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Samsung Act Tab 2 & Osmand App Vs Garmin Montana 700

Posted by gozamite on 28.1.2023
Posted in: actioncamera, adventure bike, BMW G650XChallenge, BMW motorrad, dirt bike, GPS system, gravel road, helmetcamera, motorcycling in winter, TET Finland, TransEuroTrail. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Every now and then there is a question which navigation system is the best for Adventure riding?
I don’t have the correct answer but here are some features to check. Especially if you want to ride TransEuroTrail (Finland).
I’ve been using Garmin GPSmap 62, Garmin Montana 600, Last summer Samsung Active Tab 2 & Osmand App and now I have Garmin Montana 700.
I did a testride with both of these navigation systems attached to my motorcycle.
I also had my camera (DJI Osmo Action) attached to my helmet -this I didn’t have in a very long time.
And Rode Wireless Go II microphone was connected to my camera and the microphone itself was inside my helmet.
Here is the video:

I’m not saying which one is better. They both have some cons and pros.
Samsung Tab can be a little bit tricky to keep the batter fully loaded. It is very delicate part of the tablet this USB gate where you should connect the charging wire. I was using the magnetic type of wire where there is an extra connection just after the plug that you should push to the USB gate. The power that comes from my motorcycles alternator is not quite enough to keep the battery 100% loaded all day. But in novemeber when we were riding 9 hours it took only about 30% of battery power… So I could easily ride 2-3 days without recharging the tablet.
It has also a small problem about the maps. You can get along with them but they are not as accurate than the maps in Garmin Montana. Every now and then I was little bit confused with Osmand maps. Why this track or that road is not on the map?
Garmin Montana 700 biggest drawback (so far) is that you can’t change the thickness of the saved track’s line on the map! This makes it little bit tricky to see the line on the map that you should try to follow. The strangest thing is that it was possible in Garmin Montana 600!! (And also in Osmand App!)
There are a lot of other devices and other apps to use. Especially this whole Apple -thing! I know nothing about them.
But for android this Osmand is very good choice because it’s free or it’s not expensive to buy (full licence) where you can have unlimited amount of downloads (maps).
I hope this helps you to choose a good system that serves you the best!

TET Finland Route Overview

Posted by gozamite on 24.1.2023
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, gravel road, TET Finland. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment

In TET Webpage there was the old text of “Route Overview” since 2017 but now it’s finally updated!
You can check the new text here!
As I told earlier I’m still planning few updates to the routes and tracks but those will not add thousands of new kilometers…
So at least the text is mainly correct for the future also!

More info about TET Finland coming soon!

TET Finland 2023

Posted by gozamite on 16.1.2023
Posted in: adventure, BMW, BMW motorrad, dirt bike, enduro, gravel road, Off-Road, Spring Is Coming, TET Finland, TransEuroTrail. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

There’s alrady new routes (sections) made… but we need to check everything before anything will be published.
Here are the plans:


So there will be these new sections
– Tikkakoski to Juva and from Juva (via Savonlinna) to Parikkala
– Porvoo (via Juva) to Suonenjoki
– Section 2 will have new route going from the westside of Tampere
– From Siikainen to Kyröskoski (between sections 2 and 3)
– From Yli-Ii to Taivalkoski (Between 2 and 3)
– From Tornio to Muonio (Final part of section 3)

At the moment TET Finland looks like this.
It is impossible to say when these will be published but we will start checking them pretty soon after all the snow is gone! At the moment it looks like it’s going to be before march!?!

MotoAdventureDays 2023

Posted by gozamite on 6.1.2023
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, dirt bike, enduro, gravel road, Moottoripyöräily, Motoadventure, MotoAdventureDays. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Thew web page for this years MAD is now open. Only in few days more than half of the bookings is already made!
Today 6th of January there is 90 free places -so I’m guessing it will be sold out very soon!
Make you reservation here!

Check some pictures from last years event Here!
and my story in this blog you check Here!

Last ride of 2022

Posted by gozamite on 3.1.2023
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, BMW G650XChallenge, BMW motorrad, motorcycling in winter, winter. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Week after our very nice November ride we got the first snow! And soon there was more and more coming all the time… At the best there was more than half of meter of snow on the ground. And it was also very cold all the time.
-Until Christmas!
In Christmas week it was over zero temperatures and even little bit of rain every now and then so almost all snow melted.
And then again the last 2 days of the year it was very warm. On NewYears Eve we had +5° So I decided to go riding!

And while I was riding little bit of TET route I was hoping I could find a spot where there was no ICE. And I found…

I don’t have spikes in my tires so I can only ride on tarmac or in soft snow. I’m not that big fan of winter riding… But ofcourse if the weather is ok I can go.
Next ride in 2023!

