Weather reports for the weekend were predicting that both Saturday and Sunday would be dry and above freezing, so I decided to ride the Sabre to the Winter Maintenance Clinic.
I still had not gotten around to getting the electric vest, so Thursday night I started thinking about what I could do to make this bike ride feasible. I'm a skier, and I ski fast. I figured a lot of the stuff I use for skiing would also be good for this cold weather bike ride. On the ski hill, I fight the cold from my hands and feet by using chemical heater packs that heat up when exposed to the air. I remembered seeing these in larger sizes at the sporting goods store, so I stopped in and picked up a bunch of them. I also picked up a replacement for the turtle fur neck gaiter that got lost last time I went skiing. Then I went home and did some laundry so that all the things I needed would be clean and available for me to pack.
I don't normally get home from work until after 6pm. I had some things I needed to take care of, and I needed at least another hour to pack. I wouldn't have gotten to Cleveland until after midnight; why suffer through the bitter cold of riding at night? I decided to wait until Saturday morning, and give the sun time to warm things up a bit before I hit the road. I spent Friday night getting my errands done, getting packed, and being nervous. I felt like a kid on the night before the first day of school.
Saturday morning I brushed my hair out really well, and put it in two braids instead of my usual one. (The combination of a single super thick braid and all the stuff wrapped around my neck because of the cold makes it too hard to turn my head.) I dressed in layers. First I put on tights and a turtleneck, and I duct taped some of the pocket heaters to my tights. Then I put on my warmest wool ski socks, stuck boot heaters onto the socks, and put my boots on. Over the tights I put my ski bibs, and over the bibs my leather chaps. Then I put on a special windproof neck gaiter that covers my face and neck, with holes for my mouth and nose. Then the leather jacket, and over that my rain jacket. I pulled the braids to the outside. Then I put on my helmet, and struggled to get the face mask stuff all arranged. Then I realized I had forgotten my earplugs, so I had to pull off my helmet and put them in, and struggle with the helmet again. I put the hand heaters in my warmest mittens, and put those on, and carefully arranged the cuffs of the mittens over the leather jacket's sleeves, and tightened the rain suit's cuffs over the mittens.
The Sabre hadn't been ridden since the Sunday after Christmas, so it was a little rough getting it started. I had to crank it three or four times before it turned over, and then it stalled. But the next time I hit the start button, it fired right up and kept running. I had it warming up in the driveway while I put the outer layers of my gear on and loaded the last items onto the bike.
I had packed the saddle bags with supplies for an overnight stay, a wool ski sweater, and my ski parka in case I got really, really cold. I also packed spare mittens, the new turtlefur, dozens of extra chemical heaters of all three types, tools, books to read if I got stranded and had to sit on the roadside waiting for rescue, my planner, etc, etc. The soft saddlebags are large enough that I had to pack more things than I needed, just to keep them from flapping around, but they were not large enough for the sleeping bag, so I wrapped it in plastic bags for water resistance, and a cloth bag to protect the plastic from flapping and tearing in the wind, and strapped it on top of the passenger seat with a bungee net. It made a nice backrest. Motorcycle traveling is so luxurious compared to bicycle touring; the extra weight just doesn't matter to the Sabre.
It was almost 10am by the time I pulled out of my driveway. I was figuring on riding ten miles south to Milan, and stopping for gas and to visit the bank machine. If it went well I would go on; if not I would turn around and come home, and drive out in my truck. It went very well. I felt great when I got to Milan. The only change I made was to put a piece of duct tape over the forehead vent in my helmet; even closed that vent was letting cold air blow over my head. I got the gas, visited the bank machine, and continued south on US 23. South of Toledo I stopped for an early lunch and then picked up the 80/90 toll road east. The sun was shining and I felt great! I passed a sign that said Cleveland 110 miles. I could do this.
The plaza halfway between Toledo and Cleveland was closed for renovations. That's too bad, because that's where I should have stopped. As it was, I had to go another 50 miles or so to the next one. The last ten miles, I was starting to get a bit cold and tired; I was more than ready for the plaza on the outskirts of Cleveland. At this plaza I filled the gas tank; I'd only gone 140 miles or so since the last gas stop, but why risk running out in the frigid weather? While I was getting gas, a guy putting gas in his truck on the other side of the pump told me I was one diehard biker. He had a friend who had a Sabre, and he asked if I knew where to get parts for them. I gave him the web site, www.sabmag.org, and told him to send his friend there to find out how to sign up for the list if he had questions like that.
