Okiegoon

Sometimes ventures start with a picture. In this case it was a picture in a thread a friend(Gary) of mine and I have been watching on advrider.com, it’s mostly pictures of Arkansas and various things in Arkansas. In this picture was a general store in the town of Oark, AR, it was rumored to have good food and some great riding to get there and back. Thus on that picture and the good word of some internet people that have been there Gary and I decided to go see if the rumors were true.

Thus started the planning of “Oh hey, this Saturday what are we doing? Whoa yeah that store in AR? Ok sounds good. WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN LEAVE AT 8 IN THE MORNING!? That sucks. Fine, 8 then, I’m pretty sure I don’t like you anymore”. Yeah I wasn’t totally pleased with the 8am meeting time. As Gary and our two others that joined us Sam and Jim found out, I tend to bitch a lot. Eh, it’s just what I do ya know.

Now I met this ride with a bit of morbidness in all actuality. I think that was due to Sam on Thursday talking about how our company would be hosed if we all wrecked and died this weekend(Sam, Gary, and I work together). Yeah thanks for the good thoughts Sam. As well as Gary deciding to scour the internet for wreck movies as well as stories of target fixation that same day and linking me to them. Needless to say for some reason I was starting out the ride in gloom and doom mode. Honestly.

8am, it’s early, I haven’t had any coffee. I roll into QT grab gas and cruise over to my friends, with Sam going “You’re late” I can’t recall exactly, but I’m sure that comment was met with more then a few comments that contained vulgar words, maybe even a vulgar expression or two. We gas up, rap a bit, and hit the road.

Meanwhile I’m in deep thought mostly about wrecking and dying or something. It was weird. The thing about it though was that I did not have that *gut* feeling that you get sometimes. I was just thinking about it. Probably to much, but alas, still it was running through my brain. Now the gut feeling is something that I try to adhere to as much as I can. If you get out on the road going for a ride and feel like you are out of place, or should not be on the road, or just have that gut feeling that you should not be riding at this time. GO HOME. Because you more then likely shouldn’t be riding. I have gone out on days sometimes that I get out on 244 and I’m heading out to go ride, but it just doesn’t feel right. I’m off, that *gut* feeling gets in the way. I turn around and head back to the house. Today wasn’t like that though, I was thinking about it all, but I didn’t have that feeling. Enough about that, I’ll abbreviate the ride some as the pictures I have are mostly Oark.

Stop 1: Quick pee break because we all drank water/coke or something at QT and didn’t pee before we left. Actually, we = Jim and myself.

Stop 2: We have done 51 and I have now seen the “trail of tears”, that’s a new one for me so chalk it up. I ask Gary if he doesn’t have enough HP to pass cars and not pack us up(bitching) as it seemed that in passing cars, which normally I hit 95/100 or so, he was passing and parking it. At this point, Jim has left his turn signal on for about 10 miles out of the 100 that we have ridden.

Stop 3: We get gas, we were going to a KTM shop that was in Fayetteville but we have passed through Fayetteville and are in another town. Route change and we’re running to 412 and down 23. 23, pig trail, another new one for me. Was very fun but didn’t get really twisty till we were almost to our turn off for Oark. Also it didn’t help that we had some guy in a pickup in front of us burning up his brakes trying to keep us from passing. The typical speed way up in the straights and toss out an anchor in the corners type guy.

Stop 4: 215. Wow. Very very smooth road. My pucker moment on this road was from a looooooooooooonnnnnnng right hand U sweeper that I accelerated out of to find a quick switchback into a TIGHT left hand turn. Little bit of brakes then you flop your bike on it’s side maintain throttle and “GOOD LORD THIS CORNER IS TIGHT” type moment. Was a great corner! Now we get some pictures from 215.

The bikes Sam/Jim.

The view from the top.

The turns to get where we were.

The crew +1 harley guy.

Sam is looking for bears or rattlesnakes I think.

Jim ready to go.

Quick Photo stop.

