The BMW F800GS.  The littler brother to the big Beemers Obi Wan and his buddy Charlie rode around the world on.  For me, the bigger 1200 is just a bit too big, where as the 800 seems “Just Right”.

I saw this bike in a parking lot in SLC while Gundoc and I grabbed a quick bite before we turned around and went back up to the range.  I believe this to be the F800GS, but I could be wrong… But it’s the 800 that I’ve been studying.  Autoblog has a good article on it, here.

“Why not just make your KTM into a bike like that?”

Because that’s not possible.  My KTM is a single cylinder thumper for one, and the Beemer makes almost twice as much raw power.    This makes it more suitable for longer range rides.  Softer seat and a larger fuel tank are also better for a longer range ride.  Also, the KTM has a habit of saying “Okay, let’s just run completely out of gas… right… now!”  So some sort of fuel indication would be great, like on the BMW.  A windscreen, heated grips, ABS, an actual trip computer.  Things like that make for a more comfortable machine.