Open Road Biker

A few months ago the movie “Bucket List” came out and just from the few previews it got me to thinking. What would my bucket list look like (you know, kick the bucket)? I started thinking about all of the things that I would like to do before I pass on. Not all of it is motorcycle related mind you but hey they are what I want to do right? So here it goes;

1. Hike the Appalachian Trail. I have always loved the outdoors. Hiking, camping, fishing, hell I just like to be in the woods. Maybe it is the country in me, I have no idea but since I was young I couldn’t help but explore my backyard and further. I think the best thing that ever happened to me is when my family moved back to the woods after I had got a little older. Why the AT you ask? For the hell of it why not? I really am not sure but it has just been something I have always wanted to do but I have never had the 4 to 5 months to do it in. I think maybe to accomplish this one I just may have to do it a few weeks at a time. Heck with the military keeping me gone for a year at a time and then only giving me 30 days off it will be an accomplishment just to scrape together the time to do it much less do the trip itself. So I guess the likely hood that this one gets done before I retire may be fairly slim so this may have to be put off until then (9 more years).

2. Ride the Mother Road. Who hasn’t thought about taking off on Route 66 and following it from start to finish? Now this is a item I just may be able to check off of my list one day. I may be able to do it in 3 weeks (Tennessee to Illinois to the west coast and then back to Tennessee). Maybe even have it coincide with The Stampede that The Horse Backstreet Choppers puts on every year. I would take Route 66 out and then meet up with the Stampede guys and roll back with them. That may be something to plan for June 2010.

3. Climb Denali. Yep, you are probably thinking I am crazy now, hey I already said I loved the outdoors. Mt. McKinnely is one of those been there done that things that I would like to claim. I will probably plan a trip up Mt. Rainier first though to get a little training. I haven’t done any technically difficult mountains but I have climbed Pikes Peak in the early winter. Instead of taking the trail me and a friend went straight up the side climbing hand over fist through the snow. What would make this one hard to plan is trying to find the money to do it (fairly poor person here) and getting the time off during climbing season. The season is fairly short and preparation would have to start early but what I may do, and I have thought about this a lot, is try and get the Army to station me in Alaska. That way I wouldn’t have to worry about travel as much and I could train a little. Heck I may even get to spend a little time in Denali national forest that way. I guess that is one of those things I will have to wait and see about.

 4. Sturgis. This one is self explanatory right? I mean who doesn’t want to do Sturgis? This one though may just happen August 2009. Me, my dad, and my brother have it planned. I will probably roll down to Alabama and we will all ride the whole way. Take about 3 days there and 3 back and then stay for a few. I also have a few friends that may join the ride as we pass Missouri and Kansas. Stumpy, DZ, here is your invite. 

5. Ride through Europe. Well I had my chance to do this already but I didn’t take full advantage of it. I spent three years living in Belgium and managed to ride in France, Belgium, England, Ireland, and The Netherlands. I still missed trips to Germany, Italy, and Austria. The next chance I get though I am going to do it right. I will hit all of those spots that I missed plus I may try and do Fokker see (spelling?) and a few more Super Rallies. Maybe the Army will send me and my family back so that I will have another shot.

6. Ride U.S. Highway 11 from the south to the north. This is another one that could be with in reach. Just a little planning and I think this one may be easy to pull off. I am not sure exactly where it starts but heck that may be a trip all by it self. I know that it runs up through eastern Alabama through Georgia, Tennessee, and Virginia and follows some of the greatest parts of the South Eastern United States. I think I started dreaming about doing that road sometime in 1996 when I started driving a truck (back in my civilian days). I may even take the Blue Ridge part of the way but either way I think that it would be a great trip.

7. Jazz Fest and Mardi gras. Both of these hold equal weight for me. I have wanted to visit The Big Easy during those two times since I took my first trip to New Orleans to deliver stuff. I just happened to turn it to a NPR station and they were advertising Jazz Fest in between the Blues, Jazz, and Zydeco that they were playing. I have a few friends that have talked about heading down with me. This could be another one of those trips that if planned right could be done easily. Maybe I can even find that little Po Boy shop on the Nashville wharf again.

8. Manufacturing Tour. I am not sure why but I have always wanted to go to Dearborn and see a Mustang built and then slide on over to Milwaukee and see a few two wheeled creations roll off the line. I may even take in the HD museum while I am at it. I worked in a manufacturing plant from the time I was 18 until I was about 24 or 25. I built utility beds for a place called Altec. Ever since then just to see how different things were built has interested me. Maybe one day I will be putting together a car or motorcycle every year or so just to keep the bills paid after I retire.

9. Go to Austin. I would get to see The Alamo, Austin City Limits (TV show), and stand underneath the Stevie Ray Vaughan statue. I would get to see some of this great countries history, take in some great music, and see the statue dedicated to a modern blues legend. Now on the way to Austin though I may just have to stop off in Memphis and visit Beale Street and Graceland. That would be an awesome trip. You may just see me writing about that one soon after I get back (a year from now).

10. Now to wrap this up I will list a few other things that I would like to do that I am sure on other peoples list; sky dive, bull riding, circle track racing, write a book, and if I get lucky grow old enough to see my boys grow into confident, honest, good men and have children that do the same. Maybe there will be a few generations that will be able to ride together.

