Riding while armed?

out west here, I have stopped on a remote trail in the high country only to see a mountain lion or bear nearby. I don't carry, mainly because I don't care about handguns.

If I could easily carry a rifle, I would put it on the bike just for the wildlife encounters.

As others have referenced, the meth heads are becoming a very big problem on public lands.
 
I'm very much in favor of packing a pistol whilst on the scoot. I don't do it because I just don't want to carry the weight or chance needing to clean yet another thing. With that said, I would have felt much safer when I have run upon sketchy wildlife, and environmentalists....
 
I ride in very remote singletrack mountains of Eastern Wa. State. We have lots of bear, cougars and timber rattlers. I presently carry a light weight 38 +P, 5 shot hammerless revolver. When I'm on my 20 acre remote property, I carry a Glock subcompact .45. When I used to live up there I carried a .357 mag. with the first two chambered with snake shot. I'm seriously considering carrying a .44 mag. with the same loads since we ride in snake country and the .44 is better for bear. I run into black bear quite often and see cougar sign alot.
I've been a woodsman my whole life and deeply respect all animals and nature. I just like to be prepared.
 
flybars said:
I ride in very remote singletrack mountains of Eastern Wa. State. We have lots of bear, cougars and timber rattlers. I presently carry a light weight 38 +P, 5 shot hammerless revolver. When I'm on my 20 acre remote property, I carry a Glock subcompact .45. When I used to live up there I carried a .357 mag. with the first two chambered with snake shot. I'm seriously considering carrying a .44 mag. with the same loads since we ride in snake country and the .44 is better for bear. I run into black bear quite often and see cougar sign alot.
I've been a woodsman my whole life and deeply respect all animals and nature. I just like to be prepared.
Click to expand...
I'm quite comfy with my .44, but a lot of people find them to be to big & heavy. I keep all 6 tunnels full of 240 gr hollowpoints. I can honestly say...I've never worried about animal attacks, but some humans are F---D up. The only time I've ever worried about animal attacks...Brown Bear country, Alaska. Bigfoot worries some folks:D
 
I always wanted a .44 Desert Eagle, but its just too big for my hand. Not exactly a carry gun either, but accurate and fun to shoot. Probably a good Bigfoot gun.:D
 
I stuff mine in a backpack for the ride to "wherever". The last thing I needs is a SWAT team stopping me because of reports of "A maniac with a gun, racing down the freeway on a dirtbike"
 
GMP said:
I always wanted a .44 Desert Eagle, but its just too big for my hand. Not exactly a carry gun either, but accurate and fun to shoot. Probably a good Bigfoot gun.:D
Click to expand...

I've shot these too.. a handful to say the least.. best I can say its a great gun to show off at the range.. If you want a good 44 auto get the 44mag automag like in sudden impact movie. I shot one of those. Much better as far as felt recoil. much easier to follow up with a second shot or a third if its needed and still be on target. the DE 44 you may have a hard time with quick follow ups.. especially if you have to one handed..
That said,, I have rode armed and do on occasion. I have come across meth heads up on our trails with mobile cookers in trunks.. Also some very strange things seen before up on the mountain.. . its the squeakers that freak me out.. that and the people that seam to find the way into the woods that do not belong.. Bears could be bad too.. but the most dangerous animal walks on two legs..
Pa is easy to get a license,, so is many other states.. something like 28 states honor Pa LTCF and I'm looking at getting a AZ license so I'll be up to 38. I carry a compact 1911 in a level 2 serpa so its locked in well. If I'm riding hard I'll pack it in my hydropak with my phone. And its nice I can ride in Pa on the road with it on my hip. do not get tailgaters when I do.. Pa castle doctrine has changed and is very supporting to "stand your ground" and use of lethal force. I'd rather never have to draw but given the choice to have to explain what happened or go "missing" or found dead.. It happens to hunters in my area every year..
 
