Dago
06-29-2008, 08:28 PM
Dago's version of MMM08
Fourth Mayberry Madness in the books. Great time and a few more tales to add the VN750 group lore.
Didn't hear from anyone Thursday morning so rode up to the motel about 1030 to see if anyone had arrived. My son Daniel (10yo) rode with me. The Schmoofs had gotten in the night before and Larry had arrived that morning. After some greetings (and lunch for me and Dan) we suited up for a little early riding. It was already mid-80s and humid so rather than my usual Thursday rides around here, I gladly took Papa Schmoof's suggestion to head for the parkway and the cooler temps. About 10 miles out my cell phone rang and when I got the chance to pull over, had a message from Big Dee (not to be confused with SWMBO, 'Aunt Dee'). He had just missed us in Pilot but Howard had told him we were headed to the Parkway. Called back and left him a message to meet us at a certain outlook and we were on our way again. It was a good 10º cooler up the big hill and we had the road just about to ourselves. We stopped at the designated outlook (right across from the alpaca ranch) and Big Dee caught up to us about 15 minutes later.
We headed on down the BRP and then down through Low Gap back towards Pilot. Since the others had not had lunch, we stopped at a diner along the way. I just had a piece of pie but Daniel talked me into letting him get this big Brownie Blast concoction with 3 scoops of ice cream, whip cream, etc. He finished maybe half of it then asked if we could get a to-go box to take the rest of it with us!
Now that Daniel is riding more with me, we figured it's time he got a road name. He had a few suggestions, but I tried to explain to him that nics are usually earned, not always requested. Youngblood, Doofus, and Fidget were early suggestions (he only 'approved' of the first.
Back to the hotel (through a few raindrops), with the notion of picking up any other arrivals, but no one else was here yet, so we skipped an afternoon ride and chilled til dinner. Daniel pointed out a few firsts for him: first ride on highway, first ride on the Parkway, and first ride in the rain (although I'm not sure the few sprinkles we encountered qualifies him for Wet Butt yet) By dinner time, everyone (Red Baron and his friend Becky, Wally & Carol) except Hacker had arrived. After dinner, twilight ride up to the top of Pilot Mountain. No deer this time, at least that we could see. Poor Jason got in late that night, hitting rain the last 25 miles or so.
Friday morning's plan was for me to leave about 9 with a group wanting to ride some twisties, then Howard would leave a half hour later with the rest of the group and we'd meet at lunch. When I pulled in the lot, folks were gathered around Wally's bike. As we were coming back from the mountain the night before, his bike would not idle and had cut out on him at the stoplight. We discovered he was getting no spark (or barely any spark) on the left front plug. A quick call to my Trusted Local Wrench, who said eliminate the easy things first -- replace the plug. So we trotted across to the Advance Auto across the street for a replacement. Still no joy. So we moved on to the plug wire. As Wally started across the street to see if Advance had anything we could use, Hacker had the good thought to pull the coil also and have it checked out too. No luck on the plug wire and at first the counter person said they couldn't check the coil for us. Fortunately another clerk was there who saved us from buying a new voltmeter by pulling one out of their tool box. The primary leads were reading about .24-.25 resistance which we at first thought was probably okay. When we walked back across the street, Larry had his Clymers out and the specs said we should be getting .18-.22 so the coil was becoming more suspect. The guy at Advance pointed us to a local auto repair place where the mechanic was a good old boy who also worked on bikes. Dean did have a meter that confirmed the plug wire was good (no resistance) so we focused on the coil.
Wally and I ran to my house to pull up kawasaki.com and look for local dealers. He was willing to drive to Charlotte even to get a coil and salvage some riding out of the weekend. Fortunately we had trailered in, so getting home was not a problem, he just didn't want to have to do it 2 days early! Every dealer we called said they could certainly order it, but not surprisingly no one had it in stock. Wally even tried to find out where the distribution center was so he could go there (or call a dealer close enough to get it same day), but no luck. As I posted before, that's when I thought of Dianna and left the voice mail for her.
