

G wizz

+1 especially sleeping with the bears:eek:

[G wizz]

+1 especially sleeping with the bears:eek:

Have you been talking to Mr. Guy ??? :confused:

[Mr. Guy]

What bears?

http://newscoma.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/black-bear-0012.jpg

Guy

[Ironheadziggy76]

Guy if you don't mind, I wish you wouldn't post my wife's picture on here! :lol

[Mr. Guy]

I'm going to tell her you said that. :D

She may make us all leave earlier than we planned. :eek:

Guy

[G wizz]

I'm going to tell her you said that. :D

She may make us all leave earlier than we planned. :eek:

Guy

Leave??? If he keeps that up, we might not even be welcome. :(

Don't do this to us now Ziggy, I'm counting on sampling her pancakes. :)

G wizz

[Liv2Ride]

What he said!


Yea what he and they said!

The interesting thing about having bought so much gear over the years designed for backpackers (small and light), I have since picked up backpacking. It is now my true camping experience that I've been searching for. I can't believe that it's taken me more than half of my life to discover that I am totally in my element when hauling all of the stuff I need to camp and survive on my back well into the backcountry and be completely comfortable. I absolutely love it! Getting into the backcountry is my primary reason for the notion of trading in my big HD Softail Heritage for a GS-650. But I digress. That's a different subject all together.... :) Kat

[Ironheadziggy76]

I'm going to tell her you said that. :D

She may make us all leave earlier than we planned. :eek:

Guy

Naw, she has put up with a lot worse than that from me! :eek:

I kind of burst her bubble about her Dad, they call him Bear where he worked. One of his co-workers is my riding buddy, and he told me they call him Bear because he was GRUMPY, not because he was big!

Now I know where she gets it! :lol2

[Ironheadziggy76]

Leave??? If he keeps that up, we might not even be welcome. :(

Don't do this to us now Ziggy, I'm counting on sampling her pancakes. :)

G wizz

You still planning on bringing some Michigan's Maple syrup? We've bought wiped out the jug I got her from Vermont. I can get some more if I need to.

[G wizz]

You still planning on bringing some Michigan's Maple syrup? We've bought wiped out the jug I got her from Vermont. I can get some more if I need to.

The jugs a commin ... Michigan maple syrup tastes better than the stuff they make in Vermont.
It's made right here in ... (no kidding) ... Vermontville.

G wizz

[Ironheadziggy76]

The jugs a commin ... Michigan maple syrup tastes better than the stuff they make in Vermont.
It's made right here in ... (no kidding) ... Vermontville.

G wizz

That's too funny! :D

[vannooch]

Have you been talking to Mr. Guy ??? :confused:

No but I have had my own experiene with the Black Bear.
My wife and I took a two week Honeymoon trip on the bike through the New England States. Adirondaks, Green Mountains, Kankamangus highway, Camden/Rockport Maine area, even Acadia National Park. Camped on the shoreline of Maine's east coast at Megunticook campground by the sea.

We ride 2500 miles through all of this and do you believe it no bears, moose, whales or even puffins. We're heading back into PA and my last stop was Ricketts Glen State Park (the falls trails are awesome). It's dusk and we're tired and hungry so we pitch the tent and light the hurricane lamp and sit down at the picnic table for a nice quick meal of an Italian sub (bears love these....trust me). I had one of those 12" round disposable grilles with me and I had it sitting on the bench to my right about three feet away. We're carrying on a bit and winding down (it's getting dark now) and all of the sudden I hear a snort and the sheet metal grille crashes to the ground. Not being able to see anything under the table top elevation with the lamp on it, I pick up the lamp and swing over to my right and yogi is looking at me from about sixteen inches away. Well......I set down the lamp being very careful not to spill the oil and start a fire (that was about two seconds) and start to yell and clap my hands and whatever else I can think of, my wife jumps onto the table (as if it were a mouse) and I chased it off.
Not the end....by now my heart is pounding pretty rapidly and I have a flashlight holstered and I'm practicing my quickdraw.
We calm down finally and I unhook the trailer from the bike just in case he comes back and messes around with the cooler in the tongue. We armed ourselves with a mess kit the sheet metal grille, hatchet and the camp saw and crawl into our Eureka and drift off into a comfortable peaceful night.
Well.....no, back comes yogi about twelve o'clock I'm fast asleep, my wife wakes me up only to hear the ice in the cooler sloshing around. You guessed it, yogi had his teeth buried into my cooler and was dragging the trailer around the campsite. Up I jump banging pans and grilles jumpin hollerin and growelllin', off runs the bear. Ahhhh back to my peaceful slumber surely after two times he would give up he was running that time.
Nope! back at two, the three, then four with a raccoon by his side, they even tripped over the guy to the tent, by now I'm fuming and cranky!!!!! Not only is he destroying my gear hes deatroying my sleep! I jump up scare them off and take the cooler to the dumpster groweling like an animal the whole way. I come walking around the main building facility and there are two women walking like they are scared to death of what's behind the building, and they ask is there something back there. I crankily reply NO IT WAS ME!
by now the sky is starting to lighten as the sun sarts to peek over the horizon and I'm mad! This was a wednesday night the campground was pretty empty, well we take off hiking and paddling having a great time and I get the brain storm that I'll video them tonight. Just then a 30 foot box squeezes into the sit two away and they bring out the spread....I mean everything you could ever want for yor campground picnic we're not talkin salami (though theres nothing wrong with that). So I think Perfect! the stage is set! I prep the camera and park myself in a nice comphy seat and wait for yogi and booboo. 9 o'clock, 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock......mind we were hiking and paddling all day.......yawn.....12....o....clock.....zzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzz
Didn't hear a thing.............

