Dean Cognito

Dean Cognito started as a tour guide with EagleRider in May of this year, but has been a motorcycle enthusiast his entire life. He bought his first motorcycle at the age of twelve with money earned from a paper route. By fourteen, he was working as a lot boy for a local motorcycle dealer and racing motocross in his spare time. He graduated to road racing where he earned second place in the state of California before retiring from racing to raise his family and work his way up to Service Manager (also known as master trouble shooter) at several motor sports dealerships throughout Southern California.

For the past twelve years, Dean has participated in the Rocky Mountain 400, an invitation-only dirt bike ride held in Crested Butte or Steamboat Springs, Colorado. In his spare time, he also serves as a guide for the Sierra Safari ride out of Mammoth Lakes, California, involving 150 riders traveling to Hawthorne, Nevada, over a trail that Dean has marked.

About ten years ago, Dean got back into racing and is navigating for an off-road vehicle that races in the Baja 1000, the Baja 500, and other desert races out of Primm and Las Vegas, Nevada. Whether it is riding an ATV over the sand dunes at Pismo Beach or Glamis; a dirt bike over the Mohave Desert or the Sierra Nevada or Rocky Mountains; or a street bike on Colorado, Utah, or Tennessee’s windy, twisty back roads, Dean lives, loves and breathes everything about motorcycle riding. He is now entering his second season as tour guide for EagleRider.

Tom Painter

Tom is definitely a “people person” and meeting new friends is one of things he enjoys most about guiding. After working in the aerospace industry as a financial specialist and later owning a property management company, much of Tom’s retirement is now spent on his Harley-Davidson and riding the open road. Tour guiding is a perfect match for Tom because it enables him to combine his love of motorcycling with the opportunity to meet and ride with fellow motorcycle enthusiasts from around the world.

Tom set out on his first extended motorcycle road trip in 1987. That first trip was over after three weeks but a passion for the open road was ignited and he has been taking long-distance motorcycle road trips ever since. Few people can match Tom’s knowledge and experience on the many highways and back roads of the Western United States.

Tom takes pride and great satisfaction in showing customers some of the most beautiful scenery in the USA. “After completing tours, many clients tell me the trip was their best holiday ever. Every time I hear that, I feel great. I know the wonderful memories will last a lifetime and it just doesn’t get any better than that.”

Don Tompkins

Motorcycle tourguide Don Tompkins is a former San Diego, California firefighter. He and his wife, Mary Jo presently live in Grand Junction, Colorado.

Don was born in the State of Indiana considered the Crossroads of America. His passion for travel started early as a boy with his family. He experienced touring by car and sometimes motorcycle, to many areas across America including original Route 66 during its “glory years”.

Don has extensive personal motorcycle riding experience from 38 years of touring and attending rallies all around the U.S., Canada and Baja, Mexico. Currently as a professional, he has done multiple EagleRider Tours including Route 66, Wild West and the Rocky Mountains.

His greatest joy in having you on tour is: Showing off America in the safest way possible.

Gary Fleshman

Gary Fleshman is a native of Colorado and lives in the mountains above Denver. He has been working in the tourism industry since he was 8 years old, and he’s now nearing 40, so he is pretty experienced. Gary is also a trained chef, and part-time truck driver, and for someone who spends his life guiding tours on his Harley-Davidson, he knows a lot about BMWs as well.

He is our recognised Route 66 expert, having ridden or driven ’the Mother Road’ dozens of times. What he doesn’t know about this historic route, one of the World’s ‘ultimate journeys’, places to stop and people to meet, isn’t worth knowing. His approach to guiding typifies our attitude to you as a customer – care and attention to detail.

Gary has his own website, so for some fun pictures why not check out http://www.bears-to-travel.blogspot.com

Stuart Persky

Be sure to be guided safely through the U.S. with this one – Stuart is a former police officer of 10 years and has crossed the continent several times from Alaska to Key West and Mexico City to Quebec.

Having been with us for 3 years Stuart is guiding our Route66 Tour, Sturgis Tour and whatever else he can get under the wheels of his bike. During off season, when he’s not guiding for EagleRider, Stuart is working as a truck driver and maneuvers large 18-wheelers throughout the country.

Stuart has a great sense of humor and once you get to know him you’ll understand…

Andy & Petra Wegener

They are the directors of EagleRiders guided tour department since 2001 and unfortunately don’t get to go out and guide tours that often anymore. Being responsible for the entire tour development, making all ground arrangements in the USA, keeping on top of hotel bookings and making sure your motorcycle is waiting for you, these logistics don’t leave too much time for outdoor fun. But every now and then they pick one of the tours for themselves to guide and each time “it’s a blast to be out there with people from all over the world”.

Originally from Germany, Andy and Petra toured the USA by Harley-Davidson many years ago, and loved the experience so much they went back again and again until they finally decided to stay to make it possible for you to enjoy America as much as they do.

“Sometimes it seems a little strange to show a country to visitors when you’re not a native of that country. But meanwhile I guess we’ve seen more of the USA than one that was born here. We’d like to pass on all these fabulous travel experiences of the past 13 years to our future customers and fellow riders.”