An Easy Day And A Break

June 13th, 2022

We eight RMMRC riders left Red Wing the morning of Day 5 of this Great River Road ride and turned away from the river, headed for a house on a lake that was owned and rented out by Dave’s sister and her husband, in South Haven. I think it was at about this time that I decided to completely bag the idea I had started out with of doing a story for Rider magazine about this ride. For the kind of story they want you need to stop at interesting places, shoot a lot of pictures, and generally do more than just ride through without stopping. Which was not the way this group was traveling. Plus, now we were leaving the river entirely for the next 80 miles of its route. Nope, not going to happen.

The river goes right through Minneapolis/St. Paul and our route was south and west of the cities and then north to South Haven. Only about a 140-mile day. But first there was the question of Dave’s bike. Did buying a new battery make everything better? Or was the problem deeper? He had a full charge when we started out but it didn’t take long for him to see that the problem was not solved. We got southwest of Minneapolis and stopped, he looked to see where the nearest BMW dealer was, and we turned in that direction.

You can see how the driveway starts rising almost immediately, on the right.

We got there and over the course of the next couple hours the shop did a diagnosis that showed the problem was the stator. A big deal. First off, the part would cost about $1,000; second, labor would be about $1,500; and third, they didn’t have one in stock. Big problem. As long as Dave kept charging his battery he could keep running. But what to do?

We headed on out to the lake with the only thing eventful about that being the driveway down to this house. Dave had warned us that it was extremely steep. My parents lived their retirement years on a lake like this in South Carolina and while their driveway was not excessive, there were plenty in the area where you might have a 150-foot driveway that drops 50 feet. Like this one. The difference being that my parents were in South Carolina where it rarely snows and this was in Minnesota. It snows in Minnesota. Frequently. A lot.

“How do you get to this place in winter?”

“We don’t.”

So we got there and one by one rode down, making sure each bike was out of the way of the others yet to come. This was uneventful until Charley dropped his bike at the bottom, the second time in two days he had dumped it. Unlike the day before, however, this was more of an event. I winced as I saw and heard his helmet crack sharply on the asphalt. Not good. But he was up quickly and later had no recollection that he had hit the ground like that. That’s why you wear a helmet. He also got his shin bloodied a bit by his highway peg. But basically not hurt.

While the rest of us relaxed and settled in for two nights Dave was on the phone and trying to figure out what to do. Should he try to ride home, counting on keeping the battery charged? Should he take the bike to a shop in the Twin Cities and wait for it to be fixed? Or leave it with them and fly home? And then fly back to get it and ride home or drive out with his wife in his truck with the trailer and trailer it home? Or maybe just trade it for a new bike right here. Decisions.

After four hard days of riding we were ready to be off the bikes. We went out on the lake in the boat, made a grocery run and got a lot of stuff for some good eating, and took it easy.

One issue lurked on our minds, though. Getting back up that hill. I was on my V-Strom, which has a ton of low-down torque, so I knew I’d be fine. I wasn’t so sure about Tom’s Vulcan in particular, and all of them considering there was no room to get a run at it. This would be start rolling and hit the hill in about five feet, then climb. The next day we moved the bikes around to get them all set up to just go at the hill.

Meanwhile, relax.

Biker Quote for Today

Speed costs money. How fast do you want to go?

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Electronics And Motorcycling

June 9th, 2022

There were times when we were right on the river bank but other times it was nowhere to be seen.

Along with pretty much all other aspects of our lives, electronics have infiltrated motorcycling, and it was very evident in this recent Great River Road ride I did with the RMMRC.

Right from the start we headed out with three people linked via helmet communicators. One, Dave, was in the lead, and Bob and Charley spaced themselves out throughout the group. This way Dave, up in front, was relieved of the age old concern of the leader to make sure everyone got through a light or saw we were turning. It was remarked that ideally, Roy, who always rides sweep, would be connected as well but Roy is pretty tech-phobic. So Charley stayed close to the back and reported to the front.

Several people had GPS units on their bikes, including Bob and Dave. As we were gearing up to take off from Patty Ann’s in Kiowa, Tom was fumbling with his GPS unit but unlike other times he had used it he could not get the suction cup to hold onto the inside of his windscreen. He finally gave it up rather than continue to delay because we were all just sitting there waiting for him. I don’t think he ever tried using it again the rest of the trip.

