Fall colors ride

With the new meds I’m on for my spine/nerve problems (Lyrica, for those following along at home), there’s no way I’m getting on a streetbike anytime soon.

A lightweight dual-sport, now, though, that’s another story. 🙂

I felt pretty good this afternoon and the meds’ side effects weren’t too bad, so I hopped on the XT for a 22-mile ride around some local back roads. My goal was to find some nice fall colors — most of the landscape around here is either coniferous trees or grassy hillsides, so our two seasonal colors are green and brown.

I lucked out right away and found some nice oranges and yellows along Stevens Canyon Road, a one-lane ride through — you guessed it — Stevens Canyon, and alongside Stevens Creek.

I forgot the mini tripod that I like to bring when riding through the forests, so some of the pics are unfortunately a little blurry from the low light. A couple turned out well though:

The XT got kinda stuck on the wet rocks/leaves/logs at that last photo. I’m pretty sure that when my doctor told me to “take it easy”, she wasn’t referring to wrestling a 250 lb motorcycle over wet boulders, but that’s life.

I’m a bit more sore than I probably should be (then again, I did take the low dose of the meds this afternoon instead of the higher). But maybe I can keep going out on these 20-mile rides once a week as a “dose of fun”. 😉 Right now, the weather reports are predicting sunny weekends through November…