Northern Ride – Day 1

Posted on August 8, 2003 by Freejack

August 8th
13:45-18:18
Washington DC to Friendville MD
178 Miles

Before I left on the trip I called my first stop, the state park in Ohio. On the positive side, it’s a large park with lots of sites. On the negative side, they’re all full for the night. Guess I should have called sooner.

At 13:45 I started gathering my stuff and walked out the door. It took two trips since I had all my gear and the bike was in the bike lot.

By 14:31 I was on the bike and on my way. I followed the directions given by the Microsoft Streets & Trips and realized that the times in the directions were very optimistic. I made it to the beltway at 15:14. Traffic was about average I guess for a Friday afternoon.

There were a couple of slow downs on the way out, particularly at the places you’d expect. Turn offs and lane losses. No accidents or anything.

At the Rt 68 turnoff it looked like rain ahead so I pulled off and put on my gear. It was at an exit ramp where the left turn was towards town but the right was a short dead-end. I expected I’d get pretty good at getting my gear on 🙂

One of the first things I learned about with the rain suit was that if you didn’t fully seal the arm and neck holes, you’d get balloon (from the air getting into your arms) and you’d get wet.

After a bit I pulled off and removed the suit. I realized after leaving it on for a bit that it gets fairly sweaty if it’s not raining/cold. A bit later it started raining again so I stopped at an underpass and put on my gear again. This takes between 20 and 30 minutes to get it out and on.

About 30 minutes before I stopped, I felt a pop in my back. I thought it was one of the bungie cords slipping out of its hook. I reached back and felt around a little but couldn’t find anything loose. I had two bungie cords for each bag and a strap for the side stuff (leathers and tent).

About 10 minutes later I felt a sharp pain in about the same place. On that one I thought for sure a cord had released. It was very sharp.

So, by 18:18 it was raining, I was wet and I realized I wasn’t going to get even close to my target stopping site. I spied an exit and pulled off in Friendsville Md. I stopped at the first place and, dripping wet, asked if they had a room. Unfortunately they were booked up but she called the other place and they had a couple of rooms. So I stopped at “Sunset Inn” in Friendsville Md.

It was upstairs and overlooked the pool. The parking lot was rocks and the small wooden kickstand I “made” (10 seconds on the table saw) was useful. I stripped the gear off and covered the bike.

When I took the gear off of the bike I found that the left buckle that I had used a strap on had broken and, while I could find some pieces of the buckle, I didn’t find the strap. I figured it was gone.

I walked down to the town (about 1/2 mile) and to the grocery store. There were no restaurants in town and it looked like everything was closing up. The grocery store had most of the lights out and when I walked by the back room there was a poker/dice game going on (picture of 4 or 5 guys and one with money in his hand). I walked around a couple of times and finally grabbed a premade deli-sandwich, a bag of chips and a Diet-Coke.

I commented that I hoped I wasn’t holding her up, she said that I would be the first customer of the following morning.

Anyway, I walked back up the hill to my room. It was dark and a little rainy. The hills looked cool with clouds hovering around the tops.

When I got done with “dinner”, I undressed and because of the strap, checked out my back. There were three red insect bite-size marks in the middle of my back. I took a quick picture.

I put my wet gloves on top of the light fixture hoping to dry them out. After a while I turned them over. It turns out that this isn’t such a great idea since my left glove looks like it shrunk. It took a couple of hours the next day to get them comfortable again (the right glove needed to be stretched out a little).

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Northern Ride – Planning

Posted on August 7, 2003 by Freejack

Trip to Boise and Back

On August 8th, I’m heading out to Boise for my first really lengthy motorcycle ride.

Mostly I commute on my Harley but I’ve done some lengthy rides. My first long distance ride was on my Honda 360 back in the 70’s. I rode to a gaming convention in Pennsylvania. It wasn’t all that long a ride, probably all of 4 hours but I was hating life after the ride. So much so that I cut short my stay.

These past couple of years though I’ve really been hitting the road which includes a trip to Daytona (2000 miles in 4 days round trip) and a trip to Deal’s Gap (1200 miles in 2 1/2 days) so it looks like I can handle around 400 miles in a day and maybe even 500 with some planning.

For this trip, it’s going to be around 2700 miles to Boise so I’m planning on 7 days for the ride. I have to be in Boise not later than Friday the 15th.

See The Route To Boise for the mapquest maps (stupid site) and some brief info.

For the return trip I’ll be heading to The Great White North. That’s right, a trip through Canada. Basically around The Great Lakes and then south home. That’s going to be around 3000 miles.

With side trips and lolly-gagging along, I expect to be home sometime on the 24th although I’d like to be home on the 23rd.

In planning this trip, I intend on hitting camp grounds at least two out of every three days. To save money but also to enjoy the outdoors.

I’ve been poking around the ‘net looking for equipment and lists of suggested stuff to bring along. There are some interesting items such as Microwave Ovens.

I’ve compiled and condensed the lists into these pages. While I’ve removed the duplicates and things I won’t be too hard up without (after all, I’m not conquering the wilderness; there’ll be a Wal*Mart everywhere, I just don’t want to have to stop and buy things all the time), I may still reduce the load a bit depending on how this weekend (the 2nd of August) ride with the proposed load goes.

Anyway, I’ll be adding information below either from the road (unlikely) or at each end of the trip since they have a computer.

One of the things I was planning on was to take a few pictures at minimum every hour. Especially at Sturgis and the surrounding countryside.