Service done for my XChallenge

Posted by gozamite on 30.11.2022
Posted in: adventure bike, BMW G650XChallenge, BMW motorrad, dirt bike, enduro, gravel road, Moottoripyöräily, Motoadventure, TET Finland, TransEuroTrail, Video. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

We’re actually going back in time to September 25th when I was riding with my friend Lauri from Karjalohja to Muurla direction.
This was one of the best rides this year!

Here’s the video of that days ride!

But after about 150km’s My bike wasn’t running properly anymore! The idle running was ok but when I tried to twist the gas it started banging and didn’t take more rpm’s. My friend behind me said that there is gas smelling.
We had some tools and we opened my airbox to check if the problem is there? It wasn’t…
So I decided to give it a try and that was the correct decision because after few km’s I was able to ride normally…

Trying to give more GAS!

So we were able to ride the whole day but the problem didn’t disappear!
One friend of mine took the bike and I asked the he would do “full service” in the same time as he was trying to find what was the problem.
He had the the error reader so he just plugged the tablet that was connected to my bike and we got this:

The Speed sensor (RPM) is actually the same than so called crankshaft position sensor that gives the signal to the ignition. So it was no wonder that the engine didn’t run properly anymore. But was the sensor broken? Or was the problem somewhere else?
After the engine cover was taken off from the right side it was easy to see what was the problem!
The whole sensor was covered with some small parts of metal or metal dust.
I had done the last oil-change already more than 2 years ago (and 8000 km’s) so it was a good warning about what happens if you don’t do service often enough!
After new oil (Motul 5100 4T 15W-50), new oil-filter, new spark plugs, new air-filter and new coolant water my bike was running perfectly again!
So no sensors were broken.

The warmest November day in Finland

Posted by gozamite on 19.11.2022
Posted in: motorcycling. Leave a comment

Ok maybe not the warmest ever… but anyway in 60 years! The Saturday 12th of November 2022 it was +13 or +14 in south Finland and of course we had to go riding!
I was home quite early on friday so I decided to change my rear tire! And first time in a very very long time everything went quite smoothly and now I have a Motoz (Tractinator Adventure) tire first time in my bike!
Saturday morning I was very early going to check the pressure of the tire (I have only a simple hand-pump to put air to the tire at home). At the gas station I checked that this time I had 0,8 bar pressure on the tire -not bad (but it could be more).

Rode to the forest right away to try how the new tire felt… And it was very ok! The sun wasn’t even up yet!
We had agreement with my friend Lauri to meet in on Gas Station after 9 a’clock but because I was ready with all my preparations I started maybe 8.30 from home!
This short track I’ve been thinking should I add it to the TET but the problem is the fence/ gate/ barriers when entering the road in the end of video:

They are probably going to tear down the buildings that you can see in the end of this video. We will see how the area will be after that?
It was already 10am when we started from Virkkala ST1 -station and the goal was to ride all the way to Kisko TL! This would be a lot of kilometers! The route that we did was like this:

That was 340 kilometers from Virkkala via Fiskars, Teijo, Salo, Heikin Laavu, Koski TL, Somero, Iso Valkee to Kasvihuoneilmiö where we separated. We were mainly using TET route while riding to Heikin Laavu but after that not much anymore.

My friend Lauri used to have Honda CRF300 Rally but now he has Husqvarna 701 Enduro. Quite big change I would say!

The weather was amazing!! Not cold at all but the wind was quite hard and it was bothering a little bit in open places! Finally we arrived to Heikin Laavu and it was first time for me to visit this beautiful Lean-To.

I didn’t know that it’s not easy to see this place from the road. So I decided to add map marker to the TET route because this is such a lovely place! We met also another rider there and he had already made the fire so we could fully enjoy our short brake. I spotted some woodpecker knocking on a pinetree there!

November woodpecker

Then we had to ride straight to Koski TL to fill the tank because I already made 200km’s (and I can’t do much more than that!). After that we found one OffRoad route that was nice challenge for the day.
In the southside of Somero there was some very nice nice small roads and once we even visited some private yard. You can see how was the chat with the houseowner if you put subtitles ON in the video.
The full video of this great day here:

Warmest November day in 60 years!

Now they have promised snowfall… so next time will be maybe in 2023?!

