August 15th
04:45-11:55
Madison Campground, Yellowstone Wy to Boise Id
429 Miles
I got up and got all packed up. I rolled the bike down to the bottom of the hill. I started the bike and headed to the entrance of the campground. I pulled out my leather jacket and grabbed a soda from the machine. I also checked the time and found it to be 04:45 and not 05:45. I thought it was still rather dark for 06:00.
I was also short on gas. Normally I put gas in before settling in for the night but neglected to do it this time.
On my way out of Yellowstone I saw two yellow eyes at a fairly high level. I slowed down really quickly and discovered a Caribou on the left side of the road. As I went by I spied another one on the right side in the bushes. After that I kept my eyes peeled for more eyes.
Outside the west gate there is a town and an unattended self-serve gas station. I filled up and called Rita. After that I headed out of town and south on Rt 20. The road was still quite dark and they had 8′ tall reflectors on the sides of the road which did quite well in keeping me on the road and making sure I didn’t mistake them for eyes.
I followed 20 to 15 then to 86 and 84. Outside Boise I called Rita since it was getting close to her departure time of 2pm to let her know I was almost in Boise. We chatted for a couple of minutes and I headed on.
About 10 minutes later I pulled into the motel Rita had arranged. I checked in and then bailed. I’ve been in Boise before but I didn’t know where the Harley dealer was located. After wandering around a bit looking for a laundrymat and the dealer, I got back to the motel and checked out a map which gave me a better idea. I headed off again and went by a laundrymat. Perfect. I needed to wash clothes as well. I found Cycle Nuts and Bolts service shop. I stopped there and found that I was in the wrong place. The dealer was back about half a block. I turned around and parked. I went in and picked up my “pivot shirt”. The shirt at the farthest point in my trip.
I asked if they had a reference to someone who could help with my leathers. They said they could and gave me a card for Gypsy Ride Leathers. She said that the lady who worked there wasn’t always in. She also asked if I wanted a dealer pin. I turned her down but did ask for a sticker. She didn’t have one but she did have little “buttons”. A dime sized emblem they probably put on the bikes they sold. I gladly took that and put it in my pocket.
Let me explain the problem. I bought these chaps last year and wore them through the past winter. Towards the end of winter the left zipper separated. It was a bear to get the zipper back together but I finally did it. It did it a couple of more times until the end of the winter season. Either I got better or the zipper wore down further.
On the trip I brought them with me and used them once but they split again. I used a couple of the straps, one above the calf and one around the thigh to keep it together. I intended on contacting someone in Boise to put a new zipper on since I was going to be there for a couple of days.
On my way out of the dealer I called Gypsy Ride Leathers and fortunately she was there. She said that I just needed the zipper tuned on my chaps. So I headed back to the motel to get my chaps and headed back to see her. She was in behind a group of trailers which seemed to have a bunch of bikers living there. She put an anvil under the zipper and then took a pair of flat nosed pliers, opened them slighly and placed them over the zipper mechanism. She then took a hammer and whacked it a couple of times making it tighter. She waxed both sets of teeth and ran the zippers up and down. The left one split while she was waxing it so she replaced the mechanism with a new brass one. I also had her replace the right zipper head to have them match. I did some knee bends and general walking around and it seems to have worked. I paid her 11 bucks (3 each for the heads and 5 for knowing where to whack 🙂 and headed out.
I stopped by the laundrymat and washed my grungy clothes wearing my chaps the entire time with no problems. Excellent, the problem’s been fixed. I’m much happier. And I have clean clothes. More happiness. Finally I took a shower which I hadn’t gotten since I’d camped the past two days. Yea, I was pretty grungy too. I couldn’t wait until after 7 to eat so I hit 7/11 and grabbed a snack.
One thing I noticed. When I hung up the rain gear there was a burn through on the inside of the left pant cuff. I saw it a few days ago and today I connected one and one. Back in Indiana when I was under the overpass putting on my rain gear I had put the pants and jacket over the front of the bike. The plastic on the turn signal cover must have heated up when the pant leg was covering it and melted the cover and pant leg. There weren’t any black marks on the pipes and I was usually very careful since I’ve singed pants before.
Rita’s flight landed at 18:55 or so. At 7pm I headed over on the bike to see her and maybe pick her up. I pulled in to the airport lot and parked on one of the hashmark grids rather than taking a space. I went in looking for the flight. The only thing I knew was the approximate time she was supposed to be in. I thought she was coming from O’Hare but the only flight coming from there arrived after 10pm. There was a 7pm flight from Denver so I headed down the baggage pickup to see if she was there. While I was looking around she snuck up behind me. We collected her bags and headed up to the bike. I strapped her bag to the bike and put her backpack on backwards (on my front) and drove her over to the airport motel.
After getting her stuff put away we headed out to a mexican restaurant for dinner. We chatted about the trip so far and what I’d done since I got to Boise and then headed back to the motel.