The body of a Yukon motorcyclist was discovered beside a northern California highway almost a week after the crash that killed him, said the California Highway Patrol.
The body of Raymond Jack Taylor, 58, was discovered on August 21st by California transit employees at the bottom of a large roadside drainage culvert.
Taylor had checked out of a Petaluma, California motel on the morning of August 16th and had begun riding north on his 2006 Harley Davidson, working his way back to the Yukon at the tail end of a three-week biking trip.
Mid-afternoon, as he rode along California’s highway 101, his motorcycle failed to corner a sweeping left curve, forcing him onto the asphalt shoulder.
“Maybe he could have been going too fast for the curve, cut it too wide and got off the roadway … that’s all we know at this point,” said California Highway Patrol officer Stefanie Barnwell.
Taylor came through a small 1.8-metre opening in the roadside guardrail and plummeted through some large bushes, at which time he fell off his motorcycle.
He dropped into a 3.5-metre drainage culvert and his bike fell on top of him.
Taylor’s body was not visible from the road given the large bushes and the steep grade of the culvert — it was only after a close inspection of the roadside by workers that the site of the accident was identified.
The cause of Taylor’s death is still under investigation by California officials. (Tristin Hopper)