Hello, new to forums. I am looking at making a trip from Seattle to San Francisco in June. I ride a 2006 GS500F. The plan right now is for my brother to meet me in Salem Oregon, and then we will ride down together. He rides a Ninja ZX10.

My plan is to ride no more than 6-8 hours per day. Will be using tank bag and tail bag. I was wondering if anyone had any advice. I have never ridden this long before, so I am sure I will have some monkey butt going, but I plan to wear my padded shorts underneath my gear, and take as many breaks as needed. I have time to not rush myself either way. It is about 14 hours, so I figure that by splitting it into the 6-8 hour legs, I should do ok and still make decent time. Total distance from point A to B is 871 miles. I will be returning in the same fashion.

Sounds like a good plan, timewise.  Avoid interstate as much as possible, 55-65mph is the sweet spot for covering distance while not getting fatigues in my experience on the GS.  Of course going slower and enjoying the scenery is good to.

Other than that, I'd try to work up to the distance if you can, ie. take a half a day ride, or a few, then take an all day ride or two, just to get your body conditioned to it.

+1 on avoiding the interstate as much as possible!  To me that's not enjoyable riding!

if you are doing a longer trip like that at sustained mph in the higher regions i would recomend adding a tooth to your front sprocket.  That way your rpms wont be as high while running at a constant speed.  This will cause less strain on the engine..Oh and get yourself an mp3 player  helps out a lot.

I'd do an oil change before the trip and keep an eye on the oil level during the trip.

CA traffic laws allow lane splitting and many people do that. If I remeber, the rule of thumb was only lane split if the rest of the traffic goes slower that 15mph and not exceed 10mph over the traffic.



Jenya

Also: frequent stops for coffee. I found that it takes too long to drink a full cup, so a five minute stop for espresso every hour or two really helps. (Or at least makes you jitter in time with the bike).

as for california, its nerve wracking, but i actually feel safer lane splitting, provided i do it defensively. And while its not exactly LEGAL per se, its not ILLEGAL either. While in dense traffic, it'll cut your commute in half, but itll tire you out twice as fast. Theres no official policy about general traffic speed or your speed relative to it, but a cop can always pull you over for reckless endangerment, so just be careful.

The actual lane splitting law according to the CHP website is:

Can motorcycle riders "split" lanes and ride between other vehicles?

Lane splitting by motorcycles is permissible but must be done in a safe and prudent manner

And my boss was a Harley shop owner and spoke with traffic judges on this and the general concensus with them is that it is legal to do and you may not travel more than 5 mph over traffic, but no really it's just don't be a jerk about it. I've seen people on batwing harley's try to chase me down for some reason and break other people's mirrors left and right. I've been splitting lanes for years and never so much as bumped mirrors. When travelling on roads the more packed traffic is you'll see a corresponding rise in broken mirrors on cars. I try not to add to that statistic, plus if you're really unlucky the guy could call you out on it and then you'd be responsible for a hit and run.

yea do it and have a blast doing it

Take some advice mate.  Buy a sheepskin cover to place over your seat.  The extra padding will give you an extra hour or 2 before the lower back and tail bone start getting sore.  Will be the best money you have spent.

Get plenty of trip pix

Thanks guys. Oil change and new plugs done last night, got a gel pad for my seat from JC Whitney. Trip starts tommorow around 10:30am. If all goes as planned I will be going to sleep in Medford Oregon tomorrow night.

Carry a quart of oil and check it frequently.Please read this thread. http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=41989.0

Grommet,

I did this same trip earlier this year on my GS, only I went along the coast. I can't stress enough how much you will miss out on if you take I-5 the entire way. Please, consider that motorcycle trips allow you to take in an entirely different experience than driving/ riding in a car. I-5 will be a LOT of dull, straight roads with semi's, trucks with trailers, and generally in attentive drivers trying to get places as fast as possible.

I understand you are almost certainly under some time constraints as far as when you want to get to a place, but trying to make it to very southern Oregon from Seattle in one day will be down-right tiring, gel pad or not. You run the risk of getting seriously sore that first day, which might make the whole rest of the trip exponentially less enjoyable.

Consider going to central Oregon on I-5, then cutting west to the coast and going down HW-101 until you reach the junction to HW-1 in north-central Cali at Leggett. The stretch of HW 1 from Leggett into San Fran is almost entirely twisty, beautiful, and was far more enjoyable than I-5 for me. If you'd like to check out some of my pictures, including a map of where the pictures were taken so you can see the route, check them out here: http://picasaweb.google.com/TyGuyChang/MotorcycleJourneyMarch2008

Either way, have a great ride, take lots of pictures, drink plenty of water (I opted not to drink coffee), stop frequently to listen, smell, and stretch.