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Northern Ride – Route

Posted on August 7, 2003 by Freejack

The Route to Boise

First leg: DC to Wheeling WV via Morgantown WV: 287.23 miles, 4 hours 53 minutes.

Leaving work at 2pm and heading towards a state park on the other side of Wheeling.

Second leg: Wheeling WV to Cincinnati Oh: 225.7 miles, 3 hours 43 minutes.

I’m actually heading for the King’s Park amusement park to ride The Beast rollercoaster.

Third leg: Cincinnati Oh to Madison WS: 448.14 miles, 7 hours 22 minutes.

I might try a jog to Milwaukee who knows.

Fourth leg: Madison WS to Sioux Falls SD: 437.48, 7 hours 10 minutes.

Fifth leg: Sioux Falls SD to Sturgis SD: 483.54 miles, 8 hours 52 minutes.

Actually the ride to Sturgis is faster but I’m going to hit the Badlands NP.

Sixth leg: Sturgis SD to Canyon Junction Wy: 456.75 miles, 9 hours 9 minutes

Seventh leg: Junction Wy to Boise Id: 427.41 miles, 8 hours 14 minutes

Total mileage: 2766.25

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Deal’s Gap

Posted on May 24, 2003 by Freejack

Hi all. Back from 12 days of vacation. Of that, I was only able to ride over Memorial Day so here’s a brief ride report (and no, I didn’t want to do Rolling Thunder Storms again this year 🙂

Goal: Avoid the rains, get out of town.
Destination: Deal’s Gap (1,400 mile round trip)
Depart: 2pm Friday
Return: 6pm Sunday

I bagged up my clothes and chaps into a laundry bag and then into a plastic trash bag. It was tied up and mounted under my tailbag. Boris the Spider had been my tailgunner for a month or so and continued for this trip. I also used a tank bag which had my camera, cell, plugs, moto mags, maps and various other small items. I bought a couple of mini-locks for the tank bag and used cable ties to secure the bag. Nothing I would leave overnight but I could hit the bathroom at a rest stop or grab lunch without worrying that it’d take a walk.

I tried to pack my other helmet but there wasn’t a good place to put it so I left it behind. I grabbed my cable lock and a handful of rubber gloves. Ironically I forgot just about all of my other gloves so I stopped at Whitts in Manassas to pick up a pair of “waterproof/windproof” gloves.

For my riding gear, I had my boots and wet weather gear. My leather jacket was under the blue rain coat and I had the hood up and tied down. I also used my 5/8ths helmet and aviator goggles. I tried to find one of my scarves (red or blue) but Rita’d packed them away. The only thing she had was her purple scarf so I snagged it and tied it around my neck. I used it to cover my face below the goggles. Drizzle can be distracting 🙂

I was able to leave on time which was a first. Maybe because I set the departure time to 2pm.

It was more drizzly than rainy. I headed out to Rt 28 and then south on 29 until I got to North Carolina. Instead of going to Greensboro, I took a shortcut to 40W at Winston-Salem. I started looking for a motel but found them all full up. After the third or fourth one, I found out that there was a cup race and that I should try the other side of Hickory. I called my wife and had her checking 40W motels to find a room. Meanwhile I kept going. Finally on the other side of Hickory and two exits east of Morgontown I found a Red Roof Inn that had a room. I unpacked the bike and got set up.

I put a chair in front of the heater and put my wet clothes and boots in front of it. I put my gloves on top of the bathroom door and moved the door under the heat lamp to dry and sat down to read on of my moto mags. After a few minutes I checked the gloves and found they were steaming/smoking so I moved them back a few inches.

The next day I headed west on 40 and then south on 74 (I think) to Rt 28. 28 to 143 to 129 and I’m in town. Lots of bikes both on the way in and in town itself.

I headed west on 129. There was someone behind me on a bike but he was the only one. I’m a little uncomfortable when someone is riding behind me, I’m not sure why. In a few minutes we caught up with three “wheelchairs”; Goldwings that had training wheels (a device where you can back your bike onto this contraption that converts your bike to a trike in 5 minutes; I saw them at the bike show a month or so back). As they took corners, the opposite wheel would raise into the air a couple of inches.

When we hit the white bridge, I saw three sport bikes coming from the other side. The last guy wheelied and then we were at the tail of The Dragon.

After a few minutes of following the wheelchairs, I pulled off to the side and let them get a few minutes ahead of me. I was able to get a little better lean until I caught them again. They and the other bike pulled into the gas station where there were 150 or so other bikes. I kept going though.

I was able to ride most of the rest of the way without being slowed down by someone in front. A couple of times I moved to the right and waved the sportbikes to pass me. At several locations there were people sitting on the side of the road filming people coming over the hill or around the bend. There was a yellow Porche Boxter in front of me at one point with another car filming him; a regular motion picture type camera with mounting rails on the car. They tried to wave me by but I wasn’t interested in passing on a double yellow and curves. Eventually they pulled off and I was able to continue on.

At Fontana Dam, I pulled off and took some pictures of the bikes parked there. One of the guys took a few of me by my bike.

Oh yea, I probably kept it at 2nd gear the whole way and dragged right peg twice. I noticed that I was much more confident when making right turns than making a left, hence the right peg dragging and not the left.

When I got to the bottom of the run I was looking for Deal’s Gap Resort; basically I wanted a t-shirt and maybe a map of the run so I had good information. I never saw it and eventually stopped at a gas station. In the meantime I saw three ambulances, 4 cops and a pickup all with flashing lights and all heading back to The Dragon. Someone (or more) had probably gone over the edge.

