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- Week Alabama, it's not like they said!

klaviator

Scooter Trash
Joined
Feb 8, 2022
Member Number
431
Posts
3,223
Location
Alabama
If 20 years ago someone had told me I'd end up living in Alabama I'd have called them crazy. But, here I am and it's a great place to live and to ride.

If the title of this ride report looks familiar, I stole the idea frorm one of the most epic ride reports of all time, MatalJockey's "Angola, it's not like they said". I can't promise my ride report will be as epic. Actually, I can pretty much promise it won't be but I will report on my riding in and from North Alabama.

We have a pretty active group or riders here in North Alabama and most Saturdays we do either a street or a dual sport ride. Yesterday we did a street ride because a couple of guys had new bikes that needed to be ridden on the street. Our meeting spot was a gas station in Gurley, AL.

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We had nine riders in Gurley. Most were on adventure or sporty bikes. There was "Team Guzzi"

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A couple of GSA's

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And various other bikes.

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We did have one guy on a TW200. I thought he would get left way behind but he really flogged that bike and was faster than everyone expected. We still had to wait at turns but not that long.

We rode some twisty roads and stopped at the "world famous" Rock Zoo. You have heard of it haven't you?

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After the Rock Zoo we rode what is probably the most challenging paved road in Alabama. Jackson County Road 39 is insanely steep with super tight hairpin curves. It really gets the adrenalin pumping. I didn't get any pics but one guy was shooting video so I'll post a link to that once he posts it.

Then we did more curvy roads and went into middle Tennessee.

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An over the shoulder shot.

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There wasn't much traffic but we did get stuck behind cages once in a while.

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We stopped at a scenic spot.

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Lunch was in Lynchburg, TN, the home of the Jack Daniels distillery. We passed on the whiskey but did have some great BBQ:dukegirl
 
Mud Creek BBQ, Hollywood? One of those places started by WW2 returning vet. We hit the bottom of 33 or 39 and the bike knows to take it from there…
 
Mud Creek BBQ, Hollywood? One of those places started by WW2 returning vet. We hit the bottom of 33 or 39 and the bike knows to take it from there…
I've seen the sign for Hollywwod but never eaten at Mud Creek BBQ. I have heard of it before. Maybe I'll try it some time.
 
After lunch we rode some more. We got on the famous 129. No not US 129, the "dragon". This was TN 129 which is a pretty good ride.

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The guy right behind me was on a New Triumph Tiger 660 Sport.

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I was gonna say ... "There's a new Tiger in your midst!" Did you get any feedback from him about the bike?
Good variety of bikes, all in all. Nice! :thumbup
 
After taking the pics I chased after the group.

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The guy standing on the side of the road was shooting video of us riding by.

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I love this view looking down into the valley.

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Riding on of the many "paved goat trails" in middle Tennessee.

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We stopped and took a break somehwere in the middle of nowhere:

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I was gonna say ... "There's a new Tiger in your midst!" Did you get any feedback from him about the bike?
Good variety of bikes, all in all. Nice! :thumbup
The Triumph belongs to a friend who I have been riding with regularly the last few years. He ordered it months ago and it finally came in about three weeks ago. He loves it. its much lighter than his VFR which he will be selling and has much more performance than his CB500X which has been his main street bike the last couple of years.

After the break in Delina we swapped bikes so I can give you my first hand impressions. It's a bit lighter than my 2012 Versys but as far as ergonomics and handling it's very similar. The stock seat is way better than the "weapon of Ass destruction" that came on my Versys. Of course the triple feels much different than the twin in my Versys. I thought it had plenty of power but I never ran it wide open to see what it had. The brakes were better than the Versys. Overall I thought it was a fantastic bike. If I was looking for a middleweight comfortable sporty street bike the Tiger would be at the top of my list.
 
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After swapping back we rode some of the best roads of the day.

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I didn't get any really good pics but we had perfect pavement, few houses, no traffic and lots of hills and curves. Too bad all but five of our group had already headed home and missed it.

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We finished our ride in Ardmore which is right on the AL/TN line. We talked a bit then split up and headed for home. I ended up with around 250 miles. Acouple of guys rode up from south of Birmingham and must have ridden around 450 miles. Overall it was a great day. Many people don't like group rides but they are the highlight of my week. I expect to be riding a lot more with most if not all of the riders on this ride. We also have some out of state trips planned for later this year.

Edit: Here's a video shot by one of the guys on the ride: https://rumble.com/vzcq2v-group-street-ride-on-the-v85tt.html
 
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The Triumph belongs to a friend who I have been riding with regularly the last few years. He ordered it months ago and it finally came in about three weeks ago. He loves it. its much lighter than his VFR which he will be selling and has much more performance than his CB500X which has been his main street bike the last couple of years.

After the break in Delina we swapped bikes so I can give you my first hand impressions. It's a bit lighter than my 2012 Versys but as far as ergonomics and handling it's very similar. The stock seat is way better than the "weapon of Ass destruction" that came on my Versys. Of course the triple feels much different than the twin in my Versys. I thought it had plenty of power but I never ran it wide open to see what it had. The brakes were better than the Versys. Overall I thought it was a fantastic bike. If I was looking for a middleweight comfortable sporty street bike the Tiger would be at the top of my list.
It's been getting rave reviews - seems Triumph has nicely slotted this bike into the middleweight field. Nice to have friends with new bikes, eh? :D
 
It's been getting rave reviews - seems Triumph has nicely slotted this bike into the middleweight field. Nice to have friends with new bikes, eh? :D
It is nice to have friends who will swap bikes with you. I have ridden a lot of bikes this way. Seven years ago I was looking to buy a new bike and I had narrowed it down to 4. Then two of those bikes were at local dealers at insanely low prices so I had to decide between a Versys 650 and FZ8. Both were $3,000 off the MSRP. I went on a group ride and there was a Versys 650 and FZ8 on the ride and I got to ride both. After riding both it was no contest and I bought the Versys.
 
Sometimes the riding in Alabama is not at all like you would expect. Such was the case at the beginning of the year when I did some riding that was just a bit "different".

I woke up on the morning of January third, looked outside and knew I had to go for a ride that day.

So I pulled out my scooter.

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And off I went.

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Yes that is my Avalanche. Its a 2002 with less than 150,000 miles on it. It mostly sits in the driveway while I ride my scooter for almost all of my around town commuting.

More pics of winter wonderland.

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While I enjoyed that ride, i really didn't ride very far. I mostly took a lot of pics. A bit later I decided I needed to go for a real ride.

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I live in the Huntsville city limits but only a mile or so from my house it starts to look more like Kansas than Alabama.

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OK, now it looks more like Alabama again......well except for the snow!

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I turned off into the Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge.

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In case you were wondering, I wasn't on my scooter for this ride.

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I stopped and took a lot of pics because it may be years before another picture opportunity like this comes around again. Remember, this is Alabama.

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