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We test ride the new Beemer in Bavaria!

Riding ALL of Route 66, Civil War Battlefields and the Blue Ridge Parkway, Fall Colors in Vermont, Chasing Billy The Kid, Riding the Natchez Trace, Heading for the Hoot!

An Autumn Visit To America’s Fields of Honor, And The Blue Ridge Parkway

By Beau Allen Pacheco Photography by the author

“Any understanding of this

nation, has to be based—and I mean really based—on an understanding of the Civil War. I believe that firmly. The revolution did what it did, our involvement in European wars …did what it did. But the Civil War defined us as what we are, and it opened us to being what we became—good and bad things. And it is very necessary if you’re going to understand the American character in the 20th century, to learn about this enormous catastrophe of the mid 19th century. It was the crossroads of our being and it was a helluva crossroads.”

-Shelby Foote speaking in Ken Burns’ production of The Civil War-

I

walked alone on the path to Appomattox court house.

It was here that Ulysses S. Grant rode to meet with Robert E. Lee and talk of ending the terrible war of which both were commanders in chief. It was early evening, and I had been riding hard all day to get here. The Electra Glide resting in the parking lot crackled and spinkled as it cooled off, and my boots crunched on gravel. Road weary and muddy, I was in the same repair as Grant on April 9th, 1865 when he passed this way on his magnificent horse Cincinnati, to meet Lee. I could feel the emotion that must have been brimming in the soldiers who, standing at attention, lined this road on that historic day. But now all was quiet and I was glad nobody was around who might invade the reverence here in my moment. This was turning out to be one of the great all-time rides.

Fortunately, as important as this ride was historically, I was also able to see some of the most beautiful parts of the planet in its autumn glory—the Blue Ridge Parkway and the Shenandoah

Gettysburg

Blue Ridge Parkway

Valley. The scenery here is so stunning that trying to photograph its majesty is futile. You know how that works, no matter how great the photos turns out to be, and no matter how much your friends fawn over them, you know in your heart that you didn’t capture it—not even half of it.

From the time I first saw the Ken Burns’ production of The Civil War on PBS, I was hooked on the history of this defining moment in American history. The tragedy of it, scope of it, the size of it and the importance of it was irresistible. Having been born and raised in the far western states of Colorado and Nevada where local history was about the Pony Express, the Comstock, the Indian wars and the Donner Party, I was amazed to discover such things as the bitterness of the people in Vicksburg, Mississippi who refused to celebrate the 4th of July until 1958. And as a newcomer traveling down South, how can anyone wrap their brain around the devastation of Sherman’s march to the sea?

At the time of its first broadcast in the summer of 1990 I was master of ceremonies for the Rider Rally in upstate New York. I had ridden to the rally from Colorado on an Electra Glide. Every evening after the light parades, I’d rush back to my room and watch the next installment of Burns’ 11 hour classic. I was so taken by The Civil

War that when the rally ended, I decided to see for myself some of the places where it happened.

I took the long way home, riding down the Shenandoah Valley and Blue Ridge all the way to Memphis, then to New Orleans, Houston and back home to Colorado. It was one of the most memorable trips of my life.

But as long and beautiful as that ride was, I didn’t have time to stop and savor as much as I would have liked, and vowed that someday I’d return and immerse myself in some battlefields and other landmarks. A few years later I did some of that when my brother Darrell returned a grizzled veteran from Desert Storm. He and I visited some of the battlefields between his home in North Carolina to Pennsylvania.

But the more I saw, the more I wanted to see, so this trip would include the battlefields between the area of my home in Tennessee and up to Gettysburg.

Now then, I do not claim to be an authority of the Civil War. There are people who have dedicated their lives to the study of single battles like Antietam and over a hundred books per year are published about the war. There are tens of thousands of re-enactors who are intimate with that unpleasantness of the rebellion. I am merely a traveler, an interested person who wants to be there and ride those historical

roads on a motorcycle. So, in this article I’ll try to lay out the best route to cover the most significant battlefields from the Western theatre up to Gettysburg. Also, I’ll attempt an extremely risky thing; suggest how long it will take to see any battlefield of which I speak. To experience any one battlefield could take a lifetime or fifteen minutes depending on your level of curiosity and craving for photography. My suggestions are merely to give you a loose guideline for planning your trip along the most scenic roads.

If done with reverence and care, this is one of those rides that can transcend tourism and be life changing, or at least life affirming.

If you are really interested in American history then I suggest that you do this ride by yourself or with someone who shares your interest in the Civil War because there will be many times on this ride when you’ll crave privacy—could be a cemetery at sunset, sunrise on the blue ridge, a small flag waving in the middle of a battlefield, or the metaphor of a child sitting on a cannon. Whatever it is, I guarantee that there will be moments of reflection that you’ll wish to explore in quiet solitude.

Prepare for those times.

Enjoy.

How To Get There

H

ere are directions to the major battlefields, starting with Ft. Donelson in Western Tennessee.

1. Ft. Donelson I started at Ft. Donelson in Western Tennessee for a couple of reasons; first it’s close to my home in Tennessee, and it was the first big victory by U.S. Grant thus launching his career.

The battleground is on the Cumberland River and the views are spectacular. The national park guides and rangers are extremely knowledgeable as are all the guides with whom I chatted. Tour Time; 2.5 hours.

Next destination: Battle of Franklin,— Franklin, Tennessee, approx. 130 miles.

2. Franklin From Ft. Donelson take 49South13 South-70East-96East.

Battle of Franklin-Visit the bullet riddled Carter House in downtown Franklin. It’s a very good museum, the tour guides are excellent and it gives you an immediate sense of the terrible slaughter of this last major battle of the war.

Tour time; 2 hrs; Visit the Confederate Cemetery, add 1 hrs.

Next destination: Murfreesboro, and the Battle of Stones River— Murfreesboro, TN., approx. 55 miles.

3. Murfreesboro a. From Franklin stay on 96 east all the way to Murfreesboro, and follow the signs to Stones River. i. Battle of Stones River—In percentage, bloodiest battle of the Civil War, and was a turning point for the Union. The video at the Tour Center is highly informative,

and reserve time to walk or drive the circuitous tour routes. b. Tour time—2 hrs; drive the paths and visit monuments—add 1 hrs., Visit Cemetery—add 1 hrs. c. Next Destination: Chattanooga Campaign; Chickamauga, Lookout Man. Missionary Ridge— Chattanooga, TN., approx. 180 miles.

4. Chattanooga a. From Murfreesboro take 231 South ,64 East, 41 Southeast to Chattanooga. i.

Chattanooga Campaign— This is where Grant was finally promoted to Commander of the Union Army. He said of it, ““The Battle of Lookout Mountain is one of the romances of the war. There was no such battle and no action even worthy to be called a battle on Lookout Mountain. It is all poetry.”

The Chattanooga and Chickamauga Nat’l Military Park encompasses most of the battles fought in ‘The Chattanooga Campaign’. These battlefields are spectacular, and be sure to walk to the actual jutting rock at Lookout Mountain and see why they called it “The Battle Above The Clouds.” Tour time— 10 hrs.

Grant, virtually ending the war.

Tour Time—2 hours.

Next Destination: Antietam, near Sharpsburg, Maryland—Approx.

165 miles.

5.

Blue Ridge Parkway a.

From here we’ll head to the Blue Ridge Parkway and use it as verdant causeway on the way to Gettysburg. Many of the pivotal battles of the Civil War are in the Shenandoah Valley , including Fredericksburg, Manassas (Bull Runs), Lynchburg, and many more. There were 14 major battles and 325 military engagements fought here, making this beautiful valley the cradle of the Civil War. Also, Appomattox Court house is in this valley.

Next Destination: Beginning of the Blue Ridge Parkway, Gatlinburg, TN., approx. 154 miles.

From Chattanooga, take I-75 North to Cleveland, TN, 40 East to 411East. Enter the Blue Ridge Parkway at Gatlinburg and head North.

Next destination: Appomattox Courthouse, Appomattox, Virginia.

6. Appomattox From the entrance to the Blue Ridge Parkway, ride North to Virginia 221/460East to Appomattox.

Appomattox—Lee surrenders to

7. Antietam Return to the Blue Ridge Parkway North to Maryland 45. From the Northern portal of the Parkway at Waynesboro, continue North on Skyline Drive all the way up to Front Royal. Then take I-66 West to I-81 North, then to Maryland 45 East to Antietam.

First Civil War battle fought on Northern soil, bloodiest single day battle in American history.

Tour time—5 hours.

Next destination: Gettysburg— Gettysburg, PA., approx. 65 miles.

8.

Gettysburg a. From Antietam take 66 North to 60North to 16East to116East i.

Gettysburg—This is a pivotal event in American History.

Visit everything here. b.

Tour time—15 hours.

Preparations 1. Go buy Ken Burns DVD box set of The Civil War and watch it two or three times. In my opinion, it’s the greatest documentary of all time and easily the best introduction to the history of The Civil War. a. The Civil War—A film by Ken Burns is available from Amazon for $114.99 2. Buy the soundtrack to this film and listen to it as you ride through the Shenandoah and battlefields. You’ll find that the song Ashokan Farewell will haunt you for the rest of your life. a. The Civil War— Traditional American Songs And Instrumental Music Featured In The Film By Ken Burns: Original Soundtrack Recording—various artists. Available from Amazon for $12.97 3. Read any book about the Civil War by Shelby Foote.

Example: a. Stars in Their Courses : The Gettysburg Campaign, JuneJuly 1863 by Shelby Foote; available from Amazon for $13.57.

Riding Every Mile of The Mother Road Getting Our Kicks From Chicago To L.A.

The Harley-Davidson Guided tour of Route 66 The Mother Road

By Beau Allen Pacheco Photography by the author

I

t’s day five of the tour, and we might see tornadoes today. The tropical storm Aaron is making his last moves here, and the sky is jet black in all directions.

We’re in the lobby of the motel in Oklahoma City, watching the TV weathercaster point to his Doppler radar screen showing tornadoes touching down all around us. And there are lots of them.

We’re a little nervous, but a lot excited. Today’s ride will be a tough one and all the men are shaking their heads and acting quite concerned so the ladies will be assured that we’re ever so sensitive to the potential danger of

the situation.

We already rode through a monsoon like rainstorm in Illinois that some among us didn’t think they’d survive. But this is adventure, this is what we came for, to ride the entire length 2400 some miles of Route 66 from Chicago to Santa Monica, California and experience the same things our motoring pioneers felt. If we had wanted to do the easy thing and see the Mother Road in luxury we would have taken a bus with air conditioning and vista dome.

But the seven downunders, five Australians, Two New Zealanders and three Americans on this Harley-Davidson tour are in it for the adventure and it starts now.

The West is still our symbolic crucible. It’s where we Americans have measured ourselves, to find out if we could hack it or not. From Lewis & Clark to the Mountain Men to the cowboys to Teddy Roosevelt to Buzz and

Todd in their Corvette, the West has beckoned men and women to test their mettle against the land, the weather and the road. But until Route 66 was established in 1926, there was no clear route west for the average guy. Not until that happy marriage of manageable roads and dependable cars, could the ol’ man stuff the family and luggage into the Studebaker and head for the Pacific Ocean. But even then, it was a tough go because only 800 of the Route’s 2400 miles were paved.

Through the rest of the roaring 1920’s and ‘30’s, more of U.S. Route 66 was paved. It was a respectable two lane blacktop when the Dust Bowl swept away Okies like tumbleweeds, blowing them to California where the law was waiting at the border with nightsticks, busting the heads of every Tom Joad trying to crash the gate into the Promised Land.

Everybody wanted to be the last one in. The history of preWWII Route 66 is one of relative severity and adversity; that is to say—adventure. After WWII, road construction exploded culminating in the Interstate system that finally devoured the old Route 66 like a kid sucks up spaghetti, and things got easy.

But Route 66 still lives and its history and fabric is attracting foreigners in record numbers.

After all, where else can you go to

truly discover what America is all about? As Michael Wallis said in his excellent book; Route 66 The Mother Road, 75th Anniversary Edition: “It was Steinbeck and Merle Haggard and Dorothy Lange.

It’s thousands of waitresses, service station attendants, fry cooks, truckers, grease monkeys, hustlers, state cops, wrecker drivers, and motel clerks. It’s a station wagon filled with kids wanting to know

America, the America before there were Blue states and Red states, before this was ‘flyover’ country and people were bicoastal. This is where the local semi-pro baseball team battled it out with their rivals in the next town, and everybody showed up. They played 78 rpm records during the 7th inning stretch and drank Pabst Blue Ribbon because they meant it, not because it was retro cool.

how far it is to Disneyland; a wailing ambulance fleeing a wreck on some lonely curve…Truly a road of phantoms and dreams, 66 is the romance of traveling the open highway. It’s the free road.

“The highway has been a mirror

Many of the grand old automobile marques have disappeared, but of all moving machinery that carried dreams East to West, HarleyDavidson motorcycles have remained the constant, the most unchanged. Big thundering V-twins

held up to the nation. Route 66 put Americans in touch with other Americans through its necklace of neon lights, Burma Shave signs, curio shops, motor courts, garages, and diners and cafes…Waitresses with handkerchief corsages pinned on their bosoms...waitresses, like Steinbeck’s Mae, who called everybody ‘honey,’ winked at the kids, and yelled at the cook.” Oh yes, this is where you discover

made in Milwaukee have hauled their riders across the country for the entire 81 year history of Big Mamma Six Six. We’re riding a grand road in a grand tradition.