I really enjoyed the ride on 129. An extended roller coaster ride without the safety harness 😉

I continued on heading towards Knoxville Tn. I was looking for Rt 40 and mistakenly turned onto 140 West. Since the difference was only a few minutes I just kept going and made a right on 40. I followed it up to 75 north. I was going to hit the Harley Dealer and pick up a light bulb; my right running light had gone out but I missed the exit. The next dealer was in Paintsville but I got there too late.

I have to say that the roads were great. Four lanes and at long stretches there wasn’t any traffic. It made for a nice ride.

I turned at London Ky and headed up the Davy Crockett Parkway; a toll road. In Hazard I got back on 80 and headed up to Louisa and eventually Huntington WV. Unfortunately again I couldn’t find a room. Rally Across America. I kept going until just west of Charleston (St. Alban I think) and they cancelled a room (9pm).

Sunday morning I headed out to go home. Somewhere by Beckley I encountered a smallish looking bike that had camo paint and Kanjii (or some Asian type script) on the side. I was very angly; like a stealth plane. In the Motorcyclist mag I had, I think it was one of the newer bikes in the 600cc range with Canadian tags. Anyway, we played tag until the rest area when I pulled off and we waved at each other.

Along the way I was passing a white family car with a couple of girls in the back (10 or 12 or maybe 10 and 12). They were jumping and waving at me as I went by so I stuck my thumb on my nose and waggled my fingers at them. Probably made their day 🙂

Once I hit 81N in Virginia, I knew I was back. Rude driving. People parked in the left lane. Weaving traffic. At the next stop I put my reflective vest back on in defense. I also noticed that my rear left turn signal was out as was my right front running light. Three failed lights. Must be the vibration.

I was going to hit 211 at 81 but there was a big backup at Harrisonburg so I pulled off and found 33E. I got on Skyline drive ($5 bucks) and headed down to 211. The ride down there was ok but there were two cars and a bike in front of me so we kept it slow.

I connected with 29N, made a right on 234 and headed home.

This is just the beginning of the ride report. I’ll flesh it out with more observations and anecdotes and post it to my ‘blog. I post the URL here when it’s ready.

Later (260 messages; jeeze you haven’t been busy, eh? 🙂

Carl

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Daytona Beach

Posted on March 3, 2002 by Freejack

Disclaimer: This ride description is about my experiences. The purpose of the ride was to see Daytona Beach and to drive as far as I could in the time I had. I took a week off with the intention of completing an Ironbutt ride, wandering around in Florida, and perhaps hitting some of the sights in south Florida. Unfortunately, mainly due to the weather, I was only able to ride and wasn’t able to do any sight seeing.

The ride itself was from Woodbridge Virginia, south on I-95 to I-85 south of Richmond, through North and South Carolina into Georgia to Atlanta. From there, I-75 to Tampa Florida, Rt 4 to Lakeland where my wife’s sister lives. East around Orlando to Cocoa Beach, north to Daytona Beach, and finally I-95 north from Florida, through Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and into Virginia to home.

If you’ve been on these roads, you’ll understand that there’s really not much in the way of scenery. I choose these routes for speed and distance.

Now pull up a chair, the drinks are on me.

In preparation for the ride to Florida I bought chaps and a tank bag. The bag arrived in plenty of time but the chaps did not arrive before I left (hell, they’re still not here).

I intended to leave at 5am on Saturday but a review of the weather forecast Friday night found rain up and down the east coast lasting until Monday morning. So I worked on finding some additional stuff and making sure I had everything I’d needed for the trip. It was supposed to be cold, 27 degrees Monday morning and 19 degrees in Atlanta Tuesday morning. I did not intend to be in Atlanta Tuesday morning but it’s best to plan ahead.

Bright and early at 5am on Monday morning I got dressed at my warmest. 2 layers of clothes, wet weather pants, and leather jacket. I wrapped my scarf around my face, put on my helmet and ski gloves, and headed to the gas station.

I’ve been riding to work all winter. A couple of times it was colder than Monday so I expected to have to stop and warm up my hands fairly often. I had my windguards on the bike hand grips which stopped most of the cold from reaching my fingers but some always does.

So I gassed up the bike and headed south. The weather was clear and cold as I expected. It was very cold. I briefly considered returning to my warm bed.

I stopped at 6am at the rest area. I planned on stopping about every hour to warm up and phone home. It was already pretty cold.

I stopped at the first rest area on I85, about 2 hours into the ride. My toes were getting numb. It felt like someone was holding a “cold poker” against the bottom of my feet and my fingers were numb. I think the “cold poker” I was feeling was the metal support piece in the arch of the boots. Just like you shouldn’t wear steel toed boots, I will need to find boots that don’t have this support feature, at least for cold weather riding.

I walked around warming up for about 20 minutes, phoned my wife and then hopped on the bike and hit the road again.

After 30 minutes or so, I stopped for gas, walked around a bit and hit the road again.

At 8:30 I stopped again and warmed up. The sun was up but it wasn’t much warmer. I hadn’t seen any other bikes on the road. I threw on a second pair of socks hoping for additional warmth.

I stopped again at the visitor’s center for North Carolina. I hit the center and found that they had a fire going. I chatted with the ladies behind the counter and warmed my feet and hands. I was getting used to having cold feet and hands.

It never got real warm throughout that day. I planned on having a Power Bar for lunch but I was so cold I stopped at a Wendy’s to warm up. The guy behind the counter offered me coffee in addition to my food order but I turned it down. I don’t drink coffee, and in addition, the Ironbutt advises not to drink caffeine because of the following crash.

