SATURDAY (14 August 2010) marked the end of 15 days and 5,790 miles in the saddle for DP, Hidalgo and me. We rode the first 1,515 miles from Miami Beach FL to Wichita Falls TX in 35 hours 35 minutes, qualifying for what should be certified as my 51st Iron Butt ride. The next 1,540 miles took us west across stretches of Route 66 in Texas and New Mexico, then north through the awe-inspiring peaks and valleys of the Colorado Rockies, and finally northeast across Wyoming to Sundance (where the Kid got his name), our home base for the 70th Annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. After spending four enjoyable days cruising 455 leisurely miles through the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming, we rode back to SoBe by a shorter 2,280 mile route that took us through the less-inspiring but somehow more inviting ridges and gaps of the Smokies.

For the first time since 2005, I made it all the way to Sturgis and back without being arrested under a false pretense, getting ticketed for defying an unjust mandate, or having to rush a heat-stricken rider 30 miles to an emergency room. In fact, our greatest misfortune this year was a lack of cell phone service: ATT may cover “97% of Americans”, but they sure as Hell don’t cover 97% of America. 97% of the time my ATT phone was a worthless pocket weight, so I am 97% sure I’ll be replacing ATT with Verizon. Anyway… I’ll share more details about “the Ride” in future installments, but first a disdain for political correctness coupled with deplorable anger management compells me to convey the following commentary regarding “the Rally”:

The commercial exploitation and pussification of the American Biker was as open and obvious at this year’s “Black Hills Trailer Classic” as is the ongoing perversion of patriotism, needless sacrifice of our sons and daughters, and greedy sacking of our treasury, pensions and savings by the Republocratic puppets on the payroll of “Washington, Inc.” and their Kleptocratic masters pulling all strings left and right from Manhattan. “No Colors or Weapons Allowed Inside” signs pervaded business establishments along Main and Lazelle in Sturgis proper, making clear their intent to strip us of our culture as they take away our cash. I ignored them as I always do, but this year the Case 286 sheathed on my belt actually got me summarily uninvited from two “biker-friendly” bars that will receive no free press here.

Meanwhile, just down the road at the Buffalo Chip–owned and operated by Belle Fourche attorney Rod “Woody” Woodruff–throngs of both motorcyclists (those who rode) and trailerists (those who towed) wearing shiny new Hot Leathers vests adorned with just-purchased pins and freshly-sewn patches that say something but mean nothing (ok, been there) mindlessly welcomed registered sex offender and alleged child pornographer Paul Reubens a.k.a. “Pee Wee Herman” to the stage. As biker-bucks barrister Woodruff put it, “Bob Dylan is here because people like him, and Pee Wee is here for the same reason: They are both American icons.”

BULLSHIT.

Declaring a public peter pumper like Pee Wee Herman to be an “American icon” comparable to one of the greatest folk/protest singer/songwriters of our time is an absurdity, an outrage and an insult to our biker culture. But I can understand why Woodruff would take that position. The Buffalo Chip is, after all, aptly named. As is often the case with fabrications found in the bikers’ rights arena, the Chip exists ostensibly to serve and benefit bikers but effectively to line the pockets of a lawyer. So naturally we can expect that shyster–like any shyster–to say whatever he deems necessary to keep the cash coming his way. What I cannot fathom, however, is why thousands of “bikers” were tripping over themselves to buy Pee Wee Herman t-shirts and dolls, and hundreds even signed up to ride with the sick bastard. Even worse, for a children’s charity like Kids and Chrome to stage a meet-and-greet with an accused kiddie porn collector as a fundraiser simply defies comprehension.

Given Rod Woodruff’s inexcusably perverse but undoubtedly profitable promotion of Pee Wee Herman this year, some are expecting the Chip’s 2011 headliners to include Drop Dead Fred or Boy George, but my money’s on Beverly Hills toilet troubadour George Michael. No matter, though. Barring their resurrection of Jimi Hendrix or Stevie Ray Vaughan, I’ll continue spending my hard-earned biker bucks at the Gold Pan in Custer, the Ponderosa in Hulett, the Dime Horseshoe in Sundance, the National 9 Lariat in Gillette, and the many beckoning Black Hills hideaways where our biker culture is honored and not exploited, our Constitutional right to bear arms is respected and not restricted, and “Welcome Bikers” is a sincere greeting rather than a rubber worm.

