From Middle Tennessee to Seattle and Back on a Suzuki Burgman 650

In mid-September I rode my 06 Burgman 650 scooter from middle Tennessee to Seattle and back. The Burgman is really a motorcycle in scooter form. It has a 650 cc engine with plenty of performace. The original purpose of the trip was to ride on the highest section of interstate highway in the US and ride through what may be the highest vehicular tunnel in the world. This is located about 60 miles west of Denver on I70 near Loveland Pass. The altitude is 11,100 ft and the Eisenhower Tunnel is two miles long. I decided to continue the trip to Seattle to visit my daughter.

Starting in Tullahoma, TN, it took me three days to get to Loveland Pass and another four days to get to Seattle. After a two-day layover in Seattle it took me another six days to get home to Tullahoma, TN. I rode from 350 to 450 miles a day. Total miles for the trip were 5350 and gas consumption was 46 mpg. This consumption was achieved while riding at interstate speed limits of 65, 70, and 75 miles an hour. Before the trip I wondered how the Burgman would handle the high altitude. It did just fine with no affect on performance.



I experienced terrible south to north winds across Missouri and Kansas both coming and going. Gusts were 35 to 45 mph and undoubtedly affected my gas mileage. On windless days on the trip I did average over 50 mpg and on the gusty days mpg was as low as 39. Temperatures varied from 45 to 95 degrees F. I only rode through light rain twice on the trip and didn’t have to put on rain gear. It rained once going north out of Nashville and again on the morning I approached Seattle but I stayed dry behind the windshield.

The conditions of the interstates, except for my home state of Tennessee, were pretty bad. It seemed like I couldn’t ride for more than 30 minutes without coming to a construction zone. A constant hazard was dodging truck tire carcasses lying in the road. This was especially exciting on those days when I started out driving in the dark to beat the worst of the heat.

My arrival at the tunnel was anticlimactic. Riding between hills I came around a curve and there was a sign giving the altitude and the entrance to the tunnel with no place to park and take pictures. Going further west, I70 seemed walled in by miles and miles of condominiums and pretty boring. Later on when I got off I70 and turned north towards Salt Lake City the scenery got better. In fact for the rest of the trip west, through Utah, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, I overdosed on scenery, mostly brown. I took a different route back riding through Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, Iowa, and Nebraska before retracing my route through Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee.

The Burgman performed flawlessly during the trip. Compared to my two GoldWings, the seating position was much more comfortable because I could extend my legs. The only thing I wished for was another gallon of fuel capacity. The Burgman gas tank holds four gallons. Refilling every two hours was normally no problem but I had some intestinal twinges on a number of remote stretches in Colorado, Utah, and Idaho when gas started running low and all the exits had No Facilities signs. And of course I wished I had a true cruise control, not just a throttle hold. One minor annoyance was having to do mental arithmetic to calculate actual speed to compensate for the 10% error in the speedometer reading.

I installed a Clearview XL windshield on the Burgman and would not have attempted the trip without it. I augmented the luggage capacity with a rear seat bag and a Givi tunnel bag. The Givi bag defeated the step thru design of the bike and and I would take it off when getting on or off the bike. I found out that I didn’t have to use the Velcro flaps to fasten the Givi in place. It wedged in very tightly in the step thru space. With two pieces of luggage plus the underseat storage space I was able to take all the clothes I needed for the trip and a rain suit, toilet articles, extra tools, a cycle cover, and a laptop computer. A lot of space was taken up by all the clothes I had to take because of the wide range of temperatures I experienced.

Almost every motel I stayed at had wireless internet access and I used my computer to plan the next day’s ride with Microsoft Streets & Trips. I kept in touch with family and friends with e-mail and also used the computer to access the Weather Channel to get the forecast for my route. I wouldn’t travel without one.

I only had two mishaps on the trip and they were both my fault. For some reason Streets & Trips routed me on a short section of gravel road in Colorado. Coming to a stop I braked too hard, skidded, and the bike flopped over. Fortunately this happened while I was almost stopped and the only harm done was a cracked front turn signal lens. I also ran out of gas once. I was congratulating myself on what good gas mileage I was getting and how long the gas gauge was staying on half full when the motor stopped running. I realized I had been looking at the temperature gauge for miles. The two gauges have the same type of bar display and are located next to each other. A call on my cell phone to 911 got an emergency vehicle with gas to me and I was under way again in less than an hour. An expensive mistake ($50) and one I won’t make again.

One lesson I’ve learned on previous long bike trips is not to drive through heavy city traffic with the sun in my eyes when travelling east or west. To avoid this I always stay at a motel on the east side of a large city. This means that whether travelling east or west, I always have the sun at my back when travelling through the heaviest traffic.

The jacket that I wore during the trip is the Firstgear Mesh-Tex 3.0 Jacket. As implied in the name, it has a mesh outer layer that allows the air to flow thru. I was comfortable in this jacket at temperatures up to 95 degrees as long as I kept moving, wearing just a T-shirt underneath. As the temperature got cooler I put on more shirts, then the jacket liner. At 50 degrees I put my rain jacket on over the Mesh-Tex. This is a good jacket for riding in temperatures from 60 degrees on up. It also has body armor panels. It is reasonably priced for motorcycle gear. I paid $125 at my local Honda dealer.