Coop's Corner: Hiawatha BMW Rally

Sunday, June 5, 2016

Hiawatha BMW Rally - 2016

The weekend's forecast was dismal, poor enough in fact that we were quite certain that kept some of our expected attendees away. Remaining optimistic I was relying on the predicted thunderstorms being at least as much off as on rather than setting in and lasting for multiple hours. As it turned out, our rain Friday started late afternoon and went on through the night, stopping by morning. Saturday afternoon the rain returned for a few showers, then the clearing began before sunset. It was good overall and we got lucky.

Friday I met Dave, Tim and Doug in Rollingstone once again for breakfast.

Back at Money Creek Haven Campground, we were there around 11AM.

Erik arrived and got setup, Rod, Mike joined Dave, Tim and me to head down to New Albin. I wanted to stop again at the City Market for more jerky. We all went inside, found our choice of items for a park lunch across the tracks.

Perfect timing found me waiting at the tracks to get to the town park just on the other side.

We took a different route back....Brownsville, back way into Hokah, across the Root River, west on Co. 21, up the fantastic Tschumper Rd to Co. 25. As we headed west to reconnect with Co.21, the skies to the west and north were getting very dark. We got back to Houston, made a quick stop for refreshments and then werent back to the campground for soup and the cut-up jerky that we'd been snacking on in the afternoon.

I had decided that if conditions weren't dusty on Saturday morning, I'd do the GS Ride and with the steady rain overnight, dust was going to be a non-issue this time.

Mike caught me getting in the queue.....lining up with the rest of the GS group.

At 8:50 we received the Blessing of the Ride by our Lay Pastor and not long after 9, we were on the road.

Down Drake Road and on to Deer Road, Curt, our leader stopped the group to give us a choice. The section ahead on Deer was going to be potentially more mud than gravel and that those of us not wanting to chance it could go back and loop out to Co. 23 to meet up again. It was then the GS800's electrical gremlins popped up.

Some of us decided to proceed and actually with the sun and wind, the road wasn't too bad (it was worse the last time I was there on TranZalp).

Soon back to Lanesboro where the Rhubarb Festival was in full swing. Erik and I decided to forgo the event and got something to eat upstairs at Pedal Pushers. After lunch, the guys caught up to us on Deep River and we were once again a group working our way east to Money Creek Haven. Curt led us on a grand ride and I think there was only one of the roads that was new to me....New Discovery always a win in my book.

Lazing around the grounds, the skies grew darker as we passed the time until our pulled pork dinner and program.

The chow line formed in a matter of seconds......

Attendance we reported to be 284, not too bad considering the weather threat that had been announced the previous week.

Sunday morning, I was headed home earlier than usual to meet the family for my brother's birthday gathering. Stopped for gas and a breakfast croissant in Rushford.

The Roads Taken... (had signal trouble between Lanesboro and Rushford)

6 comments:

RichardMJune 6, 2016 at 11:38 AM
Of course you mentioned to your riding buddy with the GS sidecar rig that a Ural has reverse...

I'm amazed that you are able to fit all of your camping gear in that small bag in front of the top box. Or, at least, it looks like a small bag. Maybe the scooter is huge.
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SonjaMJune 6, 2016 at 1:22 PM
Amazing how you (and your scooter) seem to manage the gravel road, Coop. And the weather played along for a change it seems.
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TrobairitzJune 6, 2016 at 2:22 PM
Glad the weather was't too bad for you. It looks like another successful rally.
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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)