This trip had been planned as one in which each person would go their own way, either alone or with a few others, following their own preferred itinerary, with the only constant being that at the end of the day we would all end up in the same place. Roy had distributed maps showing the general route and everyone had a sheet listing the stops each day. Plus, everyone now has a cellphone and with Google Maps and other tools there should be no one who can’t find their way.

It didn’t work out exactly like that. On the third day Tom got separated from the rest of us and I don’t know if he hadn’t looked at the general route, didn’t want to bother checking his phone for location and route, or what, but while the rest of us were headed to Hannibal, Missouri, he ended up heading away from the river, up through central Illinois in a direct route to Davenport, Iowa, our stop for the night.

Then, in Hannibal, we were talking at lunch and I said I intended to head off on my own. Bob was concerned:
But you don’t have GPS, do you?
No, but I can find my way.
Can you find your way to the motel in Davenport?
Yes.

Yes, of course I can, and I did. I have paper maps and I have my phone. What more do I need? But Bob said he has depended totally on GPS for years now. Does he mean he has forgotten how we got around before GPS? I haven’t.

And the GPS didn’t always do us such a good job. Entering Dubuque Dave was leading and I don’t know what difficulties he may have been having with GPS but we went every which way, turning around, retracing our steps, back and forth till we finally found our way out of town. That’s what I see as a weakness of GPS: if you miss one instruction you have to recalculate and go through contortions to get back on the route. When I travel I look at the roads before I get there and I know what I’m looking for and generally where I’m going so if I miss a turn it’s not hard to correct. And besides, maybe I want to take a different route than what GPS selects. With GPS as your only guide, if you just follow that arrow you don’t really know where you’re headed, you’re just following the arrow.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to technology. For one thing, with your phone you can zoom in on an area and see roads that even the best maps don’t show you. I love that. And being in voice contact with other riders is terrific. At least it is when someone gets separated from the group, or when you’re leading and can’t see the end of the group. I would not want to be one of those who are in constant touch the whole ride because I like living in my head all by myself when I’m riding. But it’s sure good to have at least a few people staying connected.

Regardless of whether you yourself use it or not, technology is here to stay and has changed motorcycle riding just as it has changed so many other aspects of our lives. I’d say on the whole it’s a positive. Just let’s not be totally dependent on it.

Biker Quote for Today

Run the race of life at your own pace.

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The Day Of Things Not Going Smoothly

June 6th, 2022

One of the river crossings. You can tell the Mississippi is getting a lot narrower at this point.

Day 4 of this ride along the Great River Road and we headed north out of Davenport, Iowa, to I-80, which we jumped on just long enough to reach the Mississippi at LeClaire. From there US 67 follows the west bank of the river.

If I was doing this trip with Judy in the car I would seriously consider skipping the more southern portion of this ride and just blasting out to LeClaire and heading north from there. This was where the river road started getting really consistently pretty. I would hate to miss the bluffs, the town of Grafton, and Pere Marquette State Park, just north of Alton, Illinois. But if you were strapped for time this would be a good starting point. Either way, LeClaire is a very attractive little town hugging the river, and would be worth a stop.

Of course, this is the RMMRC, and we don’t do stops. So we ran right on through.

I have to say here, this trip was originally conceived of as something where we would not ride together, where everyone would pick their agenda for the day with the only certainty that we would all end up in the same place that evening. For the most part that didn’t happen. For those like me who wanted a different agenda, we really have no one but ourselves to blame. I did do that a few times but not this day, which I regret because there were stretches later on where I really wanted to go a different route but didn’t. Tim did go off on his own pretty much this entire day but I’m not sure he’s glad he did. More on that later.

So US 67 pretty much sticks to the river, although for much of the time it drifts away from the shore, only offering you views of the water occasionally. It terminated and we picked us US 52, which took us across the river into Illinois and we turned north on IL 84. Again, after awhile alongside the river the road turned more inland and there wasn’t much to see. We connected to US 20 and took it through Galena and then on into Dubuque, back on the Iowa side.