Where we were.

This particular road, fixing to be repaved by blacktop(that’s further on) turns to gravel for about 1500 feet or so. At this point in time(200miles) Jim has had his turn signal on for at least 40 of it.

It also has a one lane bridge that takes you from the dirt back to something kinda sorta resembling concrete or asphalt. It’s supposed to be widened soon.

Ahhhh, the Oark, AR general store/gas station/restaurant. Take it or leave it.

I have to say that Oark is an amazingly welcoming town, very small and very cool. I went outside after we ordered to smoke and there was some big red dog laying on the bench. I was “Hey, sup dog, gonna chill with you on the bench for a bit” I don’t think he cared. He bailed out a few seconds after I sat down patrolled the perimeter and came back for some petting to which I obliged. Good dog all around. Then as I was sitting a couple of locals came up and were asking about the bikes, which one was mine and whatnot. We rapped and I got information on the river as well as the various roads we were going to ride. Very cool dudes all around.

Ok, know you guys have been waiting for the food posts. My bacon cheeseburger and fries.

Gary’s catfish platter. I was plotting to steal a hushpuppie as they looked awesome, but forgot to.

The previous owner and the new owner came over to talk to us and give us information about the place. The Oark General store was built in 1870, it’s been around a hell of a long time. They have canoeing, camping, rentals, some air coaster thing that has a big fan and a parachute on it to which Sam was like “NOWAY” but I was more of a “That’s gotta be cool”. The school house for Oark is noted as the most isolated school in AR. Also they said the population is like.. I think they said 27?? Anyhow the ones that live across the river sometimes get flooded and blocked in, so the general store owners have to go out and tie their smokes to a rock and throw them across the flooding river. No I don’t think they were joking. The road is going to be repaved and the 1 lane bridge is going to be widened as well. Also we learned the local wave. To find out what it is, I guess you’re going to have to go there. We’re now in the know though.

Oark General store.

We were also told of this huge suspension bridge. I figured it would be super long or something. It wasn’t. I was unimpressed and I’m sure I bitched about it some.

On the way back, 103 has some crazy stupid 15mph cautionary switchbacks. I mean go to the apex put out your kickstand do the pick the bike up on the kick stand and turn it so you’re going the right way stuff.

2 parts, not going to put them together cuz I’m lazy.

After 103 it was I-40 superslab time. About 60 miles of this and back to rural roads that Gary knows as his dad has a place out here. Gary took us on some different back roads that ended up at this bridge. Which was right smack dab in the middle of no where.

That’s the last picture I have, camera ran out of memory. Anyhow the rest is pretty much here or there, 51/onto the BA and whatnot. I had a great time, and don’t fret, Gary and Sam also took pictures and will be posting them possibly tomorrow or Monday or something. Overall was a great ride. Roughly 12 hours on the road, we obviously weren’t in any hurry. Thanks Gary for the route and various excursions. Thanks Jim for coming and having your turn signal blinking(forgotten) more then I do because normally I’m the one doing that. Thanks Sam for rolling with us as well, always a good time Bro.

Sam’s pix…

Sam.

ME!!!

Parking at the general store.

Me but I don’t know what the fuck.

Yay! Suspension bridge!

I’m dicking with my camera, and Sam is a photo whore.

I have been watching the weather for the past month just waiting for a nice 70 degree day. Earlier this week was nice as well but my work week is normally busiest at the first of the week, so I stalled out for today. Woke up, drank coffee, took a shower, and rolled out. Pretty good flow of traffic, except for a merge right before 161st on I-44, that backed it up a bit. After that, smooth sailing, until scenic 412 that is.

Scenic 412.

The gateway to the twisties really. You’ll probably use this road if you’re going to AR or MO. Nice couple of turns before Locust Grove, then head up through Sallisaw to Spavinaw for some even better curves. Through “new road” to Jay, then on a long ride, probably up through 20 into MO to ride highway 90. Today there was a slight hickup in my smooth sailing. It’s called wide load.