I paid for the gas, and opened another pocket warmer. It was only another 10 or 20 miles to David and Janine's from that rest stop, but I didn't think it was a good idea to scrimp. I placed the new warmer on my chest, and closed the jackets over it. It felt good having it there as I rode away. But it fell out somewhere, because I was getting a bit cold again by the time I got to Janine and David's, and when I opened my coats the heater was missing. I should have duct taped it to my shirt.
When I pulled into the driveway, several folks came out of the garage to see who it was. I had earplugs in and could barely hear, but I could see them speaking and looking questioning. I figured they would know it was me, since I'd told Janine and David I'd be arriving around that time, but apparently they hadn't a clue. I said "Hello, it's me!" and saw recognition and surprise on David's face. I pulled the helmet off and heard David telling them who I was as I took out my earplugs. (Reminder to self: Next time I stop for gasoline fifteen minutes short of my destination, I should take out my earplugs then, so I can hear what people say to me when I pull up.)
They seemed surprised that I'd come there on the bike without a windshield or electrics, but really it had not been that bad. Total distance from my house to the WMC was only about 160 miles. I was fine for that distance. But I don't think I would want to attempt a much longer trip without getting better equipment. My hands and feet were fine, but I had cold spots on the backs of my arms and my upper chest. It was also tiring to ride that distance without a windshield.
I knew a few of the people there already. I had met David and Janine when Erik Kauppi and I drove my truck to Cleveland to carry Richard Wainwright's Bandit there. I had met Greg Terpin when I bought my Sabre from him, and there were a few familiar faces from Chicago, guys who had visited Greg while Erik and I were picking up my bike. But I still felt kind of shy; it boosted my confidence a bit that they seemed to think so highly of me for riding from Michigan without any electrics or windshield.
Some of the people I had been especially looking forward to meeting were not there. I had been talking to Kevin Kirkendall in private email and developed a fairly good friendship with him; I was looking forward to meeting him face to face. IBM and Russell Stephan's messages to the list had always intrigued me, because they take those unbelievable trips. And several friends had spoken highly of Phil Ross. I was disappointed not to see any of them, but I quickly learned that they had gone off to the motorcycle show and would be returning. It was easy to bide my time, because there was so much going on and so many other interesting people to talk to. I'm not one to stay shy for long, so I quickly got past that first-meeting tension.
I observed much wrenching. Bob Peloquin and David Ryder were working on reassembling the rear suspension of Janine's bike. Milt was working on his fork seals with several helpers. With help from Erik Kauppi, I did the fork seals on my bike in November, so I know about fork seals already, and they didn't seem to need any advice from me, so I mostly watched the reassembly work that David and Bob were doing, and visited with the other folks that were standing around.
At some point we all went in for a fantastic lunch, which I had no trouble eating, despite having just had lunch in Toledo a few hours earlier. After lunch, more wrenching.
Finally Janine's bike was done. I'm always itching for another ride, so I offered to accompany her on her test ride. As we were getting suited up, the contingent who had been to the motorcycle show arrived. I felt shy again. I could hardly look at the new arrivals. Kevin Kirkendall almost instantly offered to let me ride his bike to accompany Janine, and I would have, but the bike wasn't there because Phil had it and he hadn't brought it back yet. Then, still flustered, I had to turn my own bike around and get it out of the driveway, because Janine was waiting. I was afraid I'd drop it and feel like an idiot. But I didn't. And it was good to leave just then, because there were too many people, all at once. The ride with Janine restored my equilibrium very well.
Then back to Chez Ryder, and after a brief bit of chitchatting we were on our way to the mongolian barbecue. I traded bikes with Kevin for the ride to the restaurant. I brought up the rear as we rode up the highway. I laughed maniacally inside my helmet, suddenly filled with joy at being exactly where I was. The other riders were inducing backfires, and pushing their center stands down to drag on the ground and make sparks, which was fun to see. They were obviously in just as high of spirits as I was. I decided not to attempt to induce backfires or throw sparks, because I never did either one before, and it seemed to me that I probably shouldn't make my first attempt at things like that on someone else's bike. Though Kevin had no scruples about my bike. (Don't worry, Kevin, I didn't mind.)
