Coop's Corner: May 2016

Tuesday, May 31, 2016

My / Our Memorial Day

A four day weekend for me, I did my best to not waste it. Only 50 miles or so ridden and those not until Monday morning. Projects and chores done, meals and coffee with friends all made the time off rich and good.

Visiting dad's flag among the so many others up in Oakwood made it even better. I parked here and walked a few of the loops where other family and friends have been laid to rest. Dad was lucky enough to come home and the most I ever remember of his South Pacific stories were the fun parts with his buddies and the typhoon he didn't think he'd survive. I heard enough more about some of his friends that never made it back home.

An Asian bike in front of an American Sailor's headstone. It took awhile but dad came to know and understand things that had to change and that during his rich and full life, did.

The lawn was mowed, some oil changed and in the late evening, a picnic on the bluff. Throughout the year and not always just in season, we take advantage of our next door neighbor, Frontenac State Park by going Sunday (in this case, Monday) evening when, the crowds gone, the park gets very quiet for the week. I started the campfire at 7 and we enjoyed our last s'mores just before 10pm.

Hanna is home from Cleveland for the week and it was paramount that at least one evening was spent overlooking the Mississippi and our State to the east.

Monday, May 23, 2016

GR3 - 2016

I met Dave for breakfast in Rollingstone, MN, our destination the Great River Road Rally (GR3) in Soldier's Grove, Wisconsin. The event is hosted by the Madison BMW Club with a lot of help and involvement by the local Lion's Club in S.G.

Typically my first rally of the season (not counting the Slimey Crud event), the weather can be very "iffy." It wasn't the least bit iffy this year, rather absolutely beautiful, just about too lovely for mid-May in Minnesota. We're far too familiar with Memorial Day weekends that break lovely on Monday afternoon and next weekend may be one of those but this year, this weekend, we were blessed.

I was early so stopped at the Snake Creek Trail Recreation Area to kill a few minutes....

though I wouldn't have needed to. Dave and Justin were early as well and waiting for me in Rollingstone. Breakfast at Bonnie Rae's.

I followed the purple line on my pre-planned Route and we were in Soldier's Grove around 11AM. Dave set up under the Big Tree where Dan (and Jill) were already comfortably established.

Eric arrived shortly thereafter and we setup near my normal spot by the tennis court.

I was playing with my Bluetooth connection on the Contour camera.....

Grounds still quiet Friday noon....

Lion's supplied firewood, always reliably supplied.

Dave, Eric and I headed out for a ride, a loop that would take us down into the far SW corner of the state. Sandy Hollow Road, one of a number of roads we visited that day that are on Chad's Trans Wisconsin Adventure Trail Route.

Dougway Road, here spelled as it should be. Everywhere else in WI the signs are incorrectly labeled "Dugway". I of course highlight this fact at every opportunity.

Along the Dougway...... my helmet cam capture.

Eric's image was better.

We met these guys....and I have to wonder if they're part of the filming project that Chad and Melanie mentioned when they stopped by Friday evening to say hello at the rally.

A lunch stop in Glenhaven.......

Onward to the south on another T.W.A.T. road.....

I only aim for the shallow ones.

You just don't see speed bumps on many gravel roads.....but we know where there are a couple of them.

This one.....

went pretty easy for Eric and I but then the ruts got deep enough that our sidecar partner Dave had to be a bit more deliberate in picking his line. This doesn't do the ruts' depth justice.

I've had to wait for all sorts of machinery, road and farm but don't ever recall being stopped by a cement mixer. He was slowly working his way backwards to make it easier to fill the front end of the slab, ever narrowing our escape path.

I looked back to assure Dave that he could sneak past but he wasn't buying it.

In just a minute the truck moved forward to start another section and we were able to pass. One last stop to stretch our legs before ending up back at the Lion's Park in Soldier's Grove.

Registration tent just a few minutes before wrapping things up for the evening.

Saturday morning I walked through the crowd (coffee in hand). This gentleman's handiwork has been featured here before, his other bike was a red Guzzi with like fairing, tank pod, rear rack and bags. ALL very nicely done!

Since my phone gets service in the valley, Dave sometimes calls home to his Sweetie Pie via 4s and Verizon. Bernie (unknown political affiliation) and Eric are discussing something, very likely TW200's. Last time I spent conversing at any length with Bernie was down in MO at the Falling Leaf Rally. He's a new TW200 owner and this weekend was about as excited as an old motorcyclist can be about his new machine (who can blame him??).

Eric and I headed out for another mix of gravel and narrow paved roads, the Route planned to be another ~160 mile loop as Friday's had been. It was a full day of buggy and horse sightings....lots of Amish farming underway.

Not all the farms are Amish however.....

Eric hadn't been to the tunnel before so that was a planned stop.

The Back Way into Camp Douglas; we had stopped for a break just before these photos were taken. The guy in the truck asked "which way you goin' down....not into Camp Douglas I hope?" I asked him if conditions had changed since the last time I'd been down the road and it was only then that he noticed we weren't on Road Bikes.

"Oh, you guys will be fine.....big rocks though." Once down I didn't complain nor did Eric.

With glowing recommendations we stopped in Hustler at the Fountain Chateau B&B for lunch and were treated and fed far better than we deserved. We were asked, "Is cook's choice alright?"

It most certainly was.

Eric was quite sure that Cindy would enjoy it and I'm quite sure that Peg would as well.

A rest stop 'up top'...........

Not sure how it happened.....somehow the "Goose Barn" just happened to be along the bold purple line that I was following on the GPS.

A sort of Selfie......

Back at the rally site....this machine full of power consuming accessories.

Saturday evening was absolutely picture perfect. Awards were handed out, we were fed and I bought a couple of beers to support the local Lions organization. Campfires and discussion.....around some fires, LOTS of discussion.

Sunday morning I was up early, those evening beers were demanding my early attention and rather than climb back in that nice, warm and very cozy sleeping bag I got up and got some exercise.

4:53 AM

5:34 AM, only a faint wisp of moon.

The berm that keeps this too-many-times-flooded city dry(er), the mighty Kickapoo just to the left.

Eric's bike got stubborn Sunday morning as were getting ready to depart. He and I had covers off and battery exposed numerous times with intermittent results. Finally we got the necessary accumulation of expertise, advise and most importantly, John's gracious help with jumper cables. The 800 fired right off and a mid-day text informed me that Eric was home.

If you ever are going to have trouble with a motorcycle, these guys would serve you well.

Eric left for home, I joined two Daves and a Dan for breakfast, half of us headed SE for home and half of us headed NW after we topped off our coffee and calorie intake.

621 miles on the KLR for the weekend and I've grown quite fond of the bike though a minor change is going to be made for its next rally outing. The medium MotoFizz bag on top of the all ready too tall bike just isn't going to pass muster any longer. So far (knock on wood) I've been able to bend my right knee tight enough on all of the other machines to get my leg over the seat and in front of the attached bag. This weekend I had an additional 2 inches of jacket liner strapped on and I simply ran out of leg length to get over this bike's sky scraping height. So, on the Kawasaki it looks like a combination of the Dirt Bagzz and H2W bags rather than the blocky Fizz.

It was great fun, weather was out of this world for May. In 2 weeks the yellow machine will be at the Minnesota Hiawatha Rally and of course another report will follow.

Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)