Clare and Dave Bartlett are from Kings Langley, Australia. Norm and Kathleen Smith are from the same town, and all four of them are on the adventure of a lifetime. They flew to Chicago, rented Harleys and rode straightaway to Sturgis.

Upon their return to Chicago, they joined this tour, and when it ends in California, they’ll continue up to San Francisco, then fly home.

Steve Daniels is from Melbourne, Australia, but he’s living temporarily in New York city. Kit Childs and his new found love Kay Harland are from Fielding, New Zealand. The foreigners on this trip are rolling in American culture like colts in clover; they can’t get enough of it and delight in every discovery.

The other two riders on the

Robinson signed up for the ride for the challenge of it. She tells us that she’s our little rich girl, our pampered Empress and that she’s hoping the ride will test her mettle, and teach her a thing or two about hardship. She’s in the right place.

At the get-together dinner on the first night of the tour, everyone sized up their new riding companions sitting across the table. It was a mature bunch with nobody under 30 years of age, and a few in their late forties and fifties. Well, that would be about

tour are Yankee women riding solo. Dolores Miller, 70, is from Stonington, Illinois and she and her Electra Glide Ultra Classic sidecar rig are the hardest chargers of the bunch. She’s a one woman parade and the center of attention at all motels and gas stops. She says this is her last tour and she wanted to make it a big one.

However, judging by her vigor and speed, she’ll likely be doing this tour ten years from now. Debra

right considering the cost of the tour and that most working folks couldn’t afford to take off 16 days of work for a motorcycle ride. The Aussies were obviously seasoned riders, they had hundreds of Harley pins and patches between them. And Dolores’ jacket was covered with ride patches from all over the country. The only rookie was Debra, but she had the right attitude.

The first day’s ride was from the

Saturday morning TV shows had been showering on us for a century.

The next day’s destination was Amarillo, which was the real introduction into the west. This is what everyone had been waiting for, and it didn’t disappoint. The tour route follows the original Route 66 as much as possible, and 85% of the road still exists, even if it’s covered by the Interstate or frontage roads. From Amarillo

came. After all, the east is from where people were trying to escape. This was the comfortably established, old and conquered part of the country. The West, is where everyone was going to, and Oklahoma was the start of the adventure (Dust Bowl days notwithstanding.) This is the beginning of the wide open spaces and endless skies that all the dime novels, weekend matinees and

then through Pecos and into our night’s destination at Santa Fe. Santa Fe can be a lot of different places depending on what you bring to it. It can be a gorgeous creative enclave in high New Mexico (nearly 7,000 ft. elevation) where the shopping is sublime and you have your choice of some great restaurants. Or it can be an artsy fartsy gathering of unbearable snobs catering to other snotty

platinum cardholders who sold out the town years ago. Take your pick.

The downunders brought innocence and naiveté to Santa Fe so they loved it, and the Yankee women lost themselves in shopping.

Everyone found what they were looking for.

At dinner that night, the Downunders were formally introduced to Mexican food and the jalapeño pepper. Kip from New Zealand ate the peppers like candy, while the other Aussies

“We’ve come to know our riding companions were leery of anything Chicago area to by the color of their jacket and helmet.”

Springfield Illinois hinting of spice. The women and it rained like a were more gastronomically highway flagger’s adventurous than the men, worst nightmare. The next day was we were on I-40 for only a few and enjoyed the meal. to St. Louis which was another miles, then headed Northwest on By this time in the tour, day pleasant but uneventful day of hiway 104. Beautiful, empty wide eight, everyone has bonded with riding. We got into the city early open hiway 104. The five minute each other. There are no cliques, enough to visit the arch and have parallax applies to some of the everyone sits with everybody lunch in the old town section. roads here, where you can sit in else at dinner and we’ve come The next day was more pleasant one place by the road and not see to know our touring companions riding to Oklahoma City. So far, a passing car for five minutes. We by the color of their jackets. We we’ve been riding in the part of rode by the Conchas Dam, Trujillo, know each others’ bikes: Dolores the country from where people and into Las Vegas, New Mexico, has the sidecar, no mistaking that;

Steve is on his own personal Fat Boy that he meticulously cleans every morning; Debra is on her dazzling personal Screamin’ Eagle

The song “Route 66” by Bobby Troupe has been recorded b Rosemary Clooney, Asleep at The Wheel, Al Jarreau, a Road King that she got as an engagement gift from her fiancée; Norm and Kathleen are on their rental Heritage Softail; Kit and Kay are riding a rental Electraglide Classic; and Dave and Clara are on their rented two tone Road King.

We know what each will probably buy at gas stops, Kathleen buys water, the author drinks straight

Coca-Cola Classic and everybody notices it. The author also has large bags of beef jerky in the tour pack of his red Electra Glide Classic.

He offers everyone strips of his meat, but nobody takes him up on it—apparently they don’t eat much jerky downunder.

The portion of Route 66 from Santa Fe to Gallup is mostly two

lane, and we pass through the little bergs that travelers would have seen back in the day. This trip is getting more authentic by the hour which is to say it’s getting hotter and dryer; the women apply lip grease at every stop and the men are shedding their jackets. The old and grizzled author is sounding like the characters in western movies

by artists as diverse as: Nat ‘King’ Cole, The Rolling Stones, and Bing Crosby & The Andrews Sisters, among others. where the weary cowboy is trying to help out the city dudes new to the west.

“If you’re hungry enough, you’ll eat your horse just like the Apache do,” the movie cowboy says slowly, cutting off a piece of jerky with his bowie knife. “Omigod, NO, I’d never turn savage and eat Dancer, my dear little mare,” answers the big city lady. Three days later, the lady is eating Brochettes au-Dancer and glad to have it.

Just like the movie cowboy, the author gives advice about coping with the western heat. “If the heat gets unbearable,” he says, “go to the hose at a gas station and wet yourself down completely. Drench your shirt, pants and boots. Then put your dry jacket on to keep in the moisture as best you can. The water evaporation will cool you off nicely and bring down your core temperature.” But nobody wants to hear it, and they push on into the withering heat. The tour stays overnight at Gallup, then Chinle then Flagstaff and Seligman.

Seligman, Arizona is one of the treasures of modern day Route 66, mainly because of one man, Angel Delgadillo. He has been instrumental in preserving the

Route 66 culture in this little town, and being the local barber, can still give you a straight razor shave.

Steve Daniels let Delgadillo scrape his neck with a straight razor (after a hot towel soak and carefully applied hot lather,) and it was one of the highlights of Daniels’ tour.

Seligman was finally bypassed by the Interstate in 1978, making it one of the last towns to exist on the original Route 66. The next day, Seligman to Las Vegas was more wide open spaces and more heat and as for the overnight stay in Vegas—well, what happens there, stays there.

Las Vegas to Barstow was extremely hot, nearly 115° and at the gas top in Ludlow, Empress Debra was done in. She was flushed and weary and just about to pass out from the heat. She wanted to leave the bike here, have it shipped home, and ride the van the rest of the way. She said she would hate to not ride her bike the entire route, but she just couldn’t hack it anymore. The grizzled old biker author took her over to the water hose and told her she had the choice of being a quitter or a winner, and this water was the difference. The Empress fumed that she didn’t want to ruin her

expensive chic riding clothes by soaking them with desert water!

Finally, she was convinced, and suffered the ignominy of drenching herself and her riding ensemble with brackish, hard water from a frayed and leaky garden hose. She squished back to her bike and rode off.

Two miles down the road she was all smiles and loving her life and at the next gas stop she was giggly and amazed. “Do you know that I actually got the shivers from being so cool?” she gushed. “That was amazing, I never felt so refreshed in my life!” The grizzled old biker author just smiled a knowing smile, tipped his hat and walked off.

The next day the tour made a side trip to San Diego for a stay at the famous Coronado hotel, and the day after that we rode to Santa Monica for the end-of-the-ride party.

We had come far, and it seemed far. Sixteen days on the road through drenching rain, distant tornadoes and blistering heat.

Along the ride, we all had bought black and white Route 66 flags, stickers and patches. Now we could display them with pride.

We earned them.

IH

ntroducing

Stability Control..

ow much technology do you

REALLY want?

Photo Courtey BMW Germany

..

Road Test:

BMW R1200R

by Beau Allen Pacheco

T

he main thing you need to know bout the new R1200R, is that it hauls ass. From clutch-out to 3000 RPM it launches like the twin that it is—but from 3000 to 5000 revs it feels like it grew another piston and from there to redline the opposed twin pulls like an inline four banger. One keeps looking down to see if those two big cylinders are still sitting sideways.

If this new offering from BMW will be the everyman’s bike that the engineers at BMW designed it to be, the first thing every man needs is lots of power and it has that by big gobs and buckets. How about 109 horsepower and 85 ft. lbs. of grunt? That’s a whopping increase of 28% of power and 17% of torque over the R1150R twin of last year. Oh, my but this isn’t your fathers’ old boxer. Not only does this new R model have more power, the engineers in white lab coats in Berlin have trimmed away

fat to where this new standard weighs in at 437 lbs. dry which unburdens the motor even more.

Now, take all that power and agility, add to it a completely new ABS system, and a revolutionary new stability system called ACS, and what you have here is a motorcycle that indeed does lots of things excellently. As it sits, it’s an exciting, nimble commuter and street burner that pops wheelies at the mere thought of it. Strap on a windshield (or not) and some bags, and the R1200R is a legitimate tourer that lives for switchbacks.

As in all things BMW, the increase in power was done in a variety of subtle ways: they didn’t just punch out the jugs by about 30% and call it good to go. As a matter of fact, engine size was increased by a measly 40 cc, and that was via an increase in stroke.

The 1150 innards dimensions were 101/70.5 mm of bore/stroke, while this new 1200 boasts 101/73

mm. The biggest factors to big power were: Compression was upped from10.3:1 to 12.0:1—valve diameters was increased from 34/29mm in/out, to 36/31—valve stroke increased from 9.69/8.6mm to 10.7/9.4, in/out—and throttle valve diameter increased from 45 to 47 mm. In such small ways is power gained.

Not only has the motor been breathed upon, but the frame has some tweaks of its own. While rake remains the same at 63°, the trail has been decreased from 5 inches to 4.6 inches, while the wheelbase has been increased from 58.3 inches to 58.8 inches by stretching the swingarm about an inch. Spring travel up front remains at 4.7 inches, while rear spring travel has increased slightly from 5.3 inches to 5.5 inches. The telelever front end is from the RT model which has been modified to fit the specific needs of this new R model. As in the RT and ST models the engine is

load bearing in a two piece frame.

Does all this add up to a substantial difference? Absolutely.

The folks at BMW in their munificence chose to hold their press launch of the R1200R up in the German Alps in the town of Garmisch, where incidentally the Beemer Bikermeeting (Not a rally, or a bash, or bikeweek, but Meeting) was in full

in its element. The big hunks of 5x5x17 / 180/60ZR17 meat on the rear offer a world of traction that invite lean angles severe enough to double the sales of boxer rocker covers. The combination of more power and lighter weight nudges up the performance envelope of the 1200R close to sport bike territory. And up in this atmosphere of rapid transit is where the BMW

“Another cool feature of this ABS is that when you’re at a stop on a steep hill, pulling the brake lever applies full braking to both wheels.” commencement. We had the opportunity to ride the bike on the autobahn as well as spectacular alpen backroads, and in all instances, the new Beemer standard lived up to its designers ambitions; it actually did everything well. All of the roads on which we rode were above an altitude of 2500 ft., and even in that rare air the new boxer pulled like a freight train.

Need to get from Berlin to Munich in a hurry? No problem, use the Teutonic slab where you can push wind at 225km/ph all day long and the 1200R is comfortably at home. (Even when the autobahn is home and a Testarosa with its piquant whine is playing grabass with a whistling 911 Turbo and both pass one at warp speed.)

Riding on the long straight lonesome is less of a chore because the boxer is now a balanced boxer via a balancer shaft. No more buzzing or fuzzing, and this new found smoothness again reminds one of an inline four cylinder—not exactly, but close.

But on the perfect and spectacularly scenic German Alps mountain roads, the R is even more

technology kicks in—Integral Antilock Braking System and Automatic Stability Control. This integrated system is new from the ground up and utilizes the newest available circuitry and computer technology. BMW has teamed up with Continental-Teves to create an amazingly comprehensive system that helps you when you’re in trouble and calms you when you’re stupid.

This new system uses valve based pressure control which replaces the old plunger system, and the tactile feedback on the controls is a generation above and better.

In the first incarnation of the Beemer ABS system, the feedback to the hand brake lever was clunky and misleading. Not so in this new system.

The first feature of this optional system is integrated braking.

Pulling the front brake lever activates both front and rear brakes.

In past integrated systems, the percentage of braking done by the front wheel an the rear wheel were set in stone. Not so here.

Braking pressure to each to wheel is determined by several factors

“On moun

the perfect and spectacularly scenic German Alps ntain roads, the R is even more in its element.�

Photo by Beau Allen Pacheco

Photo Courtesy of BMW, Germany

including load distribution. The official wording goes, “Comparing wheel locking pressure in the wheel circuits, pressure measurements within the system provides an indication of the load the motorcycle is currently carrying and adjusts brake force distribution accordingly.” Stoppies for example, are no more. The ABS senses when the rear wheel is craving altitude, and takes appropriate measures with the front brake and thus the rear wheel is grounded.