Not to be defeated, Wally decided to reassemble everything and see if he couldn't make do on 3 plugs. "Miraculously", once it was back together, it seemed to run fine without the least hesitation. Red Baron had noticed one of the leads seemed a little loose when he took the coil off and some folks attributed the problem to that. I choose to believe in the power of Dianna and that she chased off the electrical gremlins all the way from Arkansas.
So we hit the road in one group, about an hour behind 'schedule' (not that the schedule meant much to any of us). Fifty miles to our first stop, WHERE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING HAPPENED, despite what some others may post. You may read a vicious rumor that when we were leaving the gas station, someone's bike stalled -- right when the back tire was in the parking lot, the front tire on the street, straddling the gutter -- and over the bike went. All I can say is I didn't see that happen so I can neither confirm nor deny it.
Nice ride through the high country - -a few mild twists, a lot of big sweepers, great scenery. If you've seen that commercial where the guy brings his car to Subaru Heaven, I think we found John Deere Heaven, where a couple score of rusting hulks of farm equipment lay in repose. Hope someone got a picture.
We stopped at Shatley Springs for lunch and I panicked briefly when I saw a lot of old folks on the front porch, with a tour bus in the parking lot. Fortunately they had all just finished eating and were on their way to tour the cheese factory in nearby Jefferson, so we were seated after about a 10-15 minute wait. Of course it took about that long for a waitress to acknowledge our presence AFTER we were seated, but it may have been worth our wait. Our server, Leticia, was a joy and almost made us forget the slow service and mixed up orders (by the kitchen... no complaint with darling Leticia). Another Mayberry tradition is that Larry falls in love with at least one waitress during the trip and Leticia fit that bill nicely!
Without Bumpy here, Snowman and I decided it needed to be SOMEONE's birthday and since RB had missed last year, we picked him. We tried to tell Leticia that it was "that tall guy in the red shirt's" birthday but somehow she mistook Big Dee's orange shirt for red and he wound up with the birthday treat!
After lunch, it was home by way of Parkway with a few showers encountered. At our last stop, Red Baron got his rain gear on, so naturally we never encountered another drop. We got back later than planned and no one was hungry so we called the steakhouse and pushed our reservation back. As we were cleaning up, most of us were watching the six o'clock news showing a line of nasty thunderstorms headed our way, so we wisely parked the bikes and took cages to dinner.
At dinner, Daniel convinced the waitress to serve him root beer in one of their 22 oz frosted beer mugs, He polished off a couple of them --someone estimated 50 oz of root beer altogether but that included the ice -- and the nickname "root beer" was proposed.
We decided it would be Aunt Dee's birthday this night so she got the ice cream treat although it got passed around for everyone to sample.
Saturday is the day locals joins us. Daryl's son Kyle made it, and some VROC folks from a couple hours away. About 12 bikes pulled out from Howard's store, headed for the Parkway via Squirrel Spur (RB video'd his whole ride up so look forward to that). One of the locals, Buzz Gee, had told me that he was going to peel off about an hour or so into the ride and I THOUGHT we had let Howard know since he was tail gunner. Ooops. When Buzz pulled off at Meadows of Dan, Howard did his tail gunner duty while I just kept truckin up the parkway. We were spread out close to a half mile from first bike to last, so with the curves on the Parkway, I rarely saw the last bikes behind me and didn't know Howard wasn't back there anymore. Gradually, other bikes broke off as they noticed the bike behind them stop or slow and finally after about 4 miles (not 12 as Larry claimed) we hit a straight enough stretch that I could see I only had 5 or 6 bikes behind me! Howard had never caught Buzz, but since Buzz hadn't stopped at the gas station or side of the road, he figured Buzz was okay and so rejoined us, gathering in the others who had fallen out. Snowman pointed out that a 'ride leader' really should let the tailgunner know when someone is planning to drop out. D'OH!
:doh:
Made it to to Tuggles Gap for lunch (same place as last year). I was surpised to see about half the number of bikes in the parking lot as I had ever seen on a weekend. Even on the Parkway, we were seeing a tiny fraction of the number of bikes I woudl normally expect on a good weather weekend. I presume gas prices have cut into recreational riding, although there were a few big charity rides in the area that day (over 120 bikes left Mt Airy for the Miracle Children's Network ride). After lunch, nice easy -- and largely uneventful -- ride up and down the parkway. I did have deer jump across the road ahead of me twice. Not close enough to really worry me, but in all my time riding on the BRP, I've never seen deer cross the road twice in the same ride. One of the local guys (Cal fron Salisbury) had one of those deer whistles on his bike and I'm wondering if that made deer that otherwise would have been passed unnoticed in the trees as we rode by, dart across the road to get away from the sound. Dunno.
