Coop's Corner: Slimey Crud Run Weekend

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

Slimey Crud Run Weekend - May 2019

It was another great one, starting at 5:00AM for me. Cool and foggy, wonderful weather to follow for the day.

Eric and I had planned to meet for breakfast in Westby and when I warned Steve that as a result we'd be late arriving at the campground, he told me that he and Scott were meeting for the same thing a few short miles away in Viroqua. By 8 the four of us were enjoying breakfast at Borgen's.

Eric left to take a more leisurely route with his rig, Steve and I headed directly to the campground, Scott went on to get checked in at his motel.

Here's a 10 minute video, very representative of what our SCR weekends are like.

Eric brought cheese curds so we had some.....

We ate in the campground Friday evening.....Rod, Pat, Tom and Kevin joined us by evening.

Kevin arrived on the Gen 2 KLR not long after we rode in from our loop, the other 3 guys had arrived earlier in the afternoon.

Tom, ever the one to surprise us, this weekend brought out his binoculars and was identifying birds around the campsite. Early Saturday morning, he'd been out in the forest and here was returning to camp.

Our campsite in 360 degrees....

More than one meal this time at The Center Cafe.

What we do every now and then......

Our first stop, the former site of the Vermont Cheese Factory

The Holum Cheese Factory, now a residence.

Stop number 3, the Ridge Cheese Factory, another current residence.

The crew stopped outside the old Ridge Cheese Factory....just before we went into Verona for lunch.

Our fourth cheese factory, the Malone and two different points in time. This photo was from Street View, recent but not current ......

This view as it appears today, a new home built where the former cheese factory stood.

Another one of our stops, this one before I decided to abandon Tom at our soon-to-be fuel stop ....can anyone blame me??

Coffee Saturday morning...

I could see my GS850 following this example...

Rob's group, always present and have been from the very beginning.

I'll always remember sitting down at the bar one quiet Monday noon with Junior and one of his Sausage and Cheese sandwiches.

Darrell's bike, saw him, didn't get a chance to say hello. Darrell Broten publishes a monthly newsletter, the Midwestern Motorcyclist and does a dandy job of it. Send me an email and I'll return the link.

We've met, we've spoken but I don't remember his name. He rides Italian, that I DO remember.

So, we left Leland promptly at noon and things were going well, a Rustic Road here, some more lovely scenery there. We stopped for gas in Loganville and about a mile west, I heard and felt a bang when forward motion stopped.

There were 3 of us, my brother with his loaded KLR, soon to be bound for Minneapolis. Rodney was on his KLR and soon we two were on his KLR, headed back to camp so that I could grab the van/trailer to pick up my disabled bike. I missed out on 25 miles of Himalayan riding, did an unexpected 25 on a KLR but got an extra 50 in the van.

As it was, I put 518 miles on according to the odometer. My GPS total got (one more thing that was confused) goofed up because I left it on in my pocket while Rod and I pillioned on his Kawasaki.

Now that I'm home and have had a chance to look, I must have been negligent in getting the master link on my new extended length chain riveted properly. By the looks of things, my riveted pins must have worked "small" and allowed the side plate to come off. I'm lucky that the break didn't knock me down or ruin the bike. A new Master Link should see the bike and myself in Soldiers Grove in little over a week.

Our 3 daily loops.

Beautiful weather, a great time and lots of fun with good friends. We did well. Thanks once more to Colleen for putting up with us at Alana Springs and to our team that got along. I've put a video together but won't include it here.....it just may take until June to upload. It will be presented when fully ready.

14 comments:

Scott SeidlMay 8, 2019 at 9:28 PM
Sorry I missed you(and the whole event). Maybe next time.
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TroubadourMay 8, 2019 at 9:55 PM
Looks like a great weekend, I liked the 360º video idea, looking forward to the full video.
And thanks for the reminder to throw a master link in my tool kit. Glad it was the end of the weekend and it didn't lock up your bike.
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redlegsridesMay 9, 2019 at 9:12 AM
Broken/missing master link eh? I carry a couple spare ones just in case, my incredibly limited experience with chains and consensus in the T-Dub forum dictate this. Glad it wasn't something major or that the chain didn't cause damage as it flailed about. I see Ural rigs were represented....did you talk to their owners?
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AnonymousMay 9, 2019 at 4:32 PM
Very nice blog. Heck, I even remembered everything from Friday and Saturday. Thanks, Scott
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VStar LadyMay 10, 2019 at 8:47 PM
May sounds like a good month to motorcycle and camp but in reality it hasn't been that nice. You must have managed the one good day. Glad your bike repairs are minor and that all ended well.
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tgmeyerMay 12, 2019 at 5:44 AM
Coop,

Glad you were breakdown left you without more serious problems. Thanks for you the postings of your rides. I've been leading group rides to the Slimeycrud from the Milwaukee area since 2004. Just have one question. What application are you using to post the map with the thee color routes? Keep up the good work.

Tim
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UnknownAugust 12, 2020 at 1:06 AM
Hey Doug ,,,thanks for sharing. The red Morini I believe belongs to Joe Block from the Chi-town area.

Stay safe ,,,and always carry a spare link :>)

Tim S.
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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)