Featured Coast To Coast U S A

Daytona Speedway.

 

That’s interesting, we thought it must have happened plenty of times before. Also the fact that it was 2 out of 3 of us made us think they should have told us clearly. EagleRider actually insisted we watch a video before signing in. In that video the bike shown was an older model, it clearly stated put the key in the ignition. Oh well, it’s done now. At least I found 1 set.

 

He made that look pretty easy.

 

Route day one.

 

Go West.

Route day 2.

We try and stay off the main highways as much as possible. It makes it much more interesting. On Sunday, day 2, we got to see some of the more down and dirty parts of Florida. Where people actually lived as opposed to the Orlando tourist center. We were told by the couple from Tallahassee that we’d met at dinner on Saturday, from St. Augustine going across northern Florida we’d be going into ‘gen-u-iine Trump countreee’.

They weren’t wrong. I saw a massive 4x4 flatbed truck with TRUMP emblazoned the full width across top of the windscreen. That guy wanted to leave no doubt in people’s minds as to his voting affiliation and he succeeded.

Talking of flatbed trucks, they are massively popular here. For some reason there is a style that’s popular where the front wheels are radically raised higher than the rear wheels. I don’t know why this is popular but it is, surely they can’t drive well?

Also of course big 4x4 ‘s, I’d say well over 50-60-70% of all the vee-hicles on the road are massive to huge 4x4’s of some description in this part of the country. Electric vee-hicles, pah! You ain’t nobody unless you’ve got a huge deep throated v8 under that there hood.

I’ve hardly seen any Tesla’s. Although I have seen two or three Tesla Cyber Trucks which look even uglier in real life. I can’t believe anything so ugly was actually put into production. I mean who in their right mind looks at this preproduction model and say’s

‘Yeah that’s a good idea, let’s do it’.

Elon I suppose.

 

Meanwhile in Amsterdam Dulcenea del Toboso, aka the present Mrs H. has been getting our 2 year old grandson into the groove and apparently he loves it. Keeps requesting more pictures of motorbikes from the trip.

Way-d-GO!

 

I thought it would come with one in the pannier as standard. Apparently not.

It makes me laugh, I don’t know which is less likely here, give up guns or give up 4x4’s.

I don’t know who talks of such stupidity but it sure as hell aint gonna happen.

 

It turns out that Pedro’s Mrs has already made it to the Annapurna base camp. It’s 4000m high.

She’s now on her way down.

 

It Turns out that Pedro’s Mrs has already made it to the Annapurna base camp. It’s 4000m high.

She’s now on her way down.

 

More updates of the last 2 days later.
Just across the border.

 

Point Blank.

We got to Eastpoint where the road ran right along the beach and Pedro the Cruel had found a house which faces the sea. The house numbering was sporadic so we pulled up and Pedro left his bike ticking over while he walked back a few houses to establish which one we should be parked up in.

Laughing Boy just went straight in and parked his in someone’s open garage like he owned the place. It was just as well the actual owners weren’t there in Holiday Homesville.

After he’d established squatters rights he walked back to the bike and we did a wide left to go back.

Two of us parked up and suddenly there was there was a flap coming from Jorg, no laughter.

‘Quick, Pedro’s down!’

I ran from the driveway and there was Pedro the Cruel’s bike lying on its side like a dead Elephant, blocking the road.

Pedro, standing next to it, just gave it a Spanish shrug. Which looking back at it was quite an amusing reaction.

He was fine, he just stepped off it and laid it down when the weight of the machine was clearly going to win the mathematical equation.

Unbeknown to us, if you leave a ‘Hardly Doesanything’ ticking over it gets all temperamental. Being 1800cc of air cooled catastrophic conversion it likes to build up the heat. Whereupon it goes into what I can only describe as ‘limp mode’. When you open the throttle, nothing happens.

The throttle turns but it does not accelerate! No increase in revs.

So you drop it into a left, open the throttle to pick it upright and discover something else about these quirky archaic machines.

It took three of us to pick it up but amazingly there wasn’t a mark on it.

The house was lovely inside and everything was sweetness and light. I decided to go to the local supermarket to buy milk and a surprisingly expensive $6 box of Branflakes with some reasonably priced fruit.

Stopping off at the shoreline fish restaurant on the way back. Which was just as well because although booking wasn’t necessary it closed at 8pm. Seriously 8,00? That’s the way it is here.

When I got back I discovered two down in the dumps guys sitting on the step. I’d suggested to leave the bike to cool for an hour and maybe it would reset.

The good news was; the bike was working properly again.

The bad news was; they’d gone out to test the bike and the door had slammed shut. Pedro’s phone with the entry code was inside the house along with all our gear.

We were locked out of the house. No phone number for the owner. Nothing.

I love a challenge and the challenge was;
How many expletives can you get into a third sentence.

 

Get out of Jail free.

After trying repeatedly to contact the owners via Booking.com, searching for hidden keys and asking neighbours I suggested we walk to the restaurant. We couldn’t do anything, we needed to eat and someone there might know the owners.

They didn’t.

So we sat down and before the main course had come the Restaurant owner had phoned a friend, who’d phoned a friend and phoned a friend of a friend and here’s the entry code on a piece of paper.

Jubilation! Happy days and more white wine please!

We had the best meal we’ve had so far, gave them a serious tip and laughed our way back.

It was the right code!