I warmed up as best I could and hit the road again heading south hunting for warmer weather. One of the cool things I found was that as semi’s passed me, my left foot would be pushed down and I’d gain about 5 MPH in speed. But I’d read about the accidents and deaths caused by crap falling off of trucks (brakes, tire treads, etc) so I moved to the left or right so that I wasn’t too close.

At one of the stops in a shopping center parking lot, I met Leroy. As we talked, he mentioned that his father lived in DC, Apt 37 in SE. He wanted to know if I knew him since he’s a real friendly guy. We chatted a bit more, shook hands, and I saddled up again.

Because I had to keep stopping to warm up, I continued to fall behind in my time. By the time I hit Atlanta, it was 6:00pm. I wanted to be there at 2pm. Rush hour in Atlanta was lots better than in the DC area.

It was getting dark and becoming colder. I would refuel or hit a rest stop, warm up with the hand warmer in the bathroom, hit the road again and start shaking. After a few miles down the road, the shaking would subside. I figured I was hovering on the border of Hypothermia and hoping for the ride to get warmer.

Eventually 14 hours into the ride and just north of Macon (Forsyth), I gave up. I hit one of the cheap motels and got a room. I was pushing hard because of the Ironbutt, because of the 19 degree forecast in the morning, and because I expected it to warm up as I went south.

Unfortunately, while parking the bike (“park it on the sidewalk, don’t take one of the parking spots”), I dropped her. It took me a couple of attempts when one of the other guests ran over and helped me get her back up on her “feet”. After profuse thanks and a failed attempt to restart the engine, I pushed her over to a parking spot and began unpacking.

I took off the tank bag, sleeping bag and tent, and unpacked my saddlebags. One of the desk clerks had turned the heat on high in my room. I peeked out the window where the bike fell and spyed something on the ground. I went and got the broken off end (about 2 inches) of the front brake handle.

I also checked the bike over to make sure that was the only problem. I found that I was able to start her again so I was happy again.

I headed over to snag dinner. It was 7:30pm. I snagged some tacos from Taco Hell, called my wife from a pay phone (the room phone didn’t work), and headed back to my room. I tried the warm bath item my wife suggested but I was shaking so hard after the bath that I thought it made the cold worse.

I set the alarm for 5am, climbed into bed, and watched TV as I eventually warmed up.

At 4:47 the next morning, I woke up. I got ready to go, packed up my stuff, threw on two pair of socks, refilled my liter water bottle (I kept it on the “dash”, the spot behind the windshield but in front of the handlebars), checked out, and headed off.

While it didn’t appear to have rained, when I got on the road south I think the road was a little damp. I hadn’t put on my wet weather pants but I had two pair of pants and two shirts (as well as the long underwear). I also put on two pair of socks.

I also had to keep pushing my face shield up because it was fogging up so much. It was bitterly cold Tuesday morning and it was brought home when I stopped after the first hour of riding. The liter of water I kept on the “dash” was frozen slush.

I threw on my wet weather pants and top which actually helped a great deal. So much so that at about 8:30am, I stopped at a Wal*Mart and bought some latex gloves. I put the store bags on my feet between the two pairs of socks and I put the latex gloves over my wool liners on my light riding gloves. I put the leather shells over the modified gloves and hit the road again.

I was significantly warmer in my feet and hands. I wish I had thought of this Monday morning. You can bet I’ll remember it next time.

The day warmed up as I headed south. I began seeing bikes heading north, both ridden on being “trailered”.

As I passed through Ocala, I figured that I’d take a short cut down 98 to Lakeland. It was approaching 1pm and I was supposed to be at Lakeland before 2pm. After pulling off, I decided to ride the last hour without my helmet. It was nice enough and I had been fairly warm for the last couple of hours.

So, I rode the rest of the way helmetless.

After a couple of wrong turns I found my way to my destination, greeted my wife’s relatives, unpacked, and we wandered around town.

I won’t go into boring detail here since this is more of a ride report than a family newsletter.

I checked the weather for Daytona on Tuesday and found that there were going to be thunderstorms on Thursday. Ok, not too bad. I’ll hit Daytona Beach in the morning, head south to Cocoa Beach, hang out in camp for a day, cruise south Friday, and head home wanding through Daytona again on my way north.

Before I left Wednesday morning, I checked the weather one more time. Thunderstorms Thursday and rain Friday. Well, while I could handle waiting a day and wandering around, I really didn’t want to hang out two days and head north Saturday or Sunday especially since it was supposed to rain in DC on Saturday and Sunday. So I altered my route a bit, headed directly to Cocoa Beach via 4, the toll road around Orlando, and the “Bee Line” toll road to Cocoa Beach.

My wife wanted me to pick up a Cocoa Beach Ron Jon sticker. Yep, it was the only reason I was heading to Cocoa beach.

I got the stickers, post cards, and a t-shirt and headed north on Rt 1.

I’d been seeing more bikes as I headed to Daytona on 4 and again as I headed north on Rt 1.

As I got into Daytona South, there were bikes all around. Parked on the road, in parking lots, and in traffic. I did notice lots of vacancy signs on the motels. There were a few no vacancy signs.

I spotted a vendor area in a shopping center lot and pulled in. I hopped off the bike and wandered around. There were trikes for sale, both the converted type and the actual built as trikes (VW engine and V-Twin engine).