Another cool feature of this ABS is that when you’re at a stop on a steep hill, pulling the brake lever applies full braking to both wheels.

This is especially helpful for those moments when your task load is maxed and the road is so slick that the front brake alone isn’t enough to stop you from sliding back down into the abyss.

As integral as the system is, the BMW engineers reassure that the front and rear brakes “are not connected by any kind of hydraulic connection.” That is to say, if you’re applying the front brake which also activates the rear brake, and you want to add some more rear brake, you can press on the pedal and you’ll get more rear braking—right up to the point where the rear wheel starts to lock up at which time the ABS makes sense of the situation in microseconds and you get to stay upright. The brake pedal effects the rear brake only.

How does it work? It works very well indeed. Gone are the old surges in the brake lever and the disturbing noises coming from the old system. Of particular note is the stability the ABS brings to braking in a turn. When braking in a lean, the bike settles into the turn with more stability than with the uneven

or inappropriate applications of the rider. The net result is more confidence and more safety.

The ACS system operates off the same module as ABS, using the same wheel speed information etc. But instead of applying its knowledge to the brakes, it sends its signals to the motor and the net effect is that you ain’t doing any more burn outs. When the ACS system calculates that the rear wheel is losing traction from injudicious use of power, it takes action in phases. First stage is to ‘adjust’ the ignition timing so that the motor loses a bit of torque.

Keep it up and the ignition kills more power. Continue with too much wheel spin and the ignition kills even more power. If, in microseconds, the ACS determines that this spinning wheel situation is out of control, it gets downright draconian and shuts off the gas to first one cylinder then the other.

If that sounds like a formula for a high side, fuhgetaboutit, the ACS will never allow the rear end to get that backed out in the first place.

How does it work? We have no idea because our bikes weren’t equipped with it and it won’t be available until the end of the year. However in the live full-on demonstrations we witnessed, with much gravel on asphalt the effect was dramatic especially when the rider was going about 40 mph, leaned over in a turn and twisted the throttle. The motor popped and snorted sounding exactly as if the valves were floating at 18,000 rpm. But the rider arced gracefully through the turn with no sliding at all. Impressive.

The entire system integrated system continually monitors itself and should it fail, the brakes revert back to normal hydraulic function

and the ACS goes dormant.

As for riding comfort, with the new wheelbase comes some new ergonomics and ways to accentuate those ergos. A nice option offered with the R1200R to mitigate the physical trauma of riding the long straight and narrow is a choice of seats heights offered by three different seats. Their seat top to footpeg distances are 17,18 and 19 inches, and those equate to a seat height of 27.5;31.4 and 32.6 inches from the ground. There is another esoteric BMW measurement called ‘leg arch’ that calculates the distance from one foot to the other via the inseam while in the riding position, and those numbers are 69.2;70.8 and 73.2. Our test bike had the lowest seat, and we craved the tallest.

Does all this gadgetry detract from the essence and old world charm of the venerable boxer motor? No, not by our lights. We figure that the best way to keep this lovely power plant around is to constantly improve it and the parts that surround it and that’s precisely what BMW is doing; making it more able, more versatile, and a lot faster.

And besides, all this new technology adds another basic dimension and that is…did we mention that this bike really hauls ass?

Photo by Beau Allen Pacheco

So That’s Wh Those Goldwi Going!

Headed for the Honda Hoot in Knoxville, Tennessee

here All ings Are

by Beau Allen Pacheco Photos by the author

Y

ou gotta love it. Gold Wings are everywhere and it’s very cool to see a congregation of kindred spirits gather whether it be Tall Ships, Duesenburgs or the big Hondas.

I’m here at the Honda Hoot which is Honda’s flagship event where all their flagships gather. The main parking lot is a sea of windshields and skinny masts. Of course, all Hondas, in fact all motorcycles from around the world have been invited here and their owners may tag along—however Gold Wings are the bikes that hear the siren strongest, and show up in the largest numbers.

The best part of having so many big rigs here is that most of the attendees on the Wings rode them here. One does not see motorcycles tethered to trailers or sitting like grinning mutts in pickup beds— this is not Sturgis or Daytona.

Not by the longest shot. Indeed, there are no burnout pits here nor wrestling of any flavor, Jell-o, cole slaw or mud. There were over 300 vendors here, but no tattoo artists— lots of cops but no arrests. Can you

to this rally. These people ride far and they ride often so rally organizers have supplied maps and incentives for ralliers to get out of town and see Eastern Tennessee.

There are no formal group rides where you see a hundred bikes in a line shepherded by a captain man-of-steel or a wide-eyed, white knuckle maniac sweep rider trying to keep up with the parade.

Everyone departs and returns when they choose, and with whom they choose. Very civilized, and smart.

Included in the registration price is a daily lunch voucher for a meal at that day’s destination. You get there on your own and enjoy the provided lunch at your leisure.

say mellow?

Like most rallies, the Hoot has a central base where vendors are set up and from where the demo rides depart. For the Hoot it’s the Chilhowee park in central Knoxville. The grounds are

pleasant with verdant greenery and a comely lake with a frothing fountain. Entertainment this year at the park was the Ball of Steel stunt riders and the Team Extreme trials riders.

I was surprised to see the demonstration teams of competitors Triumph, BMW and Victory here, but the Honda guys emphasize to me they wish the Hoot to be a gathering of all motorcycles, not just Hondas.

They said it often and plaintively, and eventually I believed them.

As comfortable as the Chilhowee park is however, the countryside around Knoxville is the attraction

Most mornings, the day started off with riverboat cruise and breakfast on the paddle wheeler Knoxville Star. I would like to have eaten my scrambled eggs on the Tennessee river to the tune of a chuffing steam engine. However, my personal engine has no steam at 6:15 am, so I missed the breakfasts.

The first day rides on Wednesday were to Roan Mountain and Douglas Lake. On Thursday one had the option of seeing a movie at a downtown theatre or ride to the Cumberland Gap, and on Friday Cycle World gave a ride to the

Wheels Through Time Museum etc. But no one mentions the Dragon in the room; Deals Gap, aka the Dragon’s Tail. No OEM will endorse this road or even mention it, but it’s the road that most people come to ride, along with its tamer but more scenic cousin, the Cherohala Skyway.

It’s entirely understandable why no corporation would endorse these roads, they’re too, uh, exciting. And the Tree of Shame at Dragons Tail resort with it’s plumage of shredded plastic parts shows just how exciting Deals Gap is. Someone has counted 318 curves in 11 miles and I don’t doubt it. Everyone wants to ride it and there is a mini industry built around these two roads. Most of that industry depicts it as road racer heaven, and the shriek of sport bikes can be heard through the hollers from sunup to sundown.

However, the road being a federal road, is used by all vehicles from double clutchin’ E-flat semi tractor trailer trucks, to the Corvette Clubs to the Cobra clubs and in the summer, traffic can be thick…and sloooow…and frustrating. So riders get excitable and racy and cut corners and accidents happen. Lots of accidents. So many accidents that this summer the local fuzz has vowed to crack down on tricksters.

So far the traffic ticket rate has gone up but the accident rate remains unchanged.

Of all the big rallies in America, this is one of my most favorite to ride because of the American history that lives here, and the ambiance of the Genteel South.

I’ll ride to the Cumberland Gap, the beautifully recreated town of Museum of Appalachia (A Smithsonian Institution Affiliations Program),and of course our Cycle

World ride to the Wheels Through Time Museum.

You can wander through many recherché museums and never hear a word from the owner of the place.

They’re huddled in their offices with advanced degrees hanging on every wall and dare not deign mingle with the soiled masses who trekked hundreds of miles to caress the Rosetta stone of their shared passion. These owner’s lofty but obscure Frazier Crane personae, veiled with layers of nondescript violin music and the delicate aroma of lilac and vanilla, exudes the aura of ‘you really don’t deserve to be here, but if you insist, you can look, but please don’t touch.’

Are all museums ever thus?

Hell, no bubba! Get yourself to the Wheels Through Time Museum and you can’t escape the noisy owner, Dale Walksler no matter how hard you try—he’s all over the place! And he wants you to touch everything! Every motorcycle on the floor can, and will, at any given moment be and cranked up with much smoke and loud roar. Everything here runs, especially Walksler.

You can be standing, looking at

a gorgeous ACE, or Crocker, and Walksler will recount to you every interesting aspect of that marque, then tell you in endless detail about that particular motorcycle, and how he put it together and then

he’ll start it up. Every nut and every bolt on every motorcycle has been turned by Walksler and it’s my guess that when it comes to antique motorcycles, he’s the most knowledgeable person on the planet.

He is pound for pound, the hardest working man in motorcycling and his energy is ferocious.

He’s tiring to watch and you wonder what obscure drug drives him at such a frenetic pace—you wonder if someday his body will crash from sheer exhaustion. He gets a thousand things done per day: He personally works on each bike—he answers the phones—he oversees inventory—he scours the earth for long lost parts—he narrates the video on his website—he poses for pictures—he giggles at his own ideas—he runs a race team—he leads tours—he’s at war with the local city council who cannot share his vision—he designs T-shirts—he talks endlessly in a machine gun staccato—he smokes small cheap cigars—he apparently never sleeps—he has no love life—he takes no vacations—he never sits down—he eats on the run—he doesn’t pause, hell, he doesn’t even slow down—and he does burnouts in the aisles of the museum for god’s sake! And the man can ride a motorcycle.

Last autumn, I did a three day ride with him and Wayne Stanfield who

is a legend of The Great Race, a cross country antique machinery race here in America. Both of them were aboard matching 1939 Harleys, and they rode the ass off

of those bikes. They roared over dirt mountain roads, hill climbed in the mud, and sliced and diced the pavement of the Blue Ridge Parkway; all the while hand shifting and foot clutching. It’s an awe-inspiring sight to see a man hand shift a bike while in a full locked slide, both feet on the boards.

As for the museum itself, it’s a dynamic and full functioning historical repository of American motor culture and was awarded Museum of the Year by The Antique Automobile Club of America. Like all first class facilities, the museum introduces new exhibits on a regular basis, the newest being the Women in Motorcycling section on the main floor. The graphics in the display are first rate, and the motorcycles, as usual, are gorgeous. And like all the very best museums, some of the exhibits include oddities

and humor. Ever seen a HarleyDavidson powered airplane?

Walkser’s got one as well as a Harley powered ice saw for cutting ice on the frozen lakes up in Wisconsin, a mining cart, roto tiller and ice sled all powered by V-twins from Milwaukee.

Over sixty of the motorcycles in the museum are former racers.

Everything from board racers to hill climbers to flat trackers are represented and of course all of them run too. Walksler himself heads up the WTT racing team which this year took a shot at breaking an endurance record set

by Fred Ham seventy years ago, of traveling 1825 miles in 24 hours.

Iron man Wayne Stansfield rode the 1937 Harley all 24 hours, but only got 1350 under his tires due to mechanical troubles. Nonetheless it was an impressive showing for a 70 year old motorcycle, and a 59 year old man.

The Wheels Through Time Museum was one of the official rides of the Honda Hoot this year, and since I was the official Cycle World representative I was there flying the colors. It was fun for me to see how much the Hoot attendees enjoyed it, and to see how much Dale Walksler enjoyed talking with the riders. This isn’t your ordinary museum, this is something very special.

We should do this every year.

Road Test:

HONDA VTX1800T What we rode to the Hoot

Photos by Honda America

By Beau Allen Pacheco When Honda first launched the VTX 1800 in 2002 , billboards all over Sturgis screamed, “Exhaust valves as big as a P-51 Mustang.”

That bit of hyperbole during Bike Week underscored that Big Red’s new V-twin was a torque monster with a huge motor and that Honda had come to town to mark territory by pissing on some corners occupied by the guys from Milwaukee and the S&S motor based custom crowd. Now, five years later the touring version of the big 110 incher still packs a wallop.

Honda offers some mix and match variations on the very popular VTX platform and the VTX1800T is the new touring configuration which fills out the model line along with the C,F,N, and R models. All have

the same three valves per cylinder 1795 cc liquid-cooled 52° V-twin with 9.0:1 compression ratio and two spark plugs per cylinder, and all have the five-speed gearbox hooked up to shaft drive. Our touring model here wears fenders

that closely, uh, ‘resemble’ those of the R model, and a gas tank that is strikingly, well, ‘similar’ to the F model. Adding the bags, backrest and windshield makes this the lardass of the bunch, waddling in at 792 lbs., which is 58 lbs. heavier

Photo by Honda America

AT

than the ‘featherweight’ F model.

My test track for testing the T was the Honda Hoot territory of back roads in the Appalachians around Knoxville, and a fun stretch of Interstate 40 between Knoxville,TN Maggie Valley,NC. The back roads however, contained the infamous Dragons Tail of Deals Gap, one of the most notorious twisty roads in the country. If taking the VTX to the Dragons Tail for a test ride of the low slung floor-boarded cruiser seems incongruous, well, maybe it is…a little. But for most folks, one

corners which anybody can do.

(Drag some stuff on a GSX-R600, and then you are cool.) When ridden with some intelligence and consideration for the design of the machinery, the VTX can be a fun and able buddy on these challenging roads once one figures out how to utilize the massive 120 ft./lbs. of torque pounding between ones knees.

