Lots of pictures (courtesy of RxRick) and a ride report from our 4th Annual SoCal Netscum camping trip along the South Fork of the Kern River in the Kennedy Meadows/Kernville area of Southern California...

The crew saddles up to leave from Tom's place in Palmdale	Everybody and their brother stopping for breakfast at Mike's Roadhoase Cafe in Mojave	Larry and Tom setting up camp in gale force winds
Rick's compact and efficient campsite setup in record time	Larry and Tom's campsite (note use of rocks and absence of aerodynamic rain flys)	Larry and Tom inside the Grumpy Bear Retreat
Larry and Tom outside the Grumpy Bear Retreat	Breakfast of (hangover) champions	Chef Rick comes up with an ingenious solution for keeping the coffee pot from boiling over
Dog #1 sampling some of our breakfast cuisine	Boys will be boys (heads up Rick!)	Hmm... what's wrong with this picture?
A sign of things to come?	Larry and one of the many big trees to be found in the Sequoia National Forest	Yep
It just doesn't get much better than this!	Happy hour at the general store ($1 beers)	One of the regulars who recommended the owner of Dog #2's place for dinner
Dog #2 that bit Rick is shown here in a dramatic standoff with a gun wielding Larry over the sanctity of Larry's bike	Dog: 1 Larry: 0	Campfire on 2nd night
The Kern River raging past the campground twice as fast and wide as we've seen it in years past	Tom performing Marie's favorite job in her absence	Coffee Maker 2.0 (discontinued)
Dog #3 returns in the morning having narrowly escaped death the night before while rummaging around our tents	One last stop at the general store before heading back to civilization	Descending Nine Mile Canyon (look closely and you can see our bikes)
Larry cruising down 395	Tom cruising down 14	Red Rock Canyon

"The Campfire Series" (the second installment of Rick's fine art photography)
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Since the SoCal Netscum 3rd Annual Kennedy Meadows Run was cut short last year we decided to try making this year's run earlier in the season. The thinking was it would be a lot cooler riding through the desert this time of year. It was but as it turned out the road over Sherman Pass was still closed and according to the locals they probably won't be able to get it open until July. Oh well. We still had a great time and no problems with running over any rocks getting into the campground this time!

Early Friday morning Larry and Rick rode up to my place from Buena Park and Long Beach respectively. From what they said the traffic was terrible. With so many large SUVs on the road today in SoCal with their huge mirrors at just the right (wrong) height lane splitting can be very interesting to the say the least. Fortunately the ride from my place up 14 to 395 to Nine Mile Canyon was traffic free and uneventful except for the Messengers Of Recovery MC members I talked to at Mike's Roadhouse Cafe in Mojave (who ironically ate on the bar side) on their way to the Frog Jumps in Calaveras County and the Honda rider's club that pulled in just as we were leaving on their way (ironically on what was supposed to be the hottest weekend of the year so far) to Death Valley. Of course the obligatory Harley vs. rice burner jokes were exchanged but it was all in good fun.

Upon arriving at our campground in Kennedy Meadows Larry and I tried to made quick work of setting up our tents only to have Mother Nature bless us with gale force winds and dust that filled our tents with sand. This was all no doubt a very comical sight for Rick to see whose high-tech tent was set up in mere minutes. With that done the next order of business was to head to the general store for essential supplies... beer, ice, and firewood! Back at the campsite we settled in for some adult beverages before heading over to Grumpy Bears for dinner. Good thing we did because Grumpy Bears still hasn't gotten their liquor license back after the snafu that occurred two years ago. The rest of the evening was spent back at camp drinking and telling lies around the campfire into the wee hours of the morning (we lost Rick around midnight I think it was).

The next day (?) we got up and Rick figured out how to make a table out of the $15 fold up chair he picked up at the general store and a large sheet of wood somebody had left behind (and we hadn't burned yet).... neat. We then put all the various snacks we brought with us out on it for a makeshift buffet style breakfast... strangely nobody helped themselves to any of my cherry pop tarts though. We also tried to brew some coffee which turned out to be the most difficult survival task we encountered all weekend. After "breakfast" Rick went fishing. He actually caught a couple but said it was way too much work with the river running like it was. When he got back he came up with the idea that since Sherman Pass was closed we should get on the bikes and go check out some of the roads we haven't explore before. It turned out to be a great idea and a great ride. The weather was perfect even up at the 8,000 ft. snow level. At one point we came across a pickup pulling out some folks in another pickup that got stuck in the snow so we figured it was probably wise to turn around even if looked like we might be able to get through (ha ha). On our way back to camp we stopped at the general store for some more supplies just in time for happy hour so we hung around and chatted with the locals and hikers passing through. One of them recommended we check out Ireland's (sp?) place for dinner. It had been closed forever but now looked to be open so we figured why not? Turns out the food wasn't too bad (not as good as Grumpys though and I would never take my wife there) but the "atmosphere" was definitely a little off... may have had something to do with one of the owner's dogs attacking and biting Rick as we walked up and then pissing on Larry's bike I think. Anyway, we spent the remainder of the evening back at the campfire again and in the morning we reluctantly packed up our gear and headed back to civilization until next time.

Thanks again to Rick Sylvies for the excellent photography!

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Check out the SoCal Netscum 5th Annual Kennedy Meadows Run for more pictures from our next trip!