I love reading / watching your adventures, Saxonator, even when things go wrong. I look forward to the rescue, and hope your CRF is back in action soon.
Saxonator's Sick Enduro Video Diary
- Thread starter saxonator
- Start date
Thanks a lot Eoin Christie, everything is fine now, just working on the rescue video, will be fun to watch
So here is the Rescue Video, unfortunately the camera angle was a little off, I hope you still get the idea. It was for sure one of the hardest things I ever experienced in my life....ride safe Bros
Excellent effort, Saxonator. It may not have seemed like it at the time, but it’s all part of the adventure.
Took the kids out today for some more fun behind the ViP MX track behind Mae Jo. Very nice area to practice some hard Enduro Skills. They both did great, here's some footage
Improving immensely! They’re much more aggressive in their riding, and having fun as they develop - Great work by you all.
Hot day out riding, the Jungle is dry and still many small fires in the area we ride. Every year the same disaster all over again, it never stops. The good thing all about this is, you get to see more of the surface, that would be normally overgrown. This loop is so much fun. The idea was to explore more on top of the loop and try to connect to Mae Khuang Dam. This wouldn't happen, I got a puncture beyond repair and so we had to turn around. Riding with a flat in such a terrain is not easy, as you probably can imagine. Luckily the Tyre stayed on until home. If you ride fast enough the centrifugal power will let it stay on the rim
The beers would have went down well after that day in the bush.
Wild stuff mate.
Wild stuff mate.
Yeah Moto Rex, one hard day in the office I guess. I don't know why I am addicted to it, been off the bike for a while and there seems to be no cure for me, the harder the better and my 62 year old buddy is an inspiration to me with his riding skills and never ending stamina, I was quiet impressed when he just rode up over the rocky platform and made it almost to the top in one go. I needed a few attempts, but I am also double his weight...555
Damn, what a ride!! This was too much fun in one day. As many of you know the Burning Season is in full bloom right now (dunno if that makes sense 555). The air is hot and the forest looks like the surface of some planet. After a couple of rides with the CRF I am now back on the good ol' XR. Lighter and overall maybe the better bike, for what I do. We took off direction Jungle at 10am and managed to find our way thru the mild traffic at Mae Jo in no time. We entered "Ron's Track" and as usual it begins to throw all kind of terrains at you from the very beginning. So no pause and keep going thru this Theater of Pain. About 30 minutes later we were half way into the loop, this is were the video starts and were it got really interesting riding-wise. Some may say we are nuts, but I think we consider this more as a compliment....555. After a few climbs thru some rock gardens, we faced a gnarly downhill that was littered with obstacles and rocks. One more time one can see how much beating this bikes and tires can take. After the downhill we entered the creek, which was a pleasant amusement to all the hard stuff before. We followed this creek until we found our way to our hidden Jungle Pool for a dip in the cool water. Really refreshing. Half an hour later we hit the track again and entered the Mae Khuang Reservoir from it's backside. A couple of kilometers along the lake side until another nasty hill-climb, that lead us the track in the forest, that would now carry us for some miles before reaching the beach, where we went for another swim in the water. I had forgotten to take my knee pad off, but Acerbis seems to be bullet proof in this matter...555.
After the swim we entered the last section of this track. On a steep hill climb some doggies jumped into my way and I had to stop. I rolled back a few meters and was able to continue the climb. On the other side of the climb another rock garden awaited us and riding down-hill was not much of an advantage here. Still cannot believe we once rode up there, maybe a year ago. So here we go....a new loop, a new day. Hope you guys enjoy the video. Cheers
Spend two month rebuilding the mighty XR, many issues on the bike, this was a quick test ride, oh man how much I missed it unbelievable. It is hot like hell at the moment but do I care if I can fly over the mountains. C U Zoon gUyS
That looks like a sweet track to have on your back door step.
