It was New Years Day, location Browns Camp, in the Tillamook Forest deep in the hills of coastal Oregon. I had the luck of riding with Thor Drake from SEE SEE Motorcycles.
Day started off tough. The night before, Thor texted me and asked if I wanted to wake up at 5 a.m. to go ride motorcycles. Mission accepted.
So, with that, I woke up this morning and like Thor suggested, my alarm went off at 5 a.m. for what I was hoping would be a great day riding. Weather-wise, it had been sprinkling, and was about 45°. I felt okay with that because it was supposed to warm up to about 50, with some rain but not a lot. After all, it’s Browns Camp. Location means nothing, other than just that - a location. It’s a place to go, a place to ride, a place that’s open year-round, and even though it is a busy place just west of Portland, it is a place to go. With that 5 a.m. alarm, we were planning on being there by 7, which made me laugh because it’s not even light out till about 7:30 in the morning around here. That was just fine, because I have a light on my bike. So, the 5 AM New Year’s Day alarm goes off and I scramble to get my stuff together. I pour some coffee and head out to start the van.
I remember my DEF fluid is low. It’s always something.
I need to fill my DEF diesel exhaust fluid, but now leaving my hometown of Sandy, Oregon, nothing in town is open. I mean, it’s before dawn on New Years Day. I try to stop by 7-Eleven. No luck. They don’t carry any. So, I drive to Chevron, the next gas station to try and buy some. I show up a few minutes early so I have to wait until they open. As the open sign lights up, I run in. It’s just my luck, they are sold out so now I have to make the drive from Sandy to Gresham wondering if my van I’ll go into limp mode.
But it’s okay because I’m going riding.
I shoot Thor a quick text to let him know that I’m running behind and that I would try to find some exhaust fluid. I end up finding some in Gresham and I’m on my way. I don’t know about you, but this kind of thing throws me back, because I feel like I have not held up to my end of the plan. This chase has put me behind schedule. I’m behind.
It’s okay because I’m going riding.
It’s unspoken code to show up on time. Cell phones ruined that code, giving us too much flexibility and chance to change things up on your plans. You should be somewhere when you say you’re going to be somewhere. Cell phones are great and everything, but our parents and grandparents were able to make plans and show up on time without having to communicate in-between via texts.
As I roll up and meet Thor at the gas station, he laughs out loud and hands me a hot coffee. Damn, that was cool. I had some coffee from home, but it was all gone, and Thor had a fresh set of coffee in a thermos for me. We took off out of the gas station to head up to Browns Camp.
Now those of you that are reading this know that Browns Camp is kind of a collector environment - it’s where everybody goes - jeeps, trucks, four-wheelers, UTV‘s, and dirtbikes, and of all skill levels too - beginners, intermediates, juniors, pros. Browns Camp is seen as not super technical, and that’s ok. It’s New Year’s Day and we just wanted to get some riding in.
As long as the wheels are turning on the bikes, everything is good. We unloaded, got our gear on, and put our goggles on and we headed out.
It was still just a little bit dark, but we were riding and that’s what mattered. As we left our vans, we headed out. It’s just sprinkling a little bit and all the puddles were as full as they could be. It had been raining all night. We were pretty much alone on the trails, it being so early, and I all the people were still sleeping off their NYE hangovers, so there we went skipping through the puddles and having the best time.
This trip wasn’t about the location and it wasn’t about the terrain. It was just about meeting up and seeing a friend and riding our motorcycles together. My bike ran fine, no adjustments or anything were needed. I added a little bit of fuel and that was it. It has a hard hard time starting though when it’s cold. I still have all of the emissions that came on the 2017 Husqvarna 501 so it takes a little bit of time for the electric start to kick in. The batterie is OK this time as last weekend I needed a jump but that’s only because I hadn’t rode the bike enough.
That’s kind of why I was here. I needed a ride, more simply, I needed to just ride a motorcycle. I’s not about riding all the cool places, and it’s not about riding with only the cool people. It’s just about riding. After losing grandpa this year, and having a little more time to think about the things that are the most important, including doing what I love, like riding my motorcycle.
Which brings me to my riding thought this day on New Year’s Day 2021, is that we are just simply riding. We are riding because we can. We’re riding because we have just enough money to pay for these dirt bikes we are riding because we are healthy enough and, during this global pandemic we’re riding because some people can’t some people can’t afford life in general so we shouldn’t be complaining at all if we can ride or cannot ride it’s all about the act.
When my wife Meagan worked for the ALS Association she taught me a very important lesson. At dinner time, we used to sit down and talk about our day. She would ask me, “Joey how was your day?” I’d reply with something like “Oh man, I got a flat tire today.”, Or "Man, I really didn’t the thing that I wanted to happen with so-and-so account didn’t come through, so it wasn’t a very good day.” And I would ask her about her day.
Sometimes, she’d reply with something like “Well, you remember so and so and his family from last year right?”, and I’d nod, and she would go on to tell me that he passed away from ALS and that she had to talk his family today about what was next for them and how the ALS Association was going to help. My point is, her bad day was trying to talk someone through a death in their family, while my bad day was having a flat tire or having something not important at work not work out. Sometimes, it’s the little things, the small lessons that really stick with you and remind you what really is important.
And with that, we went riding because we could. We were riding because we had two legs and had just enough money left over to own a motorcycle and we had just enough time left like New Year’s Day to get in a quick ride at Browns Camp.
So this is the challenge in memory of my grandpa James Lancaster.
We challenge you to this. 101 times, ride a motorcycle this year. No, that’s not necessarily 101 trips - maybe you live in the city or maybe you have a minibike or maybe you have a street bike you could ride to work. Simply throw your leg over a motorcycle 101 times in the year of 2021. It’s the James Lancaster Memorial Challenge and 101 time challenge.
Let’s see if you can do it. This was my day one.
It’s okay because I went riding.