TAT makes you cut thru the playground. I would instead spend all of my time circling the playground.

I would fly into Denver, buy a DRZ400/WR250 and spend 2.5 weeks on Colorado trails and 2.5 weeks on Utah trails.

Here's a link to my 2 week trail only* trip in Colorado.

https://advrider.com/f/threads/two-w...-dump.1109867/

I want to do the same in Utah soon.

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Alaska 2014: Hotel Budget ZeroXmas in Death Valley, New Year in Urique

Fly to Auckland, hire a DL650 from the Suzuki dealer there and have the time of your life. NZ is like a small planet all on its own with every type of road and amazing scenery.

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Tim & Sue Angus

New Zealand in July? I tried that once.....

That's a good plan - but the window Temporaryscapee has is April-July, so a bit too early for the high passes in Colorado - although you might be lucky if you left the Colorado sections until the end of the trip... similarly, you'd have to miss some of the key sections of the TAT if starting that early in the year too.

But as you suggest, plenty of riding in Utah (although you might have to miss the La Sal Mountains still), Arizona, Nevada, California - so you could easily put together an awesome cross-country on-road and off-road route essentially doing a huge lap of the Grand Canyon for example?

Jx

Thanks everyone, this is all helpful and appreciated


Thanks JMo for the info - when would you be confident on the high passes? I could do a bit later - i was just thinking about avoiding peak holiday season.

Hi Temp' - It really depends on how severe/long the winter has been - this year for example, almost nothing is open yet; while pretty much this time last year (1st July) I was riding Imogene Pass (over 13,000ft), and everything further east of there was already clear too.

Generally speaking, if you're going to ride the TAT route through Colorado it's better to leave it until July at least (for info. the old route went via Hancock and Tomichi Passes to the north west of Salida, and north of Hwy 50 - where there is a huge network of old mining roads and jeep trails... but Tomichi is almost always closed due to landslide/s (no longer county maintained) and Hancock is pretty tough going on a loaded ADV bike these days, as it gets a lot of 4 wheeled traffic from Jeeps and side-by-sides), which is why Sam now routes you over the lower elevation Marshall Pass (a little over 10,000ft) to the south of Hwy 50, which is often open earlier and so extends the available window... since further west Cinnamon Pass (along with Engineer) tends to get ploughed (if at all possible) by early/mid June too...

However, the basin west of Animas Forks (leading to California and Hurricane Passes, which are the continuation of the TAT) are over 12,000ft, and being so remote tend not to get ploughed early... fortunately you can usually divert south via Silverton, and pick up the TAT again west of Hwy 550 (the Million Dollar Highway).

Realistically, I'd say you ought to consider hitting Colorado around mid July to give you a good chance of all the TAT route passes being open, but conversely leaving it much later than that and it's really hot further west when you get into Utah and Nevada (in fact it's already hot there by the end of June).

If you do decide that riding the TAT is your big birthday present to yourself, then I'd suggest you start towards the end of June on the east coast (essentially right about now), and that gives you two to three weeks in hand before you reach Colorado for the passes to be open, and allow yourself another couple of weeks to get the most out of the TAT west of Moab and up into Idaho etc.

Hope that gives you something to go on - although equally Morocco is a wonderful destination too, and spending your 5-6 weeks looping down through Spain and Portugal, then a couple of weeks in Morocco before coming back through Southern France (via the Alps) would be another great way to spend your 50th summer!

Jenny x