Some huge railway system stuff or something. Took up most of both lanes and no traffic could go through.

Oh and bonus, while we were waiting another wide load rolled up. Good thing they didn’t meet in the middle, as I doubt either one of these guys would have been able to back up.

HERE SHE COMES BOYS!!! No rush though, still took like 5 minutes for it to even get to us.

How many axles does that thing need????? Also it backed up traffic something fierce.

OK, onward an upward through Locust grove and Sallisaw to Spavinaw. Roads right now in Spav are pretty clean. Lots of road kill out and about though, so definitely watch for that, as well as lots of tree damage, but most of that is off on the sides. Fun times.

It wouldn’t be an Oklahoma road sign if it didn’t have bullet holes. This is the famed Spavinaw horseshoe. A long right that is decreasing radius. Watch for it if you’re cruising through Spav and take this one kinda slow.

The Pit Stop. Now closed but used to be a nice little place to stop off for a break. I still want to find out if it’s for sale and open it up again.

Onward and upward. I didn’t get any shots of new road, not really anything on it but turns and chicken farms. Cruised through new road to Jay, decided to get some eats. I am normally of the mind to find someplace local and different. I missed out and went the wrong way. Finally after not seeing anything that looked good, I turned around and had a quick bite at Mcdonalds. Doh, rolled out and went up to get on highway 127 and just a half mile away there was a little bbq shack. I missed out.

Onward and upward, went to go check out highway 127. FYI it’s trashed.

Yay for twisties!!

WHOO HOOO, even tighter twisties, but in the middle of these twisties…

Whoa, something in the MIDDLE of the road. No fun.

Oh, a big pile of hay and shit in the road, this is always fun to exit a corner into.

Mind your entry speed. Oh and watch for rocks!

At the end of 127 the stop sign before new road is full of sand. I was doing the flintstone shuffle to get it stopped without locking anything up. I’m sure the guy in the car at the stop sign thought I was a freak! I ran new road, turned around, ran new road again, stopped in Jay at the gas station filled up and went BACK through new road and back through Spavinaw stopping in Salina. Good times but the traffic had definitely picked up from this morning. I went through this morning without having to pass any cars. The afternoon I passed a goldwing, and probably 4 cars or so.

I stopped in Salina for a coke and a brief break. If you have ever watched that show over the hill, the one with boomhower or whatever. I met his his grandfather in Salina. Was going to get a coke and the guy was “ble de me hoom sha hey what?” to which I replied “Yeup”. He wanted to shake my hand and show me his glasses as well. Good times. I pay for my coke head out the door. He comes out a bit later as I am smoking, goes at it again. “behend de da boop shmeee sorta n kinda well boop dat boop whoo” I mostly just nodded. Then 2 cop cars come flying through lights and sirens blazing. He advises me that there’s a fire. Sure enough a fire truck comes blazing through just a couple of minutes later. Good call dude.

I was headed home, but what the hell. Cop cars? Fire engines? Gotta be something cool. I gear up and roll back through Spavinaw but never find them nor see any smoke or actually anything cool really. Just turns. I round out the day at blue hole, and turn around and go back through Spav. Taking time to Rev it a bit at a Mom/Daughter who were waving at me. Roll back home, meet up with Sam_Rush and head to K&N. Total miles 239.

Oh and lastly, you can tell everyone is super pumped to get out and ride, as EVERYONE on a bike waved. Eh cept for one Harley guy and one Goldwing guy.

For the past two months I have been letting my manager know as well as my counterpart know that as soon as we get a good 75 degree plus day I am going on PTO. Well looking at the 8 day forecast last week, today was that day and PTO was had.

I had two objectives today, 1. to go to Bentonville and ride the BMW S1000RR 2. To go to Bentonville and head to my local office and meet another colleague that works with our group in the same capacity as myself. It only took me 6 hours to get from Tulsa to my local office in Bentonville. Yes I meander a lot.

