Day 3
Ahh, yes, welcome to day 3. The sun is coming through the window, and the chipper sound of excited chatter is right outside the door. I wonder why my butt cheeks feel like they went 12 rounds with Mike Tyson, then I remember the intimate relationship they've had over the last two days with the seat on the 470 that berger is loaning me. I make a mental note to make like the Charmin kid and stuff a roll in my pants for today's ride. No, not on that side....
I get dressed and head out to see what's going on. It seems that everyone is up and about, and more importantly happy about it! I make my rounds to make sure nobody snuck off into the night, when I run into Brian. He tells me that the site has been down for the last two days. Luckily for me, and all of you stuck reading posts while we were riding, he has broadband and a zoomy Mac(daddy) in the RV, which he allows me to requisition to reboot the server, store the db for later download, and purge the mail server which is clogged with two days worth of mails. Afterwords, I head back out into the sun to find out that JoeUSA and wife are packing it up and heading out. It seems that yesterday's ride wreaked havoc on his knees and he is afraid if he rides again, he may have a heck of a time driving home in the car. I'm incredibly bummed to hear this, but envy his ability to do the right thing. I've heard of self discipline, but only in passing. I say goodbye to Joe and his wife, and thank them for coming to the ride.
Heading back to my end of the camp, I hear talk of breakfast which makes me happy. Oddly, I never eat breakfast, but with all the riding, I always seem to be hungry now. I begin taking a head count of willing members to go eat some gutted and skinned french toast and drink some freshly squeezed coffee. Although many are up for it, when the truck loads up, it's only me and husyodaddy. We head down to Denny's, eat one of everything, and order some to-go for Ken, then head back. Upon arrival, I find Ken servicing the bikes, so offer to help. He looks at me warily, but agrees, between draining the gatorade out of the radiator, oil changes and filter changes, I touch one oil screen and one air filter. I feel empowered and wonder if Ken realizes how invaluable my assistance is. It seems he doesn't. I figure it's best not to mention it and move on to getting geared up. Brian's beginning to make the rounds, corraling the riders.
We've all decided to break into smaller groups today, each riding in different areas, and I join in with Bobzilla(the pack leader), John the tire-changing maniac, Dez, bk, husyodaddy, ossaman, berger and Andy the flying Canadian. We gear up, load the bikes up and head out to Gemini Trail. When we arrive, we see all the other groups there as well. We hang out until they've left. They head across the 4 lane to another set of trails, and we head off along Gemini Trail. Bobzilla's in the lead, and we all follow. About 1/4 mile into the trip, we've all stopped so Bobzilla can kickstart a girl's bike that has stalled on the trail. I don't think he's successful, and in my mind I'm ridiculing his inability to start the bike. I then see that she's looking into the tank and shaking her head, so I figure it's out of gas, and feel bad about thinking that Bobz's a non-2 stroke starting weenie. We all start up our bikes(at this time, Husyodaddy's starter starts dragging, and I can actually see the sweat pop out on his forhead just at the thought of kicking the 650), and we continue down the trail.
It's Saturday, and the jeeps are out in full force today, so we're taking it easy on any trails that may have traffic on them, which turns out to be a really good move, because there's quite a lot of traffic. We head up and down the twisty on the cliff, and through the sand washes. We get to a fork, and Bobz lets us know we can go right through the sand wash, or left through the sand wash. I decide to go left through the sand wash, and Bobz and a couple of others go right through the sand wash. I like decisions like this. It seems to take all the stress off.
We get to the sharp right and steep uphill grade where Neil bit it on day 1. I make a mental note to be the diapole of Neil, and thinking anti-Neil-like thoughts, I traverse up the hill giving everyone plenty of room, and making darned sure that I don't get caught in a dust cloud(don't worry Neil, all that excrusciating pain taught me valuable lessons). We make it up and over, and move onto the next section, one I like to call "Spot with Many Steps that Make the Seat Hit Your Bum". We head up and down, and over and through, and throughout it all, I watch Andy the Flying Canadian(TM) passing people while deftly hopping up and down. I decide he's my hero of the day, and try the next step in his likeness. I fail miserably and nearly ride off a cliff edge. I decide to stop trying to emulate him, and simply appreciate him from afar. It seems much safer this way.
We get to the top of Gemini Trail, and look out over a huge expanse of valleys and cliffs, with rock bridges between them, and nearly perfect circles carved through them. There's a plaque at the top telling of an unfortunate soul in a Jeep that obviously forgot where the brake was and took the express way down. A moment of silence, and then we're off for photo ops. After everyone gets their stills in, Bobz takes his bike over the bridge and someone snaps one of him. Once done, we all remount and begin to head back the way we came. It's an exciting ride, getting to ride at the top of these cliffs, and seeing as far as the sky will allow before mucking it up with clouds. We head back down and start heading towards Bulldog pass, which is the low portion that we were looking at from the top of Gemini, so we'll get to look up at where we were looking down. It's mostly sand washes, with rock creek beds, where you can pick up a lot of speed, but every time I get to feeling good, I nearly plant the front end into a rock, so I keep it going slow, and simply enjoy the view, not wanting to screw up the ride with something stupid like, oh I don't know, say a flat.
We ride for about another hour, and make it into Bulldog, where we were looking down, and park the bikes at the "No motor vehicles past this point". We respect the local law, and don't want to thumb our noses at the local John Law, so we walk the rest of the way to the cool stuff. I'm sure everyone else at the ride hold the local law in the same high esteem. We take some photos, drink some wa-wa and eat some compressed cardboard powerbars, then sit and rest for a little bit. Through the whole trip today, Bobz has made an effort to make this a relaxed ride, and it's easily become the favorite of the week for me. Everyone else seems to be having an equally great time. If Bobz didn't smell so bad, I'd kiss him.
