Still waiting for the parts to be shipped by Twisted Throttle. I’ve been thinking about more that I will need:
- hand/lever guards (SW Motech/BarkBuster)
- crash bars; been thinking and reading a lot about these, and despite initially believing they were kind of useless, I’m now thinking seriously about buying some SW Motech ones. Still have to check if they will fit together with the engine skid plate.
- tires; having seen often TKC-80 tires used for off-road, I’m starting to think it may be a better o
ption than the Shinko’s in sand and/or mud. - seat; I’m wondering how long/how many days I will be able to ride with the stock saddle. So far my bottom stood the OEM saddle pretty well, so not decided yet.
Other than that, I still need to pay MEC a visit for the camping gear – no rush yet.
I’ve also decided to get a real camera. I was initially thinking of a simple and “relatively” cheap waterproof one, but then I considered the fact that the pictures I’ll take will need to be really great if I want to publish them in a book one day and/or sell them to some traveler/rider/nature/people magazine. So I finally opted for a 18MP Canon EOS T5i with a 18-55mm lens, and an additional telezoom 55-250mm. Quite a big investment, I just hope nothing bad will happen to that…
Below are two pictures of the bike I took today.
I still need to practice a lot to get better pictures, in particular playing with aperture, speed, ISO settings, etc.. Obviously not just to take pics on my bike, but also people, landscapes…
Locarno Beach
Queen Elizabeth Park
Other than spending money, I’m also already investigating the part of the trip in Mexico, trying to estimate how much my expenses with hosting will be, looking for places I should go and roads I should take, and others I should avoid. I already got a friendly couch-surfing offer from SkizzMan, a friendly AdvRider.com forum member from Austin, TX. Never been couch-surfing in the past, but I hope I’ll be able to return the offer one day, wherever I am… I also need to investigate other options for the trip, like Airbnb.
And finally, I’m still reading the handbook, now dealing with bikes and related hints…