At the restaurant, we had appetizers and then the mongolian barbecue. The appetizers were good, especially the crab rangoon and the hot and sour soup, and I was pleased that this mongolian barbecue had noodles. After dinner, both Phil and Kevin offered to let me try their electrics on the way back, and I almost did, but I decided against it for two reasons. One; I wanted to ride my own, familiar bike on the way back, and two; I was already dressed to ride in the cold without electrics, and they hadn't necessarily come out with that in mind, so they'd probably be miserable.
When we left the restaurant, we turned left and rode a little ways up the street to a gas station, where about half the riders filled up. I still had 3/4 of a tank, so I just waited and watched the riders mill about. Then Janine dropped her bike. I put my sidestand down to go help, but before I could even get off my bike some other riders helped her pick it up again. Then she roared off alone in one direction, while the rest of the riders went the other way. I followed the larger group, and almost dumped it myself because I had forgotten to put my sidestand up. Fortunately I caught it in time, and kicked it up.
I followed the pack back down the street, past the restaurant. The rider who was in front of me (who I later determined was Phil) slowed down and beckoned me to go ahead and take the second-to-last spot that the new person is supposed to have. I felt grateful for his perceptiveness, as the group turned onto a side street that proved to be a metropark entrance, and proceeded to ride twenty or thirty miles of twisties in the dark. I had to struggle to keep up, but they didn't lose me. I appreciated the support of that unknown rider behind me, looking out for the neo. By the time we got back to the house I was pretty darned cold and tired, and I was glad I hadn't taken anyone's bike and electrics, because that person would have frozen their ass off, and I'd have been on some unfamiliar bike trying to keep up with the pack in the dark. I was close enough to my limits that I would probably have had to drop off the back or seriously risk dumping someone else's bike.
It was wild and fun out there on the twisties with those guys. What a bunch of hooligans! Lots of backfires, lots of centerstand sparks, way too much speed. Wheeee! I knew I was out of my league, but I was glad to be there. (David later apologized to me; he said he forgot I was a new rider and he hoped I wasn't too distressed. Frankly, I spend so much time being so freaking responsible that riding with them was an incredibly joyous thing. I wouldn't have missed it for the world.)
Back at the Ryder Ranch people watched videos and hung out. I'm not much of a TV watcher, so I sat in the far corner of the dining room, where people were talking.
Later, people starting drifting off to bed, back to the Ramada, etc. I'm a night person, and I was having too much fun to sleep, so I stayed up late swapping tall tales with Mike Stewart and a couple of other folks. Finally I crashed on the living room floor. Gadget Dan was the only other person in the living room, and I was very relieved that he snores, because I do too. He slept heavily and didn't complain.
I woke up in the morning when a dog stepped on my head. I managed to go back to sleep, but then the dog stepped on my head again! I rolled over closer to the couch, but it didn't matter, it seemed that no sooner did I doze off when it happened again. I dragged myself up to a half sitting position, resting my head on the couch, and went back to sleep. I didn't sleep long before a dog slurped at my face, and I squawked at it to get away and pushed it off me, and tried to go back to sleep. Bob Peloquin was making coffee in the kitchen, and heard me talk to the dog, and he came in and sat on the other couch and started talking to me. (Morning people! Sheesh!) I'm too gregarious to go back to sleep when someone is talking to me, and I liked Bob, but I was still pretty groggy. After fending off another friendly dog attack, I dragged my whole body up onto the couch and tried to get my face out of range of dogs. Then David's girls made an appearance with the little cat, and there was just no resisting the day any longer. Gadget Dan is a sound sleeper, though; he slumbered on for some time, until even more people started moving around.
David and Janine put on a serious spread of food; bacon, sausage, bread, and a giant pan of scrambled eggs with chopped up stuff in them. I usually don't eat very well when I've been woken up early; the only time I can face breakfast is when I've slept myself out first, so I couldn't do it justice. I sat next to Katherine Stewart, and we had a bit of a chance to talk; I liked her very much.