TET Finland 2022

Posted by gozamite on 8.10.2022
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, dirt bike, enduro, Finnish Nature, gravel road, Moottoripyöräily, Motoadventure, TET Finland, TransEuroTrail. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I’ve been the Linesman of Finland now little bit over a year. When I started I didn’t have anything else in my mind except to add more nice routes to TET Finland but during this summer 2022 I finally realized the “Goal” to reach: Finland can be or should be one of the main adventure countries in Europe!
Until now we have only been the “ride-through” area on the way to Nordkapp. There’s been too much shortcuts and not riding the whole marked route because we are not interesting enough! This has to end… Finland definitely has more to offer to all adventure motorcycle riders in Europe (and the rest of the world!)

New Section 4

There will be new update coming soon: Section 4 will follow the Russian border very close and it goes all the way to the Raate road and connects with section 1 there. That most southern part between Helsinki – Vaalimaa we already have in TET.
After this next update TET Finland will have 4 mainroutes from south to north:

Section 1
This is the main route that starts from Helsinki West Harbour. It goes west from Helsinki until it starts to go north from Siuntio. Like this:

Section 1

Section 2
Was released already before I came as a Linesman. And this is very nice addition to TET Finland because I think I wouldn’t have been thinking this kind of route through Finland myself!
This section I will probably update so that it will start already from the south side of Hämeenlinna and the route would go from the west side of Tampere. But this is the section 2 now:

Section 2

Section 3
This was published few weeks ago. The section starts from the north side of Naantali and it pretty much follows the west coast of Finland. At the moment this section ends in Tornio but in the future it will go all the way up to Muonio and connect with Section 1 there. This is section 3 now:

Section 3

The main goal is to make Finland Great again… I mean it could be the main area to reach for the adventure riders to make THE adventure.
We have so much to offer! So I really hope more and more adventure riders will find our beautiful country!

MotoAdventureDays 2022

Posted by gozamite on 1.9.2022
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, BMW, BMW G650XChallenge, BMW motorrad, dirt bike, Finnish Nature, gravel road, Moottoripyöräily, motorcycling, nature, summertime. Tagged: , , , , , , . 1 Comment

Early this year I paid my deposit to join this big adventure motorcycle event. But soon I got a phone call from the person who is one of the organizers… And I was asked to join as one of the “group leaders” to make this event possible to happen. And of course I said “Yes!”
Moto Adventure Days is pretty much similar than any other adventure motorcycle event all around the world.
This year it was the second time they arranged it and it was already many times bigger than last year,
There was more than 180 participants and the event was sold out quite early in the spring.

About 9.30 PM tuesday evening

I started my ride on tuesday evening to Jämsä. It would be about 240 kilometers and I was choosing many times smaller roads. So I was in Himos only after it became dark.
After Kuhmoinen I was already riding only the main paved road because it was dark. This was my route:

Route to Himos on tuesday evening

On wednesday all the teamleaders had some practise at Haaralankangas motocross track.
We were testing quite many different things about riding enduro but it was too hot! After 2 hours I was loosing my concentration and after 3 hours I simply had to stop riding!

Uphill start
Steep Uphill start

We had routes in 5 different categories: Black, Red-Black, Red Technical, Red Tempo and Blue. Balck route was mainly offroad even with swamp and other wet parts and then the categories after were easier and easier. Blue being mainly simple wide gravel road. I was one team leader for Red Technical routes and my team number was 16!

The event itself started on thursday when all the riders started to arrive to Himos. And on thursday afternoon about 15.30 we started the first group ride!

First ride in MAD 2022

I had one 1250GS Adventure that was stuck in the loose sand part in the beginning. But after that we didn’t have any problems. Route was the best of all three different routes I was riding. It had so many different kind of surface to ride! Second time riding was on friday morning 8.30 AM.

Second ride in MAD 2022

On this ride there was pretty much no problems at all!
Third ride was on friday afternoon after 3PM

Third ride in MAD 2022

From this afternoon ride I remember that it was very hot! And that in the end of the route I made the water crossing… which was very nice experience! I have low adventure boots so I got a little bit of water inside but much. It looked deeper when I was watching the others riding there…
Saturday morning was the next ride. 8.30AM!

Fourth ride in MAD 2022

On this ride there was mainly quite big bikes. All of them were much bigger than mine!
The last ride of the event was on saturday afternoon. I was changing the route quite a lot… Mainly because I wanted to make it shorter.

Last ride in MAD 2022

The routemasters had been doing excellent work! These routes were super nice and fun to ride. Thank you again from me as a team leader and I think all of the riders are happy and grateful too!
I can only hope I will be a team leader again next year. This was so perfect experience!
I was riding back home (or to Espoo) on sunday with 2 friends. Route was pretty much the same that I was riding few days earlier. Only in EVO area we made a little bit exploring… Like this:

Exploring in EVO
In EVO

This was Great and Amazing event. I hope to see you all again in 2023!