The first couple of miles in the tightly wrapped Dragons Tail, I found myself coming up against the rev limiter because I was

long curves of the Appalachian Interstate was so much fun that it seemed like this is what the 1800T was made for. And even the extra weight of the bike seemed to make it more stable. The hour and a half ride on I-40 was delightful. The windshield was burble free, and with the perfect weather, I was tempted to keep riding north, like to Nova Scotia, or however far I could get before they caught me.

The only limiting factor might have been how much I could pack in the two leather, 24 liter (or 25 quarts,

constantly shifting gears, trying to keep the revs up. Dumb. On the VTX, one merely gets to an appropriate gear and then lets the massive torque do all the work.

One needn’t shift again, and is free enjoy the rhythm of the road. After I figured this out, riding the twisties at slow to moderate speeds became downright fun. And the Interstate was pure joy.

The VTX may not be a Dragon slayer, but it can conquer any Interstate on the map with its long 67.5 inch wheelbase and languorous 32 degrees of rake. The ergos of the cushy seat, beachbars and floorboards, combined with the smooth efficiency of the two primary-shaft-mounted balance weights and rubber mounted motor, makes this a coast-to-coaster of a cruiser. Riding the undulating

or 6.3 gallons, or 811 shots or 2.7 pecks) saddle bags. Which isn’t very much. To call this bike as is, a Tourer, is a bit optimistic because the bags are at best big enough for one person on an overnighter.

Although they’re nicely made and sturdy, for a true long haul tour they’ll have to be augmented by other forms of soft luggage. The passenger backrest will best serve as an attachment point.

But those details are easily taken care of. There is a world of aftermarket luggage out there that can provide all the storage space required. The VTX1800T has the basics of a lovely smooth motor and great comfort to make this an outstanding long haul companion.

Photo by Honda America

motorcycle has to do lots of things well and lots of VTX riders come a long way to attend the Hoot and ride these roads. So although these hard charging roads aren’t what this bike was designed for…well… here we are. And besides, logging trucks, dump trucks and semi trucks ply this asphalt everyday, and if they can do it, then the VTX can damn sure do it.

And actually, the touring V-twin does it quite nicely, thank you very much. Sure, it’s easy to create sparks by grinding the Honda’s metal on asphalt—you can create scratchings that will echo through the hollers for miles. But that’s only cool the first couple of times.

After that, it just looks and sounds like some jerk trying to impress people of how fast he is by pushing a big fat cruiser too hard in the

On The Billy T

Trail Of The Kid

Letting The Motor Company Plan Your Ride L

Story and Photography by Beau Allen Pacheco

incoln, New Mexico— I sat on a bench in front of Tunstall’s store and

saw it all. Billy the Kid and his band of regulators stepped from around the

corner behind my left shoulder and blasted sheriff William Brady to pieces.

No warning, no pushing and shoving or sonsubitching, just cold revenge and hot lead. Brady gasped his last breath not twenty feet away from my boots and his ghost escaped through thirteen bullet holes in his body. Brady’s deputy Hindman crawled across the street and died there and the other two deputies ran into a house across the street, trading gunfire with the regulators for several minutes. The smoke from the pistol’s black powder swirled around me as Billy in a spate of high dudgeon had exacted his bloody retribution for the death of his friend William Tunstall.

So started the Lincoln County wars and I saw it all through the words of three men: Monument Ranger/ historian Murray Arrowsmith, Joe Gallegos who has lived here all his life, and Joe Salazar whose Grandfather was one of Billy’s gang. They took the time to talk to me and make the small town come

alive. “Lincoln was considered to be the most violent town in the American West,” says Arrowsmith. “In 1878 the Presbyterian minister said he buried 31 people and only one died of natural causes. Lincoln made Tombstone, Arizona look like a Sunday School picnic when you see what happened here.” I spent six hours in Lincoln absorbing the local history—I could have stayed a month.

And all this happened on only third day of a great six day tour of New Mexico. I knew it would be spectacular because this arid and sparsely populated state is like that; spectacular. It contains the best of all the elements of the west: the mountains, the high plains, the desert and the indio/mexican culture. An anthropology student once told me that if one were to include the Indian cultures and the conquistadores, there is more American history in the Southwest area than anywhere else in the United States.

Two galaxies in the firmament collided to make this story happen. 1. Editor Buzz Buzzelli wanted a touring story of New Mexico, and 2. the Harley-Davidson Motor Company wanted a test and evaluation of their new touring services; Motorcycle Shipping service, their Great Roads Service, and their Ride Planner Service.

Everyone proposed the concept to everyone else, everyone said yes and wheels started turning. After hashing things out for a couple of days, the premise for this trip emerged: 1. I want to tour the state of New Mexico.

2. I live in Tennessee 3. I don’t have time to ride from my home to New Mexico, tour the state, and ride all the way back, so I want my bike shipped to a starting point, (El Paso) and then after the tour, shipped back home.

4. Harley-Davidson will take care of shipping the motorcycle 5. Harley-Davidson will make flight reservations.

6. Harley-Davidson will plan the general route with my input.

7. Harley-Davidsons will make the motel reservations.

With the above in mind I got on Harley’s website (www. h-d.com) and clicked on the Reservation Center icon. On that page is the magic telephone number; 888/224-2453. All the services I needed were on that number and after about an hour of working with the travel specialists, all the details of my trip were worked out; bike scheduled for pickup, my route was planned, flight reservations and motel reservations were made. Also my maps were available online as well as charts for some interesting side trips.

My bike would be shipped to the famous Barnett’s HarleyDavidson in El Paso, and then after the tour, shipped back to its home. The Harley-Davidson Motor Company has partnered up with the Best Western chain so all my motels were with that company. As it happens I prefer that because the odds of getting a motel with ground level accommodations are very good.

Indeed, in all but one motel, I parked my bike directly in front of my room.

Three weeks later I flew from Nashville to El Paso and caught a taxi from the El Paso airport to Barnett’s to pick up my bike. Barnett’s is heavily into providing services for riders on the road and if I had given them my exact arrival time they would have picked me up in a stretch limo. (After the tour they graciously transported me back to the airport in the stretcher.)

My bike had been at Barnett’s for a while already and was waiting patiently in the service area. It had gathered a little

dust, and they cleaned it for me before I mounted up. This service seemed a little ostentatious so I asked the gentleman who was helping me, Robert Dunn, the very attentive manager of Barnett’s, if he knew who I was or how I came to be there picking up a bike. He told me that he had never heard of me, (that hurt a little) and that all he knew was, the Electra Glide that was shipped to him would be picked up by its owner and returned for shipping. Outstanding. I packed up, mounted up and headed north into New Mexico.

Having spent a dreary winter in Tennessee where the gray skies and barren trees could sadden Goofy, Mickey, Sneezy, Dopey, Happy and that pale chick they hung with, I was ready for the wide open blue skies of the Southwest. I spurred the Electra Glide and we bolted toward Carlsbad.

The Harley Ride Planner had this trip broken down into sections and each section contained as much detailed information as anyone could want: street by street directions, miles to target and time to

own so that at the end of a tour I can say with high probability that no one in the history of riding has taken the exact route I took. And I don’t obey suggestions. The one sure way for me to never in this lifetime

different next year.

But I have to admit something here and it’s not easy for me to do: Having some plans made in advance was pretty nice. The motel reservations were very nice; no waiting, no hassle, and I walked right past stranded tourists in lobbies talking rapidly on their celphone trying to find a place to stay because the motel was full. Also, because Best Westerns are Biker Friendly the receptionists went out of their way to accommodate my needs.

And, since we’re baring our souls here, I’ll admit something else, I’ve always wanted

“Many historians Lincolnin to the be the mostStates.” authentic old west consider town remaining United target. The Planner informed that Carlsbad was 158 miles from El Paso and at posted speeds, I’d get there in 2 hours and 47 minutes. Also, I’d be staying at the Best Western Motel in Whites City which is at the entrance of the Carlsbad National Park. Perfect.

A word here about riding philosophy. History records that I’m not a real big fan of overplanning a trip. My philosophy has always been that the spontaneous road is the surest road to discovery and adventure. Rides should be more than an exercise in connecting the dots on a map.

(It’s all about the freedom, remember?) It has been my wish to ride paths that are my

eat at Spandau’s Bucket ‘O Ribs in Budapest, is to suggest that I eat at Spandau’s Bucket ‘O Ribs in Budapest. I’ll find my own favorite place, thank you very much. And too, the employees of restaurants and hotels change so much that what was good food or service this year may be entirely

to see Carlsbad Caverns. Yes, I know it’s one of those elementary-school-field-trip sort of natural ‘wonders’. But my school never took a field trip there and ever since I was a little kid I wanted to see it. And I wasn’t disappointed.

Since I arrived in the Carlsbad area in the evening, I rode up to the Caverns to check it out for the next day. “You come up to see the bats, mate?” asked a British gentleman. I told him I didn’t know about the bats so he and his wife led me to the small amphitheatre where a park ranger was about to hold forth on the emerging of the bats from a nearby cave. The lecture lasted for about an hour and then as the sun was getting low, the first bat emerged.

In a few minutes the bats stormed out of the cave in a steady funky stream.

I say funky because bats have a unique odor that wafts through the viewing area. They don’t exactly stink but Joe Salazar of Lincoln, sits on our E they don’t bathe in Vera Wang either. The bats did troubles started. His grandfather was one full counter clockwise turn like a black twister then dead,’ in the gunfight outside the sore. in a great whirl and fluffle, flew off to the northwest in search of and his family received letters from Billy bugs. The stream of bats flying across a full moon looked like a scene out of a Tim Burton movie. I sat and watched the bats leave the cave for about fifteen minutes. It was eerie to see animals emerge from deep underground, get in the sky, and know that eight hours hence they’ll abandon the fresh air for the depths of that totally dark cave. But the next day I was down in a cave like theirs and I liked it. A lot.

Yes, Carlsbad Caverns are a touristy cliché, and yes, the parking lot was full of school busses. However, the kids from the busses were mysteriously elsewhere and I had the cave to myself. I experienced absolute quiet save for the dripping of water and my own footsteps. It was enchanting. No artifice or hype, no hip hop music, no animation. Just some illuminated nature and some handrails to guide. I was down there for about two hours and could have stayed more.

After emerging from the depths I stowed my camera gear, pointed the headlight north and headed to Ruidoso. At Artesia I had a choice to make; visit Roswell and see the goofiness that Saucerheads have created around the UFO myth there or take the Trip Planner’s advice and ride through the Mescalero Apache Indian Reservation. I chose the Reservation with good and bad news. The good news was that it was a gorgeous ride, the bad news was that I got caught in a thundering, shattering mountain storm.

Up at around 4500 ft. elevation, the Sky ahead was black but I kept going until finally the hail came. I stopped in the middle of the road and looked into hell. The hail fell so that there was a definite line on the road in front of me, yonder was wet, while I was on dry pavement. I was so close to the line that I could smell the storm and hear the hail splat on the

asphalt—and the line was coming my way fast.

I frantically turned the bike around as the quarter sized hail caught up with me, pinging off my helmet and pelted my shoulders and thighs with bullet hits. After a minute of riding I broke through the line to dry pavement and hauled ass for another two miles where I came up on an empty fruit stand with an awning. I pulled under the shelter as the hail came crashing down. It splattered on the road and thudded and bounced loudly up from the grass.

No sooner had I got my helmet off when a guy named Tracy came barreling under the shelter in his Toyota pickup. “I ain’t gonna let that hail ruin my new truck,” he yelled. We sat out the mountain storm as the hail denuded all the trees and shrubs in its path. The cattle and horses standing under the barren trees sought what shelter they could find.

When I returned to the road the hail was three inches deep and riding on it was a slippery and scary affair. I fishtailed up to the summit of the pass where the hail slush was now about six inches deep. However, the road down the other side was relatively dry and in a mile it was absolutely dry.

Mountain storms are quirky things.

Electra Glide while in front of Tunstall’s store where Billy The Kid’s The only problem now was that I was soaked s Yginio Salazar whom the history books call ‘The man who played and the temperature according to my bike’s Salazar claims that Billy The Kid lived out his life in old Mexico thermometer was about 38-40 degrees. I was y as late as 1938. freezing when I pulled into Mayhill Mercantile in Mayhill, New Mexico. Fortunately this little mountain store is a full service place and I bought a nice second hand fleece jacket for two bucks, just right to get me down the mountain.

The proprietor advised that I might want to take hiway 244 to Ruidoso as it was shorter and more scenic. It was all of that and empty of traffic to boot; it’s one of the great motorcycle roads in the country. The road winds up to about 7,000 feet or so then descends rapidly. The dreaded hail storm had been here and in the glaring sunlight the moisture returned skyward in great clouds of steam. It was an eerie sight and added to the magic of the road.

I stayed in Ruidoso that night,

town has shrunk since I was a boy. The schoolhouse in those days was full of kids. But now it’s closed.”

I asked him if his grandfather knew Billy the Kid. He said yes and that… “My grandfather was a sheepherder here and he told me that Billy the Kid used to stop by his camp and visit with him. Of course the Hispanics didn’t take sides, they were neutral in the Lincoln wars. He said that Billy the Kid was a nice guy, but that’s all he said about him.”

Murray Arrowsmith introduced me to the other Joe, Joe Salazar, whose grandfather on the other hand had a lot to say about Billy the Kid. Joe’s grandfather was Yeginio Salazar, sometimes knows as ‘The man who played dead’. Salazar says of his grandfather’s role in the famous McSween house shootout…“he

a beautiful little town, and had a great Mexican meal.