That mighty XR just keeps going and going, just like you Rudi.
yeah man I hear you, one has to never give up, stay on the bike, stay in shape and best of all stay in Chiang Mai....Rock'n Roll Baby
oh man, what a ride, two month off the bike and I can feel every bone in my body again. Why I can't just say "No" when it comes to exhaustion. The ride went smooth until about 75 % than after a few drops of the bike the stamina went down a lot. No way to turn around now, had to finish the loop somehow. By now out of water...3L didn't last very long in that heat. Bike running good, but rider has problems holding onto the handle bars
. Somehow we managed to get thru all this. A 62 year old Austrian and a crazy German 52 years old trying to make the best out of life. Once out of the bush a few Sodas and Beers in our favorite Bike Mechanic Shop and home for a much needed shower and some nap.Now I gotta work on my fitness to get back to where I was before
Haha, yes the bash plate is a deformed beauty, could easily be a master piece in the "Modern Art" Section of the local museum
Oh man, what a ride
. My dear 62 old friend never stops for anything. Today no exception. Gnarly, loose and rocky terrain up and down the mountains towards the Mae Khuang Reservoir from the backside. All very doable with some skills until the downhill section. The video doesn't do justice how steep it really was. But if my old friend gets off the bike be assured it is steep...555. I love this loop it is very challenging but has great views in all directions. A little swim in the Mae Khuang Lake with all the gear on was a welcome release from the heat. Everyone did great today, the Motorcycles ran great and no injuries. Well done lads.
Busy all week and finally Friday is there. Talked to my riding buddies and we decided to take it a little easier today, somehow this plan didn't work out. Not surprised at all.....haha. It is allways the same story with us, start easy and then it's getting wild and crazy. Today we were joined by our Dutch friend on his WR250 2-stroke model with Rekluse, nice little bike, but a lot of smoke. Me as camera man had to fight against the clouds of white smoke, inhaling those was not fun and gave me a funny sensation in my stomach.
So I kept a little distance. Some parts of the track I knew from previous rides, but after a short time it was all new and very exciting ride along the steep mountains towards the Mae Khuang Reservoir. Many tracks lead to the dam and there is still plenty to explore. Very steep downhills and uphill sections make it a little difficult for the average rider here. The river bed was very slippery because it had rained a lot the day before or was it because my knobbies are down a lot, who knows. Got home about 5 in the afternoon, had a quick shower and immediately went to the restaurant for the weekly Motorcycle Meeting every Friday
So it was Thursday night and I felt pretty exhausted and what would be better to wake up and go out riding. So I sent my buddy a message around midnight and got a quick reply from him. So it's Friday morning and time to jump onto the bike and get out there and create a little bit of unusual music in the Jungle. Today only me and my buddy, because nobody was able to improvise with this short notice.
After the heavy rain the weather was just perfect and the grip was very good on the loose rock sections. A lot of fallen trees barred our way thru the Jungle, but nothing that could not be jumped or cleared immediately. My tires were down to almost Zero profile but I still managed to get thru all this without to many spins. At two sections I took a dive because of that.
It is always good to ride on new trails and I enjoyed it a lot. On dried out waterfall section I finally managed to break off my frame with the foot peg still on. The frame was previously welded but not professional enough. So now I had to face a gnarly ride back with just one foot on the peg and the other sitting on the edge of the bash plate or hanging loose. Not easy to keep balance that way and pretty exhausting too over the gnarly terrain.
An hour later we were out of the jungle again and it was beer o'clock for my friend and Soda time for me. Hope you enjoy the video
Lot of rain the last couple of days, so perfect condition for riding. Today I gave my camera to Erich for a change. Also I set the recording to 2.7k at 30fps on my Go Pro 5. He recorded about an hour of good footage and I was too tired to edit anything afterwards, so I just exported everything as one big file that came up to 37 GB....the resolution is awesome, just the colors don't come out to well, I think I need to work on this. Never tried before to record in that high resolution as my Mac is pretty old already and is very slow of processing everything. So today no music, just straight forward video. Everyone did very well on those rocky trails. My son Oskar was able to tackle most obstacles without any help. That is outstanding for a 14 year old. I just wished he was as interested, when it comes down to learning....haha. Our new friend on the WR had a little bit of a hard time, but managed to go until the very end, well done mate. Hope you enjoy the video, Erich is riding pretty fast in the first sector, great to watch
Finally after fixing my head gasket issue I was able to go ride again. Brilliant weather in the Jungle, pretty cool but a little slippery, but the Quick Tires delivered good grip overall.
