Life is an adventure, so live it to the fullest.
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After spending the day wiring and re-wiring all 3 bikes and trailers and deciding to leave the flatbed, Bert tried to start his bike to make sure he had not run the battery down. It started up just fine, but the idle kept getting higher and higher. Bert was pissed! He had spent around $2000 on this bike to fix this problem and get it looked over so it would be ready for this trip.
We were all hot and frustrated. Bert said to hell with it, he was going to fly to CT to see Johnny graduate and then just go back to Israel. Dad told him to take his bike and I offered him my bike. This trip started out as his graduation present to his son. I was heartbroken to not be going on the trip, but it was the right thing to do. Dad and Bert started getting the trailers matched to Dad’s bike and my bike. I walked off and wallowed in my self-pity for a bit. I didn’t want to cry in front of Bert. I didn’t want him to feel bad about taking my bike.
When I get myself under control I went back to see if there was anything I could do. Dad and Bert suggested that we all go. Four people on two bikes… it would be crowded, but we could do it. At first, I was resistant! If I couldn’t take my own bike, why go?! But as I thought about it I realized that I was being hard headed and I really didn’t want to miss this trip. When we went to bed that night, the 3 of us were going to finish wiring things up and get head north the next morning on the 2 bikes.
When we got up the next morning, we got my bike wired for the trailer. Bert started his bike and it still was idling high. He thought about it and decided that he would ride it any way. The thought was that if it would make it to CT, he could get it fixed there. We loaded the bikes, hooked to the trailers and headed north.
We rode out from the cabin with a great hope in our hearts that all the bad luck was behind us now and set our sights on the Blue Ridge Parkway. The ride was beautiful and exciting. In some places the sharp 25mph curves would make me nervous, but with each one I felt better and better. Not only was I getting over the fear caused from my accident, but it just seemed that everything was finally going to start going right. I think we all felt that way.
Because Bert’s bike was idling so high, he had to maintain a certain speed. Because I had laid my bike down just a month ago in a gravel filled curve, I was not comfortable with running his speed. So from time to time he would get far ahead of us and stop to wait for us to catch up. But finally we made it to the highest point on the Blue Ridge parkway and got a picture.
We hit some construction on our little detour down to South Carolina. Bert shut off his bike every time it looked like we were going to be stopped for any length of time. We made it to the NC/SC line, took our pictures, and rode back up to US64.
As the day went on, we started to realize that Bert’s bike might not make it to Putnam, CT. We had to jump it off twice. Once in the middle of a town at a stop light. (That was lots of fun!) While stopped, Dad put on his 4-ways and heard something pop. Now he had no turn signals on his bike or the trailer. We got Bert’s bike running and changed plans. Surly there was a Honda shop in Ashville, NC. We would ride US64 over to Ashville, grab a room for the night, find a Honda shop the next morning, get Dad’s bike fixed and carry on.
We jumped on US64 and hammered down, me in the lead, Dad’s second and Bert bringing up the rear. Bert was the only one that didn’t have a trailer and wasn’t having lighting problems. We were scooting along when all of the sudden I saw Bert make a right turn behind us. I knew what had happened… his bike had died again. Dad and I went down the road a bit. We found a place to turn around and Dad went back while I waited. When they didn’t show up in a few minuets, I rode back as well. They had tried to jump the bike off again and it just wouldn’t start. Bert was pissed and was cleaning the bike out. There was nothing we could do right then, so we might as well go on to Ashville, get a room and start again the next day. I found a place to turn around again, Bert hopped on the back of Dad’s bike and we set off to find a hotel room.
I thought that some of ya’ll might find this interesting. I have Google Latitude on my phone. It ia a very cool app! For those that would like to follow along on the trip in real time, you can come to my blog and find it in the left side bar.
I do believe that Murphy has set up shop in one of our pockets! Would someone PLEASE get him out and shoot him! Grab a cup of what ever ya like to sip on, sit back and get comfortable, because recounting the last few days is going to take a bit and you are not going to want to miss it.
Saturday morning we finished that last little bit of packing and hit the road, 3 bikes pulling 3 trailers. We rode over in to Alabama, picked up a skinny road, (two lane road), and went down to the Alabama/Florida line. We crossed into Florida just far enough to say that we entered the state and took a picture.
We then made our way back to the big road, (interstate highway), and hammered down to Georgia. Our plan was to make it to Blue Ridge, GA to my Aunt & Uncle’s cabin. We would spend the night, get up the next morning and ride on up to the Blue Ridge Parkway. But Murphy had to stick his nose into the mix and it just didn’t happen that way.
I had added a handle bar mounted speaker system to my bike so I would have some tunes for the ride without having to put earphones in my ears. It came with a usb charger for my iPod. With all that wired into the bike, the new break modulator and now pulling a trailer that has lights…I started popping fuses. I popped 2 before we decided that eveything I had on there needed a bigger fuse. Once we put a 20amp fuse in place of the 15amp, I have not had any more problems with blowing them. But that was not the only problem going on.
