July Riding

I haven't been able to get the Blogger site up and running for weeks so this is a condense of what has been happening.

I rode down to Sam Hall's in McClure, Pa and Kandi, Cora and the boys rode down in the truck. I loaded some things in the bed of the truck that I brought back from Florida that Sam bought on his vacation down there. On the way back we got in to a nasty thunder storm with lightning, high winds and some heavy down pours. Outside of Lewistown I went to make a turn onto rt 22 and the bike wouldn't turn. I was going up a slight hill and a sweeping right hand turn. I came about 3 or 4 feet from hitting the cement guard rail, but I didn't and at the last moment the bike decided to turn. I got home fine. Cora complained to me that I was riding too slow in the storm! I was going anywhere between 25 to 35 when it was in a heavy down pour.

Tuesday I took Kandi up to Altoona on the bike. It was her first ride on it since July of last year. That was when we got caught in a nasty thunderstorm. This time everything was fine. She put her oxygen bottle between us and I had a make shift back rest. I rode about 60 most of the way. When we got there she asked me why I was riding so slow. I told her I was going 60 and she didn't believe me. Comeing back I showed her on the speedo that we were doing 60 and she said the speedo was off because we were creeping along. So I hit 70 and 2900 RPMS. The Owners Manual says at 2900 I should be anywhere between 68 to 72 so it is right. Then I hit 80 mph and told her to look. She said no way we was going that fast., but I was flying past cars so she believed it. She asked why it seems like we are poking along. I had to tell her because that is the quality of the motorcycle. It means it is well balanced and such.

I found a rode coming back from the Lewistown Hospital last week. My mother went into the ER because she couldn't get her breath and was shaking. So I left the ER around 2:30 AM I took a wrong turn but found a great riding back road from Lewistown to McVeytown. Even at night this was a very good road. I prayed that I would make it home safe. Less than 30 seconds after saying "AMEN!" I noticed a car coming at me. I flicked my high beams off and on but he still came at me. I stayed in my lane but slowed down and downshifted to 2nd gear. At the last second I swerved over to the other lane and he ran off the road on my side! The rest of the way home I noticed many deer along the road in Farmers' fields.

Yesterday I went down to my mother's with the boys so we had to take the Van. We cut the grass and trimed a little bit there and at Aunt Nancy's My mother called so we left to go pick her up. I haven't been the whole way down 35 and the Lewistown turn off since I was a little kid and maybe not even then. Man what a great riding road. Rt 35 has many hills and straight streches but futher down it does have some turns. We turned off on what I think was 333. I followed a sign that said "Lewistown 14 miles." I'll have to go on this ride again but on the Harly. This road had at least 4 or 5 15mph switchbacks on it! at 60 mph the van wheels were flying off the road some some of the hills! It was fun in a van, I can't imagine how much fun it is going to be on a bike!