wfooshee
O, Woe is me!!
Since getting my '03 back in June, my riding has pretty much been to work and back, a 6-mile city trip, and the occasional jaunt up the road in an evening just to get out.
Yesterday I rode from my home in Panama City to my brother's in Pensacola, took I-10. This was my first ever slab ride on a bike. I'd never had a bike before that I comfortable on a highway with, much less 80 mph. Took two rest stops on the way, at Ponce de Leon, where I got on the slab, and at mile marker 30, the last rest stop before P'cola. Didn't get out till after 9, and with a fillup and the two rest stops, took just under three hours.
Waited for my brother to wake up, and he led me to a bistro where he coffee'd up and we had lunch (his breakfast.) He has a Superhawk I didn't know about, which has had some rough treatment by its original owner. It's got some scars, the aftermarket cans are pretty loud and mounted crooked, and there are no rear turns signals, the owner put a split tail-light on it - one side blinks as the signal. Not very clear from more than say, 3 feet away. But the Ducatti-esque sound is pretty darn cool.
After lunch (on me, apparently) he led out of town and into the backroads north of town. Found some surprising twisties up there. We traded bikes for one leg, and I have to say that you can certainly tell the difference between a liter twin and the FJR! I'm too old for that huggin-the-tank riding position, so I was glad when the swap back came. I actually enjoyed the Superhawk, but a couple of things come to mind. The grips were thicker in the middle, like bulb-shaped, which was really uncomfortable really quick. And the top three gears were so close together I didn't think I'd actually shifted the first time I went up through the box! Only dropped about 300 RPM from 4th to 5th, and then to 6th. And you think stock mirrors on early FJRs are useless? The Superhawk name apparently comes from the rider's appearance as he tries to use the mirrors, flapping his elbows up and down to clear his view. I also liked that the controls' "weight" was less. Lighter clutch, lighter throttle tension, etc. (And mine has the unwound spring.)
My brother was lovin' the FJR. He's known the bike longer than I have, as it was his friend over there I bought it from. He liked the risers I put on, didn't like the Grip Puppies, and didn't notice the PCIII with the smoothness map, which I took to be the correct indication of how well it works. When I'd complained of hand fatigue after I bought the bike, he said I wasn't doing something right, either in posture or grip, so I was very amused to see him shaking his right hand every few minutes while he was on it.
We never found the road he set out to find. He said it has two turns that you actually can't ride, you have to walk the bike through, but the rest is great fun. The roads we did ride were satisifying enough, and surprising to me for both curves and hills, for this "flat" part of the world.
Only one small sort of inident thing kinda happened to mar the pefection of the day. We were at a stop sign and turning right. My brother went, and I looked, it's clear, so I went. As I brought my head around to look into the turn, there's this little red bike parked in my line! Apparently he re-thought the right turn and was getting ready to tell me left instead, but stupid me thought he'd gone, and I started my turn with my head pointed backwards. (How stupid can you be and still function in the world?) When I saw him, I sat up and grabbed brake and clutch, got the bike stopped about 8 inches to late. My front fender rode under his left can, and while I didn't knock him down, I couldn't hold my bike. It leaned left, then left some more, got my foot down, still coming left, can't hold it, so I set it down best I could and stepped off. I muttered something and then told my brother I thought he'd gone. Perhaps "muttered" isn't quite right. I used Skert's technique to lift the bike (which works great, by the way!) and we inspected the bikes. My turn stalk folded just like it's supposed to, as did the left mirror. The bag was undamaged, and there was no fairing damage. The fender had a good scrape mark on it, but otherwise no harm. My brother's bike was undamaged except the can was tweaked a bit. He grabbed it at the tail and un-tweaked it, explaining that it's not like it hasn't been tweaked before, as many times as the original owner had dropped the bike. He also said that hopefully the tiny drop I went through will satisfy the fates and they'll leave me alone now. Especially if I learned from it to stick my eyes where they belong!
We resumed our run, and it wasn't 4 minutes after that it started raining. Coincidence??? So back to town and dry clothes. At least the weather system dropped the temperature. It had been high 90's, and now was low 80's maybe even high 70's.
I came home via US 98, which is much shorter, but takes the same time because of traffic. (Destin absolutely sucks, traffic-wise!) Only stopped once on the way home, had run out of Gatorade.
My day's total was about 370 miles, the first time I'd been more than a hundred miles in a day on a motorcycle in my whole life. As for what I need to do to get more days like this, I have an Audiovox cruise control I haven't had a chance to install, yet. That HAS to happen! My butt was not happy at the end of the day, and my knees were complaining before I got to Pensacola. Highway pegs may be in my near future, but I can't go the bucks for a better seat right now. My mileage was disappointing, only got 42 on the way over there, but like I say, my first slab ride. Apparently 80 is not as thrifty as 65 or 70. I got 41 on the trip back, but that tank incuded the play time, so I was actually surprised to get that high.
