Quest for Mototrcycle Insurance

Motorcycle insurance is not required in Washington. What you don't hear is something that I just learned in my MSF Motorcycle Safety class which is that if you do not have insurance and you are in an at fault accident, you can be required to post a $5,000 bond immediately. And if you don't the court can take necessary action to make you, including freezing your accounts.

After hearing that and knowing that accidents can happen first hand, I went on a quest to find the best insurance.

I of course did what every person would do. I called my insurance agent and they quoted me 300+ for the year. Not knowing anything about Motorcycle insurance I almost signed up but I didn't have my VIN cause I was at work. Later that day Jason told me that he go a quote from Progressive because his insurance didn't insure motorcycles and Progressive gave him a much better quote than my State Farm agent gave me. Of which I have only been with them for 15 years carrying a perfect record. So I started shopping.

In my research, Progressive kept coming back up. So I went to their site and they have a great tool that gives you a quick quote, has links to explain everything you are looking at, and provides 800 numbers to get help if you need it.

When I ran my quote and it was under 180 giving me more coverage than my agent offered. I then called my state Farm Agent and was told that the quote I had was the best they could do and they recommended that I buy from Progressive. hmmmm.

Later Jason ran a quote at Geico and it was in the 500+ range and their quoting tool took forever.

A friend of mine from my Safety class told me that her friend that works for Allstate said that sometimes they can match Progressive.

So needless to say I chose Progressive. And when I called them. I like dealing with people if I can. I asked why they were so much cheaper. He let me know that they are ranked #1 for motorcycle insurance, probably because of their pricing. I then tried to stump him and asked how they rank with auto and he said they are #3 with State Farm leading that pack.

A couple of things to think about.

Your insurance is ranked on several factors. Mainly your credit score, then driving record, then age and gender, then the size and style of the bike. Then smaller items like if you are married or own a home.

Some agencies allow the policy to be suspended if the policy is not needed. (this is good for fair weather riders) State Farm allowed this.

Progressive will not. They said their pricing is good because they know it will be in effect for a full year.

State Farm only considers your age, gender, and size of engine where Progressive takes more granular approach and rewards for making better choices.

No ride weekend....MSF motorcylce class time!

So this past weekend we did not get the chance to go for a long ride as Doug and myself headed down to Seattle for some motorcycle riding education. We took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation (MSF) Basic Rider Course thru Pacific Northwest Motorcycle Safety. The class was scheduled for Thursday from 6-10pm, Sat 8am-6pm and Sun 8am-2:30pm.

Day 1 - Thursday:

We got there a little early as they warn you to not be late or you are out. There were supposed to be 12 people in the class, but one person never showed up. We met our instructor, Carey, who was pretty easy going and overall a nice guy with tons of motorcycle experience. This first day was entirely in the classroom, watching some videos and having some pretty good discussions about general motorcycle information. Real basic stuff.....yawn. Luckily we motored thru and got done early and they let us out about 8:45!

Day 2- Saturday:

This day was split into 2 parts. The first part, range time, where we got to actually ride the motorcycles, and then we were back in the classroom for some more information and then a knowledge exam.

Starting out on the range, we got to pick from a selection of cycles, most of which were 250's.

Here's a pic of the bike I chose.

The bikes were all lined up and the first thing we were instructed on was how to mount them, dismount them, start them, etc. Then we got to ride them! Well, sort of.....we got to sit on them and frigging push them back and forth across the range. My legs burned from the cycle aerobics, but hey, there was a point to this right??? (I'm still waiting for the point). After that, we started them and powerwalked them back and forth, then finally put our feet on the pegs and rode them! Hooray, riding a motorcycle at last...oh wait....I've already been riding...ok, well, I pretended it was my first time.

We then went thru a regimen of various exercises learning small skills and each one building on the next. By then end of the morning, we were all having fun riding our lawn mowers, er, small ass motorcycle around like champs.

Next, we headed into the classroom for some more education and then we took the knowledge test. Test....hahahahahahaha, it was pretty frigging easy, you'd have to be retarded to miss any questions. I got 100....Doug, well, he got 98....keep trying sunshine! LOL, sorry Doug, had to do it.

