Tomas and Lucie Vetrovsky » Photos http://tomasv.com Photos and stories from traveling around the world and living the dream Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:48:10 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Motorcycle offroad traning and Mt. Rainier trip http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-offroad-traning-and-mt-rainier-trip/ http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-offroad-traning-and-mt-rainier-trip/#comments Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:23:16 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=260 On Sunday April 8th we met at 8:15 near HWy 18 in Hobart. The goal was to find and explore some new dirt routes before our 2PM motorcycle offroad training in Roy, WA. I have spent hours on Google Maps in street views trying to find which roads may not be blocked and lead us to some more rugged area. Unfortunately I have not expected signs like the first photo below – we agreed we are not going to push our luck if though on the map it seemed that road connected to a nice system of fire roads.
The next road was gated off because of the Tacoma watershed area – OK that one I understand. But all of the other DNR gates I don’t. Why can’t street legal motorcycles travel on dirt routes, when there is no active logging??!! The same goes for the Hancock managed land – there are so many roads that would be great to travel but all of them are off limits. So the only dirt road was 165 to Evan’s creek ORV area where we found Ford 150 stuck in snow/mud. Went back for help and left before the rescue was finished. Beautiful views form up there!
Next we went to Roy, WA for the Puget Sound Safety motorcycle offroad training. We started with their smaller Kawasaki KLX 250 bikes but quickly switched back to our big Vstrom 650 and my BMW R1200 GS for some of the exercises…

At the end we decided to try jumping the logs with big bikes – something we have not imagined would be possible even with the small once before the training – it worked! Just look at the videos below :-)

great day, great ride!

Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper
Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper

]]> http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-offroad-traning-and-mt-rainier-trip/feed/ 0 BMW and Vstrom 650 off road in Nort Bend, WA http://tomasv.com/bmw-and-vstrom-650-off-road-in-nort-bend-wa/ http://tomasv.com/bmw-and-vstrom-650-off-road-in-nort-bend-wa/#comments Sat, 31 Mar 2012 02:08:06 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=251 Today was another great day for riding – while it was raining so hard at most Eastside, the North Bend area based on the radar was dry – we even got to see sun through the clouds at some moments. As you can notice a week later compared to the last moto trip the snow line was much higher so we were able to find out why the road was closed – wash out from a stream.

Since this was Karel’s first real time off the pavement he pushed his bike and while I wasn’t sure about the strength of the mud I decided to ride – it was fine and it held the heavy BMW R1200 GS just fine.

Or course it looks so easy in the video:

Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper

]]> http://tomasv.com/bmw-and-vstrom-650-off-road-in-nort-bend-wa/feed/ 0 Motorcycle dirt road North Bend, WA http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-dirt-road-north-bend-wa/ http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-dirt-road-north-bend-wa/#comments Fri, 23 Mar 2012 06:05:31 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=246 While there was snow when I woke up this morning, by the time I got off the last conf call it was sunny so I could not resist and took the BMW R1200 GS out for a short, 70 mile trip with about 40 miles of dirt near North Bend, WA. Awesome afternoon, even got to play and practice on a side trail for a bit – came back home with a big grin

 

http://ridewithgps.com/trips/575770

]]> http://tomasv.com/motorcycle-dirt-road-north-bend-wa/feed/ 0 Kayaking the Valdez glacier http://tomasv.com/kayaking-the-valdez-glacier/ http://tomasv.com/kayaking-the-valdez-glacier/#comments Thu, 12 Aug 2010 04:25:51 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=227 6 month pregnant still going strong…

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]]> http://tomasv.com/kayaking-the-valdez-glacier/feed/ 0 Anchorage to Valdez http://tomasv.com/anchorage-to-valdez/ http://tomasv.com/anchorage-to-valdez/#comments Sun, 01 Aug 2010 04:15:39 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=222
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]]> http://tomasv.com/anchorage-to-valdez/feed/ 0 Kenai in Alaska – Grizzly and Black Bears everywhere! http://tomasv.com/kenai-in-alaska-grizzly-and-black-bears-everywhere/ http://tomasv.com/kenai-in-alaska-grizzly-and-black-bears-everywhere/#comments Tue, 27 Jul 2010 04:11:57 +0000 tomasv http://tomasv.com/?p=220
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Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper

Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper

Fast Tube
Fast Tube by Casper

]]> http://tomasv.com/kenai-in-alaska-grizzly-and-black-bears-everywhere/feed/ 1 Lucie’s Graduation http://tomasv.com/lucies-graduation/ http://tomasv.com/lucies-graduation/#comments Fri, 18 Jun 2010 21:06:01 +0000 tomasv http://www.tomasv.com/?p=169 It’s a bit complicated… Especially since Lucie is still going to school :-) But the short story is that during her studies at Bellevue College, the school has changed to a 4 year institution thus allowing those in existing programs to “upgrade” their 3 year Interior Design degrees (as well as others) to a 4 year BAs just by adding the last year and change. So Lucie has graduated from the original program but has 2 classes left in order to get her BA but those have to be taken subsequently in different semesters. So final, final date will be sometime in January 2011…

]]> http://tomasv.com/lucies-graduation/feed/ 0 Skiing Olympic Whistler 2010 http://tomasv.com/skiing-olympic-whistler-2010/ http://tomasv.com/skiing-olympic-whistler-2010/#comments Mon, 01 Mar 2010 19:04:58 +0000 tomasv http://www.tomasv.com/?p=153 After being in Vancouver for the Olympics we drove up to Whistler to continue watching some of the downhill skiing and were able to ski and share lift rides with some of the sportsman like Zahrobska, Body and their teams. Thanks to our friends we had an incredible accommodation in 5 million $ house on Blueberry hill and the only drag was the “no parking” rule in the Whistler village

]]> http://tomasv.com/skiing-olympic-whistler-2010/feed/ 0 Olympics Vancouver 2010 http://tomasv.com/olympics-vancouver-2010/ http://tomasv.com/olympics-vancouver-2010/#comments Sun, 28 Feb 2010 18:46:15 +0000 tomasv http://www.tomasv.com/?p=150 We were lucky to be able to attend the Winter Olympics 2010 in Vancouver, B.C. Canada. For Lucie it was her first Olympics ever, Tomas was able to go and see the 2002 in Salt Lake City, UT USA. We got tickets to the Czech-Russia game and while we lost, we had an incredible time…. Pictures below

]]> http://tomasv.com/olympics-vancouver-2010/feed/ 0 Hiking Mt. Pilchuck http://tomasv.com/hiking-mt-pilchuck/ http://tomasv.com/hiking-mt-pilchuck/#comments Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:16:26 +0000 tomasv http://www.tomasv.com/?p=164 Mt Pilchuck is a great, fairaly easy hike north of Seattle. The hardest part was carrying our dog, Weimaraner Lucky into the observatory building on the ladder, while holding her 50 pounds under my arm :-) But we all made it all the way, the views were incredible and the pictures came out great

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