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Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Want to go for a DAMN Ride? So do we! :whoop:
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beejaytee
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by beejaytee »

It was an awesome trip. There was some awesome sights to see along the way. There were some area that were over run with vines that Phil knows the name of. These areas look as though we should run up on some ancient ruins. Lots of water/mud crossings; I think there were somewhere in the ballpark of 813. Some rocks that were the best traction and some that were slick as ice. A cave, a cliff and a waterfall. It really was amazing to see such sights so close to home.


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Nobody
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Nobody »

My first trip of a kind and it was so awesome I can't find a word to describe it :loveit:

Only downside for me was those long asphalted roads. Don't get me wrong, those roads are really nice, but I wanted ofroad, offroad and then a little bit more offroad :D. Also the fact we were on knobbies didn't help in that aspect.
But the amount of offroad we had was nice anyway. There were some streams, some mud (everywhere), some rocks, some uphills, some puddles, some downhills, some trees on the track, some roots, some ledges and some low hanging branches attacking non-suspecting riders with open visors. (hello to the emergency room :cheers:)

Also I now regret we didn't go to see the famous carburetor hill (see it while I was still on two eyes :killingme: ). After we did Hensley's Settlement option that was rated as extreme and we all could make it to the end, anyway. I don't think I would conquer it, but still regret I haven't tried it. Perhaps even won't start, could chicken out, but still.. :lol2:

The company was awesome, some of guys would never miss the opportunity to laugh at you if something went wrong :lol2: And we're all just a group of posers.. when there is a nice view behind! :smoking: There should be more pics coming. I had only a few and nothing really cool, just WF changing tubes. cause that's what I saw whenever I pulled my camera from the backpack :killingme:
I have tons of video though, but it needs to be edited before anyone could watch it and I have a busy week now, so don't know when I'll finish that.
Thinking of a relatively short video with only fails on it. Would be grateful if other guys who have captured fails would send 'em to me. I know beejaytee got at least one nice ditch exploring video :jack:

My bike seems to be very well after the trip. Nothing major came out. Instead tracked some problem zones that would need some attention, like cooling system weakness I have on slow sections, but even after a couple of times warming it up to 250 went w/o any consequences (I think). And one cooling session under a waterfall when it was almost 250 :angel:

Hate returning to real life :lol2: , but even writing this and remembering was nice :cheers:

P.S. how/if can I insert full quality pics? What's the size limit it would allow to drag'n'drop in browser?
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Bucho
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

It was really a great trip. The KAT is a great dualsport route. We probably were a little overly ambitious to think we could do the entire thing (options included) in five days.

While the first day leaving from Matewan did have lots of pavement (really awesome twisty pavement), we could tell right away that the area had recently had plenty of rain.


This was the trail. I'm sure its dry most of the year.
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

We took a minor navigational error and we got to do a short bonus trail. This was sort of the "tough options warm up" for some of the guys. I believe this is Brian (Phoo's dad) and Jim.

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After that we got on track and the trail crossed and recrossed this same stream about 20 times.

Darrel attempting to keep his feet dry.
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

This is somewhere along that stream section. The lead group is hanging out and waiting. Later we learned someone went down and minorly drowned a bike. They got going eventually...

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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

The first day was really starting to stretch out. This is near the end. Everyone decided to do this first option.

Here is Janis pausing for a moment, (waiting his turn for a short hill I think). Note the kudzu in the background, like Brent mentioned, they were areas where it completely took over everything. On a side note, Janis was a little tentative this first day as he had little offroad experience coming in to this. But by the end of day two he had leveled up several times and is now pretty much an offroad pro!.

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Jim on his DR650 (which he really wished was one of his other bikes on these tougher sections)
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Note the downed rider in the background, it was not an easy hill on big luggage carrying dualsports.
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

After finally finishing that option past seven pm, we headed for our hotel. The group got split up somehow, but finally we all got to the hotel around 8:15 that night. A long day.






I think this is my final pic from our first day. (Actually from start of day)
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

On day two we got into more awesome offroad. We also found more and more huge mud puddles.


Pat guesses poorly on which line to take
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Luckily we got him out with minimal fuss.
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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

We mentioned there were a ridiculous amount of puddles and stream crossings right?

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Re: Kentucky Adventure Trail (KAT) June 19-25, 2017

Post by Bucho »

This was interesting. On a small "no paint lines" backroad, we found this blocking the path. I'm assuming some poor truck driver tried to turn around and got his rig stuck?

Either way, we were able to scoot around the edge of it (with out falling down the hill)
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While some of the offpavement stuff was tricky. Some of it was easy, relaxing dirt roads.

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The days are starting to blur a little bit in my head. I can't remember if it rained on us a little at the end of the day, or we were just wet from the 500+ puddles we rode through. Either way we were happy to finally get to our hotel that night.
We had a good meal at a steak house.
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