Made it home with about 160 miles under our tires for the day. Daniel rode with me (he skipped Friday's ride) and commented that not only could he now claim his first 100+ mile ride, but his first numb butt!
Dinner was hamburgers and hot dogs at the Villa Dago. A very pleasant surprise when Billy and Carolyn pulled up. They had decided to ride up the Parkway (with Billy's two brothers) and join us. Got to meet Daryl's bride of 40 years also, a lovely lady far better than Big Dee deserves <G>. Apparently the brick wall around my driveway is enchanted because everyone who was sitting there instead of a lawn chiar in the driveway, won a door prize. I think Schmoof may have been the only one NOT sitting on the wall to win. Before the last ticket was drawn, Aunt Dee (who was holding Daniel's tickets) moved from her chair to sit on the wall, and sure enough -- Daniel's ticket was drawn.
We raised $66 for the Shoals Handicap Summer Camp, and Daniel decided to add $34 from his winnings so we could make it an even $100.
Billy's brother Greg also plays guitar, so we had our singalong late into the night. Papa Schmoof brought the lyrics to 'Battle of New Orleans' but we still couldn't get it right (though we all know one verse real well so we just kept repeating that one!).
Getaway breakfast the next morning and most everyone was on the road by 9. Hoping to hear safe arrival reports soon. The Schmoofs and Jason are heading through some weather it looks like. Everyone else trailered.
Ok, there's a few highlights. I know others will fill this in with their accounts. Start planning for next year, last wekend in June (25-28). The motel has really deteriorated so HQ will be Dr. Flippen's B&B <www.drflippins.com> -- Howard will get us a rate that will make it about the same as the motel -- but they only have six rooms, so reserve early.
Pics to follow.
Fourth Mayberry Madness in the books. Great time and a few more tales to add the VN750 group lore.
Didn't hear from anyone Thursday morning so rode up to the motel about 1030 to see if anyone had arrived. My son Daniel (10yo) rode with me. The Schmoofs had gotten in the night before and Larry had arrived that morning. After some greetings (and lunch for me and Dan) we suited up for a little early riding. It was already mid-80s and humid so rather than my usual Thursday rides around here, I gladly took Papa Schmoof's suggestion to head for the parkway and the cooler temps. About 10 miles out my cell phone rang and when I got the chance to pull over, had a message from Big Dee (not to be confused with SWMBO, 'Aunt Dee'). He had just missed us in Pilot but Howard had told him we were headed to the Parkway. Called back and left him a message to meet us at a certain outlook and we were on our way again. It was a good 10º cooler up the big hill and we had the road just about to ourselves. We stopped at the designated outlook (right across from the alpaca ranch) and Big Dee caught up to us about 15 minutes later.
We headed on down the BRP and then down through Low Gap back towards Pilot. Since the others had not had lunch, we stopped at a diner along the way. I just had a piece of pie but Daniel talked me into letting him get this big Brownie Blast concoction with 3 scoops of ice cream, whip cream, etc. He finished maybe half of it then asked if we could get a to-go box to take the rest of it with us!
Now that Daniel is riding more with me, we figured it's time he got a road name. He had a few suggestions, but I tried to explain to him that nics are usually earned, not always requested. Youngblood, Doofus, and Fidget were early suggestions (he only 'approved' of the first.
Back to the hotel (through a few raindrops), with the notion of picking up any other arrivals, but no one else was here yet, so we skipped an afternoon ride and chilled til dinner. Daniel pointed out a few firsts for him: first ride on highway, first ride on the Parkway, and first ride in the rain (although I'm not sure the few sprinkles we encountered qualifies him for Wet Butt yet) By dinner time, everyone (Red Baron and his friend Becky, Wally & Carol) except Hacker had arrived. After dinner, twilight ride up to the top of Pilot Mountain. No deer this time, at least that we could see. Poor Jason got in late that night, hitting rain the last 25 miles or so.