One could spend a week there riding the roads and soaking up Southwest culture, not to mention the world famous quarter horse racing at Ruidoso Downs. The next morning I stayed on hiway 70 to Hondo Tinnie, then caught 380 to the town of Lincoln and my introduction to the legend of Billy the Kid. One of the first people I met was the aforementioned

Murray Arrowsmith who told me that, “Many historians consider Lincoln to be the most authentic old west town remaining in the United States.

They say that if Billy the Kid rode into town today he would instantly recognize it.”

Joe Gallegos who is 75,and a gracious, thoughtful man who was born here would agree.

“When I was growing up here, this [main street] was a dirt road,” he says, “and it was four feet lower than it is now. The

got shot coming out of the McSween house. He got hit 4 times, he was 15 years old. One bullet hit his rifle and it blew up in his hand and then he got hit in the shoulder which spun him around, then he [got shot twice in the back]. Well, my

going and when he did that, Billy got hit in the leg, and it was a burn or wound that nobody ever heard about.”

That would be exciting enough, but what Salazar told me next is either true and historically shocking or else

again with Arrowsmith who shook his head and told me that all historical evidence points to a different conclusion than Salazar’s story; Billy died in Ft. Sumner on July 14, 1881, from a bullet administered by Pat Garrett. However, he also said

“One bullet hit his rifle and it blew up in his hand and then, he got hit in the shoulder which spun him around...”

Grandfather got shot four times and the Murphy people, they went and kicked him several times and rolled him over with his gun belt, and he acted like he was dead. They were gonna shoot him while he was down there but then they decided not to waste another bullet on him, he’s had it. But before they did that, Billy ran by him and as he looked down at him, [my] Grandfather signaled with his eyes to keep

untrue and irrelevant. He told me that Billy the Kid wasn’t killed by Pat Garrett, but actually lived to a good old age in old Mexico! I was astounded by the matter-of-fact manner in which Salazar spoke, as if every intelligent person knew that the famous kid gunfighter escaped Lincoln county and headed South. Sitting in front of Tunstall’s store, I spoke for over an hour with Salazar, taping every word about how history has it wrong.

After Salazar left I spoke

that Joe Salazar is indeed the grandson of Yginio, and that oral history, especially down through family, should always be considered.

I stayed in Lincoln for over five hours and absorbed every bit of history I could, walking the streets, visiting all the historical sites and talking with locals. Because of Lincoln, I was hooked on New Mexico history and Billy the Kid. I picked up a volume of Billy the Kid, A Short and Violent Life,

by Robert M. Utley, and read

The bad news is that the author was pelted with quarter sized hail on a New Mexico pass. The good news is that nothing smells as good as sage brush in the rain.

it cover to cover that night. This was turning into an all-time great trip. I mounted up and headed north to Santa Rosa like the saddle tramp I fancied myself to be.

My room was waiting for me at the Best Western in Santa Rosa and the clerk advised that if I was a Billy the Kid devotee I might want to visit the tiny hamlet of Puerto De Luna about twenty miles distant. I said I would and rode a very scenic little road to PDL as the locals call it. The ride was the best part as the town isn’t much anymore. A very pretty church, Nuestra Senora del Refugio stands lonely and locked up on the outskirts of town and it is the most scenic structure there. The Alexander Grzelochowski house still stands and it’s where Billy the Kid was fed his last Christmas dinner by the Grzelochowski family whom he sometimes befriended and sometimes stole from.

The next morning I caught Interstate 40 and droned into Albuquerque. The Travel Service had me booked into the very lovely Best Western Rio Grande Inn in Albuquerque. This is a relatively new hotel and the crew was a crackerjack. In the midst of a cosmetics convention, I was registered quickly and the manager made sure that my bike was parked in the most conspicuous and safe spot on the grounds. Most new hoity toity places like this try and hide motorcycles; not so the Rio Grande Inn. To them, nothing was too good for that red Electra Glide. Nice folks.

After dinner I strolled around old town Albuquerque for a while, and while it’s quaint it has the whiff of sterile urban renewal and held no appeal for me, especially after being in Ruidoso and Lincoln. I strolled back to the hotel and got some rest for the next day’s ride, another interstate blast to Truth or Consequences.

I regret that I didn’t have enough time to explore this little town with the goofy name (yes, it’s named after a TV show) but I was eager to ride one of the side excursions recommended by the Haley-Davidson Touring Service, hiway 152 to Silver City. I got up early the next day and rode this hiway which is part of the Trail of the Mountain Spirits Scenic Byway, which is one of the featured rides on the Harley-Davidson, Great Roads Explorer website. It’s ride number 2 on the site and if you click on the icon you’ll instantly have all the information you can use to tour the area. And the area is outstanding. Great curvy roads, lots of scenery and no traffic. A perfect way to end the tour.

The next day I straightlined it to Barnett’s in El Paso where I dropped off the bike and was treated to the stretch limo ride back to the airport. A few days later the bike was delivered home safe and sound.

Left Top: The sign pointing to the Lincoln museum amphitheater hints at the relaxed atmosphere in the historically important town of Lincoln.

The locals are more than eager to tell what they know of the town’s past.

Inset: Joe Gallegos is a native of Lincoln. His grandfather was a sheepherder who frequently hosted Billy The Kid at his camp. The ‘Gallago’ house where Joe grew up, is a historical site in Lincoln.

Does

And so was it another trip like this? Well, let’

Q. Would I ship the bike again?

A. Yes. They did an outstanding job and they took great care of the bike. I’m not offer rentals so the question in this instance of which is better—to rent or ship— from Nashville to El Paso is $850.00. I asked five different dealerships their rent renting a bike would have cost almost exactly same total, depending the amount The downside to shipping is that the shippers allow themselves twelve to sixteen could be without your bike a total of a month.

Q. Was the Trip Planner a valuable service?

A. Yes, it was. If I knew nothing about New Mexico and was totally at the mercy happy with the tour. The recommended roads were very ‘bikey’—the right blend Q. Was the Tour Service valuable?

A.Absolutely. The airline reservations were what I needed and the motels they se of both worlds in motels: Large chain-operated reservations system and individu Best Western, the employees at each motel were extremely biker friendly and hel actually get to know bikers, they prefer the bikers to any other tourists.

And as far as New Mexico goes as a motorcycling state, well, it’s sublime. That Mexico was more than merely entertaining and more that just a vacation. With a

The Mother Ship Make The Grade?

o we come to the evaluation; worth it and would I take ’s take it by sections.

t averse to renting motorcycles, however Barnett’s doesn’t —is moot. The cost of shipping the bike door-to-door tal rate of an Electra Glide Classic for a week, and of insurance one purchases and the local tax rate. days transit one way. In a worst case scenario, you

of the Tour Planner, I would have been very d of scenery, fun roads and light traffic.

Shi

pt he bik Pla e? it? nner wo rth Tou rS er vic e

elected were spot on. Best Western Motels offer the best ually-owned-personal-service. Since Harley has partnered with lpful. As in most cases in the hospitality industry, once the employees

t’s all I can say, sublime. The way this trip turned out, touring New all that I learned and all that I saw, this trip turned out to be important.

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man cing The diro nda cks

Fall Colors On a Harley

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By Beau Allen Pacheco Photography by the author ometimes a ride turns out to be more than just a ride, sometimes a ride is romantic. Yes, we’re talking about the being-with-your-sweetheart kind of romance but also the swashbucklng, danger-mixed-withpassion kind of which all good romance novels are made. You’re not exactly sure how it happens, but the moon and the stars line up perfectly with the changing of the seasons and suddenly you feel eighteen again. Sometimes you pick just the right place to ride where traffic is scarce, the roads are curvy and languid and somehow just riding them with your mate is sensuous and bonding.

And sometimes with a little luck you find the perfect place to stay; you know, the kind where years later you remember the pattern of the bedcover, the squeak of the stairs and smell of the hot pancakes in the morning. Sometimes, spontaneously in spite of ourselves, it just all comes together.

And so it happened last Fall. I had wanted to show my bride Vicki, the beauty of the Adirondacks when the Autumn foliage explodes in riotous color before the long northern Winter sets in. I had been up there years before and the

beauty of the area has haunted me ever since. So I did some research, made the reservations, Vicki got the time off from work and we flew North from our home in Nashville, Tennessee.

And that was the last of the planning. My theory is that the biggest promoter of romance is freedom and spontaneity and conversely the biggest killer of romance is schedules, timetables and appointments. The next best element of romance is surprise and discovery. Blessed is the person who discovers new places sees new sights and strings together a series of events for the first time in the history of man. How wonderful…how romantic. Isn’t it amazing how as motorcyclists we always tout the freedom of riding bikes and then plan a trip down to the tenth of a mile, budget to the penny, ride in large groups and let the tyranny of groupthink demand: Where to go, where to eat, where to get gas, where to take pictures, how fast to ride, in what order to ride, what bike to ride, what to wear…and on an on. There is no romance in schedules.

And discovery is difficult these days because of our information access. As far as I can tell, everything has been photographed and either published in books or posted on the web. It’s entirely

possible to see everything beforehand that’s worthy of seeing.

Thus researching too much can take all the excitement (romance) out of a trip. Familiarity breeds boredom. Schedules and routes, connecting the dots on a map and seeing the expected isn’t the formula for adventure. And so

dear reader I shall tell you of the beauty of the area in which we rode and of our personal experiences minus the boring details, hoping that you will someday discover your own personal version of the Adirondacks.

Because of the draconian vehicle rental laws in New York

state—only one Harley dealer offers rentals and it’s way south of the Adirondacks—we chose Wilkins Harley-Davidson in Barre, Vermont from which to rent. These are great folks, the dealership has a long and distinguished history and has been in the same family since 1947. From Barre we headed

southwest and took backroads through the stunningly beautiful Vermont countryside to New York.

The entire New England area was on fire with fall foliage and everywhere we looked the scenery was spectacular. Vermont has a texture of its own and we vowed to return and explore its roads in the

“We invaded N crossing near Fo

New York on a ferry ort Ticonderoga.�

near future.

We invaded New York on a ferry crossing near Fort Ticonderoga.

Riding onto a ferry and making a water crossing always adds a wonderful timbre to a ride—could be about the change in the road from asphalt to water to asphalt, or the rocking of the vessel, or the expectation of discovering the other side of the water or the seemingly endless variety of the style and quality of the boats—I don’t know. But whenever possible in whatever country, I eschew bridges and take the boat. The Ticonderoga Ferry (established 1759) from Shoreham, VT to Ft. Ticonderoga, NY is a jolly ship manned by a sterling crew; not a

lubber among’ em, nor any man jack a pirate. The ride across the narrow of Lake Champlain was swift and true. Debarkation on the New York side offers

The first fort structure was built by the French in 1755 and called Ft.Carillon. You can research and walk the grounds to your heart’s content and retrace the long version

“Mix the reds of Andromeda with the

amplify those by a hundred percent an almost immediate access to the quaint town of Ft. Ticonderoga, (Cheonderoga if you’re Iroquois) and the fort itself. For history lovers this is the first opportunity to explore elements of the rich and increasingly unknown early history of The United States.

of the fort’s legacy. The short version is this: In 1759 the British kicked out the French and renamed the it Fort Ticonderoga—then in 1775 American patriot Ethen Allen and his Green Mountain Boys kicked out the English—then the English kicked out the patriots and

eventually torched the place. End of story. The stone walls lay fallow until 1909 when the entire fort was restored as a museum.

Near Ticonderoga resides the

vacation. Fortunately we chose a good one, the Schroon (skroon) Lake Bed & Breakfast on the outskirts of the small town of Schroon Lake and the lake itself.

yellow gold of your wedding ring and nd lay them in a field of emeralds.

”

former fortress called Crown Point which in its day was perhaps the largest British hard fortification on the continent, the entire complex of which covered 3.5 square miles.

Both bastions attempted to control southern Lake Champlain and both were focal points for the French/ Indian was of the mid 1700s. You history buffs—your path is clear.

Now when it comes to romantic ambience few things enhance a trip better than the well chosen Bed & Breakfast. A good one can make for the perfect trip while a bad one can ruin even your good memories of a

We chose it for its more or less central location in the Adirondack region and for being far away from a larger town. The only downside to the Schroon Lake B&B is that the interstate is a mere fifty yards from the building and the traffic can be quite loud at morning and evening drive times. However, the food was good and plentiful, and Jack and Jane Baumgarten, the owners are cordial and eager to please.

It was in just such a B&B in Sturgis, South Dakota that Vicki and I met and that’s why this trip is

so sentimental. Ten years ago she had ridden her Nostalgia Softail up from Austin, Texas and I was there in my official capacity as editor of Big Twin Magazine. As good fortune would have it we were both staying at the Hayloft B&B south of Rapid City on state hiway 16. (It’s now called the Sweetgrass B&B and I wouldn’t stay there if you paid me. I stopped by to take some pictures last year and the owners got down right nasty about my photography.

Their website has a declaration… “huge fines will be imposed,” that is an indication of their temperament.) But in happier times it was the perfect cozy place to meet ones lifelong sweetheart. We chatted over a couple of breakfasts and exchanged email addresses and phone numbers. She rode home to Texas and I rode home to California and after some amazing twists of fate, we were married four years later.

Vicki is an accomplished rider,

(among other things, see sidebar) and motorcycling has been in the center of our lives. We even had the opportunity to ride through Italy together but it’s been a while since we’ve taken an extended trip so we were both giddy to take this ride through the Adirondacks in the Fall. And in the Fall if your timing is good the scenery is spectacular and well, extremely romantic. The colors are an explosion of mother nature’s creativity.