I thought of my wife who doesn’t like to ride because she’s so short and can’t see around me. These built trikes had a very low driver seat and a passenger seat that sat fairly high. An interesting alternative that would let her enjoy the ride more.

As much as I’d hate to trade in my new bike, I also don’t want to spend all of my time on the bike by myself. I’ll have to think about alternatives. We’re also considering trading the more expensive bike for two less expensive bikes that equal the cost of the Hog.

I picked up a t-shirt (not a Daytona one) and a California flag, either for a bike flag pole, or even better, as a centerpiece for my vest.

Up the road again. I stopped in at a pharmacy and picked up some earplugs. I noticed a higher than normal ringing in my ears and decided that protection would be a good idea.

So I headed north again. I hadn’t seen much in the way of events and didn’t see as many bikes as I thought I’d see. The lady at the pharmacy commented that many of the bikers had gone to the Orlando Bike Week instead of the Daytona one. I couldn’t tell if she was pleased or not.

Towards the north side of Daytona, I found the Harley area but nothing in the way of parking. I was reaching the end of the time I’d planned on spending in Daytona because of the weather and continued on north.

Fortunately the weather was a bit warmer so for a few miles outside of Daytona but before Jacksonville, I went helmetless again.

There was a shortish traffic stop outside of Jacksonville. Construction shortened it from three lanes to two and an accident delayed traffic.

I continued on around Jacksonville, up into Georgia until I was a little south of Savannah. I hit a Motel 6 and stopped for the night.

The next day, I hit the road at 6am and headed north. The weather was fairly nice. I was able to use my light riding gloves most of the way.

Somewhere around Fayetteville, I ran out of gas and had to use the reserve. That hadn’t happened on the whole trip. I pulled off at the next gas station and ran my card. Whoops, the card failed as well. There goes lunch.

I called a couple of buddies at the office and had them throw a couple of bucks in my account. Good friends are hard to find.

I hit South of The Border and picked up a t-shirt for Victor and headed off again.

When I made it to Virginia, I stripped down to my flannel shirt and jacket and just the single pair of pants.

It was 5:30pm by the time I made it home.

My starting milage was 7730. My ending milage was 9855. Over two thousand miles in 4 days. And I enjoyed every minute of the ride, even the cold.

Next time I think I’ll be looking for the electric gloves and socks and highway bars with soft lowers.

Have a great day and if you hung out this long listening to my story, have another beer on me.

Carl

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America’s 911 Ride

Posted on November 12, 2001 by Freejack

rec.motorcycles.harley #395301 (1 + 2494 more)
From: Carl Schelin
Subject: America’s 911 Ride (very long)
Lines: 265
Date: Mon Nov 12 19:03:37 EST 2001

Hey all,

I’m back and the drinks are on me. Diet Coke for me bartender.

I just did a quick scan back and didn’t see anything about this weekend’s ride. I’m not sure if no one knew, cared, haven’t had a chance, or what so here’s my ride report.

URL:http://www.americas911ride.org there are pictures up now.

I’ve been trying to get my wife out on a group ride. Arguments mainly being that it’d be safer in a group and she’d enjoy the ride better than alone.

She must have heard this on the local classic rock station (94.7) because she brought the web site to my attention.

The purpose of the ride, as stated on the site, was to honor the folks who gave their lives in New York and the Pentagon and to _bring_ funds to New York instead of sending money.

So we made our arrangements, grabbed our gear, and headed to DC Saturday morning. (By the way, I think we were one of the few with orange vests on over our jackets, in case you were there and saw us.)

It was a bit on the nippy side so I had my longies on as well as my belly belt. We pulled in at the Washington Monument and there were probably 1000 bikes of all types and styles. I wandered around looking for someone I might know and the wife headed to the porta-potties.

I get the feeling the coordinator didn’t expect so many folks to show up. There were three porta-potties and only two were in use. The third one being locked. Rita said that while she was waiting, a police office came up to cut the lock off of the third one when a lady from the teepee (there’s a teepee set up on the lawn) ran up and said that the porta-potties were hers and that she was letting us use two of them out of the kindness of her heart. I say we raise a glass for her right now (_salute_).

We had a blessing of the bikes at pretty close to the official kick-off (10am) and Rita trotted up a few minutes later. We got geared up and hopped on the bike.

As we were pulling out of our parking place, I saw someone’s white and power blue bike start forward (about 20 bikes up from us) and almost tip over. A couple of guys grabbed it and helped him get it up. Close call.

So we headed out of the parking lot, to the right. As we were making our right turn on 14th street, my right floorboard dragged on a hump in the road. Pretty heavily too.

We went up behind the Holocaust Museum and on to 395, police escort all the way. We hit the Baltimore-Washington Parkway and headed north. At times we were hitting 80 mph to catch up with the pack. At other times, we were inching along with the accordion effect.

We got stuck in traffic up towards 695 (Baltimore Beltway) as the police stopped the folks in the right lane. We slid over to the right as we got there and headed out at speed again.

We zipped up to the exit for 95 north (nice curved exit) and headed through Baltimore. Along the way the police were stopped at entrance ramps to 95 stopping oncoming traffic. At places, people were standing outside their cars and waving at us as we drove by. It had to be impressive (and a little annoying) to see all those bikes going by but it was exciting.

We approached the first toll booth. Back at the beginning, everyone paid for the tolls up front. They tied an orange plastic tape around everyone’s arm. This was so they could count the riders as they went through the booths.

At the first booth, the Maryland Police paid for all the tolls so we all drove right through. Raise a glass for the Maryland Police (_salute_).