Friday morning's plan was for me to leave about 9 with a group wanting to ride some twisties, then Howard would leave a half hour later with the rest of the group and we'd meet at lunch. When I pulled in the lot, folks were gathered around Wally's bike. As we were coming back from the mountain the night before, his bike would not idle and had cut out on him at the stoplight. We discovered he was getting no spark (or barely any spark) on the left front plug. A quick call to my Trusted Local Wrench, who said eliminate the easy things first -- replace the plug. So we trotted across to the Advance Auto across the street for a replacement. Still no joy. So we moved on to the plug wire. As Wally started across the street to see if Advance had anything we could use, Hacker had the good thought to pull the coil also and have it checked out too. No luck on the plug wire and at first the counter person said they couldn't check the coil for us. Fortunately another clerk was there who saved us from buying a new voltmeter by pulling one out of their tool box. The primary leads were reading about .24-.25 resistance which we at first thought was probably okay. When we walked back across the street, Larry had his Clymers out and the specs said we should be getting .18-.22 so the coil was becoming more suspect. The guy at Advance pointed us to a local auto repair place where the mechanic was a good old boy who also worked on bikes. Dean did have a meter that confirmed the plug wire was good (no resistance) so we focused on the coil.
Wally and I ran to my house to pull up kawasaki.com and look for local dealers. He was willing to drive to Charlotte even to get a coil and salvage some riding out of the weekend. Fortunately we had trailered in, so getting home was not a problem, he just didn't want to have to do it 2 days early! Every dealer we called said they could certainly order it, but not surprisingly no one had it in stock. Wally even tried to find out where the distribution center was so he could go there (or call a dealer close enough to get it same day), but no luck. As I posted before, that's when I thought of Dianna and left the voice mail for her.
Not to be defeated, Wally decided to reassemble everything and see if he couldn't make do on 3 plugs. "Miraculously", once it was back together, it seemed to run fine without the least hesitation. Red Baron had noticed one of the leads seemed a little loose when he took the coil off and some folks attributed the problem to that. I choose to believe in the power of Dianna and that she chased off the electrical gremlins all the way from Arkansas.
So we hit the road in one group, about an hour behind 'schedule' (not that the schedule meant much to any of us). Fifty miles to our first stop, WHERE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING HAPPENED, despite what some others may post. You may read a vicious rumor that when we were leaving the gas station, someone's bike stalled -- right when the back tire was in the parking lot, the front tire on the street, straddling the gutter -- and over the bike went. All I can say is I didn't see that happen so I can neither confirm nor deny it.
Nice ride through the high country - -a few mild twists, a lot of big sweepers, great scenery. If you've seen that commercial where the guy brings his car to Subaru Heaven, I think we found John Deere Heaven, where a couple score of rusting hulks of farm equipment lay in repose. Hope someone got a picture.
We stopped at Shatley Springs for lunch and I panicked briefly when I saw a lot of old folks on the front porch, with a tour bus in the parking lot. Fortunately they had all just finished eating and were on their way to tour the cheese factory in nearby Jefferson, so we were seated after about a 10-15 minute wait. Of course it took about that long for a waitress to acknowledge our presence AFTER we were seated, but it may have been worth our wait. Our server, Leticia, was a joy and almost made us forget the slow service and mixed up orders (by the kitchen... no complaint with darling Leticia). Another Mayberry tradition is that Larry falls in love with at least one waitress during the trip and Leticia fit that bill nicely!
Without Bumpy here, Snowman and I decided it needed to be SOMEONE's birthday and since RB had missed last year, we picked him. We tried to tell Leticia that it was "that tall guy in the red shirt's" birthday but somehow she mistook Big Dee's orange shirt for red and he wound up with the birthday treat!
After lunch, it was home by way of Parkway with a few showers encountered. At our last stop, Red Baron got his rain gear on, so naturally we never encountered another drop. We got back later than planned and no one was hungry so we called the steakhouse and pushed our reservation back. As we were cleaning up, most of us were watching the six o'clock news showing a line of nasty thunderstorms headed our way, so we wisely parked the bikes and took cages to dinner.