How pretty are they? Mix the reds of Andromeda with the yellow gold of your wedding ring and amplify those by a hundred percent and lay them in a field of emeralds. Now you’re getting close. And you have to see the colors in person.

The photographs you see are just fleeting moments of the color spectrum that change with the surrounding foliage, the angle of the sun and the breeze in the leaves. No tree or mountainside looks the same day to day and that’s why timing is essential. We were there the week of October 10th, and it we perfect. Locals tell us that prime time color can vary from year to year and that’s

it’s best to call a Chamber of Commerce and see how the leaves are progressing.

The local folks dress their buildings and streets for the fall colors and the natural decorations here are the autumn decorations of Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. New England images are landmarks for the holiday

spent a couple evenings enjoying their apple and pumpkin pies and hot chocolate. After riding in the cold and rain I can think of nothing better than warm homemade apple pie. One of the reasons to take a trip such as this is to get away from all the electronic intruders in ones life from TV’s to celphones to faxes to the internet.

After riding in the cold and rain nothing better than warm homem season from Currier & Ives’ iconic painting, American Homestead Autumn to the jack-o-lantern of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Indeed, Washington Irving’s Headless Horseman was a Revolutionary war soldier who haunted New England and could have plied his scary trade by any of the many covered bridges around here. Because the fall colors are so bright and vivid they invite images of all things gold and auburn like harvested wheat, apples, pumpkins, maple sap, corn on the cob, maybe some grapes. And what do you make of all that? Well, you make an endless list of great things to eat starting with apple cider, apple pies, pumpkin pies, maple syrup, a world of wonderful breads, and on and on.

As luck would have it we discovered Pitkin’s restaurant on Schroon Lake’s Main Street and

Sitting in Pitkin’s eating pie and chatting about the days ride was sublime and closing my eyes I can easily recall the warm booths the friendly waitresses and the deep delicious taste of their pastries.

Now, as I said earlier I’m not one to recommend anything. I would rather you discover your own favorite places to eat. However if you’re in the area, it’s the end of the day and your search for food has proved forlorn and your out of options, Pitkin’s is a safe harbor for some good solid local food.

The downside to riding this far North this late is that it can be cold, really cold. A couple of mornings the temperature was in the low thirties and I don’t care how tough you are—that’s cold.

In the five days we were there we got three days of broken overcast, one day of solid rain and one day of random sprinkling. That’s not as bad as Buffalo, New York which got twenty two inches of snow and scared heck out of us, but the cold was daunting enough. Although this range isn’t as tall as say, the Rockies, the Adirondacks have 40 summits higher than 4,000 feet and there’ll soon be more because the scientists tell us that the range

is rising up out of the earth at an ankle busting 4mm per year.

Still, the riding is worth the weather because when the sun shines the colors are magnified and the roads are gorgeous. At their most fun these roads undulate and roll through the countryside and you glide through with a soothing rhythmic pace unlike the Sierras,

I can think of made apple pie.

Rockies or Alps that invite you to cut and slash at a frenetic speed around whiteknuckle twisties. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…but the Adirondacks are more relaxed and civil and—dare I say

it?—romantic.

Adding to the languorous ambiance of New England is the happy fact that since this is off season, everyone was either home or in school and we pretty much had the roads to ourselves. Notice that in the photography there are no other cars to be seen? Only good things come from that: no lines at the historical sites, no lines at gas stations, no waiting at restaurants, no hassled waitresses, the tackiest trinket shops are closed for the season, plenty of space at the inns, park wherever you want, no tour busses, no behemoth RVs and no tailgaters. Now that’s the definition of motorcycle heaven.

The town that attracts the most attention in the Adirondacks is Lake George, and it is indeed a pretty place. It’s no mystery why Americade chooses Lake George as the center of their rally: Beautiful roads, lots of restaurants, lots of lodging, lots of history, lots of things to do. About ten years ago I took my first ride on a parasail there and I still recall the terror of swinging like a pendulum under the canopy as the shroud lines reached the horizontal and hearing the boat crew yell at each other about how to “stop that guy from whacking into the water.”

At this distance those memories are exciting and fun to

recall, yet any flying I do in the future will be supported by wings.

For the history buff, Ft. William Henry is a focal point for early American history and the canon demonstration can be…uh… impactful. The excursions on any of the boats that ply the lake are peaceful and extremely scenic especially in the fall. Lake George is a long lake and one gets to see all of it when traveling by boat.

This five day trip has been the highlight of our riding season and we’ll do it again. Having spent most of my life in the West and Southern part of the United States, New England is one section of the country I’ve yet to fully explore and I shall remedy that at every opportunity.

After a ride I always try to nail down what was the best part, what element was most burnished into my memory of that ride. For the Adirondacks the best part was the empty and inviting roads. Closely following is the ecstasy of the fall colors and the ambience of autumn with all the trappings: the abundance of seasonal foods, the decorations and the slower pace of life in the Fall.

All of that, of course, adds up to the magical part of the trip; The Romance. It was worth everything to have some time alone with my lovely wife and watch her enjoy riding in the beautiful Adirondacks.

We held hands and talked and giggled and acted like kids on a date.

Romantic…sometimes you just get it right.

S t u r g is

is

Eight

short stories that will give you a more

American phenomenan called Sturgis Bike Week

perfect insight into the

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Corps flag in the background.

I told him I’d sure try, and we got some more shots of him and the flag.

After I was done shooting, I gave him some of my cards and told him I’d be honored to send him some prints of this session.

He quietly took the cards and gently said, “Why, thank you, that would be nice.” This quiet man is the most genuine biker I met here at Sturgis. He has seen much, he has done much, and he rides far and alone.

I hope I hear from him.

Godspeed, Wolf.

I

was visiting the Sturgis National Cemetery for the last time this year and I noticed a man just sitting on his Heritage Softail, looking out over this field of valor. The light was perfect and I asked if I might make his picture.

He politely and quietly said, ‘sure, I’d like that.’

I introduced myself and he said his name was Wolf. That’s it, just Wolf. I asked if I might have his name for this dispatch, and he quietly said, “no,” And that was that.

He told me that he was from Boston and that he rode all the out here to Sturgis for his trip of a lifetime. From here he would go to the West Coast, ride down hiway one, then back home to Boston.

He didn’t know how long he’d be gone, he was just riding.

He was camping close by and he told me that, “I’ve come here

every evening jus to thank these people for their sacrifice. I owe them,” he said. He told me that he had been a Marine and that he was proud of that. He had joined The Corps during the Viet Nam war, but by the time he was through with training, the fighting was over. He said it in a measured matter-of-fact way that bespoke neither regret nor apology. He told me that his time in the Corps was spent “cleaning up some messes,” around the world. I have no idea what he meant, but I could tell that I had heard all I was going to hear about that.

He only spoke to answer my questions, otherwise he was content to watch with amusement, my working with the camera and trying to catch the light. But mostly he just sat quietly and looked out over the field.

When he did speak first, it was to ask if I might get a picture of him with the United States Marine

S

Sometimes I forget what I’m riding,” says Jim Bourget,” and I reach down by the side of the gas tank for the shifter.

But it ain’t there! And then I remember I’m on a new bike. But, I guess old habits die hard because I rode about twenty five years with a sideshifter.” That is to say, Jim Bourget of Boston, rode Harleys with sideshifters longer than most people here on Sturgis’ famous Main street have been riding at all.

Even though he’ll be a young and inspirational eighty years old soon, he still works.

He’s master pipe fitter and has been riding HarleyDavidsons for sixty six years.

We met on Main street in Sturgis with Bourget and his various relatives, Raymond Clark, also 79(!), Warsofsky, 43, and Mike Clark 45, all of whom ride Harleys.

All are from the greater Boston and Cape Cod area, and they defer to Bourget when it comes to conversation and motorcycles.

“I bought my first HarleyDavidson in 1940” says Bourget.

“It was a 1936 E model. Then I went in the Army right after that.

I sold that first bike in1947, and bought a new 1947 model, then after that I bought a 1949 Hydraglide.” Bourget smiles, talking about those old Harleys—“I really like the old foot clutch, side shifters with the spark retard on the left and throttle on the right. I owned a couple of Indians but their controls were opposite, so like many guys I ‘Harleyized’ them by switching

the controls.” He laughs out loud at the thought of such a sacrilege back in the days when Harley riders and Indian riders were so loyal to their motorcycles that they didn’t even speak to each other. In many parts of the country the rivalry was bitter, and the Harley and Indian racing teams played for blood.

We asked Bourget his opinion of today’s riding world. “Yes,” he says emphatically, I’d like to comment about how many women of all ages there are riding motorcycles now. Seems as though 8 years ago you wouldn’t see this many women riding bikes,

especially riding Harleys, and dressers to boot. Why, the other day I even saw a woman riding a bike with a man passenger!,” he says in amazement. “I thought that was an amazing sight to see a woman riding and a man sitting on the back with a large smile on his face. I absolutely approve, I think its’ wonderful. And women can be tough, too. I rode out here two years ago, and a woman rode with us, and she hadn’t been riding more than two years and she rode all the way. She rode from Massachusetts, across the prairie, in the wind in all sorts of weather. And since then I’ve been observing other

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women riders, and I have a sense that they’re at least as good at riding as men are. As a matter of fact, I’ve been riding a good many years, and I think this motorcycle thing gets better all the time. The bikes are better, the women are better.”

We ask him if the women are prettier now, and he grins widely.

“I don’t know,” he says, “they were pretty good looking when I was younger!”

Even at this early date, Main street is full. Bikes are parked peg to peg, sidewalks are packed hip to hip, belly button to fanny pack, and the street will look like this the remainder of the rally. There may be as many as 600,000 bikers here this week, but only a tiny fraction of that number can fit on Main street at any given time. As we chatted the aroma of sizzling sausages, green peppers and onions tugged at us while Harleys rumbled by, and that American West phenomenon of huge raindrops falling from a crystal clear blue sky overhead nudged these men to wax philosophical about Sturgis. “ This really does sound like rolling thunder,” says Ray Clark.”

I think that’s the only way you could explain downtown Sturgis to anyone who’s never been here.

You know, I really feel like I’m in the middle of the motorcycling society.” Bourget agrees and opines that you can forget Daytona and any other motorcycle gathering; you haven’t really seen the motorcycling world until you’ve seen it here.

A

the fringe, he’s ndrew used to it. He’s Aukes is an air force kid a high whose father school works on Bsenior here in 1 bombers at town and he’s Ellsworth Air a good kid.

Force Base just He’s one of the down the road, housekeepers and Andrew is at the motel at tight with his which we’re family and it’s staying and plain he adores he’s working his father. hard and Military brats saving his can handle it. money, doing And Andrew his best even loves his though his boss rock-nis a jerk. He’s roll. soft spoken With some help from his and a bit shy, dad, Andrew has scraped and one can up four hundred bucks, just tell that enough money to go see he’s probably a full blown galaxy of not one of the rock stars that are here ‘in’ crowd, for Bike Week. It’s an and isn’t opportunity he and the much shucks other locals would never of an athlete. have were it not for Bike But Andrew Week. Sure, this yearly is tough and event is good money strong; he has for the businesses and to be because the economy and yadda an American yadda yadda. But for the male at average working folks eighteen years here, Bike Week is a old will take a great opportunity to see things they lot of gas from would normally never would. his buds for Andrew has tickets for: taking a job as Nickelback, Black Crowes, Gin a motel maid.

Blossoms, Carolyn Wonderland But Andrew & the Imperial Monkeys, Ross doesn’t care &Rotten, Charlie Brechtel Band, about being on Montgomery Gentry, Kid Rock,

Ted Nugent, Joe Walsh & the James Gang, Buckcherry and Alice in Chains.

“My dad just went out and bought the tickets and when he brought them home in a big stack, I went yeeeaaaah,” he says Spicolli style.

Bike Week is a bit like a Woodstock West that has a better lineup than lots of rock festivals like Bonaroo in Nashville, and the vibe is a thousand times better.

Andrew is hoping that his dad can get some time off from the Air Force to go with him at night, but there’s a war on and the B-1 is a big part of it.

Kayla Vickerman is a high school student who works in housekeeping here too, and like Andrew is a bit shy, but she has Goth overtones and it’s easy to see she’s a bit of an intellectual. She’s

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also sick of their boss and although she’s only worked here a couple days, and although she’s not a biker, she has a biker’s heart. If her boss doesn’t get off her back, Kayla will tell her boss to shove it.

And like Andrew, she just turned eighteen and she likes her rock-nroll.

She went to a concert last night and I ask her, despite the rowdy reputation of Sturgis concerts, did she have fun? “Yeah it was fun,” she says softly, “it was my first time to the Buffalo Chip, but it was only Billy Idol so it wasn’t that bad.” Take that you fortysomethings, who thought Billy Idol with his trademark sneer was the god of rampant sex and pure

rebellion back in the seventies when he was hot.

The rock concerts are the biggest deal here for sure, but after talking with Andrew and Kayla for a while, it’s plain that after the music, what they like the most about Bike Week are the bikers themselves. “ I like the bikers,” says Andrew,” because they like to party and have a good time just like us kids out here.” Andrew tells me about how the bikers crack him up with their tall tales of travel and daring-do.

He’s not sure if the stories are true but he loves hearing them just the same.

