- Joined
- Sep 25, 2009
- Messages
- 2,538
- Age
- 69
- Location
- West Des Moines, IA
- Bike
- 2022 Kymco AK 550
- 2024 Miles
- 006503
Heres something you may also want to consider, more studies have come out in favor of lane splitting from a safety standpoint. This is a huge factor in California due to our severe traffic congestion. With a trailer you no longer have that great option. California so far is the only state that allows this but as I mentioned the studies will probably open at minimum more debate and possible passing of lane splitting in other states.
I for one carry quite a bit of camping gear as I like to cook at camp. All I have on my ST1100 are the side cases and a Hydra 2 bag on the passenger seat I run lengthwise. It's a great bag in good sizes reasonably priced and waterproof ( to the point of a down pour ). It holds my 3 man tent,fly, poles, ground cover,twin air mattress,a real pillow,sleeping bag ,bag liner and 12 volt air pump with room to spare. This is the mid size bag which fits nicely on the bike. I use one saddelbag for all the cooking and kitchen stuff and the other one for clothing and ditty bag.
I also ride solo so take advantage of it and give some kind of dry bag a try, that and some ROK straps and your all in for under a hundred bucks. It's a cheap experiment and thats half the fun.
I really haven't considered it but there is a reason for that. Unfortunately it will be a very long time before Iowa even considers lane splitting. Just not enough traffic to make it beneficial and BDC attitudes that would make it downright deadly here... even if it were passed into law. So not really a motivation here.
I do have a Kwik Tek Dry Pack XL dry bag that I received for Christmas from my son. It's 103 liters packed and closed. From Amazon for $50. I plan to put everything that goes inside the tent in that (sleeping bag/pad, clothes, ditty bag, etc). The tent and tarp and such will go in a separate smaller Sea to Summit dry bag and set on top of the big one. Cooking stuff in one panier with room to spare and tools, extra jacket liners/gloves, and misc stuff in the other. Will see how that works. I always keep the tent/tarp separate from the inside stuff since I can then get those out in the rain without risk of getting the other stuff wet. All last season I camped in the tent since I don't have a hitch on the new bike. But I was using 3 additional smaller dry bags piled high on the tail. The Kwik Tek will bring that pile under control.
Have you tried Glucosomene, Contdrotin, with vitamin D and MSM. Works miracles for me every day.
Have tried those but doesn't work the same for everyone. We both tried that stuff and joints felt worse for both of us so we stopped. My knees are fine as long as I don't kneel directly on something hard. A problem with the knee cap more than the joint so I now use a knee pad to solve that problem and it works great. I'd bring the pad along either way, tent or camper.
Thanks for all the ideas. Keep them coming. So far I am leaning toward tent camping and selling the camper but still not totally convinced either way. Plan to do some more tent camping this May and June to see how it goes.
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