A Wing and Prayer Trip Fall '07

Hi All:

Well I am about to depart on leg 2 of the trip. As you recal I road the GoldWing, hereforeto referred to as Bobby-Sue, to Puerto Vallarta in Mexico in the fall. Rathere than just ride it back, I stored it there. Well now is the time to go rescue it!

I fly back to pick up the Goldwing on Friday, today. I was hoping to send this email sooner but the combination of work demands and having wicked sinus problems due to allergies have delayed publishing.

So trip to Sayulita (near Puerto Vallarta) went smoothly, if not tiring.

I had to stay up late Thurs night packing and had to be up super early Fri. To add to that, a last minute call to the doctor about my allergies (and an agravating cough) resulted in a last minute doctors appointment and medication for Strep Throat! Needless to say with little sleep and an illness the flights here and cab ride all sort of drifted by in a fog.

The bike runs, I have been doing some prep and checks to make sure it is ready for the long hot haul to Pheonix. All is well on that front.

Other than bike stuff and a few brief visits with some friends I have just been chilling out. Well, as much as one can chill with 100 degree heat and a bit of a cold.....yeah, the worst part of that is no icey cold beeeeer for me.

I did however poach some surfing, it had to be done. It was awesome too, although the time away did not help my surfing skills.

Its hot, damn hot, hot hot and hot.

When I left off last time I was having a mid-day respit in Navojoa, complete with swim, cerveza and siesta, lovely.

OK so a brief re-cap.

In October Viktor and I took 2 weeks and rode down the west coast to LA. Viktor stored his bike there and I continued on for another 2 months into Mexico. I did the Baja Peninsula, the Baja 1000 Race then took the ferry across to the mainland. From there I made it as far as Puerto Vallarta before staying a few weeks with surfing, sand and a special seniorita. From there I flew back to Ontario for Xmas then back to Vancouver for work.

I was still tired from travelling so when the check came I signed my room number, and name and left. It wasn’t til later that I realised I had been eating in a different hotel…. Oops. Well, I am sure the Sheraton chain will survive. Lack of tip? Not terribly upset about that.I went in to the office early to do some prep for an 8am meeting. I then had several meetings and worked through lunch.

At around 2:30 I left work for the airport, checked in and worked for another hour til the flight left.

So the guy helps and in the process I hear a snap, not a good sound in maintenance or extreme sports. The mysterious the snap sounds equals a broken throttle cable. Completely disabling the bike. Ahhh SHIT!!!May 17 - Phoenix to Vegas

Anyway she had to get the flowers, get them to another hotel, get to her hotel , change, and get to the wedding. In an hour and a half? When it takes about 30 mins just to walk past a single hotel? Yeah. Needless to say she was stressed.So the night before both Vik and I were pretty wired. We arrived in Vegas around 11pm, so it wasn't until about 2pm until we got into our hotel room. Watching TV and chatting until almost 4 resulted in another late night. Even though we slept in until about 9:30am, we had to check out of the hotel, so yeah, another night of very little sleep.

I got my bike in a good spot with some room and proceeded to undertake the changing of the throttle cable. This operation involved tearing a lot of the top of the bike to get good access including the gas tank, air filter, air breather and housing and a few other pieces, all of which were sprawled all over.So between so much happening in Vegas resulting in another late night to bed and me needing to get to business meeting in the morning resulted in another short sleep.

I clearly recal the moment the REAL heat hit us. It was rounding a corner near Death Valley junction and SOB was it HOT! It almost took my breath away, like hitting a sauna blast. Hot, damn hot, like…Africa HOT. We were told that it broke 120f that day! Well we finally did it, we got up early and left Las Vegas. What is it about that town the makes one stay up late into the evening? The night before it was the show at 9pm, THEN dinner and a ton of walking around til all hours.

Well sure enough there was a Sheriffs convention at the restaurant and one saw me. Of course he lectured me, duh, preaching to the converted. What struck me as funny was how he was going on and on about how THIS state has helmet laws and THIS state does not tolerate that behaviour and THIS state is this….blah blah blah. Long story short, I got a full 11 hours sleep that night!!!! I woke up feeling like a champ!!!!

Well he thanks me effusively and tells us about flustered and in a hurry he is as he was on his way to get married in a chapel and was worried it was going to close! Wha? Married, now?
“Yup, getting married right now”