247 Miles, that’s how far it is to Locust Fork Alabama from my house in Clarksville TN. That was my little ride on the 22nd and 200 miles of it was under a dark gray sky with the weather trying to scare me into turning around the further I went. I was lucky, it never rained but I did find out that my gloves suck! The headwind made me burn about twice as much gas as I should have and I thought I was going to run out before I got to the gas station that I was going to fuel up at. Now other than it being a little cold the ride was great. Nothing like a good ride to help you clear the cobwebs out and give you some time to just relax and enjoy the wind blowing by you at 70+ miles an hour. I ended up riding the last hour or so in the dark and while I love riding at night you never know when that 12 point buck that you wish you could see on your hunting trip is going to decide to jump out in front of you and commit suicide in your headlights. I mentioned a little about the headwind above, well that wind was tossing my bike around all day. A few times I thought that it may blow me off the road. I did relearn a few lessons that I should have remembered before I left;
1. Eat! I got real busy getting everything ready before my little trip and I forgot to eat anything. I got up that morning and went to work getting ready, no breakfast, no food what so ever. By the time I made it to my gas stop I was starving. The little bit of junk food that I got there didn’t do me very much good either. Once I made it too Locust Fork sometime around 6:30 PM I was more than ready for a meal.
2. No matter how full your tank is always top it off before you take off. I was just a little below full when I left but I soon realized that I wouldn’t be able to go the 200 miles that I was expecting to
be able to go.
The trip back may just be in real bad weather. I am hoping that the rain that they are forecasting won’t materialize but I guess I should expect the worst and prepare for a cold, wet ride. I will tell you how that goes once my fingers thaw. Ride safe, ride hard, just ride!
( I will be talking about my ride back tomorrow so stay tuned)

St. Paddy day weekend, man what a trip. This is one that the kids and future grandkids may hear about a few times over or maybe I should just try and suppress that memory….. nahhh. We were supposed to roll out at 12:00PM to catch a 8:00PM ferry on Friday right? Wrong, we didn’t roll until around 1:00PM and blasted down to Cherbourg, France to catch that ferry. At 85 and 95 miles an hour you would think you could cover 350 miles fairly quick right? Wrong, there seemed to be a toll booth every few miles but we did make it with some time to spare so we thought. After stopping for a few minutes overlooking the port from the hillside we cruised on down to the ferries and went inside to check in but the company we were using seemed to be closed. After a further inspection it seemed that the departure time was 6:00PM (it was around 7:00PM). Well thanks to some quick thinking on behalf of temporary Road Captain DZ we were ready to slip onto another ferry. It was a cargo ferry that wasn’t bad. The accommodations were adequate and the meals were good but have mercy we were on that thing until 3:00PM the next day. When we rolled off at the port in Rosslare, Ireland we were going to try and catch a parade in the nearby town of Wexford but it seemed that we were just moments late so we headed on up to Dublin to set up camp and then head into town for a little green beer. The camp site took a little while to find but by around 8:30-9:00PM we were headed into town (hell we were hungry by then too). After looking for somewhere to park (which took forever) we all decided on the Hard Rock Café and surprisingly we were able to get some beer and seated fairly quick. The food was o.k. but the beer was even better. Outside everything was crowded and every pub was standing room only. It took some work to belly up to the bars. We searched around and visited Thunder Road (a motorcycle themed restaurant) and then found a little upstairs pub where they were playing some live blues, it was just one guy playing a Dobro and another playing the Harmonica. We listened to a set and downed a few beers then decided to try our luck with another pub but they were all closing. I guess it was time to head back anyways, heck our morning ferry would leave at 8:00AM and that meant we had to be there at 7:00AM and get up much earlier. Everything from that point until we got to the ferry went off without a hitch but low and behold the ferry was late leaving (it is Sunday now and we are heading to England to visit Stonehenge). The boat leaves about 30 minutes late and we head out on our little 3 hour journey only to get close to port (Holyhead) and the captain announce that because of weather and mechanical troubles it will be 4 more hours before we can dock. So we head back out to sea and do big circles for 4 hours until they fix the bow thrusters and when we finally dock it is around 5:00 PM. No big deal if the weather holds out right? About an hour into the ride it starts a nice light sleeting which turns into a slushing and heavy snow. By 12:00 AM we had went around 180 miles and were cold to the bone and teetering on frostbite and hypothermia. We decided to call it a night, call off Stonehenge, and push on the next morning. We had made it as far as Birmingham and a little Holiday Inn Express but the good news is we all woke up with a new talent. Breakfast was continental style and quick. We headed out and brushed the snow off the rides and rolled on towards Dover and the chunnel (channel tunnel). Even though the traffic was heavy in places we still made decent time and it was a good day for riding (so far, so good). When getting close to the train that would take us over to Calais, France, we decided it was time for a meal so we found a little pub called The Butt of Sherry in the town of Hythe where we had a great meal and good beer. That was the best little place that we had eaten at the whole trip. Had a good time there but eventually we decided to saddle up again and head out. The train got us to Calais by 5:00PM and we headed home but found ourselves taking an hour detour. It only made the trip 3 1/2 hours instead of 2 and put me home around 8:30PM.

Monday night, 1030 miles (on the road, at sea?), and Dublin for St. Paddy’s day, what more could you ask for? It was an experience I will never forget and would love to do it again. Surely the next trip will go as planned right?
Check out the pictures at www.openroadbiker.com