back on the bike part 1

New battery.

Fresh gas.

Fire it up, short 20 mile ride to Geoff's.

Inner thighs about to short circuit. Always happens on the first ride of the year. It passes.

Over the next week and then some a days work will get done. Springs front and rear. New horns. New tires.

Geoff, call the shop up, see how much it is to change tires.

$34

Dropped the first one off. Be done in about an hour. We went to a Chinese buffet and talked.

4 hours later and Geoff has gone to work and I'm at the shop waiting for the job to get done.

That will be $42. This was the first sign that things would go awry. I didn't get it.

$34 plus tax, plus disposal, plus supplies.

Hmmm, 4 bikes in this garage, 3 more at home and 2 is running around on his Sportster. Tire changing equipment might be a good idea.

2 is Geoff's brother, his name is Greg, so is Geoff's father, my brother, a Greg, so is Geoff's father in law. Geoff's parents didn't like the Senior Junior stuff but they had to name son number 2 after dad, so he is Greg 2. I've called him Junior which seems to torque them off just a little so he can be 2 here.

Geoff's bike wasn't ready for the trip either. He needed plates, he needed his license re-instated, he needed the front wheel replaced. He had wheelied the bike once and lost it while looking at the clear blue sky and bent the front rim. We bought 3 before we got the right one, on the day before we were going to leave.

Friday morning I'm packing my gear when my sister comes around. I tell her that a raccoon has invaded our trash cans 2 nights in a row and she might have to pick something up if it happens again. That is too much for her and she treats me with an angry rant.

I stopped packing. Too bad I wasn't done.

Call Geoff, let him know I'm going to be a little bit late. He is still in bed.

I get to his house around 10, he's gone. I go to work, I have to replace a rubber foot peg.

This and that follows, you know how it goes, and we finally get under way. 60 miles south of Columbus we stop in McArthur for some pop, it's 12:45. A couple of small towns later we make a wrong turn. The plan has gone awry.

We t-bone into an east/west road unexpectedly. I can't look at a map because I didn't bring one, stopped packing, remember? The maps are sitting on my table at home.

We go one way then turn around to go another. Too bad, we were right the first time.

Stopped in Portsmouth for lunch, a late lunch, crossed the river into Kentucky and came back again because I thought it would be better to get back on the plan. If I had remembered my geography I wouldn't be compounding earlier mistakes with these later ones.

We catch a couple of traffic jams along here. It sure doesn't help.

Finally cross the river and work our way through Huntington WV. Route 10 south. It is really a nice road. Never saw any gravel in the corners. Road right through the heart of coal country. This is West Virginia. Crossed a mountain. When the yellow sign has a squiggly line and says 15 mph it means it.

30 towns later I know there is no way we are going to get to the hotel in good time. We pick up some maps and alter the plan.

I don't want to turn on 16 south because I think it might be too dangerous in the dark, we continue on 10, there is an interstate ahead. I ask Geoff to take the lead, my visor is tinted and it makes things a little harder in the dark.

We crossed the roughest mountain of the whole trip right there. One rising slow switchback after another followed by diving slow switchbacks on the other side.

By this time we are both sore and tired. Neither one of us has spent any time in the saddle this year and here we are putting in a 12 hour day. On top of that the Kawasaki that Geoff is on is shaking parts loose the whole way and we have to keep stopping to make repairs.

We arrive in Princeton WV and talk about stopping to figure our next move. This place is hopping! The music is pouring out of a bar on the corner, all down the street we pass hundreds of kids hanging out, it's Friday night!

Found our way to the interstate, Geoff is in the lead but he is going too slow, his speedometer cable has shook loose. I get out in front and we take off! He asks later about how fast we were going, well we were mostly just keeping up with traffic so it wasn't much, just more than you get used to in Ohio.

The road is wet, we are cold and tired, we stop again near the NC border, asked some locals about our destination. We were less than 25 miles from Sparta NC and no one could offer much help.

It took us 2 more hours to cover that distance, lost again, wet roads, wrong turns, fog. We were looking for the intersection of 2 highways, too bad they crossed each other twice. We found both of them, just spent a lot of time at the wrong one first.

We finally found the motel. 2:30 in the morning. I struggled up the stairs.


We got into our beds, cold, in a lot of pain, and laughing ourselves to sleep talking about our big adventure.