Anyhow this isn’t really about my 300ish miles on the CBR, it’s more about riding the S1000RR, so we’ll skip through the short bits(like my toilet paper) and get to the meat. I got started from my house about 9:30 this AM, it was still chilly outside and stupid windy but oh well. I make it to Salina, OK before stopping to pee, yes it’s only 50 miles, yes that big glass of water before leaving was a bad idea.

First stop, peed, got gas, bailed out. As I was making my way to Jay, OK there was a fire of a BIG sort or something, on highway 20 it covered like 5-10 miles with smoke. So I decided from there that I would go ride Spavinaw WMA which is an awesome road anyway to see if I could see it. I couldn’t but hey, I rode the WMA a while towards where I had come from to find out. Also the WMA is whoa awesome. FYI. You never get to see this in the summertime due to the leaves. Lake Eucha.

After that we’re back on track, through Jay, through to Bentonville. I make a quick stop to see if my counterpart is doing lunch, since it’s via email it’s taking a bit and I decide to head out to the BMW dealership. It’s tucked back in a corner so of course I get lost twice on the way but finally I make it there and DAMNIT. There’s no S1000RR outside. I figured as a Demo model they would probably park it outside but it wasn’t outside. I resigned myself to thinking that if it was a big pain in the ass to move the bike out to ride it then I would just skip it and move on.

I head on in and the S1000RR is sitting right in the middle of the showroom and I start checking it over. This is where I meet Bob. “Hey!” Bob calls out from behind his desk, I reply with a “Hi, how’s it going” to which was met with “You know what? You should ride that bike”. What? Well yes Bob, yes I should ride this bike, thank you! He advised to hang out a bit and cool down, while sitting around chatting with Bob he took a copy of my drivers license to make sure I was legal and have it on file. I look over the S1000RR and Bob kicks it on and takes down the Mileage…

YOUR PROTAGONIST!!

The loops consists of roughly 37 miles of wonderful twisty roads. Some wide open sweepers as well as some really tight 90 degree turns. Let’s get to the test ride, the bike starts up great. Then I got scared of it and turned it off and rolled it back inside. I ain’t riding that beast! OK, no I didn’t do that. Talking with Bob and he showed me all the bells and whistles “Here’s how you switch modes, here’s the turn signal, start, kill switch, this is the ABS on and off DON’T TOUCH THIS” That type of stuff. I was going to start off in Rain mode but Bob was “What, rain mode? Weak sauce son, you put on your big girl panties and start in street mode!” well actually he didn’t say that but he did say rain mode was really weak and to start in street to get a better feel for it. Also it was almost out of gas, he asked if I would fill it up if the light came on.

Link to the route…

Click here for 34 mile route.

Again, the route is wonderful and twisty. Taking off in street and the power is very smooth, no jerkiness at all and excellent delivery. The brakes. Honestly the absolute strongest brakes I have felt on any motorcycle to date serious stop on a dime stuff. Also, THANK YOU ABS, for saving my butt. About 3 miles into the ride still in street mode I was coming up on some 90 degree turns. One of these turns was right over a crested hill, I topped the hill at some speed and said “Oh hey, turn now” so I grab a handful of brake like I would on my CBR, this was a terrible idea. I’m grabbing a handful of brake, my nuts are now slammed into the tank, and the bike is doing the CHUT CHUT CHUT with the ABS freaking out on me. Obviously I made the turn fine, albeit with an elevated heart rate and eyes popping out of my head. Seriously, without the ABS right there I would have locked the front and dumped it.

Here’s a view of what you get to ride through on your test ride…

After testing the ABS and then stopping to change my underwear, a few miles down the road well enough of this sissy street stuff I’m switching to race now thank you. Whoa. Lots more juice, still smooth as all get out though. Very smooth through the corners as well. Also I have to add that the S1000RR has a great seat! Super comfortable. The pegs are up a bit higher than my CBR’s pegs, also the pegs seem to have more room when you’re putting a knee out, if that makes sense. CBR riders will get it. It’s just roomy, and very very comfy actually. Moving on to the riding again.