I’ve been to Dubuque a few times and was looking forward perhaps to stopping for lunch and spending some time there. But that was apparently not the plan, so after some missed turns and confusion we continued on out of town on IA 3, headed northwest. Now the river was not even close by but we were passing through some really pretty countryside. We hadn’t stopped in a long time so as we rode along a ridge line I was pleased to see a scenic viewpoint and desperately hoped Dave, who was leading, would stop. He didn’t. Man, I really needed to get off that bike for a bit!

We got back on US 52 and turned north, eventually rejoining the river at last. Finally we stopped in Gutenberg for lunch.

At that point we learned that Dave’s bike was not running well. His indicators were telling him the battery was not charging. It was decided that after lunch he and Charley would ride on straight to La Crosse, Wisconsin, where there was a battery shop that had just the battery his bike needed. We were all hoping that was all it would take. At lunch the first grumbling began to be voiced from those of us who are not inclined to the Iron Butt style of riding. It would continue to percolate.

From Gutenberg we followed what is actually called the Great River Road north to Marquette. The Great River Road continues, on up to Lansing, at which point we crossed into Wisconsin and picked up WI 35. This runs right along the river but we came to a construction zone. Bob was leading now and he rode right up to the blockade and asked the guys working if we could just scoot past and keep going. They said no, there were others areas where the road was unpassable, but if we took the marked detour but turned left at County Road K we could skip much of the detour and get back to the river much quicker. So we did, and that was actually kind of a fun ride through the hills.

After that it wasn’t far to La Crosse, where we found Dave and Charley at the battery shop, getting a charge put in Dave’s new battery. It was at this point that I made my mistake in not following my own lead. It was going to be another hour and a half till the battery was charged enough and I should have taken off. I would have gone on to Winona and then crossed to the other side and ridden along the east bank of the river pretty much all the way up to Red Wing, which was our destination for the night. But I didn’t.

So when we left we stuck to US 61 all the way, on the west bank. All along the way I could see the road on the east bank and it sure looked like the much prettier, less busy highway. I kept thinking we would cross the river and take that road but we never did.

What did happen was we got into Lake City and a construction zone. Along the way we lost half the group so Bob pulled over to wait. They didn’t show up so Bob went back to look for them. He didn’t find them so we rode on, not hurrying. We pulled over at one point to get gas and Charley, after gassing up, was pulling his bike around to the shady side of the building and dropped it. Dang. No harm done. Then we saw the other guys pass by on the road so we knew they were OK. We pushed on into Red Wing, found our motel, and met up with the others.

It turned out that going through the construction zone someone had stopped suddenly in front of Mike, he had braked quickly, and Roy plowed into him. Again, no injuries, but some damage to Mike’s side bag. We were just glad to get to Red Wing, and Dave put his battery on a charger overnight, with everyone crossing their fingers.

Except Tim wasn’t there. I was out in the parking lot at 10 that night talking to Judy on the phone when I heard a bike and there was Tim, finally arriving. I didn’t talk to him then but the next day he told me he didn’t even get out of Davenport the previous morning when he wiped out on some gravel. With that and a few other issues he had had a very long day.

Biker Quote for Today

When you arise in the morning think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive, to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love, to ride a motorcycle.

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Critters Along The Way, Alive And Dead

June 2nd, 2022

Yes, we did cross the river a few times on this trip.

Anywhere you go you’re going to see a variety of critters, many alive, and often many dead. What you don’t necessarily think about is how which critters you see varies in different parts of the country. That difference was really brought home to me on this recent Great River Road trip.

Around Colorado the most common road-kill you’ll see is probably rabbits, followed by deer. And that’s really true up in Wyoming. There was one time riding through Wyoming when we were seeing at least six dead rabbits every single mile. Bunny apocalypse. Carrion-eater paradise.

It’s different elsewhere.

I first started noticing the difference when we got to Missouri. I was born in Missouri and have been there many times in later life but I don’t really ever recall seeing armadillos. Well, I saw plenty of them this time, “sleeping by the roadside” as John’s wife Cheryl expresses it. And there were a lot of opossums, too. And skunks. Plus stuff I couldn’t identify.

But not all the critters were dead. Along one stretch of road in Missouri I spotted a little box turtle, about five inches long, diligently plodding its way across the road. Wow, how long has it been since I’ve seen a turtle in the wild? I wished it safe passage as I blasted past. Then, not too long afterward, I spotted another, also about in the center of the road, but this one was pulled into its shell, presumably scared by the bikes in front of me. I wished it well, too.