At dinner, Daniel convinced the waitress to serve him root beer in one of their 22 oz frosted beer mugs, He polished off a couple of them --someone estimated 50 oz of root beer altogether but that included the ice -- and the nickname "root beer" was proposed.
We decided it would be Aunt Dee's birthday this night so she got the ice cream treat although it got passed around for everyone to sample.
Saturday is the day locals joins us. Daryl's son Kyle made it, and some VROC folks from a couple hours away. About 12 bikes pulled out from Howard's store, headed for the Parkway via Squirrel Spur (RB video'd his whole ride up so look forward to that). One of the locals, Buzz Gee, had told me that he was going to peel off about an hour or so into the ride and I THOUGHT we had let Howard know since he was tail gunner. Ooops. When Buzz pulled off at Meadows of Dan, Howard did his tail gunner duty while I just kept truckin up the parkway. We were spread out close to a half mile from first bike to last, so with the curves on the Parkway, I rarely saw the last bikes behind me and didn't know Howard wasn't back there anymore. Gradually, other bikes broke off as they noticed the bike behind them stop or slow and finally after about 4 miles (not 12 as Larry claimed) we hit a straight enough stretch that I could see I only had 5 or 6 bikes behind me! Howard had never caught Buzz, but since Buzz hadn't stopped at the gas station or side of the road, he figured Buzz was okay and so rejoined us, gathering in the others who had fallen out. Snowman pointed out that a 'ride leader' really should let the tailgunner know when someone is planning to drop out. D'OH!
:doh:
Made it to to Tuggles Gap for lunch (same place as last year). I was surpised to see about half the number of bikes in the parking lot as I had ever seen on a weekend. Even on the Parkway, we were seeing a tiny fraction of the number of bikes I woudl normally expect on a good weather weekend. I presume gas prices have cut into recreational riding, although there were a few big charity rides in the area that day (over 120 bikes left Mt Airy for the Miracle Children's Network ride). After lunch, nice easy -- and largely uneventful -- ride up and down the parkway. I did have deer jump across the road ahead of me twice. Not close enough to really worry me, but in all my time riding on the BRP, I've never seen deer cross the road twice in the same ride. One of the local guys (Cal fron Salisbury) had one of those deer whistles on his bike and I'm wondering if that made deer that otherwise would have been passed unnoticed in the trees as we rode by, dart across the road to get away from the sound. Dunno.
Made it home with about 160 miles under our tires for the day. Daniel rode with me (he skipped Friday's ride) and commented that not only could he now claim his first 100+ mile ride, but his first numb butt!
Dinner was hamburgers and hot dogs at the Villa Dago. A very pleasant surprise when Billy and Carolyn pulled up. They had decided to ride up the Parkway (with Billy's two brothers) and join us. Got to meet Daryl's bride of 40 years also, a lovely lady far better than Big Dee deserves <G>. Apparently the brick wall around my driveway is enchanted because everyone who was sitting there instead of a lawn chiar in the driveway, won a door prize. I think Schmoof may have been the only one NOT sitting on the wall to win. Before the last ticket was drawn, Aunt Dee (who was holding Daniel's tickets) moved from her chair to sit on the wall, and sure enough -- Daniel's ticket was drawn.
We raised $66 for the Shoals Handicap Summer Camp, and Daniel decided to add $34 from his winnings so we could make it an even $100.
Billy's brother Greg also plays guitar, so we had our singalong late into the night. Papa Schmoof brought the lyrics to 'Battle of New Orleans' but we still couldn't get it right (though we all know one verse real well so we just kept repeating that one!).
Getaway breakfast the next morning and most everyone was on the road by 9. Hoping to hear safe arrival reports soon. The Schmoofs and Jason are heading through some weather it looks like. Everyone else trailered.
Ok, there's a few highlights. I know others will fill this in with their accounts. Start planning for next year, last wekend in June (25-28). The motel has really deteriorated so HQ will be Dr. Flippen's B&B <www.drflippins.com> -- Howard will get us a rate that will make it about the same as the motel -- but they only have six rooms, so reserve early.
Pics to follow.