My Buddy on his Husaberg 350, a very awesome bike for this kind of riding. For sure he was shining on his new bike. Gnarly but, pretty awesome ride with many different terrains
pretty awesome day out with the boys and joined by my 14 year old son, who is doing better and better. It get's more and more obvious he needs a bike with larger wheels. The small KlX125 is a great bike, but the ground clearance is not much compared to our bikes and those are already limited. As you can see in the Video on many section he got stuck with the bash plate hitting the rocks. This track is for sure one of the harder tracks of Chiang Mai with a few tricky section, that one needs to approach with respect in order to get through there....555. My son love this stuff as much as we do. Looks like we have another member in our group that will evolve with the right amount of time to an experienced Enduro Rider with great skills. I wished I had a little more money to sponsor him, but maybe it is also time for him to think how to collect some money somehow. Things become so much more valuable than.
Im still impressed what our Honda XR250's can withstand. Many of our friends need to change their bikes every year and we are still on those old scramblers and stir up some serious dirt for your eyes and ears.
Editing the video has become now more challenging, because I get the footage of my riding buddy too. The files are getting super big and the time I spend editing gets longer and longer every time. At the moment I do not put any self made music up but I might do so very soon again. So long guys...stay safe out there and keep on riding...Cheers
Our latest discovery in the deep Jungle's of Chiang Mai, is what we call "Dinosaur Park" from now on. The section to get to the "main entrance" of the Park is a super steep drop off downhill. Best thing is not to look down and just let go while pressing both brakes with very little effect....hahaha.... We called it "Dinosaur Park" because it reminded us of another time and we could very well imagine Dinosaurs being around that area, that was filled up with giant boulders and massive rocks. Today we took a slightly different route and this was even more challenging, but that's where all the fun is found.
When leaving the Park section, there is a very steep cliff and the sides are supported by some roots and planks that we stuck in there to prevent us from falling down there. Once we cleared this section we had to balance our bikes on the edge of this trail. Last time I slipped down there for about 30m, but nothing happened to the rider and bike. It takes a lot of guts to get going in those situations. Finally we were out of the hardest bits, another hill climb before we will connect this track to the riverbed that will bring us to the farm nearby. But it all ain't easy, still a lot of obstacles to clear, tired and exhausted we leave the river bed section to encounter some nice muddy bits on our way out....Hope you guys enjoyed it as much as we did. I composed the music for this video, but unfortunately the organ solo is totally out of tune, there a glitch in my DAW, that I have to fix when exporting the music to MP3, I didn't realize that until the movie was up to YouTube already.
so here we ago again, my son had a pretty long break from riding and he wanted to go and try out the new track we found just a week ago. It is hard to believe that we are still able to find new tracks after so many years of riding. This track took a little bit of bush waking beforehand to clear it from the bamboo, but this a pretty normal thing here in Thailand. Oskar did very well until we approached the North Face climb. It is a tricky little climb and needs total commitment and full throttle in Order to clear this section. If you don't have enough momentum, there's little chance you make it. Well our 62 year old Enduro Wizzard from Austria showed me last time how to do it and it seemed to be not that difficult at all if you are committed. Oskar somehow hesitated but, after convincing him for some time he wanted to try it all by himself. This is a brave attempt for a still 14 year young man. He did everything right until the top, but then the front came up to high and he had to let go off the bike on the very top. (6:30 in the video). The bike tumbled down the cliff like a dice and luckily it didn't fall any further. The second cliff was about 10m of height and probably would have wrecked the bike. The brake lever made a small crack into the engine housing, but after checking the oil we decided to plug the hole with some bamboo and continue our ride. There was still plenty of obstacles to clear on this track but the Kawa KLX 125 hold up nicely. This track is very demanding and require full concentration and smart planing while riding. The rider has to decide while riding which way to go to keep the flow. Nevertheless we all had plenty of fun and were all happy to be returning our bikes with only minor damages. Hope you guys enjoy. Keep the power up and see you out in the bush.
Damn that son of yours is nearly as good a s the old man already. As toughas, a KLX125, bullet & hole proof.
Keep up the good work Oskar.