Another PA advantage. The DE is kind of a novelty, too big and expensive to be practical. I've got a .357 King Cobra and a nice Ruger .22 bull barrel with a lot of work thats very accurate. I'm told the Deltas use these for counter terrorism drills on planes, two in the forehead easily.:eek:

One place you never go unarmed is out at sea. Piracy is real even up here in the north Atlantic. I have countless hours at sea as a mate on a charter dive boat, and we were armed to the teeth. Some of the distant wrecks were over 80 miles from shore, so you have to take care of yourself. 12 ga. pump gun, .357, AK47, and an Uzi 9mm. A fellow diver saved my ass one day, put a 12 ga. slug through the back of a big shark that was circling me tighter and tighter during a long decompression(I had to stay underwater).
 
I had no idea I was on the menu until I came back aboard. This was on the wreck of the Andrea Doria, which is loaded with sharks at times. I was in my 10 foot stage of a long decompression, on my own accent line tied to the wreck below, and attached to an inflatable bag on the surface. I had previously released the boats anchor line/chain from the wreck and they were circling waiting to pick me up. Lucky the guy was an avid hunter and a good shot. Moving, bobbing boat, moving target. Fortunately the thing went down quick and the light current swept the blood in the water away.
 
I was wondering about the sharks blood but assumed your hold time had to be close to up.

Decompression time is no joke. Seen a guy go through that in the Philippines and he was in a lot of pain. Had to be taken to the Naval Base and decompressed. He wasn't the sharpest tack to begin with so it was tough to tell the effects. I was definitely keenly aware of ALL my times after that.
 
Not to get too off topic but I spent a lot of time deep water wreck diving in the '80s and '90s. Air, gas, my own custom decomp tables generated from software I designed. We used a lot of in water oxygen and stage gas (enriched oxygen mixes)to accelerate/pad decompression for safety. Some of these dives were over 250 ft and required up to 3 hrs decompression. I made it a point to fully understand the science and take charge of my own well being.

If your interested, read the best seller book "Shadow Divers". Its about my friend and old dive buddy and his quest to identify a UBoat our dive boat discovered about 80 miles off the coast of NJ in 230 ft of water. Its also about us, and the culture of deep water skipwreck diving. Completely true story. Its currently being made into a major motion picture, due out in '13 I think.

OK, sorry, back to guns.
 
We need a dive thread. Funny how much alot of us have in common. In my 20's I was a "working" dive master for a local shop. Once a year a couple of us made the trip to Moorehead, NC to wreck dive for two weeks at a time. Alot of sand tiger sharks there, but never had an incident. We dove mostly down in Mexico in the sea of cortez.

Never a shark incident I said, but those damn barracudas. Couldn't figure for the life of me why they would always swim towards my face until I realized my shiny chromed 2nd stage reg was attracting them. :D
 
I have another friend that owns a charter boat in Hatteras, been there many times. Yes, big tigers on the Tarpon wreck. Lots of 'cudas too, they "stand their ground" if your near their nest.

Steve, you could have a BB gun in Canada?:D
 
I used to hunt gunmen when I was in the Marine Corps. 0317.

Seriously, one time a group of us were riding and ran into some very hostile bunny huggers. If one of us had been armed, those very unkind folks would I'm sure found a way to be far less hostile.

I do hate how indignant those folks are. As if we have no right to ride because it is a multi use trail. We even stop and shut off our bikes to let them pass.

Grrrrrrrrr.
 
I'm so happy that folks in Finland are so not so hot-blooded in that situation. In any casewe have to have prohibition of landowner to ride in his/hers land. Most of our training places are managed by associations.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

V
GasGas GP300 KYB Fork Stiction Issue
Replies
5
Views
84
coopernicus
coopernicus
Wbdisco
From scratch
Replies
7
Views
3K
Moto7man
M
farmerj
Ring Gear Screws Sheared
Replies
3
Views
1K
farmerj
farmerj
L
What plastics?
Replies
1
Views
2K
SS109
SS109
M
Rieju Ranger 300
Replies
10
Views
31K
Moto7man
M
Back
Top