Yesterday I rode from my home in Panama City to my brother's in Pensacola, took I-10. This was my first ever slab ride on a bike. I'd never had a bike before that I comfortable on a highway with, much less 80 mph. Took two rest stops on the way, at Ponce de Leon, where I got on the slab, and at mile marker 30, the last rest stop before P'cola. Didn't get out till after 9, and with a fillup and the two rest stops, took just under three hours.
Waited for my brother to wake up, and he led me to a bistro where he coffee'd up and we had lunch (his breakfast.) He has a Superhawk I didn't know about, which has had some rough treatment by its original owner. It's got some scars, the aftermarket cans are pretty loud and mounted crooked, and there are no rear turns signals, the owner put a split tail-light on it - one side blinks as the signal. Not very clear from more than say, 3 feet away. But the Ducatti-esque sound is pretty darn cool.
After lunch (on me, apparently) he led out of town and into the backroads north of town. Found some surprising twisties up there. We traded bikes for one leg, and I have to say that you can certainly tell the difference between a liter twin and the FJR! I'm too old for that huggin-the-tank riding position, so I was glad when the swap back came. I actually enjoyed the Superhawk, but a couple of things come to mind. The grips were thicker in the middle, like bulb-shaped, which was really uncomfortable really quick. And the top three gears were so close together I didn't think I'd actually shifted the first time I went up through the box! Only dropped about 300 RPM from 4th to 5th, and then to 6th. And you think stock mirrors on early FJRs are useless? The Superhawk name apparently comes from the rider's appearance as he tries to use the mirrors, flapping his elbows up and down to clear his view. I also liked that the controls' "weight" was less. Lighter clutch, lighter throttle tension, etc. (And mine has the unwound spring.)
My brother was lovin' the FJR. He's known the bike longer than I have, as it was his friend over there I bought it from. He liked the risers I put on, didn't like the Grip Puppies, and didn't notice the PCIII with the smoothness map, which I took to be the correct indication of how well it works. When I'd complained of hand fatigue after I bought the bike, he said I wasn't doing something right, either in posture or grip, so I was very amused to see him shaking his right hand every few minutes while he was on it.
We never found the road he set out to find. He said it has two turns that you actually can't ride, you have to walk the bike through, but the rest is great fun. The roads we did ride were satisifying enough, and surprising to me for both curves and hills, for this "flat" part of the world.
Only one small sort of inident thing kinda happened to mar the pefection of the day. We were at a stop sign and turning right. My brother went, and I looked, it's clear, so I went. As I brought my head around to look into the turn, there's this little red bike parked in my line! Apparently he re-thought the right turn and was getting ready to tell me left instead, but stupid me thought he'd gone, and I started my turn with my head pointed backwards. (How stupid can you be and still function in the world?) When I saw him, I sat up and grabbed brake and clutch, got the bike stopped about 8 inches to late. My front fender rode under his left can, and while I didn't knock him down, I couldn't hold my bike. It leaned left, then left some more, got my foot down, still coming left, can't hold it, so I set it down best I could and stepped off. I muttered something and then told my brother I thought he'd gone. Perhaps "muttered" isn't quite right. I used Skert's technique to lift the bike (which works great, by the way!) and we inspected the bikes. My turn stalk folded just like it's supposed to, as did the left mirror. The bag was undamaged, and there was no fairing damage. The fender had a good scrape mark on it, but otherwise no harm. My brother's bike was undamaged except the can was tweaked a bit. He grabbed it at the tail and un-tweaked it, explaining that it's not like it hasn't been tweaked before, as many times as the original owner had dropped the bike. He also said that hopefully the tiny drop I went through will satisfy the fates and they'll leave me alone now. Especially if I learned from it to stick my eyes where they belong!
We resumed our run, and it wasn't 4 minutes after that it started raining. Coincidence??? So back to town and dry clothes. At least the weather system dropped the temperature. It had been high 90's, and now was low 80's maybe even high 70's.
I came home via US 98, which is much shorter, but takes the same time because of traffic. (Destin absolutely sucks, traffic-wise!) Only stopped once on the way home, had run out of Gatorade.
My day's total was about 370 miles, the first time I'd been more than a hundred miles in a day on a motorcycle in my whole life. As for what I need to do to get more days like this, I have an Audiovox cruise control I haven't had a chance to install, yet. That HAS to happen! My butt was not happy at the end of the day, and my knees were complaining before I got to Pensacola. Highway pegs may be in my near future, but I can't go the bucks for a better seat right now. My mileage was disappointing, only got 42 on the way over there, but like I say, my first slab ride. Apparently 80 is not as thrifty as 65 or 70. I got 41 on the trip back, but that tank incuded the play time, so I was actually surprised to get that high.
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Kind of fun, huh?