After resting, we get back on the bikes, and start riding again. More sandwashes, and then up another trail that gives us some higher ground, so a little more elevation change, and slower trails. I enjoy riding these simply because you can simply relax without fear of shaving your face off like I do in the sand washes and rock beds. We head up to a dead end with a gorgeous view, then turn around to meet the tail end of the crew. Bobz makes us stop for a moment to tell us we're weenies for not waiting at the intersections for the next guy in line, and I think to myself; "self, you gotta be a weenie to get left behind, and deserve to get eaten by birds with bad breath." This thought will come back to bite me in the butt in short order. We head back to another dead end with a loop with a cave at the top. Bobz takes some of the guys up there to look around, but I and a few others wait at the bottom. I don't go because the return looks pretty nasty with a very narrow trail and steep dropoffs on each side of it. They hang out for a while, then return, and we all suit up and remount. Everyone but Ken I and John the tire changing maniac get going but my bike won't start on the button. No fear, one kick and I'm off! But there is nobody to be seen in front of me. "self, don't worry, bobz made it clear not to be weenies, so I'll see somebody at the next intersection". Wrong! Nobody to be found at the first, second or third intersections, which is the last intersection I remember passing, so I begin to worry. I have to keep stopping for Ken to guess at the next path to take(he seems better at guessing than I am), so we're falling farther and farther behind. Needless to say, I keep going faster and faster thinking that I'll actually catch up to these guys when it happens. Around a bend, I see sharp rock edged steps along the center of this jeep-wide road, with a baby-butt smooth pass along each side of it, so I make the obvious choice and ride up the center when all of a sudden, it feels like someone coated my rear tire with baby snot. I look down to see it flopping around, so I pull off the road and wonder if I can kill and eat Ken before I get too weak. Ken and John the tire changing maniac stop, and John says "Ride it out". I say "It's not my bike, and I don't want to mess it up." Ken says "Let the next owner worry about it." In the end, John the tire changing maniac rides off to get Bobz and his tube. Ken and I put the bike up on a log, pull the wheel, and have a seat. Within a half hour, Bobz and John the tire changing maniac return. Bobz loans gives me his tube, and John the tire changing maniac has it in in under 5 minutes. After 3 Co2 canisters, we realize that it holds air about as well as the old tube, so it's decided that we're going to ride it out flat anyways. Bobz gives me his DRZ and volunteers to ride the 470. I'm really contemplating kissing him now, but he smells even worse than he did the last time I considered this, so I refrain.
We head out single file in first for the remainder of the trip, watching Bobz traverse the windy up and down the cliff. It's awfully squirrely, but he makes it to the truck without any incident. We load the bikes up and head back to the camp, where we all unload and clean up.
Everyone decides that we'll do it camper style tonight, so Bobz cooks up some chili, and Ken and Husyodaddy head to the pizza joint to get some eats and we settle in around the fire to tell our nightly lies.
WARNING: Here's where the story gets "Ol' Yellerish" weepy like. You've been warned.
So, during the prep for the ride, I've heard of people bringing stuff to auction off, and I even brought some stuff to auction off, although I didn't know what the money was going to. So here we sit talking, eating gas inducing chili and pizza, when Ken walks up pushing the 470. I think to myself "man, I hope somebody bids on that, because I'm going to feel bad if nobody does". Cause I know that Ken's been trying to sell it. I also question his common sense, what with trying to auction the bike off at a Force Ride where almost everyone has one except for me. Yes, I'm that stupid.
Brian walks up to the center of the crowd and asks if he can interrupt. Now here's where I kind of can't tell you exactly what was said. Have you ever had something happen to you so amazing that your teeth went numb? I don't mean that's all that happened, but where something causes you to go so numb, that it includes your teeth? Well, this was one of those times for me. As Brian begins to tell the crowd and I how much they appreciate the site, I can feel it in my legs. As he gets to the point where he says that they wanted to do something for me, I can't feel any of my extremities. When he gets to the point where he's talking about how I don't own a Berg, there goes my teeth. That simple. Now I know what's going on, so I do what any manly, testosterone driven male would do-I begin to weep like a little baby. Everyone is talking to me, but I can't answer. Thinking that everyone now thinks I'm a heartless jerk without even enough courtesy to reply to these guys only makes it worse. I try to say something, but all that keeps coming out is "Oh, wow...." and even that is without any real inflection. I lost count at 12 "Oh wow"'s. In the end, it's told to me that a lot of members got together and gave Ken money to purchase the bike for me. They came up short, so Ken simply gave me the bike for what was donated. I gave berger a big girly hug. I also got banners, shirts, bum pack, Husaberg riding pants, a backpack and a battery tender from Brian, Husabutt and Fryguy. All in all, a pretty amazing night.
So in the end what happened? I got an all expenses paid trip to Vegas and Moab, and I think it's safe to say that I had the most amazing ride of my life, met some of the faces I've talked to for over seven years, made some of the best friendships I'll ever have and became one of the best outfitted Husaberg owners over the course of three days. I keep thinking of all the guys I met, and it makes me sad to think that it's over for now. I wish it never would have ended, but have the hope that it will happen again soon, and will have to make due with that knowledge. If the other guys had half as great a time as I did, then the ride was a success, and I can rest easy. For those that didn't make it, you missed such a great gathering of great people in a great location. I hope you consider making the next one.
Bless you all for making me the happiest webguy on the net, and although I know I can never repay the favor, I hope I can at least keep your time at the site a comfortable one.
As for my riding? I think if I had ridden one more day, I could have given Joshua a run for his money. Oh yeah buddy, he'd have heard the footsteps over the scream of his 65.
