California road trip advice please!

[the Ferret]

Holy smokes you guys are hard core! I'd be whining if I had to spend more than 5 or 6 hours total in the saddle in a day. I love riding, but I also love to stop, stretch, look around, meet people, take pictures, have a lunch or ice cream somewhere... 800 miles at a 70 mph average is just shy of 12 HOURS saddle time. Maybe that's someone else's idea of fun, but not this guy!

You can't average 70 mph, You can only average 55 mph at best, closer to 50. Even Iron Butt'ers figure on that kind of time/miles. Excessive speed = excessive risk and with it associated risk fatigue. Then you have to stop and pee and get gas, even if you don't stop to eat. 800 miles is closer to 16 hours riding time with necessary stops. At 200 miles per tank it would take 4 gas stops. Then you have to drink water at each of those stops to stay hydrated. Drink enough to stay hydrated and you will have to pee at each of the stops as well. Figure 15-20 mins per stop or in 800 miles a little over an hour of not riding time.

The 942 miles took me over 19 hours. I've also ridden 5500 miles in 11 days which averages out to 500 miles a day or 10 hours minimum in the saddle a day, 11 days in a row. Some days were longer than others lol. You don't have time to stop and see a lot when racking up that kind of mileage in that number of days lol.

[LongRanger_imp]

We'd leave SD at 7:00 AM and arrive at Furnace Creek for burgers by 12:30 PM, so that's about 5.5 hours to go 400 miles. We'd hang out in DV for a few hours, take a few scenic excursions, and then head back to SD that afternoon, taking our time and stopping for dinner along the way. Keep in mind you can make really good time in the Mojave if that's what you want to do. I rode a Saddlesore 1000 on similar roads (California and Nevada high desert) in 15.5 hours on my Kawasaki Concours (7.5 gal tank) twenty years ago. It was a fun day and not at all fatiguing, though I probably couldn't ride at that pace today. It's really nothing to boast about -- it was just the circle of friends I rode with at the time.

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