However, A.J. Henrikson,22, who is my favorite bartender and works at Boston’s, doesn’t care if the stories are true or not. A.J. is a gorgeous girl who wears her brunette hair up in a biker’s bandana, and it’s plain to see why the young studs hit on her so much.

“I was thinking that I really like waiting on the bikers because they’re in just the best mood everrrr,” she says with her valley girl rolling ‘r,’ and a bit of upspeak,“and they’re just really fun to wait on and they’re ready to get to know me and I’m ready to get to know them. It doesn’t even feel like work for me. I make a lot of money that week,” (ah yes, the money) “but for me it’s the people. I love it when I see a biker from last year—I’ll see them coming to the bar, and I’ll have their favorite drink waiting for them and they just love that.”

A.J. opines that bikers are far

more fun than other groups that come here like the spam-in-the-can drivers (motorhomes) or the stock show people. “The stock show people,” she says, “make me run around and don’t really appreciate my work like the bikers do. The bikers are so much more relaxed and easy to get along with. They’re more patient too.”

Like thousands of other small town kids across the country, Andrew, Kayla and A.J. will be leaving soon for college in other cities in other states, but they tell me they’ll be back. They’ll be back just like Andrew’s aunt in Utah, who comes to Bike Week every year just to see all the people and the motorcycles.

Even shy Kayla says, “I’m moving to Seattle, but me and my friends are looking forward to coming back to Bike Week every year just because… I don’t know why…just because everybody’s here, and everybody’s doing things.”

Ah yes, Kayla my dear, , you get

Somewhere in South Dakota Or, my interview with Montgomery Gentry

I

’m lost. Big time lost. I’m on a Dyna Wide Glide on an endless dirt road somewhere north of Sturgis and Rapid City. But I’m not sure how far north I am, and I have no idea where this road goes, but it’s supposed to be one of those ‘shortcuts,’ when you take the ‘backroads,’ that will get you there a lot quicker. Right.

I asked a couple of locals the fastest way to get to the Buffalo Chip campground in Sturgis, because I was in Rapid City and supposed to interview country music superstars Montgomery Gentry in a half hour.

“Oh, don’t take the interstate,” one of them said, “the bikes and cars will be lined up for miles on the exit ramp into Sturgis, then when you get to the ‘Chip,’ the lines will be even longer!”

“That’s right,” said another, “take the back way, and you’ll miss all the traffic and there won’t be any lines from the direction you’re coming.”

Fine, sounds good to me; they live here, they should know the way. So I followed their directions and got off the superslab at Elk Creek road, and headed North. I rode for about five miles when the pavement disappeared, and suddenly I was a dirt tracker. ‘Well,’ I thought, ‘no problem. ‘This can’t last for long, and besides, for most of the life of the Harley-Davidson Motor

Company, their bikes were ridden on roads not yet paved. If they could hack it then, they can damn sure hack it now.’ So I pressed on.

I dusted ahead for another fifteen

the first rain drop smacked me on the nose.

It was a big drop that splashed onto my goggles. The monster kind of raindrop that had it stayed in the

miles through rolling hills dotted by farmhouses, some new, some abandoned, but all surrounded by the ubiquitous Butler Building tin silos and sheds. One lonely rancher apparently collects old harvesting machinery because he has fifty of them lined up on his property, all the same colored tin as the Butlers.

The Wide Glide rumbled along happily even though the front wheel got a little nervous in the deeper sand. Every couple of miles a pickup blasted by, driven by a big burly rancher, the roiling dust cloud and sprayed gravel forced me to stop for a moment and let the fine dirt settle. ‘This place could use some rain,’ I said out loud. And

thunder cloud a few more rotations could have been a hailstone.

‘Perfect,’ I thought. “I’m lost on a dirt road in the rain. Here comes the mud.’

So, like I said…I’m lost…big time lost. I haven’t been this lost since the time my dirt bike quit somewhere in the middle of Bolivia. Come to think of it, the wide open terrain there looked a lot like this.

But I gotta stay focused here because I’m late and getting later, stopped here on the side of this dirt road. My interview with Montgomery Gentry should be starting right now and I must be two hours away from The Buffalo

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Chip. To find exactly where I am, I pulled out my Garmin GPS V and fired it up. Surely it could tell me which way to go. But no. This dirt road didn’t register on its database, however the Garmin did tell me I was fifty miles Northeast of Sturgis, which meant I was far later than I thought. I shut down the GPS and when I put it away in my backpack, I broke out my cel phone so I could call Montgomery Gentry’s road manager and tell him I’d be late. Fat chance. There was only stone cold silence from the cel company that promises fewer dropped calls. And the buffalo was no help either.

I couldn’t believe it, a huge buffalo stood right in the middle of the road like he owned it, which he did.

He wasn’t afraid of me, or my motorcycle or its horn but he jumped three feet straight in the air when the lightning bolt hit twenty yards behind him. I only jumped a couple of feet but I was just as scared as he was because I saw the flash and I swear I felt the heat.

The explosive crack of the thunder almost knocked me off the bike.

The buffalo charged straight ahead and he passed right by me, close enough that I could smell him and feel the ground shake.

Now then, any other time I’d be irritated. I was lost, late, buffaloed and getting wet. But then I thought, what the hell, this is Sturgis Bike Week. I came here to ride, and I’m riding. Business and schedules be damned—if it ain’t fun here, it’s nothing. So I cranked up the Dyna and was about to push on when a

rancher in a pickup slid to a stop and he asked if I needed some help and did I see that crazy buffalo running down the road? I asked him how to get to the Buffalo Chip, and he laughed and said I missed the turnoff about ten miles back.

He gave me more directions and warned me about the lightning, I thanked him profusely and I charged back from whence I came.

By now the rain felt like needles and I covered my face with my left hand as I rode on in the dirt and emerging mud. This time I found the turnoff and rode for another hour until I got to the Buffalo Chip.

When I got backstage, their road manager Chris Wyatt told me I was an hour and a half late and the guys were sleeping in their bus. If I wanted an interview and photos I’d have to wait around for another three hours. I replied that would be fine, and I met up with photographers Peter Reitzfeld and Kelly Lasky. We walked the grounds of the Buffalo Chip which is a little more mellow than I remember but still has its biker roots. This is where all of those naughty pictures come from that you see in the biker magazines.

Although it’s not as raunchy as it used to be, still, I was amused to see a couple on a blanket working diligently to start a new family.

When I got back to Montgomery Gentry’s bus, they were waiting for us. I’ve known the guys for six years now and we greeted each other with hugs and handshakes.

They were about to go onstage so Peter and Kelly quickly got their shots, and I was one minute into taping a quick interview when the Hawaiian Tropics models walked by in their ‘almost bikinis.’ Well, that was the end of the talking. We all stared like teenagers as they

walked by, and when they were gone, the guys had to leave for their meet-n-greet. And that was it.

Now, being a dedicated journalist, and after a full day of ‘research,’ I am obligated to fulfill my assignment, and transcribe the entire tape of my interview with Montgomery Gentry. Here it is.

Me: How many years have you been coming to Sturgis?

Gentry: We started coming here in 1999, and this is our fifth time here.

Me: Do you guys ride while you’re here?

Montgomery: Yeah, we always come a day early to ride but it seems like it rains when we’re here!

Me: Do you take your bikes with you on tour?

Gentry: You bet, we have a trailer just for our bikes.

Me: Whoa, there goes the Tropics girls!

Montgomery: Good Lord!

Gentry: Holy…!

Me: I don’t know what to say…

Montgomery: I think we be done.

(Everyone is laughing) Not much of an interview, but then, I have to say, the adventure was worth the effort. And the adventure is what we’re here for.

After the concert, I take the three hour ‘shortcut’ back to the motel instead of the interstate which would get me there in a half hour.

There is still lots of lightning and rain, but I’m sad to say there was no sign of the buffalo. Maybe I’ll ride this road again tomorrow and find him.

I wonder if he thinks Harleys bring thunder?

Everyone else does.

“

Dis is der trip of de lifetimes,” says Konrad Beer of Munich, Germany who is riding his 1952 Panhead from Texas to Sturgis and back. He had his bike air freighted to the Dallas airport where he picked it up, kicked it over and like his heroes in the movie Easyriders, headed out

had no reference point. Seeing the Mexican border gave him a hint, but again, he wasn’t sure. The Grand Canyon and Monument Valley might have come the closest, because his Pan broke down around there and he was picked up by a genuine American Indian who hauled his bike to the dealer in

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latter from Denver on up here to Sturgis. He likes it so much here, that he might just declare this the center of America. For him, this is the best of all possible worlds; great open spaces, and motorcycles everywhere.

Wherever Konrad goes, people

It takes clanking brass balls

to ride an antique motorcycle across the desert.

to see if he could find America anywhere. It takes clanking brass balls to ride an antique motorcycle across the desert. Those old motors break down a lot unless they’re perfectly maintained and the shops have no Panhead parts out there, let alone replacement custom parts from which his frame is made.

He thought he found America in San Antonio and El Paso, Texas, but he wasn’t sure, he

Farmington, New Mexico.

From Farmington Konrad rode to Durango, Colorado and crossed Wolf Creek pass which he didn’t think much of. When it comes to mountains, people who live in the Alps are hard to impress, and like so many Germans who come to America, he would much rather spend his time in the desert or the great plains. He had seen the former, and passed through the

take pictures of his bike and want to talk to him. They want to know where he’s from, where he’s going, where he got his bike…everything.

He’s lovin’ his fifteen minutes and he was grinning from ear to ear the entire time I was with him.

“Dis is heaven, ja?” he asks. “ Nah,” I answer, “it’s just South Dakota. But close enough.”

T

he ladies that come here are spectacular. No matter their age, from 18 to 50, during Bike Week, they’re all ladies. Some people say that the Laughlin run with its proximity to Los Angeles, and Daytona Beach with its beaches and commingling Spring Break has the prettier girls, but no, Sturgis has them all beat hands down.

The ladies that come to Sturgis know it too. They flaunt it and they flirt.

There must be something about Sturgis being so far away from any big city and accompanying political correctness that is liberating to the Bike Week ladies. They laugh more, they ride their bikes more and longer, and at night they drink a little more. Why, I even saw a few of them yesterday smoking cigars!

And the clothes they wear! Oh, my. You got your spandex and your short shorts. You got your pasties and g-strings and thongs and tank tops and no tops. And chaps— ladies love chaps because they know that every butt is enhanced by chaps.

Ordinary butts are made to be very good, and good butts get to be spectacular.

It’s a veritable sea of hot leather and female pulchritude. And they love to have their picture made.

I have yet to be turned down by a lady when I ask for a photo. Not only do

they agree, most of them will snap out a rather nice pose as if they’ve been practicing in the mirror all their lives, and then hand me their camera so I can shoot them with it.

A few of them who have the right ammunition will even hit me with

a barrage of exposed cleavage.

I blush and they laugh.

I just love Bike Week.

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7

Dispatch To Our Brothers Prospective buyers will In Arms have to prove that they

I

are in, or have served just today saw the in the military, but once press release for that is accomplished, the new military the owner will have edition Harleys. a very special bike Like all Harleys, indeed.

I bet I’ll see lots of them they’re gorgeous, but here next year because these bikes will have here in Sturgis many exthe added significance military men wear their colors with a great deal of of a beautiful custom pride. The Viet Nam Vets, installed official mostly Army and Marine seal of the particular Corps, have many hundreds of members, and you see branch of service in which the rider served. them in their vests all over

town. The Navy types wear baseball caps with the name of their ships on the crown, and the Air Force guys wear t-shirts emblazoned with the aircraft type they were most intimate with. My brother Darrell ordered his new Springer from Cool Springs HarleyDavidson in Franklin, Tennessee when he was still ducking mortars in Baghdad. The first thing he did was get a new paint job with the famous picture airbrushed on his bike, of an army medic bending over a wounded soldier and waving away the grim reaper with the words, “not

yet.” Harley-Davidson riders take their patriotism seriously, and Sturgis offers some great places to visit for anyone wishing to see things military.

My favorite is the Air Museum at Ellsworth Air Force Base just six miles east of Rapid City on I-90.

It has many of my favorite aircraft including a B-29, and a static display of the bomber type currently in active service there, the B-1 Lancer, or as the crews affectionately call it, ‘The Bone.’ The museum is free and because it’s on the outer perimeter of the base, you can drive right in. I was surprised how many motorcycles were in the parking area to see the old aircraft. For a big thrill, hang out on the South side of the base for a while and chances are you’ll see a B-1 takeoff.

Very impressive.

A National Cemetery is located within the Sturgis city limits. It’s gratifying to see that each headstone was honored with an American flag this year. I don’t know why it is decorated like it is,

but it’s very stirring, and is a fitting tribute. For those with a desire for historical research, this can be a fascinating place.

Of course the most famous and most visited patriotic icon in the region is Mt. Rushmore. I would bet that fully half the riders who come to Bike Week go see the four presidents on Rushmore because there is a steady stream of motorcycles in an out of there. When you come here to Bike Week—and you know you will someday— try to see the monument at the night lighting

ceremony. It’s beautiful to see, and for the most part the ceremony is reverent with the exception of a goofy and inappropriate little spiel giving historical equivalence of the honored presidents to an insurance salesperson, and the individual who invented liquid paper. Nice try at being politically correct, but dumb. Aside from that, Rushmore is absolutely worth the trip up the mountain.

