A Birthday to Remember

May 31 - Memorial Day and my 53rd. birthday. Time to ride back to Columbus. It will be a day I won't soon forget.

We climbed on our bikes at the hotel at 6:00 a.m., determined to make it back by mid-afternoon so we could relax a little bit before starting the grind on Tuesday morning. The best laid plans of mice and men. . . the trip came apart at the seams pretty quickly when, barely down the street from the hotel, I did a last minute quick turn to the left onto the George Washington Parkway and Cheryl missed it. . . I heard her tires sliding, and prepared for the worst.

At the bottom of the ramp, I pulled over and ran back to the top, but alas she hadn't gone down - thank you God - and had merely slid a bit and rode on into a sleeping Washington DC. I pondered, then, what to do in terms of catching up with her. She called me on my cell while I was getting back on the bike and told me to meet her a mile up the road.

In starting my bike up, though, I noticed it simply wasn't running right. Later I learned it was running on only one cylinder, and I limped it into a scenic overlook on the Potomac about 3 miles down the road. Cheryl finally had gotten turned around and arrived about 10 minutes later. In that intervening time, I had called my Columbus mechanic, Bill, who told me that likely the "fall over switch" had tripped when I dropped the bike the day before.

A safety feature, the only way to reset it was to remove the negative battery terminal for a minute and then reinstall. Of course my toolset was woefully short of anything useful to do this, so Cheryl and I struggled, sweated, and sweated some more before finally getting the terminal cleared. But, the space to put the bolt back in was simply too tight and we couldn't leverage the battery up and out to get to it.

Hundreds of bikes blew by on their way home, each tooting their horn a cheery good morning. And, after an hour of struggling, along came Buck. Buck and Mary Buckshaw, from the west side of Columbus, pulled off to see if they could help. Not only were they a Godsend, they were characters right out of some story. Buck had waist-length long blond hair and a US cavalry hat, while Mary had cowgirl boots, some impressive artificial appendages up front, and an Alaskan fox fur hat! He could've passed for Leon Russell or an early Greg Allman, and he took charge.

Of course Buck was prepard with a full toolset, and we were able to quickly leverage the battery up and get the terminal reinstalled. It started right up to cheers of "hooray" and hugs all around. When I tried to pay them something for their trouble, Buck simply responded that he had trouble once and someone pulled over for him. Besides, he was from the west side and that's how they treat folks in need. They pulled away and we reloaded to get on the road about 8:30 a.m.

But, within 30 seconds I knew the problem hadn't been resolved and the drop switch wasn't the problem. I limped along at about 50 mph up I-495 onto I-270 before pulling off an exit to find a gas station. The owner told us there was a large Harley Davidson dealer about 13 miles away, so off we set. My bike was barely chugging up and down some of those hills, often dropping down to second gear just to make it. Cheryl trailed behind and, I'm sure, was very worried about how we'd handle this.

Sure enough, about 13 miles away we encountered Fredericksburg (MD) Harley Davidson and, to my surprise, they were open! In fact the Service center was open and there was a mechanic onsite. They said they'd take a look and we quickly went down the street to have a long-awaited birthday breakfast at Perkins. Unfortunately when we returned, the mechanic said he couldn't find the source of the problem.

For an hour, Cheryl and I waited while he looked further, but still no solution. About noon, we decided it was best for her to leave without me as it appeared I would have to stay overnight at that point. My heart sank as I watched her pull away, but knew it was best since she had a "can't miss" meeting for work this morning. So, I sat there talking with the locals.

Alas, at about 1:00 he found the problem. A wire leading into the fuel injector for the second cylinder had become frayed from rubbing against my throttle and brake cable. It was shorting out and preventing the second cylinder from getting gas. He quickly fixed it and took a quick "quality control ride" to ensure it was running properly.

Indeed it seemed fixed, so off I took at about 75 mph on I-70 headed west. The day was hot and very sunny, and my mood was good. I thought perhaps I could catch up with Cheryl if she'd pull over at a rest stop or somewhere, but that was not to be.

About 150 miles away from Fredericksburg, it was beginning to rain so I pulled off to the edge of the highway to get my rainsuit on. I thought I'd check my phone to see if Cheryl had called, and she had to say where she was. Unfortunately, I also had two "urgent" calls from the Harley Dealer, so I stood there with trucks and cars roaring past me and trying to understand their message.

Apparently in his haste to get me on the road, the mechanic had not reconnected the gas hose that connects the right and left side of the tank. Sure enough, the hose was clamped off with a cheap clamp and the nipple end where it attached to the other tank had a cheap rubber cap on it. He wanted me to go to a car parts store, buy a good clamp, and reattach the hose. After all, "those are cheap shop parts and probably won't hold". The failure to hold would mean gas would run out all over the engine and me. . . . not a pretty thought.

So, in a driving rain - the first of so many I lost count - off I went. About 10 miles up the road, there was a town with an auto parts store - closed of course - so I went to Dollar General - do they ever close? - and bought the American solution to everything - duct tape. I figured I'd let the clamp that was on there go and hopefully it would hold, and I duct taped the living hell out of the nipple with the rubber clamp. Time to start praying for both to hold.

For the next few hours, I had to pull over about every 80 miles because I only had gas from half the tank, so that afforded me a chance to check my handiwork and, yes, it was holding. Cheryl and I exchanged voice messages and I hoped to catch up with her just north of Morgantown, WV - the halfway point.

That, too, was not to be because Cheryl inadvertently went south on I-79 at Morgantown instead of north. She realized when she got to Charleston, WV that she had gone the wrong way. I learned this when I stopped for some dinner at Washington, PA after having ridden through rainstorms at least 5 times. I had quickly tired of putting on my rain suit, so I went without it and got completely drenched. The wind would dry me off pretty quickly, but then along came another soaking storm.

It was just short of miserable and I was worried, of course, about Cheryl riding in it. She's a good rider, but hardly as experienced as me. I've ridden for 40 years now and was having trouble with the weather. There were points were staying on the road was difficult, but it was the only way to get home.

We connected live with each other while I was at dinner, and in her own inimitable style, she ws cheery and upbeat and having a ball. In fact, she had stopped at a Dairy Queen outside Charleston and was enjoying a chocolate cone dipped in chocolate. She said not to worry and she'd see me at home.

About 8:30 p.m., I finally pulled in to home. The cheap clamp held, and so did my duct tape work. She had arrived about 10 minutes earlier and we stood in the garage hugging and cheering each other for about 10 more minutes (and of course, thanking God for delivering us safely!).

The trip overall was really great, and now that I lived through yesterday, will be one - from start to end - we don't forget. Hope you enjoyed tagging along vicariously, and we'll see you again soon on our next bike trip.