The Butterfly Masacre Resumes

Oakland to San Diego
Page 1 of 7

Please don’t assume that the title of this story reflects any animosity on my part towards the delicate creature known as the butterfly. I’d rather photograph them than kill them, but without any intention whatsoever I’ve killed scores of them. This began on my trip through the mainland of Mexico 2 years ago when I caused the untimely demise of probably thousands of generic little yellow butterflies with the windscreen of my motorcycle and the visor of my helmet. My recent journey to the Baja ended with the deaths of far fewer butterflies overall, but it seemed that they were bigger, more elegant butterflies than the ones on the mainland. Further, rather than plowing through swarms of the fluttering bugs, these butterflies seemed more solitary, and strangely drawn towards the front of the motorcycle. From out of nowhere they would fly out of the scrub alongside the opposite side of the road, timing their journey perfectly to coincide with the oncoming rush of 500 pounds of steel and plastic. This story, which will speak no more of murdering butterflies, is dedicated to them.

The plan for this latest adventure materialized in an unusual way, and the adventure did not go off as planned by any stretch of the imagination. I have a tooth that has been feeling a bit sensitive over the last few months, and not having a dental insurance plan I decided to explore some other options. I’d heard of people going to Thailand to get dental care even when they have local dental insurance since so many procedures are not covered or are barely covered. Thailand is not a cheap plane ticket, so I thought I’d try to find some other places to go. I typed “dental tourism” into Google and found that Budapest is the latest hot spot to travel to for good quality dental care. However Budapest is another thousand dollar plane ticket. Singapore and India, ditto. Then I saw Mexico listed. I zeroed in on a recommended doctor in San Jose del Cabo. “I could ride my motorcycle there,” I thought to myself, “and the transportation costs would be virtually eliminated.”

I made an appointment for before Christmas and figured I could get there in just a few days. I spent a small fortune getting the bike ready, far more than expected and started to wonder how much I would have left for any required dental treatment. First it was just new tires, some nice TKC-80’s that would allow me to check out the back roads. The tech that put the tires on was very concerned about a kink in my rear brake line and my chain and sprockets, so I took the bike to BMW SF where they agreed that the brake line needed replacement, and felt the chain, sprockets and brakes also needed replacing. I told them I’d change the brakes myself, but do the other work. When I went to pick up the bike it wasn’t done, the brake line was backordered. The manager and I decided it was just going to have to do, after all it’s only the back brake!

There were also the rear tire issues. The morning after the expensive new tires were put on, the back tire was flat. I removed it and grudgingly accepted as much needed practice changing out a tube. In fairly good time I had a brand new tube in there and inflated the tire. It immediately went flat. I’d pinched the tube with the tire iron installing it. I took the old tube, which had been originally installed on the side of the road in the middle of the Atacama Desert two years ago, up to the bathtub to find and patch the leak. The bubbles came from the valve. The dumbass tech hadn’t screwed the valve stem in tight enough, no patching was required, the tube didn’t need to be replaced. So I put it back in the tire – this time it held air. For a while at least. I was on the 580 doing about 75mph when it suddenly went flat. I managed to get the bike to the left breakdown lane without dumping it. Within seconds a pickup truck stopped and the guy pulled out a ramp and asked if I needed a ride. I had the other tube with me so I told him I’d just replace it – but thanks! A spoke had broken and the end of it punctured the tube. I spent about an hour patching and replacing the tube and filled it with air and was on my way again. I stopped at the next exit and topped off the air. All good. Went a couple more exits at highway speed then got off an exit and checked the air again. All good. Got back on the highway and was cruising along and all of the sudden it went flat again. I was in the slow lane this time and managed to get to a good spot and called to be towed, I was going to have a professional change it this time. This seems to have done the trick since in the last month I’ve only had to add a few pounds of pressure once. It took me almost two thousand miles to get to really trust the bike and the tires again, I was ridiculously conservative in the corners for a long time. Now I’m back to my relatively conservative self, I’ve never got to the point where I’ll ride the bike with the reckless abandon I’ll ride a snowboard.

So after all this preamble, the trip could finally begin. I left on Wednesday December 19 with 37104 miles on the odometer. The weather held for the day, although going over the Grapevine into LA, it looked like it might rain, and there were scattered rain clouds in the mountains above the city of LA. I rode to San Diego that day, an 8 hour ride, and stayed at Rob’s dad’s house in Rancho Santa Fe, one of the nicer houses I’ve ever been in. They gave me a pair of shoes to wear around the house so I wouldn’t sully anything with my motorcycle boots. There were tasty pork chops freshly prepared when I got there, followed by checking out the grounds and then hot tubbing. Much wine was consumed and Rob’s girlfriend Rachel was thrown out of the hot tub and into the pool a couple times before the evening was over.

Next: Punta Cabras