Ok, after the test, we were set free for the day. And it was only 2:30 or so!!!! Once we got home, Doug and I went for a ride on our real bikes to Joe's and then Home Depot. Nothing worth writing about, so I won't.

Day 3 - Sunday:

We got to the range a little early so we could do some warm up riding. We did laps around the course all following in line. It probably looked pretty funny to an outside observer. After that, it was time to start learning some more difficult maneuvers.

Enter the box. The box is about 18 feet wide by 40 feet long. We had to ride into the box, do a u-turn, then another u-turn, and exit the box. Sound easy...yeah right...you can't put your foot down or cross the lines. I couldn't do it. Noone I watched could do it. Dan the other instructor, he did it...I hate you Dan. (not really :) )

After the box, we went into some other exercises. Running over boards scattered around the course, turning, stopping real quick and my favorite, swerving to avoid the bus. I'm good at swerving and like it, so this part was fun. As the day wore on, we all started to gel as a class. I almost forgot, one of the girls (sorry, I forgot her name) fell during the box exercise and her and her husband decided to leave. The rest of us hung tough. Ingrid, riding her little Ducati scooter, starting getting more bold and was zipping all over the place She was actually pushing the person in front of her to go faster. (I made a bet after the class that a couple of months from now, we'll run into Ingrid riding her new Harley. LOL)

As the morning wore on, we ended up practicing the various parts of the skills test we were going to be taking later on. Everyone was doing ok, until, Kristin dumped her bike practicing the u-turns in the box. She walked it off, and then, 5 minutes later, we get told it is time to start the eval. We were a little concerned for Kristin since if you dump it at all during the eval, you FAIL. She looked ok, but only time would tell.

Into the eval: Part 1. U-turns in the box. I was next to last to go, and let me tell you, the anxiety of waiting sucked. In all the practices, I never was able to do this right. I watched rider after rider go, some pulling it off, some putting a foot down, some crossing the line. Kristin went, and she did it well. Good job, now it was my turn. I entered the box, tension mounting, I could hear the dramatic music. I shifted my ass to the right and started turning left, head up, look behind...no no. not down...dammit....too slow.....ok, now shift ass to the left....turn right...NOOOOO don't look at the line...dammit, well, since I was looking at the line, I saw myself cross it...oh well, 5 points lost, but off I went into the swerve test. Speed up, thru the cones....BUS! swerve right, back left.....ahhhh......perfectly done...and the crowd goes wild. err....well.....ok maybe not.

Next part. Speed up then stop in allotted distance. This one is easy. Just get up to about 15-20 mph then when you pass the green cones, stop as fast as you can. My turn, and off I went...up to speed, head up, pass the cones....easy on the brakes, shift into first, left foot down first. Carey has me push down on the shifter..yeah....I got it in first...so I did ok.

Last part.....the turns. You start off, get up to speed, make a right turn, then slow down and roll on the throttle as you enter the 130 degree turn, make the turn and down. Easy! I was nailing this all day long. Off I went, up to speed, make the right turn, speed up, brake....and......coast into the turn.....CRAP..what was I doing??? roll on the throttle, look thru the turn, ok.....did it. Test done. Park and get off the bike.

After all was done, Carey went off to compute our grades...and......we all passed! Everyone did it!

Great job to all!

For anyone who has never ridden a cycle, I HIGHLY recommend taking this course. It can take you from never ridden to feeling comfortable riding. I saw it happend to others in my class.

The Whidbey Trip (and first time on the superslab)

My bike on the right, my neighbor Doug's on the left

What a great day for riding today. A couple of members of the gang and a guest or 2 got together this morning to head out for a trip to Whidbey Island. The weather was going to get to about 70 degrees, so we were all pretty excited to spend the day on a nice long ride.

Another shot of my ride, ain't she a beauty

After a little bit of a rough start.....Phil took the lead and went a really round-about way to get to the ferry. I was in the rear and got stuck at a light. I had no idea where everyone went and after stopping and a few texts and calls, we all figured out where to meetup. We're learning the group riding piece. Ok, so once we got to the ferry waiting area, the ferry was loading and we literally had to run to buy tickets, get mounted up, and race to get the last spots on the ferry.

