So far this has to have been one of the worst winters I have seen since I started riding. Living in Montana, it’s typically cold, and even in May, there are the occasional freak snowstorms. Typically, however, there is also a pretty good balance of nice days to keep the mood up and let us riders go out and find our legs (or wheels, as it may be). That has not been the case yet this year. So far I cannot recall a day where the temperature has approached 70 degrees, and the warm and sunny days we do end up getting are sparsely scattered between long, drawn out rain storms or cold, windy days. So needless to say, I have not gone on a lot of good rides yet this year.
In the absence of warmer, mileage inducing weather, I have been working on a few little projects to help make my motorcycle trips a little better. The first is a piece of gear that I wrote about a little while back, the camping hammock. I decided to give myself something to do besides endlessly clean my bike, so I began making my own camping hammock. The basic concept is really simple: Take a piece of rip stop nylon, hem the edges so they don’t fray, tie the ends together and hang it from two trees. So far this has worked out pretty good for me. I have been doing a lot of experimenting with how the ends are gathered and tied, but after a little bit of trial and error, I think I have things set up where I want them.