[bigdoghd]

Rereading the orginal post, I'd love to see pic's of this. I did a solo run up north alst year not planning any camping just my cloths, bike cover, misc tools, jacket and one helmut and I was loaded to the max. Well my back seat was free yet. If I was to have added my wife and camping gear, there would be noway I could have had everything I needed. Keep in mind my Ultra is pretty mint and I would not want things rubbing on my paint. Alsi I like to cover my bike at night and the cover alone takes up 75% of one saddle bag.

[Scooterman1]

Have you considered a pop-up tent trailer designed to be towed by a motorcycle? The Aspen Classic and the Bunkhouse are a couple good choices.

See the forsale section. I have an Aspen classic for sale there. No pressure just a thought

[Cousin Jack]

My wife and I ride two-up comfortably on a Honda ST1300; admittedly not one of the bikes with the most load capacity..... just takes a little experience, a little research.......

The trick is to minimize everything, and have everything fulfill at least two purposes..... for example, we usually wear mesh clothing, and supplement it with a layering system of pile jackets and Frogg Togg raingear. We carry nothing that we can't wear on the bike. We have at times worn hiking boots to use as both riding boots and (of course) hiking boots!

Sometimes we'll go for weeks with just two or three sets of underwear.... but it's the compression shorts, wicking shirts type underwear, synthetic stuff, garments which you can wear into a campground shower at night and it will just about dry by morning...

Best way to see the world in our opinion, although we've just bought a camp trailer in a concession to age.....

http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/NassirIIColorado268.jpg

twenty years ago, we weren't as accomplished, but we had a lot of fun!

http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/Suzuke750003.jpg

Fred Rau says the most important thing to pack on a bike for a tour is.......attitude! With a good attitude, you can handle just about anything..... two-up touring has brought us some of the richest experiences of our lives together.....

http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/croppedalaskasign.jpg

I only hope the trailer turns out to be as much fun as our four or five tents we've owned have...if not, I'll sell the thing, and go back to a couple of sleeping bags, pads, a strong 3-4 season tent, anything else is just window dressing!

http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/RedinMontana.jpg

[G wizz]

twenty years ago, we weren't as accomplished, but we had a lot of fun!

http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/Suzuke750003.jpg



http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd226/roscinante/croppedalaskasign.jpg



Don't know about you ... But your wife looks as lovely now as she did twenty years ago ... P^

[Cousin Jack]

Don't know about you ... But your wife looks as lovely now as she did twenty years ago ... P^


Thanks, friend! She's even better looking now! Me? Ehhhhh....... But don't be fooled, that delicate looking woman is tougher than nails, has camped in the mud, blood, rain, snow, hail, and high winds; survived a deer collision in your neck of the woods that would've killed most people, and she just keeps smiling on! One summer years ago, we were planning on going up to Alaska..... we were all ready to go, all packed, actually, and she was inside closing up the house..... But I had this bad feeling, ya know? For reasons I couldn't explain, I just didn't want to go up there, so.....

As she came down the steps, I said, "Honey. We're not going to Alaska; we're going to Arkansas instead!"

She stopped short for a split second, blinked, just once, and then said, "Well, okay...just let me call my Mom and let her know....."

Gotta love a woman like that! The following year, we went up to Alaska just fine....

[G wizz]

One summer years ago, we were planning on going up to Alaska..... we were all ready to go, all packed, actually, and she was inside closing up the house..... But I had this bad feeling, ya know? For reasons I couldn't explain, I just didn't want to go up there, so.....
I said, "Honey. We're not going to Alaska; we're going to Arkansas instead!"

WOW ... And here, all this time I thought I was the only one that had premonitions ... :eek:
Mine always seem to come true ... How about yours?

[Cousin Jack]

WOW ... And here, all this time I thought I was the only one that had premonitions ... :eek:
Mine always seem to come true ... How about yours?

Well, most of the time I don't know, since I usually avoid the course of action that I have bad premonitions about!

:D:D:D:D

I know one that came true, though, the one concerning my first wife -- ol' "it's either me or that damn motorcycle!" I had bad premonitions concerning her, even on my wedding day, but I was too young, too stupid, and too alcohol-involved to act on it..... (the proper action would've been to run like hell!....) I could've saved myself much pain..... No one should marry their first wife! If it turns out to be your only one, that's okay, but, man -- them first ones are a killer....and expensive!

:D:D:D

[G wizz]

Well, most of the time I don't know, since I usually avoid the course of action that I have bad premonitions about!

:D:D:D:D

No one should marry their first wife! If it turns out to be your only one, that's okay, but, man -- them first ones are a killer....and expensive!
:D:D:D

First wives ... :eek: ... Been there, done that ... :p


As for premonitions ... Early this year, we were making plans to ride out to Arizona to see the Grand Canyon this summer ... Woke up in the middle of the night sometime in March, nudged Whatever ... and told her we wern't going out west this year ... somthing just didn't feel right.
With the high temp's and droughts they've had, along with the fires, we're glad we didn't go.

[R and R]

Her first time...

I took my first wife ( you can see where this is going) on a Camping / Motorcycle trip. Heading to Colorado left early one afternoon to put in a short day stopped after 100 miles camped seamed ok.

In the morning she anounced that she was Not a camper and Not a motorcyclest.

No problem placed her on a Grayhound home and I had a great trip to the mountains.

One of my better trips..........

R