From there we headed to our first stop. Maryland House service area. This completed the first leg of the trip. 72 miles according to the web site and it took about two hours to get there. We were running behind schedule since we were supposed to be there at about 11:15 or so.

We all hit the pumps, bathrooms, and food areas. I took my long john top off and we all took about a 30 minute break. Several of the folks at the area stopped us and asked what we were doing.

At the end of 30 minutes, we all gathered our gear, hopped on the bikes, and moved out.

Again, the police were blocking traffic. At the next service area, they were at the exit ramp, forcing the cars over to the side of the road.

The next leg was about 40 miles and the stop was at Mike’s Famous Harley-Davidson in Delaware. There isn’t really much to say about this leg. When we stopped at Mike’s, we pulled off of 95, around the front of Mikes, looped around to the back and to the front of the parking lot. The folks there gave us a ticket for a free fountain soda and 15% off of merchandise at Mike’s.

I got in line for hotdogs and Rita headed in for the sodas. She didn’t like the line and bailed.

We went into Mike’s and checked out the store. One guy came up to the cashier with about 200 bucks of t-shirts. I was checking out the bikes (there were about 30 on the floor) and saw the one I have (’02 FLSTC) going for $23,999. The FLSTCI was marked at $23,499. I wanted to pick up a leather vest but not for $200, thank you very much.

Still, it was an interesting place, with lots of cool stuff.

We bailed from there and headed for the third stop in New Jersey.

We headed up to 195, 130, 1/9 and towards New York.

The police would ride up to the lights and keep people from going through the intersection. Then they would fly by us at a pretty good clip to the next light. At some points, they would force cars to the side of the road. We got separated from the front of the pack by some lights that weren’t blocked or by someone who moved into the flow and stopped for the light. A couple of times, the two rows of bikes split to either side of the stopped cars so we could continue on.

I saw several riders stopping at gas stations.

We hit the third stop, a small gas station where we overwhelmed them with our service. Several folks were pointed to another gas station a couple of miles up the road. When we got to the pump, I found that the nozzle leaked gas on my tank. We whipped out our rags and stemmed the flow. We paid the guy but he didn’t have any change so we got the tank for 3 bucks.

Several of the guys couldn’t wait for the gas station bathroom so headed out behind the station to take leaks. No no, we didn’t take any pictures 🙂

One of the organizers (Ted maybe?) hopped out as we were getting ready to go and apologized for us getting split up. He told us that he would personally run the cars off of the road if they got in our way again.

So we headed off again on the final leg of our journey to New York.

It was getting dark as we came over to bridge leading to New York. We stopped at the beginning of the Holland Tunnel as toll arrangements were made. The picture at the lower left (the dark one) might have even been us sitting and waiting.

Once that was taken care of, we headed in. It was the loudest most awe-inspiring sound you’ve probably ever heard.

As we hit Manhattan, Rita had us pull out of the pack and head to our lodgings. The YMCA at 63rd Street and 8th Ave just off of Central Park. Going up 8th Ave was quite interesting as traffic was everything you might expect. There was a crane in the middle of the street and we were close to be nudged several times by the cabbies.

We found the YMCA, got our keys, and dragged our stuff to our room. Bunk beds, a TV, and a bathroom/shower down the hall. The height of luxury.

We headed out to New York and grabbed something to eat. We wandered around a bit and headed back to our room. We watched TV for an hour or so and hit the sack.

My sleep was broken several times by me trying to wake up. I thought we were still on the road and I was forcing myself to wake up before I hit the guy in front of me. That was a restless night.

In the morning (6:30am), we got up and headed out to the city. We hit breakfast at Cafe Edison on 47th street and took in some sights.

We hit the subway and headed down to Ground Zero. The concrete dust was blowing around, getting in your eyes. The police were blocking access to the site so we skirted around. We stopped at the church with all the signs on the fence and read them. Some of the faces I saw as we walked around were very grim. Others were just tourists (“quick, get a picture of me with the WTC behind me”).

As we hit the side where Battery Park is, we were able to see what was left of the World Trade Center. It was sobering, I’m sure.

We went down to Battery Park and looked out to Lady Liberty and Ellis Island.

We headed back uptown. We stopped in at Lincoln Center (we were across the street from it) and one of the Trump buildings. We went back to our room (the bike was still there in front and totally unmolested), grabbed our stuff, suited up and headed home.

We left at about noon and headed out Lincoln Tunnel to the NJ Turnpike. We hit the first service area, stopped in line behind some other riders but decided to head to the next one because of the lines.

We gassed up at the second one and headed south. We skipped the third one but stopped at the fourth. There were three bikes there that we saw and more pulled up as we were hanging around. One of them was the guy we were riding behind on one of the legs north. As he put on a second pair of pants and socks (it was quite cold going home), he brought us up to speed on his adventures from when we split off.

There was some further delay after getting in to Manhattan before they finally hit their rooms.

In the morning, the riders went down to the same church we were at (but later in the morning) and left a sign (you’ll see it in the pictures). Then they were escorted out of New York. I’ll let someone who was there detail that part if they want.

For the rest of the trip down the Turnpike, I used the thumb wheel (cruise control 🙂 which actually worked pretty well. The quick spin off at the toll booth was interesting though.

At the first toll booth we were ready and had the money out, but at the next couple, I had to take off my gloves and get the money out and keep moving. An experience I’m sure many of you have experienced.

