June
Had a great weekend here, it was extra-long – I had taken three days off from work with my DD going away to
summer camp on Sunday, and told the DH: we are goin’ ridin’!! Friday night we all went down to a “bike night”
in a small-town just south of here; we rode with our friends Garry and Shirley… well over 700 bikes “on the
square” in Indianola!! Beautiful evening, great ride both directions. On Monday with Stef at camp we set out
to ride from Des Moines to approximately Unionville, MO – actually a tiny town called Livonia – where Steve’s
folks live. It is a lovely ride mostly down Highway 5, and we know it well because we’ve done it so many times
in the cage. So the landmarks seem to fly by pretty quickly – it’s about 100 miles door-to-door, but we had to
gas up and also took a lunch break along the way so it took us about 3 hours to do what’s normally a 2-hour
car trip. It was a nice ride down, but we were hot and tired when we got there; we visited a bit with the
folks and they encouraged us to take a short nap, which we did, so we felt a whole lot better after that!
My MIL gave me the garden tour of their little converted one-room schoolhouse home, then they took us for a
late-afternoon snack up the road at an antique-and-general-store place. After that we headed home and rode
it straight through – just as we pulled off the interstate, with about 3 miles to go to home, the wind
picked up and the temp dropped about 15 degrees. It was gonna rain, and raid HARD!! We pushed through to
home with nary a drop, BUT with 40- and 50-mph wind gusts!! Boy my poor little Sporty was drifting all
over the road – even Steve said his Heritage Softail was getting whipped around!! Made it home in the
nick of time.
Tuesday was a bust for riding because Steve wanted me to go to the auto auction with him (he’s a car dealer),
so we did that – it was an eye-opener, that’s for sure, but man is it tiring! (Who’d think that standing on
concrete for four hours, with FIVE auctioneers blaring across five lanes of cars rolling through the sale…
would tucker me out! LOL)
On Wednesday I had planned for us to visit either the Wilton Candy Kitchen in Wilton, Iowa (original 1920’s
soda fountain and candy store) or the Boone and Scenic Valley Railroad in Boone, Iowa. We chose Boone
because it’s closer, and Steve was still a little sunburned from Monday. (Everyone at the auction
commented on his WHITE forehead and RED face… we explained to everyone that his do-rag was the cause
of the mid-forehead “split.”) Had a nice but hot ride to Boone about 45 miles north of here… hung
around the Railroad museum and took a ride on the “Fraser Line” – a daily passenger/sight-seeing
excursion that travels along the Des Moines River and goes over a 150-foot-high trestle bridge… it
was beautiful and we decided that we’d have to come back at some point to take Stef on the train,
and then come back yet again to ride the Dinner or Dessert train in the evening. It was an uneventful
and easy ride home.
I was glad for the opportunity to take a couple of “destination” rides (as opposed to the generic
“riding around” I normally do on weekends), and I’m all the more determined now to do some sort of
longer bike trip yet this season… I need saddlebags and a backrest though for sure!
May
Boy, the weather here has been strange! It had really been pretty chilly up til the last couple of weeks;
we had a late-season frost/freeze in mid-May and because it had been damp and cold prior to that, I am way
behind on my garden for the year. Trying to balance gardening with riding the bike… neither one getting much
attention! It has finally warmed up in the past couple weeks; we went on a large-group memorial ride on May
21; about 400 bikes took a short jaunt across town to the memorial gardens at our state capitol. Very nice
event, perfect weather, no bad luck to report (yay – I’m keeping the shiny side up!)… Very much like the Toy
Run last fall, and a nice memorial program. One of the “visiting dignitaries” was the guy who paints an annual
memorial mural on a large rock situated on one of our Iowa highways, Ray “Bubba” Sorensen. I work for our
Chamber of Commerce so I’d actually researched this a little before, but heard lots of comments from the
bikers that somehow they thought Ray was an older guy – he’s actually a young adult just out of college.
Here’s his website and a preview of the rock: http://bubbazartwork.com/.
Took another nice ride on Memorial Day itself – the DH, DD and I set out with no particular destination in
mind except “lunch,” and we ended up in the town of Boone about 50 miles from here. Took a scenic way up,
had lunch there, and took a scenic route home through a lovely state park called The Ledges. Whoever said
Iowa is flat hasn’t seen this place (
http://www.iowadnr.com/parks/state_park_list/ledges.html)!
April
Been buzzing around a little, mostly down to visit Garry and Shirley… Garry’s been converting his HD Night
Train into a Heritage Softail, and he’s building a Yamaha chopper; and, Shirley is learning to ride and just
bought a used Yamaha 250 Virago – it’s a great-looking bike and lightweight; she hasn’t ridden her own for
maybe 40 years, so she’s starting from scratch to learn to ride. Another short hop is over to Porky’s BBQ
for Thursday “bike night” and Saturday or Sunday morning breakfast. No big adventures on the bike yet this
year, although I did have a flat tire in the garage the other day (grrr - $$)… I think we need to plan a day-
or weekend-trip. As far as mods, I tried an easy-clutch-type product and it didn't fit very well on my bike,
have decided I don't need it anyway as I've gotten used to the clutch tension already. Buckhorn bars arrived and
got installed a few weeks ago - they are AWESOME! This was an HD kit that came with the cables and all...
changed the look of the bike and boy do they fit me a lot better!
March 26-27
Took another ten miler Saturday, very short but still pretty cold - only 45 degrees!! Much better on Sunday - in
the 50's, we rode back to our friends' place just south of here (Carlisle, Iowa) to show off the Sporty and to do a
"hole saw mod" on its exhaust. It's good and loud now, for 3 minutes' work and NO cost! WOOHOO, my first mod! Need some
riding position adjustment as my windshield is cutting my line of sight in half... Clutch cable was lubed so it's easier
to pull in now, but still needs an EZ-Clutch as it's really hard to hold it in at stoplights. Buckhorn bars have been
ordered - more mods to come!
March 19-20
First rides on the Sportster! Parking lot practice on Saturday (temps in low 40's, only out half an hour)... and
a short road ride on Sunday (temps in high 40's - only about 10 miles' worth). Awesome bike, DAMN it's neat to
be a chick on a bike!
March 6 - First Ride of 2005!
What a gift of a day! FINALLY able to ride, we took a ride down to visit friends about 10 miles south... minor incident for Steve trying to get on the
interstate (see "Assholes" article on homepage).
We had lunch at a little diner called the Windmill Cafe, then back on the bikes and travelled the short
way down to Lake Red Rock and Knoxville. While en route we passed Cordova State Park, home to the tallest
observation tower in the Midwest. This thing is an interesting structure: it used to be a water tower
serving the state parks in the area, but when they all hooked up to the rural water system the tower
was no longer needed. In 1995 they decommissioned it, and in 1998 they built a spiral stairway around
the outside of it and an observation deck at the top. The deck is 106 feet, and 170 steps, off the ground.
Stef and I decided to make the climb - she's afraid of heights and I'm not in the best physical shape for
this sort of thing (two days later and my thighs are still burning!), but we both made it and discovered
that the view of the surrounding Des Moines River Valley is breathtaking. On this clear day you could see
several miles in every direction, and we spent about 20 minutes enjoying the vista. 