"In the beginning"

[Crazy Uncle Larry]

Hi guys!
Larry Hudlemeyer aka "Crazy Uncle Larry" here. This past July 08 I ended a long sabbatical between bikes! Years ago in "Uncle Sam's" Air Force I was fortunate enough to be in the UP of MICHIGAN. Started out on a 73 Yamaha 360 Enduro (sold it!) then moved up to 76 Yamaha XT500 (traded it for custom & mech work plus paint on the upcoming sportster)moved to Indiana (fewer to no available trails) rode a 74 Sportster, left it on the island of Guam and sort of figured I had moved beyond having a bike. I should point out I am married to a N U R S E and they generally aren't real supportive of bike riding, period. Raised up two fine boys and somehow managed to get through the teen years without mention of bikes. Again, thought bikes were a closed chapter. This past June/July our youngest son (#2 Son), the mischief-maker that he is emailed me and said we should look into adventure riding. Heck...we've rode mountain bikes, rock climb, mountain climb (Mt. Elbert/14433ft;Quandry Peak/14265ft), kayak, camp, rode shotgun on the Deadwood stagecoach, trained some mustangs, been in the movies (FBI sniper in "Lakota Woman"), so why not get back into riding?!! Found this 81 XT500 in Denver's Craigslist this past July 08. It had been sitting for the last 6 years. #2 son drove down to Denver from Laramie one Saturday morning, shot me a camera phone picture, gave the guy $500, took off the front wheel and loaded it into his Toyota 4Runner and took it home. I got to it the end of July. He did a good clean job on the carb (goes to UWYO-Mech Engineer student with access to the lab). We put it back together, put clean gas in the tank, pulled the plug and shot some Marvel Mystery oil down the jug, stroked the kickstarter and lubed the cylinder. Put the plug back in, turned on the gas, hit the choke, & went through the start routine (decompression lever etc) that I remembered from my 76 XT500. On the 6th full-kick, she started right up, no smoke, no problem! We added a TT600 for #2 son in August. We thought we would slowly re-build our riding skills with these old irons before moving on to something else. We would have like to moved up to the Yamaha XT660 Tenere and used one of those for ADV riding as we are still partial to the enduro-type bike. We've seen the KLR's, the big Suzy, KTM's, BMW's, and Husky 610E's and all of these are definitely straight up nice bikes! But, since Yamaha doesn't send the big 660 to the US, we've kind of settled on moving up to a couple of Honda XR650R's at some future date with a larger tank, light kit, frame-mounted add-on rear rack, and soft bags. In the meantime, we'll dance with who we brung and ride what we have! #2 son (Aaron) and I have spotted some of you O&A (out and about) during our shake-down rides. Yeti, we've seen you twice out Sheridan Lk road (Oct and Nov). The middle of Nov 08,#2 saw your ADV sticker and tracked you through Adventure Riders bb and subsequently to the DDSR bb. We were the yahoos loading up two bikes and a 4wheeler out at the Victoria Lk pull-off. Some people might mistake us for mudders, jumpers, and hill climbers. Shoot, my old knees won't take that kind of beating! We aspire to the trail, single or double-track dual-sport from point A to point B! But, like someone has said on here before...the main thing is the ride and it's all good! That's why we had my nephew with us on the 4wheeler; we wanted to expand his horizons and he was more comfortable on it.

This is getting long. I'll catch you later and share some more photos from this past Monday's (19 Jan 09) quick ride. Hope I have this posting figured out. If not, appreciate some slack until I can get on top of it! Oh yeah, had to take the airbox off of the XT and put a K&N in its place.

[fringefan]

Thats awesome. The XR is a sweet rig and I bought one for my dad a year ago from a guy in Denver. Kills me he only rides it around town when it could be out here getting used for it intended purpose.

[The Yeti]

Yeti, we've seen you twice out Sheridan Lk road (Oct and Nov). The middle of Nov 08,#2 saw your ADV sticker and tracked you through Adventure Riders bb and subsequently to the DDSR bb. We were the yahoos loading up two bikes and a 4wheeler out at the Victoria Lk pull-off.

I think I remember seeing you, although that spot has a lot of guys loading/unloading all the time. Next time you see me, flag me down!

Are you living in the Black Hills now? Anytime you wanna ride, just let me know!

[Hank]

Welcome Larry!   Another XT.. cool.

[Number Two]

I'm going to jump in on this thread.

I am the 'number two' son in question.  My name's Aaron Hudlemeyer.  I live in Laramie, WY.  I figure Wyoming is on the DDSR sticker, and my old man lives up in the black hills, so I'm legal.  I graduated high school in Rapid before leaving to seek my fortune.  I'm currently a grad student/full time engineer here in Laramie.  As told above, I just got into bikes this fall and started riding.  I've got an old '84 yamaha TT600.  It's a little rough, but I'm having a great time putting miles on it.  I'm mostly riding county dirts roads and some two-track, while I get comfortable on the machine.

I was pretty excited to find this forum based so close to home.  Hope to make it to the rallies this year.

[Number Two]

Oh yeah, almost forgot...