Again, they send you off into stuff like this…

Currently in race mode, zipping right along, and get through the AR parts and now up into MO. Up onto highway 90 in MO which is a local Tulsa favorite to ride on the longer group rides that head out, just wonderfully twisty and lots of elevation changes. It’s on this road that I learn about the traction control. Being that I come from riding a 600 all the time, I am very heavy on the throttle. I mean the S1000RR’s shift light comes on when in my mind we’re getting to the fun part of the power band. I never red lined it, but I didn’t pay attention to the 8k shift light either, I was shifting more in the 10-12k range. Talk about crazy fun.

Talking about a heavy throttle hand, it was on 90 that rolling on through a few corners that I got that chug chug chug of stuff cutting out. Possibly due to the rear slipping a bit? I dunno, for all intents an purposes the traction control did a wonderful job and I never really felt unstable in a corner when I was feeling it. Also for those that say “The BMW S1000RR won’t wheelie” while in abs/traction control mode, well that’s crap, it just takes a good hill and a good stab on the throttle and the front goes WHOA and the rider(me) goes “OH SHIT” and doesn’t even need traction control because I chopped the throttle before it could kick in. In a straight line though the wheelie control thing kicks in when romping on the throttle at about 3-4 inches off the ground.

Want to know what also was a ton of fun? The shift assist. I was thinking that it would also assist with down shifting but mashing on the shifter to go down without having the clutch in yielded no results. The upshift though, WOW. Find a straight line, hit the throttle, and just keep tapping the shifter all the way through to 6th. It cuts the throttle for about a quarter of a second and you just going woooooooOOOM woooooOOOOOM WOOOOOM WOOMMMMP all crazy smooth like. It was amazing, probably more so to me because I love rowing through the gears at high RPM’s. My test ride is at an end and the fuel light was on, I took it to get gas then took it back to Bob and made him take another picture.

Final thoughts? I’ll stick with my 600. The S1000RR is super nice, and has tons of bells and whistles and technology, but after riding it and it being my first true outing on a 1000, I still like my 600 better. Most of the 1000/1200 sport bike riders I know talk about how they kick it up into 4th or 6th gear and just roll through the twisties using the torque to roll on through the corners. Now my mentality might change, but for me that sounds boring. I love the scream of my 600 when I’m rolling on from 11k to 15k rpm, there’s nothing better. I don’t want to putt around or feel like I’m putting around never shifting. Also, being that I love the higher RPM’s and tend to keep the bike in the upper RPM’s, with the feedback I was getting from traction control on the S1000RR I figure riding a regular 1000 in those RPM’s is probably guaranteeing a highside. So I’ll stick with my puny 600, you can keep your 1000’s. Although I have to add, anyone who has ridden one that tells you it feels like a 600. Yes it does, it felt just as light and flickable as my 600 all the way through, but with 193HP. Eesh.

Another thought, the S1000RR is a huge bundle of technology. I love technology, I love new technology, but I also like tested technology. I imagine the S1000RR somewhere down the road this first year out will possibly develop a pretty big fault somewhere in that technology. Such as the Aprilia RSV4 and the new engines they need. I’m hoping I’m wrong, but newer awesome untested technology I tend to shy away from. Oh and final thought on the S1000RR ? Without that newer technology of traction control and ABS, this machine would be unridable. It’s just. That. Nasty. And I didn’t even get to put it in Slick mode.

I’m pretty sure you can see my smile, even though I have a helmet on.

Back on the 600RR I head to my local office and get to meet my counterpart over there. We chatted for awhile and it was starting to get late so I headed out and back home. Didn’t hit any twisties on the way home, just took the interstate, yeah lame I know, but I was ready to be home. So with both goals met, I traveled the superhighways back to the homestead. Was an excellent first ride of the season, got to knock the dust off the CBR and then test ride the SS1000RR, pretty full day all around.

Cheers!