Bert bought a new shinny trailer and it has 4 wires where all our bikes have 5. We got tail lights and break lights working, but no matter what we did, we could not get turn signals. The trailer Bert was pulling had tail lights, one break light and the right turn signal. The trailer I was pulling had tail lights, break lights and left turn signal. We figured that we could re-wire everything when we got to GA for the night. We had spent all day the day before trying to get them working and couldn’t.
The tempretures got up to around 97 going down the road and by the time we got to Blue Ridge we were happy to see it! We decided that if we could get everything re-wired in the morning and get out of there by noon, we would be ok.
Yeap! you guessed it, Murphy struck again! We spent all day there working on trailers and bikes. Bert fried my break modulator and we had smoke curling up from it for a few minuets! We took it off the bike and started again with a different trailer. Nothing was working. Dad & Bert bought lights, drilled holes on the new trailer, mounted them and ran the wires to make them the turn siglals. Whoo! Hoo! We had one trailer wired to two bikes, Dad and Bert’s bikes. My poor bike was left sitting for a while.
Bert decided that they would go ahead and totally re-wire the flatbed trailer I was pulling. He cut out all the old wires, ran the news one and wired the pig-tail……nothing! Not one single light worked no matter how he wired the pig tail or what bike it was hooked to. So the decision was made to leave it.
It’s 0445 in the morning and I am excited about this trip. I can’t tell you how many time I hear people that ride motorcycles talk about how they would love to take off for a month or two, live off their bike and ride all over the country. Well, I am going to do just that…starting today. A few months ago my brother, Bert, said he was going to be coming home from Israel and wanted to criss-cross the country on his bike. One of his sons, Johnny, is graduating from high school in Connecticut and this would be his graduation present. Bert planned giving the Ultra Classic that he has now to Johnny and buying another bike. With him going to be in Israel for a few more years, I thought that was crazy. The bike would only be ridden once a year when he came home on vacation. My Dad, Albert, said he was going to go with them and how great it would be if I could go as well. OH I agreed, but both of us were worried about whether my wrists could hold up to a 10,000 to 12,000 mile, 45 day trip.
For those that don’t know, November 19, 2008 I fell off the top of my loaded flatbed and shattered both of my wrists. That fall ended a 20 year truck driving career. I had pins and external fixators in both arms for 10 weeks. It took me 6 1/2 months to be able to get back on my bike and that was after I added a clutch assist. For months I would walk out to my bike and see if I could pull the clutch lever. I figured when I could pull it back and hold it a few seconds, then I could try to get back to riding it. Five months after the fall I was beginning to wonder if I would ever be ab;e to ride my bike again, did some research and found the clutch assist. By Memorial Day weekend of 2009, I had it on the bike and rode to Gulfport for the All Harley Gulfport Blowout Rally. It was painful but I was happy to be back on my bike. (The old saying where there’s a will, there’s way is one of my favorites.)
In August 2009, I rode to Sturgis, SD for the big bike rally there with my trucker/biker group that I co-founded, Road Dogs on Hogs. By the time I made it to Nebraska and met the main part of the group, I was popping pain pills like they we candy an in tears by nightfall from the pain in my wrists. I put my bike on one of the guys trailer for part of the last day into Sturgis and rode behind other people almost all week there. When the rally ended I only made it about 300 miles out of Sturgis when I decided that I was in to much pain and taking to many pain pills to be safe. I called my Dad and he hooked to a trailer and came to get me. It broke my heart to put my bike on a trailer and realize that I could not do what I had done just a year before.
When Dad talked about Bert’s plans for this trip and everything that he was doing, I really wanted to go. He asked me if I really thought I could do those kind to miles in that many days. I told him I could. “My wrist have healed a lot since last year. I will be fine,” I said. In the back of my mind I really wasn’t sure. Then I got to thinking. Johnny would be getting his motorcycle endorsement in May, and this would be his first big trip. I wonder if Bert would be open to the idea of him, Johnny and me teaming up to keep the two Harley’s going. It would save him from having to buy another bike, give my wrists a break and not put so much pressure on Johnny who is a new rider. Dad talked to him about it and he liked the idea.
So here we are, a couple of months later and will be leaving out on this once in a life time motorcycle trip in a couple hours. It has not been easy getting here. I am going to college at the University on Southern Mississippi and my boyfriend lives 500 miles away in Dover, AR. I had to finish the semester, get to Arkansas to see Danny, the boyfriend, get the bike looked over, got a cat sitter, help Dad get Bert’s bike and all the trailers ready for the long trip and be ready to roll by today. This has not been an easy task. Bert’s bike would not stay running and we took it to the shop. After finals, I rode mine to Dover, AR and put it in the shop there to have a 50, 000 mile service done. One thing after another happened and things were found on my bike that needed to be fixed before this kind of a trip was made on the bike. I got it out of the shop and in less than 24 hours later, laid it down. Luckily, the shop I had it in are great people and they had me back on the rode with a new custom paint job and a bunch of bling in a week and a half.