I

n my second dispatch, I told you about all the HarleyDavidsons coming into town by the hundreds, then thousands, tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands. Motorcycle headlights came from all points of the compass, pointed directly at Sturgis, South Dakota for bike week. I stood on the I-90 overpass at exit 58 and watched them come in. It’s Saturday night now, and a few minutes ago I stood on that same overpass and watched in amazement the thousands and thousands of taillights headed in the opposite direction. Going home.

And saddlebag by saddlebag, Tourpak by backpack, they’re taking with them pieces of Bike Week. It’s anyone’s guess how many t-shirts, jackets, boots, belts, hats and vests are packed in those bags going home, but it’s a lot, because riders tell me those bags are way fuller going than they were coming. Some things they bought don’t take up any space at all, like the patches that were sewn on vests and jackets. Tattoos are easy to pack, but one must be gentle, a loose shirt sleeve flapping in the wind can be excruciating in a hundred miles. The rolling tattoo parlors did big business; I saw dozens of shiny arms, legs and backs, all with new tattoos covered with petroleum jelly.

I talked to a gentleman from New Orleans who was filling his Harley at a gas station, headed out of town. He had a colorful new set of anchors and chains over the letters USN buzzed into his right bicep. It’s his first tattoo and he’s 62 years old. The reds and blues of his new ‘tat’ are brilliant and shiny. He told me he was in the

Navy back in the early sixties and I asked him why he waited so long to get one. He laughed when he said he was waiting for the price to go down. When he finally saw that wasn’t going to happen he figured it was time to ‘get ‘er done.’ When

how it sparkles in the sun, and he shrugged sheepishly. Well, a deal’s a deal, and Sturgis 2006 was good to both of them.

John and Joni Elward of San Bruno, California are loading up their pristine FXR and heading

I asked his wife’s opinion on her husbands new branding, she said she didn’t much like it, but they made a deal, and she showed me her new Black Hills Gold ring with a diamond that would choke a horse. She showed me

back home via Oregon. Like so many people I’ve talked with, the Elwards say this is the trip of a lifetime. This is their first Sturgis and they’re doing it right, riding the whole way. They wondered if they’d ever make it here after

“AndJustagainlike likeso manyso many,aroundthistownwill tonight probab

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hearing about it for so many years and they tell me the only thing that surprised them was how many families there are here. Sturgis isn’t nearly as rowdy as they’d heard, and they’re conflicted about whether they like that or not. They

He was sitting at the entrance of a campground and was staring intently at a mountain range a hundred miles distant. He tells me that this was the best damn party he ever saw, and he will sing about it as he rides in the back of his buddy’s pickup all the way back to Oklahoma.

Me: What did you like best about Sturgis?

The Clam: The party.

Me: Did you leave the campground?

The Clam: Nope.

Me: How come?

The Clam: Because the party was right here.

And with that he resumed his examination of the mountain range.

The parking lots of the motels are filled with Winnebagos and mini vans full of kids, and the ‘Welcome Bikers,’ banners are coming down.

Bargains are everywhere, and if T-shirt prices are any indication, last minute shoppers are finding great deals in downtown Sturgis.

In some places, T-shirts are now going three for ten dollars. I stopped and looked at some, and

t, I’m packing my gear for home. bly be my last big ride of the year. didn’t feel let down, it was just, well, a little different.

Eddie The Clam would disagree.

When I asked him why they call him ‘the clam,’ he told me it was because he likes to party.

”

they’re so thin as to not make the third washing intact, but they’re definitely available. One can only wonder how much he could save by buying a motorcycle here from the hundreds that are for sale.

There are lots of layers to Sturgis,

and almost all of them are good.

Three separate times while I was eating, people had designated that restaurant a meeting place and I saw them greet in emotional reunions. Some were relatives, others long lost friends. I even witness the accidental and spontaneous reunion of two cousins who hadn’t seen each other for over thirty years. What are the odds. I myself was reunited with Steve Flescher, a high school buddy and football teammate from our alma mater, Sparks Hi in Sparks, Nevada. I haven’t seen him for decades, and he and I vowed to stay in closer touch. Who knows, maybe we will.

Just like so many around town tonight, I’m packing my gear for home. And again like so many, this will probably be my last big ride of the year. Already the unusually hot weather has broken up here, and it’s downright cool this evening.

If you were here in Sturgis, I hope you had a great time. If you’re reading this somewhere in North Carolina, Germany, Australia, Iceland, Alaska China or anywhere the internet goes, it’s my wish that this new miracle of communication and my humble peckings on this keyboard have brought Sturgis Bike Week closer to you. This is a new undertaking for The HarleyDavidson Motor Company, and it’s been exciting to be part of the team that has worked so hard to create this for you.

Here’s hoping I see you on the road.

Until that time.

Where the author learns to love a rally

HOGS ON HIGH SE

by Beau Allen Pacheco Photos By The Author

with no bikes !

N THE EAS

It

took a while for me to get it, this Hogs on the High Seas Rally…er…deal… er…thing. When I first got the assignment to take

the cruise I didn’t like the concept, and what’s more I didn’t want to like it. I’m a motorcycle travel journalist dammit, and this is just a cruise where you dress up in your biker costume and spend money with motorcycle vendors. I thought the whole concept was parasitic; merely a way to make a buck from the motorcycling world.

No motorcycles, and no riding—just what the hell kind of rally is that? What’s the point? Why do it? Motor rallies are a gathering of machinery, right? You go to an Austin Healy rally and see hundreds of those classic sports cars on the road for miles around. Same with Hot Rod Rallies, Corvette Rallies and Mustang rallies. They rally there, they’ve driven to a rally point,

that’s why they call them rallies.

On a Hogs on the High Seas ‘rally’, you ride the ship, go to the vendor area and buy things, then at each port is a ‘rally’ event. At

are the myriad snorkeling, scuba diving, golfing and sightseeing tours offered by Royal Caribbean Cruise lines.

For the first two days I groused

them as kin but they still looked sadly out of place on a spanking Royal Caribbean cruise ship.

But then at dinner at precisely 8:30 pm on the second night, I got

Cabo San Lucas, it was a special party at Cabo Wabo, at Mazatlan it was Senor Frog’s, or a party at the local Holiday Inn. In Puerto Vallarta HOHS hosted a party at Carlos O’Brian’s. All of the parties were usual biker events—drink a lot and be somebody. In addition to the HOHS events on shore,

around the ship scowling at Easy Rider era vests and headbands, and flabby arms dangling from black tank tops of fifty and sixtysomethings. Is anything dumber than wearing black shirts in the tropic sunshine? Sure, they have a Harley logo on them so that the other ‘ralliers’ can identify

it. Like an epiphany, the whole concept came together in my brain and this cruise made all the sense in the world. There I was, in the grand dining room chatting with my table mates when all of a sudden, I found that I was profoundly enjoying this meal with people I had never met before, but with whom I was

This cruise is like going to a your hometown and graduate

eliminates people with whom you have nothing in common. We’ve endured the same hardships, we have the same value system, same sense of adventure, we’re all iconoclasts, and we even look alike. I was amazed to see how many bikers there were who shave their heads and had goatees just like me.

This cruise is like going to a

instantly at ease. I was among friends.

While the non-biker passengers had eaten their evening meal at 6:00 in their suits and ties and evening dresses and high heels,(the cruises are typically half bikers, half non-bikers) we bikers were enjoying dinner at our leisure in jeans and t-shirts. Formal dining for us meant wearing leather instead of

and I had nothing in common with anyone I met; and hectic because it was Christmas break and the ship was full of insufferable upper-middle class kids with an unbearable sense of entitlement, running and hollering in the

party where everyone is from your hometown and graduated from your high school. You may not know them, but you’ve walked the same streets and eaten at the same

tuxedoes. The kicker was when I flashed back to the ordinary cruise I had taken four months earlier with my wife and in-laws. It too was on a Royal Caribbean ship, but the atmosphere was far different.

While I enjoyed it, it was both stuffy and hectic. Stuffy because dinners were suit and tie affairs

passageways.

But the High Seas cruise isn’t a rally to which you ride your motorcycle and incidentally, you get to spend time with brethren— no. This is where you get to take a cruise specifically to be with people you already know and like. It’s a filtering system that

burger joints. These are folks with whom you have a history of shared experiences even if you didn’t do it together. You know where they came from and they know what you know.

There are all sorts of theme cruises: nudists, dentists and golfers, etc. But this is better.

a party where everyone is from ed from your high school.

Hogs on the High Seas is organized by bikers for bikers. And not just any bikers. No, the natural selection process here is narrow; we’re talking Harley riders.

Although it’s not even necessary to own a bike to sign up for a Hogs on The High Seas cruise, it turns out that the vast majority of High Seas cruisers are avid riders. And the cruisers who are on this boat are all HOHS fanatics. Indeed, fully 50% of the HOHS guests on this cruise are returnees and I talked with many people on the ship who were just signing up for another cruise.

Bringing bikers together on a cruise ship was the vision of Dean and Debbie Anderson. “I had a tool franchise and I did all the rallies dozens of times and we were getting bored with them,” he says. “Then we were at a rally in Virginia in the pouring rain, and we thought, we have a lot of friends in biking and we like to spend a lot of time with them, but we don’t like paying $250 a night for a $39 motel room, and paying high prices for bad food. So we thought if we could get the price gougers out of the equation, we could travel with our friends to some cool places.

Now, as a rule, Bikers don’t go on cruise ships, so we were going to try and give them something they hadn’t done before.”

That proved easier said than done according to Anderson. “ It was hard to get the cruise lines to accept us and our concept of taking bikers on a cruise. The first time we sent a proposal, they answered that due to security concerns, they couldn’t accommodate bikers on their ships. I answered that I thought they were discriminating against bikers. Of course they didn’t want to get in any liability hassles over minorities, so they sent our

proposal to their captain of security The cruise line said if it was okay with him, they’d allow us on the boat. Well, their security guy was a biker, and he said bring ‘em on. He got the deal done for us.

At one time or another, we’ve had every group, or gang represented on our cruises, from Hell’s Angels to Christian Riders, and they all get along—as long as they don’t wear their colors. Over the years we have proved to be Caribbean Cruise’s highest revenue generators of all groups with the lowest maintenance.” Anderson grins widely when he says the next sentence: “now they like us a lot.”

The fact that so many ‘ralliers’ keep returning, and the Cruise lines like them so much is a result of the Anderson’s meticulous attention to detail and excruciating work ethic. “We pre-cruise every event before it happens,” says Debbie.

“And I mean every cruise. We want to make sure the ship meets our standards and that the land events are in place. Then we approach the businesses on shore that we think our guests would be interested in. Now, some of them are real receptive, but some are skeptical that we can bring over a thousand bikers to their location. But we can, and we do. For our party places like Cabo Wabo, and Senor Frog’s we’re their biggest event of the year.”

Also, in the attention to detail department, the Anderson’s don’t let just any vendor participate in their cruise, and lots of them apply for it. But Dean, who is a motorhead deluxe, personally inspects each product submitted by a prospective vendor. If their product is a good one, then they might be allowed to display on a tour.

The Anderson’s also give back to their ‘ralliers’ in a big way.

A landlocked rally of around a thousand folks is pretty small and one might expect to win a couple hundred bucks in a poker run or door prizes. But the Anderson’s give back a whopping $320,000 in cash and merchandise on their Caribbean cruise. It’s a little less on their smaller cruise but not much, and that doesn’t count the three Harleys they give away. One afternoon on this cruise they gave away $15,000 in a single bingo game.

Hogs on the High Seas has turned into a love affair between Dean and Debbie and their cruisers.

Both of them are fanatical about providing what they promised.

But it’s more than that. This whole thing gets emotional because Dean and Debbie take very seriously the responsibility of providing them with fun. “We have Cancer patients, here, we have people who just had a heart attacks, and they know this is the last fun thing they’ll ever do. And they choose us. That effects us profoundly.”

Every rally has a charity of choice, and the Anderson’s have created the HOHS Dialysis Fund Inc. Over the years they’ve raised over three quarters of a million dollars for their charity. The main reason for the fund is provide a cruise for people on dialysis who would usually not get to go. On this cruise there are fourteen people who must undergo dialysis three times a week. HOHS has provided the machinery and a staff of four nurses and a doctor to administer the treatments.

The Anderson’s devotion to individual patrons is remarkable.

“You got me and Dean to drag your ass back to the ship when you’re

drunk as a skunk,” laughs Debbie.

“We’ve never left a passenger behind, nobody’s ever had a DUI, and nobody ever got killed on our event.”

After I saw the light at dinner on the second night, I started interviewing the ‘ralliers’ about this cruise. All of them were fanatical about liking the cruise, and all of them used the word camaraderie and brotherhood a lot. But it was the conversation I had with Dusty and Joy Santee from Yakima, Washington who were NOT with the HOHS group that was the most enlightening.

I asked them what it was like sharing the ship with a bunch of bikers. “Fantastic,” said Dusty. “In fact I’m buying a Harley when I get home. I’m 60 years old, and this has just stirred my juices, this is fantastic. This is a wonderful group of people. The bikers we’ve met here are by far the best we’ve ever met on the seven cruises we’ve taken. Even though we’re not part of the group, we try and mix with them as much as possible. We’ll make sure that the next cruise we take is with HOHS even if we don’t have a bike by then. We’ll book it online when we get home.”

Dusty and Joy got it way quicker than I did.

Photo Ga

allery