Birds showed their presence. On the third day, leaving Pere Marquette State Park, I was just cruising along when all of a sudden, seemingly out of nowhere, some big bird came soaring straight at me. I ducked to avoid it and in the one second or so that this whole encounter took I observed it desperately flare its wings to hit the brakes and then flap like crazy to dash off in a different direction. It probably came within about three feet of me.

A little later the same day I watched as another large bird swooped very close in front of Tom. Then a few days later a wild turkey made a mad dash across the road right in front of Charley.

The coolest of them all was also as we were heading north from Pere Marquette: a bald eagle came soaring out of the trees and hovered above the highway, giving us an excellent view of itself. I’ve never seen a bald eagle up that close in the wild ever before. Totally cool.

The farther north we rode the less we saw of wildlife. We were moving into cooler territory and I guess they weren’t all out of their winter homes yet. But man, along the river to the south it seems to be teeming with wildlife. I guess that should not be a surprise to anyone.

Biker Quote for Today

Yes it’s mine, and no, you can’t ride it.

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Finally The River

May 30th, 2022

The lobby of the lodge at Pere Marquette State Park. Yes, that’s a chessboard with 3-foot-tall chessmen.

A different kind of long day today on this Great River Road ride with the RMMRC. We left St. Charles in the cool of the morning, with mist over everything. Very magical. We rode to the river at Alton, where we crossed on a new bridge very unlike the old one I drove over tripping on acid 50 years ago. That’s a story but it doesn’t bear telling here.

Then we turned north on the road that runs right along the river—very nice. This is MO 100. There were high bluffs for miles and I was kicking myself for not having my camera at the ready. Another negative of riding with a group; on my own I would have stopped and gotten my camera out. We passed through Grafton, which looks touristy but interesting. Then on to Pere Marquette State Park where we stopped and checked out the rustic old lodge. This would be a nice place to bring your wife to if you’re into these sorts of things. It’s definitely on my list of places to visit with Judy.

We rode up to a viewpoint and that was where we lost Tom. When we were ready to go, he went along on the road we were on, while the rest of us backtracked. He expected it to come back to the lodge but in fact it comes out to the river about three miles further down. We never saw him the rest of the day. I don’t know if he doesn’t read maps well, didn’t know what the planned route was, or what. Reaching him later by phone we found that he was many miles away from where we were and he had just decided to head straight to Davenport, our night’s stop.

The rest of us rode on to Hannibal and had lunch. We came through some nice country, rode along the river at times, but didn’t see the river at all for much of the time. From Louisiana, Missouri, to Hannibal was the nicest part.

In Hannibal, after lunch, the plan had been to visit the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum, which comprises several sites around the town but it was blazing hot and everyone wanted to just go on. Except me. I said I’ll see you later but the main site was swarming with school kids so I said forget this and headed out. I stopped at a former Suzuki dealer a little later and bought a new helmet because the one I had worn was literally falling to pieces.

I took what turned out to be a side trip over into Quincy but then crossed back into Illinois to follow US 61. A little further on I took the business route through La Grange and Canton, both right on the river and then followed the highways up to Keokuk. From Keokuk, on the Illinois side following IL 96 it was a nice road right along the river, going through some historic areas. I stopped in Nauvoo for an ice cream break. This was another of the questions I had asked the day before: Don’t you guys ever make a stop for ice cream? Heck the OFMC makes it a point to have an ice cream break pretty much every day. Ice cream is synonymous with motorcycle riding isn’t it?

Some of the group had talked about wanting to stop and see a lock and dam along the river. I have to admit, as much of my life as I lived along or near the Mississippi River I had no real idea that there were dams on this mighty river. That’s totally illogical because my uncle, who lived in Granite City, Illinois, worked at a lock there. But there are dams, a lot of them, on the Mississippi. I made it a point to sit on the shady side of the street in Nauvoo eating my ice cream in case I had passed the other guys and they should just happen to come along at that time. It didn’t happen, at least in part because they never did stop at a lock, though we came past several of them.