Dad had picked up Bert’s bike while I was gone. We decided to take it fro a ride and it had problems, the idle was to high. I called the shop it had been in and he told me some thing to look for. I could not find anything wrong with just a look over, but we decided that we would take it back to him on Thursday. I washed and polished my bike and thought I would do the same on Bert’s bike. It has been sitting for a year and really looked like crap. When I went to pull it out of the garage, it wouldn’t stay running. Dad and I loaded in on the trailer and took it to the shop. That was this last Tuesday, we got it back on Thursday and it seems to be running great now.
Bert flew in from Israel yesterday and the 3 of us got the new trailer he bought to pull behind his bike re-wired. We did the last minuet checks and started packing. I think, after we get the last minuet packing and arranging done, we will be ready to roll. I will be blogging as much as I can from the road and taking pictures. We will have cameras and a cam-corder with us. So check back often to see how the trip is going and to share in the ride!
My Dad, brother, nephew and I are planning to criss-cross the country this summer on the motorcycles. Since I know my wrists wont be able to handle 10,000 to 12,000 miles in 5 weeks, Bert (my brother), Johnny (my nephew who is a NEW rider), and I are going to swap out on the two Harley’s. We will all be pulling trailers and will camp out almost every night we are on the trip. We will have two camcorders, several cameras, and one laptop with us on the trip. I hope that I will be able to post something every night or every other night that we are on this trip. Of course there will be the mobile shots that I upload to Facebook and MySpace during the day. So be sure to watch out for those.
To my truck driving and biker friends, please stay in touch while I am on this trip. If we are going to cross paths maybe we can stop for a few minuets and visit. If anyone would like to ride part of the trip with us, you are more than welcome to. Please just understand that we are going to be on a bit of a schedule. My brother is flying in from Israel on a certain day and has to fly back on a certain day. So if you want to ride with us, you will need to meet us some where on our route. We will be spending a couple of days in the northeast for Johnny’s graduation and down around Del Rio, TX to see my niece, Taylor.
Here is our schedule:
Saturday June 12: Drive from MS through AL and FL to North GA
Sunday June 13: Drive from GA up to start of the Blue Ridge Parkway in NC and into VA with short trip to SC
Monday June 14: Blue Ridge Parkway takes us to Harpers Ferry in WV and into DC Maybe
Tuesday June 15: DC Area into MY and DW and up to PA to Dutch Country
Wednesday June 16: PA to NJ and NY and into CT to the Boys House.
Thursday June 17: Day trip from CT through RI, MA and NH and into ME for lunch then back to CT
Friday June 18: Dinner with the Boys
Saturday June 19: Johnny’s Graduation
Sunday June 20: Day with the Boys
Monday June 21: Drive from CT through MA and VT then into NY to Cooperstown
Tuesday June 22: Baseball Hall of Fame then down to State Park outside NYC
Wednesday June 23: Trip into City to the Statue of Liberty
Thursday June 24: Drive up to Niagara Falls
Friday June 25: Drive from Niagara to Detroit through Canada
Saturday June 26: Leave MI drive through Waldron MI into OH then over to Waldron, IN and down to Louisville KY
Sunday June 27: KY to Cave in Rock IL then over to Paducah and down to TN Maybe in MO but at least to AR
Monday June 28: AR down into LA and over into TX
Tuesday June 29: Over to the Alamo and into Del Rio
Wednesday June 30: Camping with Taylor
Thursday July 1: Camping with Taylor
Friday July 2: Camping with Taylor
Saturday July 3: Camping with Taylor
Sunday July 4: Camping with Taylor
Monday July 5: Up to El Paso and maybe into NM
Tuesday July 6: NM to AZ
Wednesday July 7: AZ to Hoover Dam Area and NV
Thursday July 8: Death Valley up to Lake Tahoe CA
Friday July 9: Out to the PCH
Saturday July 10: PCH up into OR
Sunday July 11: PCH inward to ?
Monday July 12: up into WA or over into ID
Tuesday July 13:through ID and up to Glacier Park in MN
Wednesday July 14: drive toward WY and Yellowstone
Thursday July 15: Yellowstone
Friday July 16: down to UT
Saturday July 17: UT over to Denver CO.
Sunday July 18: Drive through NE and into KS
Monday July 19: KS to OK
Tuesday July 20: OK and Mo then into AR (I will be splitting off at Harrison, AR and going to Dover, AR for about a week then will ride home)
Wednesday July 21: Day in DeWitt
Thursday July 22:Drive to Biloxi
Friday July 23: Drive to Lucedale
