Mission Accomplished

Oddly enough, the one question that was seldom, if ever, asked of us on our trip was “Why?” Do people assume they know why?
I have about 2,000 pictures from the trip. This week at work, they are running in a random slideshow on my personal laptop. I spotted this picture of Lisa; it best expresses my answer to "Why?" I would ride 9,000 more miles to see my daughter this happy surrounded by the best that Nature has to offer.
When we arrived at the turn around point on Going to the Sun Road in Glacier National Park, Lisa yelled out from her helmet: “Mom, you where right, YOU JUST GOTTA SEE THIS TO BELIEVE IT”.

We got by with a little help from our friends.

I bought a few thank-you cards today for the people who welcomed us into their homes during our journey. But Hallmark doesn’t really sell all the types of thank you cards I need, so I’ll have to make up some of my own.

Thank you to the folks at Max BMW, they really understand what it means to support riders who are on the road.

Thank you to Jim, my trusted mechanic, who said I could call anytime, and set me off on a bike that didn’t need any support.

Thank you to the blog readers who donated quite a few tanks of gas, you made our miles a little lighter! We got anything from 130 – 190 miles a tank, and paid 2.65 to 3.65/gal. – And who knows how much a liter in Canada!

Thanks to those of you who left blog comments, sent emails, PMed, IMed or texted me! Isn’t technology grand? I wasn’t always able to reply back to your well wishes, but I shared them with Lisa and they brightened our day.

Thank you to the people who followed the blog and took the time to mention it to us when we met in person. It’s been very good to share our adventure.

Thank you to all our forum friends, who offered advice, rooted for us and read our stories.

And a big hug, kiss and thank you to Kevin for holding things down on the home front, sending pictures of kitty to Lisa, clearing the deck, and riding out to play with us for a week!

R&R in DC

We're at friends house in the DC area. We left the MOA Rally on Sunday (more about the Rally later). and rode to Cleveland with Kevin. We went through Milwaukee, Chicago and Cleveland - just passed through on the highway. It would have been nice to make a pit stop, but as with so many other sites, just too many things to see and not enough time. We couldnt have asked for better weather in the past couple of days, mostly clear, sunny in the 80's. As we got into the DC area the humidity shot up and the thunder clouds loomed, but we only saw 2 minutes of rain.

The fan on the K75 decided to quit in Chicago traffic and the bike began to overheat. Luckly we got out of the stop in go in time. I'm going to try to track down a fix, but may end up riding it home. I'm ok if we keep moving. 8,000 miles and this is the first mechanical problem, fingers crossed.

We're off to see the sights in the city, and take in a baseball game tonight.

SD is one Hot Place!

Picture: The motorcycle gods looked upon us kindly today as we skirted these thunderstorms, we had only the road spray to contend with as it passed over the road in front of us.

We're resting comfortably in our air conditioned hotel. Sometimes this is the only cure for a hot day. We heard that it was 106 in the Black Hills (SD) yesterday. I believe it. As we decended out of the mountains the air was unlike anything I'd felt riding. It felt more like I was tending a fire. One road we were on was freshly oiled...or was the aphalt melting?

We had an enjoyable stay at our first Black Hill BMW Rally. We won the long distance two-up award. Easy to do with almost 6,000 miles on the clock. The first place solo rider was from the North West Territories, look it up, it's adjacent to Alaska.

I also got my first tastes of being an MOA Board of Director, and people figured out where they knew my name from I enjoyed listening to other riders' concerns about the MOA. I just enjoy talking about bikes! Poor Lisa, she just wanted to get back to the hotel pool! I owed her some time off. So we called it a short day today. We enjoyed coffee in downtown Spearfish, headed to Wall Drug, and ended the day in Pierre, SD.

Things You Learn Along the Way

As you go across the country, you’re bound to learn a thing or two. Here are some things I’ve learned.

-That restaurant Sonic, that you always see commercials for, it actually does exist. Maybe it’s a western thing.

-The black and white crows on the Windex commercial, they exist too. We saw one in Washington.

-There are no Dunkin Donuts in the West or The “middle” of the country. I knew this already but I didn’t want to believe it. Once you’re past the northeast, say good bye to D+D’s … and maple syrup! Ugghh… pancakes just aren’t the same with icky fake maple syrup!

-You can write with pen and a pad of paper on the the back of a motorcycle going 65mph on the free-way. That’s how I remembered all these things that I learned.

Hot Enough for You?

At a rest area in the Blackhorn National Forest, an old duffer shuffled over to us as we geared up. "You heading up or down?" he inquired, "you won't be needing those coats if you are heading down". "Oh yes" I replied, "if we go down, we'll need these coats". He didn't get my play on words. I find it hard to convince myself at times, but you are better off with the jacket and full-face helmet to keep the sun off you...and bugs too! E-VAP-O-Dana from Aerostitch offers some relief. It's a bandana you soak and tie around your neck and enjoy some cool relief.

How hot was it?
Imagine your Joe Rocket mesh jacket feels like a snowmobile suit.
Now imagine you are wearing it in a Sauna.
While drinking hot tea.

Well, maybe not a Sauna, because it was bone dry triple digit heat today. The only relief came from elevation. And at 9,300 feet we found lots of relief. What beautiful riding on WY-14 through Blackhorn. Amazing red roads, red rocks.

Relief From the Heat

Picture: Road to Crater Lake, OR

Since the slight rain we encountered on our Coastal Oregon ride on last Monday we've had nothing but nice weather. Watching the Weather Channel, it appears we've been very lucky travelers. A couple of days before arriving in Glasgow, MT, hail storms struck the area. A couple days after leaving Spokane, WA rain and wind damage struck the city. Heat has enveloped the area we are in now (Boise) but we've kept our cool riding in the hills. It was about an hour of the hot stuff getting to our hotel yesterday, but no big deal. We hit the pool upon arrival. Today we'll arrive at Yellowstone, I expect it to be a little cooler there too and plenty of elevation to take us there. It also looks like the rain is on the other side of the mountains. So we'll be watching the Weather Channel closely as we get ready to depart the area and head toward Spearfish, SD. It's been happy trails when you've seen more snow than rain in July.

The Long and Winding Roads

Yesterday I was pondering the following: Can a road be too long and winding? We left Brookings, OR (at the very southern tip of coastal 101) and headed for the Redwood Forest. We had an amazing ride there and got some nice pics. I’ll post them in the Picture of the Day section. We continued south on 101 to Arcata where we reluctantly took a left. It was 2:00 when we got onto 299 and then turned North onto 96 and spent the rest of the day. It was on 96 that I wondered about the long and winding road. 5 hours, on the second half of the day was tiring. What a road. It follows the Klamath River. It has tight turns, long winding turns, up hill and down. I was too tired for this road. 5 hours of a road that is 10x as challenging as our beloved VT-7. No doubt I’d feel differently if I was fresh, but I was one tired camper when we rolled into Yreke, CA (near Mt. Shasta) around 7:00pm. It was like a yummy ice cream Sunday…but it was to much of a good thing!