Some of the bikes on the ferry

Bye bye Mukilteo

Once we landed on the other side, we headed north. Everyone decided to have me lead as I had mapped out a route last night. We stopped so Mel could gas up, then headed out on the ride. I picked some winding backroads to keep us off the main highway, and avoid traffic. The first road was great, with plenty of twists and turns, some beautiful forests, and best of all, NO traffic! After several miles, we ended up in the seaside town of Langley. We decided to stop for some lunch at the Doghouse tavern. It's a very very old place and looks about the same is it probably did 50 or more years ago. The urinal in the men's room was probably the original and not anything I would ever want to have to clean.

The bikes parked up the street from the Doghouse

After lunch, we headed north out of town onto some more twisty, windy and relatively traffic-less roads. We did get stuck behind some moron in a Volvo going 5 under the speed limit for a couple of miles before we could pass. I got my first chance to pass a car on a two-lane road! It was quite the rush and remarkably easy...gotta love the power of the cycles. We wound our way around, back onto the main highway, and then off towards the Keystone ferry dock. What a fun road! It was across a wide open plain with the Puget Sound off to the side. We then pulled into Fort Casey for a much needed break.

A view walking towards the defensive wall

Map of the Fort

Fort Casey was a WWII defensive fort with a bunch of cannons aimed across the sound. Some of the largest naval battles of WWII were fought here. Ok, maybe not......in fact, none of the guns were ever fired.


One of the long range cannons

A closer view

We walked all around the Fort. It's a pretty cool place, lots of concrete went into building it. I wonder what life must have been like for those lucky enough to be staioned here as the views are amazing from here.

Looking across the sound from the fort

Well, enough time at the Fort, it was time to head out on the highway and look for adventure, we got our motors running.....hmm....sounds like song lyrics or something. Anyway, we hit the main highway and headed north towards Oak Harbor. After we passed Oak Harbor, we continued north across Deception Pass. Sorry, I did not get the chance to take any pics here as we did not stop, but we did see 2 bald eagles overhead. I almost crashed while trying to watch them, ride a motorcycle, avoid pedestrians, avoid other cars, chew bubblegum.....all at the same time!

We ended up north then east on highway 20. I decided to take the group south onto Best Rd. It's a great side road that winds through farm country, past the growing tulips and ends up meeting up with I-5. This was a great choice....until.....we got about 5 miles from the end and there was a line of cars as far as the eye could see. WTF???? Looks like everyone who headed up to see the tulips was using this road. It sucked crawling along and having to constantly hold the clutch lever and try to not put your foot down. Mel, who was bringing up the rear, later told us he was playing a game...."see who would put their foot down first." Guess who it was....yeah...me.....but it was only because I was in front and when the damn truck in front of me stopped, what else was I going to do???

After about 20 minutes of the grind, we finally met up with the superslab....I-5. This was it....my first time on the big highway. I was a little nervous, but quickly jumped to 70 mph, only to see everyone else in my group blow past me! I guess I was going too slow, or maybe they were sick of following me. Oh well, Mel hung back and made sure I was ok. Thanks Mel! It was actually not too bad, except my damn sunglasses kept sliding down my nose...that's what you get for buying Wal-Mart sunglasses. The only scary part, passing Everett, the road was under construction and had been graded. At 70 mph on wavy pavement, being on a motorcycle is not fun! As you can guess, I survived and we made it home.

That wraps up the trip. We saw some great sites, the weather stayed amazing the entire time, the temp was just about right, and noone had any issues! Thanks to Doug, Mel, Phil, K, and Robert for following me and helping make this a fun trip.

Total miles: about 130
Total time: around 6-7 hours

Yeah, it's a biker gang!

Ok, I did it. I went and joined a gang of the roughest, meanest, craziest S.O.B.'s west of Manor Way......the Summerlin Ridge Gang, a bunch of motorcycle riders who just have no clue.