Gran Turismo – Grand Canyon: Day 4 – Zion National Park, UT to Grand Canyon, AZ : 373km
We’ve left the heat of the Vermillion Canyons behind and as we begin our final approach to our destination periodic bolts of lightning streak downwards to the Arizona desert floor. This is a storm, a proper one. Occasional lashes of rain cut through the sand’s blown grit as the wind tosses the Ducati GT1000 around [...]
Gran Turismo – Grand Canyon: Day 4 – West Wendover, Nevada to Zion National Park, UT : 1000km
It runs under the salt like electricity, but the GT1000’s tires can’t insulate me from this current. We’re on one of North America’s temples of speed, the Bonneville Salt Flats, which, damp in spots, is featuring tenuous traction as we play on the stark white moonscape. Given the conditions I’ll not be emulating “The World’s [...]
Gran Turismo – Grand Canyon: Day 3 – Boise, ID to West Wendover, NV : 600km
We’ve cut the day short and landed in West Wendover, Nevada. I use “we” in a sweeping sense as I’ve come down ill and the GT1000 and I have been riding in the support vehicle for the day. No great sacrifice though, this transit of the “droneways”, our newly minted term for interstates, has taken [...]
Gran Turismo – Grand Canyon: Day 2 – Spokane, WA to Boise, ID : 750km
I’ve gone naked. By the time we reach the Old Spiral Highway outside of Lewiston, ID I’ve stripped the screen from the Ducati GT1000. The windscreen was slowing the handling, making the bike susceptible to sidewinds, and inducing a weave past 160kph. Removing the screen the Ducati GT1000 is transformed. The steering is lighter, the [...]
Gran Turismo – Grand Canyon: Day 1 – Vancouver B.C. to Spokane, WA : 793km
Stopping to take video of our group’s bikes as they ascend off of Diablo dam and into the Cascades along Highway 20, I’ve fallen behind. Mainly it seems because I miscounted the bikes and ended up waiting for a rider who didn’t exist. That’s okay, because our long-term loaner Ducati GT1000 is happily charging through [...]
