Who Put Those Rocks In The Motorcycle Seats?

Somebody did. Ow.

We are nearly through with our latest adventure and it's been some thing. Some things good, some things not so good. Somethings were learned. But nothing was terrible and we were safe.

Here's a picture of The Norman Traveling Road Show and a couple of his admirers.



The first day we went nearly 400 miles but we got to Baker City, Oregon before dark! We went on the interstates all day and it made for a very long day indeed. We both decided that 350 miles on an interstate is more than sufficient unto a day. Didn't see much of Baker City because we stayed on the edge of town, along the road we were leaving on in the morning. Totally beat, we quickly decided to declare ourselves non-Iron Butt material and ordered a 'za from Pizza Hut. Came just when they said it would, and that happened to be concurrent with the finishing of the unloading and schlepping of multitudes of small, weighty motorcycle luggages up to the second floor.

I 90 over the Cascades is beautiful and fun and we both enjoyed that part. It was hot in Ellensburg where we stopped to have lunch and we were reminded of just why we want to live on the other side of the mountains from Ellensburg. We ended up at a Dairy Queen, hoping for some outside seating, but no such luck. Neither of us could remember any place in E-burg with outside seats. So we stood in the shade of some skinny leaved trees and ate our burgers standing up, while Norman ranged about our feet hoping for crumbs and/or onion rings to magically appear in his path. At least it rested our butts and it wasn't bad in the shade.

Leaving there we took I 84 (I think) all the way to Baker City. Parts of it were beautiful, parts of it were hilly and curvy and all of it was fast. 70+ mph doesn't feel real comfortable. One little mistake and you're toast. But everyone else wants to go that fast, so we did too. I think we arrived about 6:30. Maybe a bit earlier. All I know for sure was pizza came at 7 pm as promised.

My scoot gets horrible mileage at 70+ mph. Horrible, terrible, awful. I run out of gas before Ray does when we go that fast. We managed about 110 miles before needing to fill up so we bought many, many gallons of very expensive gasoline. We used it up like we own a Saudi oil field. Along the way we discovered just how far we can go once my gas alert starts flashing. All the way to the next gas station as it turned out. Lucky for us.

We did a fair amount of upping and downing and those lovely sweepers. Nice! Once we left I 90, there was not much traffic at all. Of course, there really is not much of anywhere to go TO out there. One thing we did notice was the difference between the entire I 5 corridor and the interstates we were traveling on this trip. Along the length of I 5, except for Shasta and some other small places in northern and central CA, there are 3 or 4 fast food places (or more) at every single interchange. You can hardly drive a half hour between our house and Los Angeles without encountering a McDonald's. On these roads less traveled, not only are the interchanges few and far between, national chain-type fast food is practically non-existent. It is good to know this, for planning The 2010 Grand Tour.

This day we also learned that shady outdoor tables have mostly gone the way of the dodo. Also good to know when traveling with a dog. We learned dogs in sidecars get as hot as the humans on the motorcycles do. Our particular dog will "sip" during the day's travel and then tank up like a camel when we are in the motel room. We learned to put his first drink down in the bathroom, where the floor can be easily dried off. We learned to park way at the end of any rest stop lots unless we want to talk to everybody and his brother, mother, sister, cousin and wife. Norman in a sidecar is worse than Morphous Wrex triked, when it comes to being an attractant.

We learned the standard Dog in a Sidecar Questions and the answers we'd like to give:
Does your dog ride in the sidecar? No, we make him run alongside.
Why has his tongue got spots? He wanted a tattoo.
Can I pet him? Sure. (followed closely by)
Will he bite me? Only if you touch him.
Does he try to jump out while you're going? Nope, he's smarter than he looks.
Is he tied in there? Nah, we just let him stand on the trunk and hang over the top of the windshield.
Does he like to ride in the sidecar? No, we force him in there.
Does he have goggles? Why, yes, there they are on his face!
Where's his helmet? O, gosh, he left it at the motel!
How does he hang on? We've got his thumbs on order.
What's his name? No-No Bad Dog.
What happened to his ears? We had them cut off so they wouldn't flap in the breeze.
What kind of a dog is that? A sidecar dog.
Where'd you get him? Junkyard.
What happens when you want to eat, like, lunch? We don't, we drink it as we go.
How long did it take you to teach him to ride in there? Where?
Where's his food? At McDonald's.
Oh, look! He drinks out of a cup! Don't you?
Can I introduce my dog? Nope. He likes people but not other dogs. (this is the actual truth)

We stayed at a Super 8 and it had a positively lovely good sleeping bed. Norman snuggled up in his sidecar dog bed after a sunset stroll around the edges of the parking lot. There were owls out hunting in the warm evening, hooting up a storm. Something was rattling in the brush and neither Norman nor I liked that sound, so we gave it a wide berth. Ray and I watched a bit of tv and went to sleep about 10. Thus ended the first day. Pictures to follow. Or be added.