We stopped at Maryland House again on the way south and took a few minutes break. The sun was almost down in our eyes and it was colder. Rita threw on another pair of pants, a shirt, and had a towel under her jacket to keep warm.

We hit the road again and caught up with three other riders. We pulled in behind them and kept up with the pack, safety in numbers don’t you know. When we got to the last toll booth, I pulled up next to the last rider and basically asked if they didn’t mind if I tagged along. He said sure and shouted to Nick at the front. We had our dollar out and ready for the booth but apparently Nick paid for us too. We didn’t expect it but wish to express our thanks for his generosity and want to raise a glass to Nick and the others (_salute_).

As we were pulling out, I experienced something that I’d read about, and even tried to be careful about all the other times. We slid a bit in the slick at the booth. The guy next to us pulled over just past the booth. We stopped to make sure everything was ok and he was just putting his glove back on. We were almost clipped by a car as we stopped.

We picked up the other riders on the other side of the tunnel and headed through Baltimore and south on 95. Just past the rest area, the guy at the rear peeled off and left. Home or gas, we didn’t know.

At the 95/495 turn off, Nick headed west and we headed east. We headed on to the beltway and took off ourselves at 295. We waved at the last guy while we hit the exit ramp.

We went down New York Ave to 385. Damn near got hit at “The Mixing Bowl” by two cars who were arguing about who should be in the left lane. We hopped off at the Fairfax Parkway, hit Rt. 1 and headed home.

All in all, it was an interesting trip since it was my very first group ride. The police blocking traffic for us was an experience. Rita loved the ride up and complained about our speed on the way home. In a pack at 80 is one thing. On our own at 75 is a bit too fast for her.

Still, I had to wipe a few tears away when I think about my friend Jeff Simpson, a VA EMT who lost his life at the WTC. It was a moving experience.

If you’re still here, raise the glass to the folks who died doing their job at the WTC (_salute_), raise a glass to the folks who died at their job and their families (_salute_), and finally, raise a glass to the veterans who died and may be dying for our country now (_Salute_).

Carl
’02 FLSTC (Natasha)

Posted in 2001 - America's 911 Ride, Motorcycle Trips, Motorcycles, Virginia | Leave a comment

Motorcycle Accident!

Posted on February 14, 1990 by Freejack

I was riding my motorcycle north on Rt 1 just south of Stafford Virginia, Feb 14th. I was doing 55mph in the left lane and a 10 wheel flatbed truck was slowing down to make a right turn into a DOT lot which is back in the woods a little. A small Ranger sized truck was waiting to make a left turn from the DOT lot to go south and decided to make room for the 10 wheeler and pulled out and stopped crossways in the left lane, right in my path.

I could see he was looking to the right as I tried to stop. I immediately crossed off going in front as he wasn’t looking and I might hit him anyway. I crossed off sliding the bike and going straight imagining the damage. I decided to try and thread the needle by going behind and between the two trucks hoping the guy would pull forward.

Unfortunately he didn’t and I failed to thread the needle running into the wheel well and flying over to land in the road.

I had a Vetter windscreen on the bike which is mounted on the frame using a square metal support. My left knee hit that as I was propelled forward and ripped a 3″ x 3″ ‘L’ shaped flap just above the knee and also lifted the skin below the ‘L’ off the kneecap. I also fractured the cartilage between two toes. I also tore my left rotator cuff. There were various cuts and scrapes as well.

Weirdly while the knee looked the worst with a hanging flap of skin and all, the small cut below the knee was the worst based on the doctors as it cut a nerve trunk. As a result my left shin is partially numb. Other issues is a hyperextended ligament on the outside left knee causes pain now as I get older combined with the cracked cartilage in the foot causes limping.

But I did get to use a great line. I was in the emergency room on a gurney and allowed to call my now ex-wife.

“Hi, I have good news and bad news. The good news is I won’t be riding the bike anymore. The bad news is I’m in the emergency room.” 🙂

I spent a week in the hospital with the knee left open and packed with sterile gauze which was interesting. I used to have a picture but I don’t know where it is any more.

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Yamaha 250 Motorcycle

Posted on March 17, 1977 by Freejack

When I lived with my Aunt and Uncle for a year, my uncle “gave” me a broken down motorcycle. I have no idea what it was and he said the “seals were broken” which made no sense to me at the time (about 14 I guess). I actually thought the freeze plugs were seals.

Anyway, when in The Army in Ft. Meade Maryland, and after my incident with my first car, I bought a little Yamaha 250cc motorcycle. I’d wanted a motorcycle since living with my Uncle but I didn’t know how to drive one. A friend of my in the platoon (Maury) was willing to show me how to ride so we took the little 250 out to the abandoned barracks and practiced riding up and down the parking lot. I of course killed it a few times but never dropped it. Maury was pretty strict about being safe while riding (I want to say he had a Honda 454; four cylinder 450cc); wearing a helmet and keeping both hands on the handlebars at all times.

After tooling around post on it for a short time, I rode it, smoking (needed a tune up), into Laurel and traded it in on a bigger bike. It was also my first new vehicle. A 1976 Honda CB360T blue in color.

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1974 Ford Pinto

Posted on September 17, 1976 by Freejack

My first car was a yellow 1974 Ford Pinto.

I was stationed at Ft. Meade Maryland as a Military Policeman and needed to have a car. One of the guys in the platoon headed off to Korea so I bought the Pinto from his wife. I think it was for $600.00.

It’s tough not having transportation to get around on post. Most of the time I can hitch a ride or catch a post bus but it’s still not easy.