From Nauvoo I mostly followed signs for the Great River Road and some of it was very nice but some not worth it. I was really glad to reach the hotel and get a shower. And good to relax and have a beer. This was not a 450-mile day again but it was darn near a 400-mile day by the time it was over. That’s a lot of riding and I was just glad to have taken the second part of the day at my own pace.

Biker Quote for Today

Knock knock! Who’s there? Iona. Iona who? Iona brand new motorcycle, wanna go for a ride?

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Changing Helmets In The Middle Of The Ride

May 26th, 2022

I’ve got a really good Shoei helmet and a perfectly good Icon helmet but, illogically, I have most frequently worn what I take to be a fairly crummy Hawk helmet for a number of years.


The old Hawk helmet.

The thing with the Hawk is that it is modular, but I almost never flip it up, and it has a Velcro-attaching patch of fabric across the front to keep cold wind from blowing up by your chin. In winter especially I like that bit of fabric. Plus, the helmet itself is comfortable. Or was, I should say.

Setting off on the Great River Road Ride I chose to wear the Hawk. But that’s not what I came home with.

I got the Hawk a long time ago, as a freebie, to do a review of, back when I was writing for Examiner.com. The main feature was that it came Bluetooth equipped. Theoretically you would link your phone to the Bluetooth in the helmet and voila, you had in-helmet communication. It never worked. I tried linking it to the phones of several friends and we could never get it to work. But it was very comfortable so I used it.

Early on I ran into some issue and as I fiddled with the helmet to fix whatever it was that was wrong I discovered that the flip-up part was only attached to the rest of the helmet by what appeared to me to be fairly flimsy clips. I wondered if, if I had a crash, those clips would give and that part of the helmet would just fall off. But I liked the helmet so I kept wearing it. Hey, I’m not going to crash, right?

Well, on the first or second day of this trip I noticed that where the two pieces attach they appeared to be pulling apart. That didn’t seem good. Plus, I had been having trouble keeping the helmet liner assembly–the plastic pieces that fit together to hold the foam liner in place–in place. At one stop Tom brought me a piece of plastic asking if it came from my helmet. It had. And now, when I took the helmet off, the entire fabric liner seemed to want to come out along with my head. This was just not OK any more.

On the third day of the ride we stopped for lunch in Hannibal, MO, and I checked for a local motorcycle shop. I found a Suzuki dealer on our route ahead about 20 miles and resolved to stop there. I was splitting off from the rest of the group after Hannibal anyway so this was perfect.

The new Zox helmet.

I got to the shop and it turned out they are no longer a Suzuki dealer, but they did have exactly six helmets still in stock. Only one of them fit me. I bought it. This was a Zox helmet.

Now, to me, Zox is a no-name brand and who knows how good it is. I did later Google it, however, and found that it apparently is well-constructed, meeting both DOT and SNELL standards, and is aimed for the low end of the market. Works for me; I only paid about $105 for it, and the lady was glad to get it out of her inventory. Five more left to unload. I gave her the Hawk to throw away. (She also said she had some good Suzuki luggage she’d like to sell me for a good price but I passed.)

About an hour later I was having second thoughts. The foam liner was pressing into my forehead and hurting. I’ve had helmets like this before. My first two helmets were Bieffes and they did the same thing. For years I wore helmets as little as possible because they hurt. I tried pounding on the foam in the specific spot and that had helped some but I was glad to finally get rid of that first Bieffe and I still have the second but never wear it.

The next day we stopped at a battery shop because Dave was having issues and we all hoped it was just the battery. There was a motorcycle shop just across the street so I went over there to look at helmets. They had a good selection, and some were not overly expensive. Did I really want to buy another new one and abandon a one-day-old helmet?

I spoke to a sales guy and asked him why some helmets are like this. He said some helmets are shaped more for round heads–like his–while others are for oval heads–like mine. I looked at him and by golly he really does have a round head, and mine is definitely more oval. Well that explains it. You just have to pay attention to what you’re getting. Not that I had much choice buying the Zox.

I decided I could get home with the Zox, even if that meant discomfort. But then I decided to try compressing the foam in that spot as I had with the Bieffe. And amazingly, it didn’t take much and it made a world of difference. I can actually continue to wear this helmet now. Sweet. And I’m so glad I got home without suffering the whole way.

Biker Quote for Today

The idea is to die young as late as possible.

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