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Technorati Tags: bikers rights, black hills motor classic, buffalo chip, colors, Motorcycles, paul reubens, pee wee herman, rod woodruff, sturgis, weapons, woody

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I had intended something more ambitious for “Ride 5-0″ than a SaddleSore 2000 comprised of two round trips to nowhere.  But times being what they are, I am fortunate and grateful to be doing any distance riding at all…  Anyway, the SS2000 requires that you ride over 2,000 miles in under 48 hours.  On this particular ride, I covered 2,087 miles in 40 hours 27 minutes total time, or 30 hours 3 minutes riding time.  On the first leg (day one), I rode from Miami Beach FL to Cecil GA and back via Alligator Alley and IH-75, covering a distance of 1,048 miles in 14 hours 44 minutes for an MTH of 71.13.  On the second leg (day two), I rode roundtrip from Miami Beach FL to Ridgeland SC and back via IH-95, covering a distance of 1,039 miles in 15 hours 19 minutes for an MTH of 67.83.  There are no world records or even personal bests in any of these statistics.  But it was a safe and successful ride, and that must satisfice.  Here are the highlights:

Leg 1: Round-Trip from Miami Beach FL to Cecil GA

Sleepy witness signatures gathered, at 6:19am on Friday, 18 June 2010, I pulled an ATM slip at a SoBe Wachovia and logged the start of my ride.  It was a typical muggy South Florida summer morning.  But once I got rolling, the wind evaporated the beads of sweat and I had cool running all the way west across an almost empty Alligator Alley.  Workday morning traffic slowed me down as I headed north up IH-75 through Naples and Fort Myers, but once the traffic thinned I had perfect riding conditions all the way to Tampa.  Just north of there, I hit the first of three major accident-related traffic jams and rubbernecker slowdowns (that seem to occur every time I ride that stretch of interstate).  These queues mandated some creative lane definition in order to maintain an acceptable pace of forward progress.  But from my gas stop in Alachua northward into Georgia, all the cagers kept their eyes on the road and their shiney sides up, which allowed me to sail on into my turnaround point at Cecil with no further interruptions or irritations beyond the seemingly perpetual road construction along that route.

Heading south back to Florida, it was midafternoon by the time I reached Ocala.  In Central Florida in the summer, it rains almost every afternoon, and this day was no exception.  Those large, cold thundercloud raindrops were a welcome relief from the sweltering heat.  But after a couple of hundred miles, I’d had all the relief I needed.  The downpour finally began to dissipate as I rounded the bend towards Alligator Alley just after 7:00pm.  From that point on, the red-orange sun hanging low in the west behind me seemed to be battling yet another band of clouds in front of me for dominance of the turbulent skies over the Everglades.  And from this age-old natural conflict came a Kodak moment that made me regret not having a camera:

I was approaching the Broward end of the Alley and home when a glistening in Hidalgo’s left rearview mirror caught my eye.  I glanced over to see the reflection of a round red sun sitting in the middle of a bright blue strip of daylight bounded by the horizon beneath it and a cloud bank above.  It made the mirror look like a chrome-framed picture postcard.  More spectacular, though, was what I saw when I looked back up:  A huge, thick rainbow was perfectly centered over the highway before me, framing within it an arch of dark clouds fronted by intermittent bolts of lightning that seemed to flash directly down from the rainbow.  It was as if God was staging a rock concert, and it was almost time for the band…

Leg 2: Round-Trip from Miami Beach FL to Ridgeland SC

After taking in my fill of skim milk, scrambled eggs and Don Francisco’s Colombia Supremo, I rolled down to the 5th Street Shell and filled up my tank, logging the receipt and the start of leg 2 at 7:27am.  From there I made the short hop across the causeway and headed north on IH-95.  Being a Saturday, traffic was light and I had smooth sailing all the way through South Florida’s tri-county metroplex and northward to my first stop at Vero Beach.  In fact, I had good weather, open roads and easy riding all the way through Jacksonville, Georgia and on into South Carolina.

I reached my turnaround point at Ridgeland SC at 3:08pm … as did the first of several summer showers and thunderstorms I’d be riding through as I headed back southward.  Just north of Brunswick GA, the rain started coming down in slanted sheets that slowed me to 15mph for a few minutes.  But once I punched through, that was the worst of it.

Sunset was approaching as I stopped for gas in Titusville FL at 7:30pm.  Clouds would fill the skies for the rest of the evening, but I was south of the rain now and had dry roads from there to Miami.  “Dry” roads, yes, but not necessarily “safe” roads…  Somewhere near Mile Marker 100 by Stuart at around 9:00pm, I hit something lying in the road that looked, felt and sounded like either a heavy metal garbage can lid or an overturned manhole cover.  It was dark in color, and lying on black asphalt under a starless night sky, so I didn’t see it until I was right on top of it.  The impact ripped the spring off my sidestand and took out my speedometer and odometer.  Luckily though, I was still upright and rolling, and I didn’t detect any other damage.  So at my next and final gas stop in Jupiter, I bungied the sidestand then rode her safely home to SoBe.

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