Bike Trip Journal
Wed. June 12th: We are in Amarillo, TX. Quick update: Left Sat morn (8th) and drove to 340 mi. to Memphis. As we left Atlanta, it was cold enough that we stopped and put our leathers (leather jackets and I put on my chaps as well). We missed our turn on Hwy 78 in Birmingham and drove nearly to Bessemer before I figured it out. As we stopped to head back, we decided to fill up (have to fill up every 100-130 miles) and eat lunch at a Cracker Barrel. Danny called the waitress "Bubbles" which was very apropos for this quite animated young lady. In Memphis, we stayed with a cousin and her husband (Angie & Steve). It was great to get to know them better and get a brief visit. I had missed their wedding and got to see their wedding pictures as well as the Southern Living book that also had pictures of their wedding in it. Cool! While we were sitting around talking, one of their cats decided it loved Danny and stuck his head in Danny's glass to drink his water. Yuck! While he was going through that, I was enjoying looking at their album collection and was really amazed at their 300-CD, CD changer!
Sun. 9th: We rode to Fayetteville, AK. I was pretty wiped out from not getting a lot of sleep lately so we pulled into a rest area to help me wake up. I drank a Coke, which is unusual - I seldom take in caffeine. When we left, coming out of the rest area, I started to accelerate and kept going till I hit 110 mph! What a rush! So that is why Cokes are so popular ;-) We stopped for lunch at a Subway and met a guy that was riding a Harley from SC to CA. Turns out he is from G'ville, SC and works for Milliken ( a large company based out of there). On the way to Fayetteville, we had to get off I-40 and go north on I-540 into the mountains. This is a beautiful drive up into the mountains and is sparsely populated. We did not realize that there were so few gas stations and were starting to worry since we had gone 130 miles, had hit our reserve tanks and there had not been any gas stations for miles! We finally found one! Whew. After we filled up with gas, we went to use the rest rooms in a grocery store. There was a man in the men's room and a woman in the lady's room and they were shouting over the wall to each other! The woman finally left, but the guy did not - so we used the woman's stall.
In Fayetteville, we stayed with a friend (David & his wife Janice) that I had gone to high school with in PA. many years ago. David and I had a great time talking about the old days and catching up. He is in a band that loves to play blues and has played at the Hard Rock in Memphis and was in the semi finals in a blues play-off in Memphis!!! That afternoon, David took us for a ride around this beautiful area and even showed us J B Hunt's home (trucking). It was a fun visit and we got to meet his son (Damon) who is also a musician.
Mon 10th: We got our 1st rain this morn as we left. Fortunately there was a coin operated car wash near when it started, so we waited it out in one of the car wash bays. Once it cleared up, we drove to Siloam Springs, AR and visited the gardens of Pauline Henry - a famous daylily breeder. We continued on to Tulsa where we followed the old Rte 66 to OK City. When we first got onto Rte 66, we backtracked to see the famous Blue Whale. That was really fun! When we got back to Tulsa I thought it would be a good idea to get a chocolate dipped ice cream at an old looking Dairy Queen type of place that looked like it had been on Rte 66 since its inception. While nostalgically eating our ice cream cones, a kid comes up to us and tried to bum 50-cents. He started to follow us around and said he was 16. (We are convinced he was about 13 or 14 and, from what he said, was a runaway from California). He asked to go with us to Arizona, but there was no room. We got back on the road and about mid afternoon we were behind a string of slow moving traffic. Danny got an opening and took it. I was not nearly as quick and got stuck for a while longer. Finally I saw a clearing and I really kicked it to pass all of them at once. By the time I passed the last one, an oncoming car was approaching and nearly went onto the shoulder to miss me. I continued down the road to where Danny had pulled into a gas station and I pulled in too. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, a policeman pulls up to me and asked: "why did you do that"? I told him and that I would not do it again. He smiled and drove off! Whew! In Oklahoma City, we decided to stay for the night and drove to a campground outside of Norman, Ok on Lake Thunderbird. We got here after 10 pm and the camping areas were closed. A ranger told where there was another camping area that was open 24 hrs. We got there and set up by flashlight. Unfortunately, there was some decaying meat in the dumpster and we were down wind! Not too bad, though. Next morning we found out that there were no showers. Danny washed off in the muddy lake and I used the sink. Oh, that night as I got out my new tent to set it up, one of the tent poles was broken! The next morning before we left Norman, we stopped in Wal Mart to exchange the tent. Gas here was $1.12
From there, we got back onto Rte 66 and drove to Clinton and went to the Rte 66 museum. In the middle of the afternoon, it was 99 degrees.
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