There was much milling about and chatting, and then we set out for the bike show. Since they were charging six bucks per vehicle to park, even for motorcycles, we decided we'd all pile into Janine's van. There were nine or ten of us including the girls, but none of the sabmags bite (or if they do, they hide that propensity well) so we squeezed in. Unfortunately, that was more weight than the van's suspension could handle, and the muffler started scraping just getting out of the driveway. So a few people got out and Janine drove them in the other car.
At the show, Kevin wandered with me and we looked at all the bikes that were available to sit on. We agreed that the most comfortable one was the BMW touring bike; I forget the letter/number designation, but it had great ergos for tall riders, and an interesting windshield that could be snapped up and down for different amounts of wind protection. Some notably uncomfortable bikes were a Ducati with a strangely shaped gas tank (I guess the bathroom breaks would have to be closer together for the rider of that bike) and an extremely wide cruiser, I think it was a Valkyrie? It had the ergos of a lawn tractor.
I was looking for a windshield, but didn't manage to find one. At the Honda club booth, we met a guy who asked me what kind of bike I rode, and I said that I rode a V65 Sabre, and so did he (pointing at Kevin) and the guy said he rode a Sabre too, and asked if we were in town for the Winter Maintenance Clinic? Turns out he was a lurker on the list; his name was Larry George. As we were talking to him, Bob and Milt came up and also got introduced.
I was getting a bit tired, and Kevin had already seen the show on Saturday, so we wandered over to the food area. Kevin bought some "Mackinac Island" fudge and we staked out a table and sat down. David, Janine and the girls joined us shortly thereafter, and helped polish off the fudge. Then Kevin and I rode the ferris wheel with the girls. When we ended up stopping at the top, they rocked the car like crazy. I guess I'm a stick-in-the-mud; I didn't help rock. I wasn't scared and I don't get motion sickness, but it seemed to me that they were rocking the car pretty violently, and if another large person joined this activity, someone might fall out. Also I didn't want to upset the ride operators. Like I said before, I spend way too much time being too freaking responsible.
When we got down from the ferris wheel, it was time to see the trials bike demo. That was pretty neat; they were practically dancing on those bikes, bouncing them around doing wheelies and stoppies and catching air by going up ramps.
After that, we ran into Russell Stephan, who asked if I had seen the Gerbing booth. I hadn't. So he wandered over there with me, and it didn't take much convincing for me to get the electric jacket and thermostat. We met back up with the others, and I ended up at the food area having some hot pretzels with the girls. I was getting pretty hungry by this point; it was probably 3pm and I hadn't eaten much breakfast all those hours ago. Eventually we all met back up and made our way back out to the parking lot.
In the car, David said something about helping me put the hookup on my bike for the electric jacket, but I said I thought I could handle it myself. He said he'd loan me the tools, but I said I had everything I needed in my tank bag. Kevin expressed confidence that I could do whatever I wanted to do. Then we started talking about women listers. Kevin confessed that when he first met me on the list, he thought maybe I was a ringer, a guy pretending to be female. David said something about how women came and went from the list, and eventually a woman like me had to come along. I decided to consider that a compliment.
Back at the house, I worked on the hookups, and the Dan from Chickamauga wanted to help me out. I wanted to read the instructions, figure out how it worked, and do it with my own tools. It was sweet that he wanted to help, but having just been pumped up by David and Kevin in the car, the last thing I wanted to do was be rescued from wrench work on my bike. I hooked it up and it worked great.
Not long after that, I collected goodbye hugs (I'm sorry guys, but this handshaking thing just doesn't cut it!) from the remaining folks and rode off. Kevin rode with me the first mile or so, before turning south. Then I continued on alone. The electric jacket was marvelous! It got dark before I even got to the toll road, but I rode on. Remembering that the oasis at the midpoint was closed, I stopped at the first oasis and topped off the tank. I got cold fast when I unplugged.
I rode the rest of the way home without any stops at all, even though I had initially planned to stop for food in Toledo. After unplugging at the gas station I was not anxious to unplug again. About the time I reached Toledo, I started experiencing a lot of trouble with my glasses fogging up. I kept having to raise my face shield momentarily to clear the fog, and then my eyes would tear up so I couldn't see, and so I'd pull it down again, and the fog would come again. I wonder if the humidity reached some magic threshold or what? Anyway, I made it home all right, and I am looking forward to my next Sabmag event.