Since I was paying installments to the guy’s wife, I didn’t get the title or anything. Being a fresh young kid, I didn’t know any better. I rode around on the original Georgia plates which had expired. I took a few trips out to my girlfriend’s house to hang out, go to the movies, etc. We both had attended Linganore High School, me for my last year of High School before joining The Army. Once when taking her home coming out of Baltimore on 70, we got pulled over by the state police. We’d been “making out” while I was driving so I suspect it was for distracted driving. I was advised to pay more attention to the road and sent on my way 🙂 Her brother had kept the registration for some reason, I don’t recall why.

About 6 months after getting the car, I’d just paid it off and had the title. I was heading off to the DMV to get my plates etc. I’d left Ft. Meade and Odenton and was heading north when I realized I didn’t have the title with me. I stopped to make a left turn intending to pull into the parking lot and turning around. While stopped, I was watching the mirrors in addition to watching for an opening. While waiting, I looked in the mirror and saw a blue car with two broad white stripes coming up behind me. As I saw the rear of the car come up, I pushed harder on the brake and clutch and covered my head with my arms. She hit the left rear of the car and careened across traffic running into the street sign before coming to a stop.

When I looked up and looked around, I noticed the car had died and the spare tire, which was in the rear (it’s a hatch back) had broken the rear seat popping through and pushed the passenger seat up to the dash. The seat back was pushed forward and the tire was sitting on the seat.

I tried to start the car, I don’t know why. It didn’t start so I climbed out and saw that the gas tank cap was off and gas was running down the side of the car. The impact had popped the cap off and spurted some of the gas out of the car and on to the road.

In the aftermath, the car was towed and I was in the back of the police car explaining about the accident. I did get a couple of tickets; no registration (remember, girlfriend’s brother had the registration), out of date plate (which I was on my way to take care of), and no insurance (I didn’t think I could get it since the car wasn’t in my name).

I didn’t tell anyone in the platoon about the accident, figuring I’d just take care of the tickets and such myself. Again, not knowing any better.

My Platoon Sargent found out about it; I suspect now from the police blotter and confronted me about it. He was understanding and very helpful. He went with me to court, of which I was pretty scared. The accident was discussed and at the end, the judge asked me if I’d paid for the accident. I said, “I wasn’t at fault.” They were a little taken aback, I guess they though I was the cause of the accident. I had to pay the no registration ticket but the other two were dropped.

I did go to where they towed the car and picked up my tapes but left the car as it was totaled.

I didn’t get another car for another 18 months.

Posted in Maryland | Tagged | 2 Comments

Ft. Meade Maryland, Old Barracks

Posted on August 6, 1976 by Freejack

I was stationed in Ft. Meade Maryland at the 293rd Military Police Company, 519th Military Police Battalion. The other company was the 209th Military Police Company. I originally stayed in the older barracks, I was upstairs, third room from the end on the left. The door locks wouldn’t work so you had hasp locks. One of the favorite things the guys would do is lock folks in their rooms at night. All you needed was a spare lock and there you go. Fortunately there was an overhang outside the window so you could climb out and get the lock cutters. Another thing was to hide from being grabbed for some task or another. You could reach through the door and lock yourself into your room. You wouldn’t miss morning assignments of course but you could use it to miss being grabbed if someone was unavailable for duty such as Security Patrol.

When I got there, I was looked upon with some suspicion. See a week or two prior to my arrival, according to stories, almost the entire platoon was busted for drugs and they missed the Platoon Sargent by only minutes. Since I didn’t drink or smoke, I was looked upon with suspicion and since I didn’t drink or smoke, I never really connected with the platoon so was pretty much always an outsider.

One weekend I had headed home, when I returned, I found a crap load of drywall in my room and one of my posters being used to cover up a hole in the ceiling. I called the platoon Sargent in and he investigated. First though I got yelled at for having an extremely messy room. I had lots of album posters up on the walls, Pink Floyd to Traffic and Chicago. But the room itself was in pretty bad shape. It turns out that a couple of the guys got drunk and decided to get into my room, don’t know why. In their drunkenness, they crashed through the ceiling in to my room. They tried to hide the hole with one of my posters.

Another time, in winter, while waiting in formation for the start of the day, I took a snowball to my right eye. I remember seeing white but shook it off. It was my effort to be “one of the guys.” I did get some at-a-boy’s from the guys for not snitching but it didn’t really help all that much. I often wonder if that’s why my right eye is a bit blurrier than the left and why it has more floaters in it.

One of the cool things was the officers were trying to keep us on post. They had the various companies pony up and they opened a post “diner.” You could go any time at night and using your ration card, pick up a burger and fries with a drink. It didn’t stay open for long though.

One of the things you’d do when on clean up is clean the barracks. The main thing would be to buff out the floors from all the boot scuff marks. We’d get some Johnson’s paste wax (the yellow can) and a metal clothes hanger. It’d be wrapped around the can so we had a long handle then the was would be set on fire. This melted the top bit. Once it melted a little, we’d drop the lid on top to snuff the fire then dribble the hot wax on the floor. Then the buffer would be run to smear the wax across the floor. An old towel would be dropped on the floor and the buffer put on top of it then we’d put a final shine on the floor buffing out the wax. Once, in a panic, I missed putting the lid on the burning wax and slammed it against the wall to put it out. Unfortunately the walls were wooden. Fortunately for me, it actually put the fire out but think of what might have happened if it hadn’t and had started the barracks on fire! But it didn’t so I’m good 🙂

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