Open Road Biker

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)

I ran across a video for these guys and found it kind of interesting. Watch it and tell me what you think.

I guess I am not too PC but there it is, Merry Christmas! Enjoy the holidays and wish all of you out there the best for the new year. Thanks for visiting Open Road Biker and I will have stories of my Christmas ride up this week over on my other site www.openroadbiker.net

See yall then.

A new week, a new beer. This is the first domestic that I have done a review for and so far I am not too impressed. While this beer isn’t bad, it isn’t great either. I have drank my share of beers and have found plenty that I like. This one won’t be on the buy again list though. It had a very poor head as you can see in the picture and really it tasted just like a Budweiser with the faint flavor of allspice in it (that is what they use in pumpkin pie right?). I guess it is no wonder though because it is made by Anheuser-Busch.

Jack’s Pumpkin Spice Ale
This beer is a 5.5 ABV, light brown in color (maybe more of a dark, dark gold). It tasted like a few Pilseners that I have drank before but it had a bitter finish. I purchased a six pack because my brother had said that he wanted to try it. I have to wonder if it will all get drank though. I guess we will finish it. It may turn out to be good with a meal or something. We should be having a big dinner on Sunday (they had better have me a birthday cake, my bday just passed on the 20th). So here we go into the numbers;

Aroma 7/10
Appearance 8/10
Flavor 6/10
Palate 5/10
Overall 6.5/10

Aroma; The aroma wasn’t bad, the smell did make me look forward to drinking it. The bad thing is that the smell and the taste didn’t really resemble enough to amount to anything.
Appearance; This was a good looking beer except for the flat head. I have to wonder if maybe these beers had been on the shelf too long.
Flavor; This was the first downfall, now it wasn’t entirely unpleasant but it wasn’t something I would want to drink very often. While I could taste the faint pumpkin flavor and it did add a little extra flavor to the beer, it just wasn’t enough to cover that rough pilsener taste. Maybe if it was a smoother beer to begin with then the flavors would have shone through.
Palate; This finish was rough, nothing more to be said. I was making that bitter beer face with the first few sips. I guess this was what really made it an undesirable beer for me.

I guess when it boils down to it I can’t put this in the bad beer column because it did have a few redeeming qualities and a few of you out there may even like it. We all have different tastes so maybe you will have a different opinion of it. Have you tried it before? Tell me about it in the comments section. As always drink responsibly and don’t drink and ride.

I have been Reading The Horse BSC since I ran across a copy while in Iraq in 2003. What a great magazine. They don’t have all of the trailer queens in there, just a whole lot of stuff that you could build in your own garage (if you have the skills). If you want to subscribe just click on the following link. It will take you to Amazon.com where you can pick up a subscription fairly cheap.
Horse Backstreet Choppers