Fall Road Trip Day 5

    The music of the day was actually pretty random.  I have no idea what the Garmin is up to now.  I think it is trying to lull me into a false sense of security, then play the same song over and over for the next 6 hours. 

    Today's ride was a little bit of a grind.  I really haven't had a burn day yet, and I have a long one tomorrow also.  I am most likely going to Denton, and then on Thursday go to Ft Worth.  That will be as good as a burn day.  Then I will be heading for Hamilton, TX for Roll the Bones III.  I actually get so sit in a sidecar and just hold on.

    The day started off in a little town called Cordova, TN.  After talking to the desk clerk, I decided to get up at 6 and be rolling by 7 to beat the traffic.  That also put me out early enough to stop by the Starbucks south of town to get coffee.  While I was sitting there, I spoke to a very nice police officer, who told me that if I waited until about 8:30 or so, the traffic would die off, and I would be less likely of seeing deer.  Then he added that there had been close to 300 deer/vehicle collisions in October so far.  That pretty much convinced me to stay until 8:30.  I was pleasantly surprised that traffic was fairly light, all things considered, and it only took me about an hour and a half to get to the Mississippi River.

    This brings me to something interesting that I have discovered.  After crossing that river 3 times in 2 days, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that it was the scariest thing I have ever done on a motorcycle.  I know that you need to stay loose on the bars, and let the bike roll straight.  I know that you just have to stay loose and don't fight the wind. I also know that my entire body was relaxed....except for my toes....they had a death grip on the pegs, through my boots.  I also learned that if I look at the relation of the middle section of the handle bars to the part of my visor that meets the chin bar, I can gauge how heavy the cross wind is.  Shortly after that, I stopped looking at that......

    After my trip through Suburbia, TN today, I figured out how to spot vehicles that are just dangerous.  The more of those stupid stick figure kids on the back, the more room they need.  The more of the sport or cheerleading kid stickers, the more aggressive they tend to be.  On the whole, I am going to be glad to spend tomorrow on pretty deserted back roads all the way to Denton.  I plan on doing the Talimena Skyway, and shooting video.  Then I am just going to burn it all the way back to Denton.

Here is today's route:


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Have fun

Dave

Fall Road Trip Day 4

    Well, it seems like this road trip is a journey through my playlist also.  My garmin is on crack and it tends to play groups of songs over and over on shuffle.  It is still starting out with Crystal Method....same damn song.  Today was a journey through Frank Zappa, Neil Diamond, Queen Annes Lace, and Lady Gaga.  First let me say that when corrupted by road noise the song sounds like "Donna Noble, Patch in....Patch in."  Now I will have to Netflix Dr. Who tonight to reset my brain.  Frank Zappa while riding is just odd....The strange noises that he tends to use are very disturbing on motorcycles.  Lady Gaga.....where do I start?  When "Bad Romance" came on, I noticed that people were giving me lots of room and staring.....a whole lot.  Lesson learned, no dancing on the bike at 80mph......just say no....

    This has turned out to be a good scouting run.  I have found lots of places that I really want to bring everyone back to.  It is just freakin gorgeous up here.  I am finding it to be a bit lonely though.  it is a very stark reminder of just how Austin is.  I have run across no Friends of Dorothy.  I saw a few, but they would not make eye contact.  No stickers on cars, nothing. 

    I got a lot more thinking done today.  I still have no idea what I thought about, but I feel better, calmer, and lighter.  That means the trip is working.  There were a lot of wrong turns today, I mean a whole lot.  I only did 260 or so "map" miles, but there were a good 40 or so of wrong turns.  Pretty much all there was to do was to let go of it and roll.  I knew where the interstate was, and that it would take me to the hotel.  It was really a matter of not getting to go a couple places because I missed the turns and there was no clean way to get back.  I found some other real interesting places though.  There is no way to really get a picture of them, but there are two steel bridges, one across the Mississippi river, and then you take a right and you go across the Ohio river.  The spans are just over 1.9 lanes wide, and about 3/4 mile long each.  It was pretty awesome riding up and back down those big steel cages.  This brought me around to the idea that people would be happier if they could grasp the idea that there are no "Wrong Turns", just the other way of getting there.....sometimes with better scenery.

    Rumor has it that Memphis has a Starbucks.  I don't really care if I get coffee, I just want to speak to someone who is moderately intelligent, and not a backwoods conservative for about 5 min.....I will evwn buy a coffee as the price of admission.


I promised some video, here it is, but before the whiners start complaining that I crossed the double yellow, the camera is hanging off the left side of my tank.

Here goes:








And here is my route for the day:



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Enjoy,

Dave

Fall Road Trip Day 3

    The thought for the day is ABBA.  It just so happened that "Fernando" started playing right when I turned onto AR SH87.  It must have looked pretty funny from the outside watching me trying to hang onto the bike in those curves while dancing in my seat.  I actually had the entire road to myself due to some really interesting planning.  When you are riding in a state with a 100 to 1 church to school ratio, the best time to ride is Sunday morning between 8am and noon.

    The playlist pretty much dominated my thoughts today.  The music selection with the garmin on shuffle is only a bit annoying.  What I realized is that it resets every time you turn the garmin off.  It also starts every time on the same song.  I do like Crystal Method, but I got sick of hearing the same song every time I start the bike. I managed to cycle through my entire list of Queen, Abba, and Garth Brooks.  It was actually kind of creepy.

    I think the best thing about the ride today was that there was really no profound thoughts.  There is actually kind of a point of Zen where your brain does not retain much.  It basically processes information and then moves on.  It is really kind of interesting, I pretty much solved all of the problems in the world but I don't remember the answers. 

    Tomorrow night, I will be uploading the first couple videos, depending on the speed of the wifi at the next hotel.

Here is the route so far:



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Have fun

Dave

Fall Road Trip Day 1-2

     After a year of big project, busy weekends, and just way too much stuff to do...the ride begins.  Getting out of Austin was a nightmare.  Between Austin and Denton I actually saw 4 wrecks.  That was 4 times where the traffic on I35 came to a halt.  I35 was a solid parking lot all the way from Waco to Hillsboro.  After talking to another rider at the Starbucks, I decided to go over to FM 933 and then TX 22 back over to 35 after Hillsboro.  At that point it was run like hell to Frisco.

    Next came the trek north.  I have pretty much decided that this is going to be a brain burner.  Basically I just want to see how far I can go.  The plan is to ride until I am done, or it is dark, every day.  Since I ended up having brunch with friends today, it was short.  I made it to Muskogee, OK.  The plan for tomorrow is to hit the trail of tears and then going NE.  Don't know how far yet, but I do plan on shooting some video.

Enjoy

Dave