Close encounter................

[Donal]

Just got back from a ride and found this little stowaway in my helmet ventilation thingy...........

:blink:

Don

 

[lnewlf]

Was your lucky day....While riding my nekkid Sazook I collided with a bumblebee at about 60-hit me right in the adam's apple and damn near cleaned me right off the bike...Little bastard managed to sting me too.

 

[TomInPA]

Coming home from Carson City on Friday I got nailed right below the chin. I suspect it was the biggest wasp in the world that grabbed my chin and stuck its ass in deep as I pawed at it and smashed it with my glove. Damn, I'm glad that doesn't happen often with the tall windshield and Laminar Lip. This one sneaked in..

 

[SacramentoMike]

Had one too. Memorialized below.

.

 

[garyahouse]

One day in 1975, I was mindin' my own business, slowing down gradually as I was pulling up to a stop light. I had already downshifted to first, and had the clutch pulled in. I was wearing an open face helmet and a light jacket. Something with a BIG stinger went down my neck. It stung me good at about 10 mph, and I could still feel it crawling around under my collar. I was still slowing down: almost to the light. I started slapping myself in the helmet and the neck with my left hand. Amazing how lousy my "aim" is under those circumstances. Spoze I belted myself about 10 times all together. Couldn't get bike outa gear as my left hand is busy slapping myself silly. It stung me again. I was in panic mode. However, my attempt to kill what I was certain must have been the world's biggest hornet... were making the side of my neck numb, I couldn't tell if I was getting stung over and over, or if I was inflicting my own injuries as I tried to kill whatever it was. Now the bike is bucking as I force it to stop... still with just one hand on the handlebars. At about 1 mph, the bike fell over as I hopped off and attempted to get my helmet off my head... with my stupid gloves on. Note: gloves are only stupid under circumstances like this. I was STILL slapping myself assuming I was getting stung again by whatever it was. Remembering back, I know several things for sure:

Those behind me in traffic got a great show without paying a dime for admission.

I did get stung two or three times though I never found my assailant. The rest of what I thought I feeling was probably self- inflicted.

The bike (1972 Suzuki 500) got a bent clutch lever and torn hand grip

Though there weren't many available at the time, I began thinking about getting a bike with a fairing.

However, it would be nearly 35 years before I would buy my first bike with a real fairing: my FJR. Just another of the many reasons why I love this thing.

No more bees for me. I use my extra tall windshield-always. Though Florida bugs create a year round decoration on my windshield, it beats digging them out of my shirt -- or my teeth for that matter.

Gary

darksider #44

 

[maddad]

I have a helmet with an inside flip up sun shield. Just driving out of an intersection in heavy traffic, wasp lands on the sun shield and cralls up inside the helmet. Boy did i get off the road quick.

 

[SacramentoMike]

Funny post, Gary. I guess you know about that pocket of still air behind your windscreen that bees, hornets, wasps, eagles, whatever, can fly around in all they want, right? (Like the one I had mounted when my bee got me?)

Maybe we all need one of these. I'm thinkin' Group Buy. The rest of you guys in?

"I have a helmet with an inside flip up sun shield. Just driving out of an intersection in heavy traffic, wasp lands on the sun shield and cralls up inside the helmet. Boy did i get off the road quick."

Geez, Donal, why didn't you just start riding one-handed and punch yourself in the head till you subdued it? :lol:

 

[ElliottM]

I am going to try to make this succinct enough to have you follow along. One of the (but not THE) more embarrassing moments in my life.

About 12 years ago I had a house on acreage, built on a slope, with pasture, a barn, etc. So one fall day I am towing a brush-hog behind a quad ATV, wearing a dirt-bike helmet, clearing blackberries and brush, when I ran over a wasp nest with the brush-hog. Immediately I am swarmed with wasps, and quickly my helmet is full of wasps. I am getting stung repeatedly, and I jump off the ATV and run down the hill toward the barn, swatting like a mad-man at the wasps. There is about a 4-foot ledge above the barn from the pasture, and I am running with reckless abandon and realize i am running too fast to keep my balance through the ledge to the barn floor. Of course I face-plant at the barn floor, landing on my wrist, thinking I had broken it. I did the normal thing most dorks like me would do - I got up, brushed myself off, and quickly looked around to make sure there was no way anyone could have seen me. My wrist was very swollen as a result of the face plant, so I wound up driving myself with one arm to the ER, but in the end I managed to escape without any broken brones.

Thankfully I lived where I could see none of my neighbors from my property, or vice versa. Had someone been there to film me I am sure I would be a perennial winner on "America's Funniest Home Video." I told my then fiance and now wife the story, and now I have the pleasure of hearing it repeated in front of close friends or new acquaintances from time to time to ensure I remain humble.

 

[azitlies]

Some pretty funny stories Well... for an observer!! lol

I use pledge to clean lens' etc. After reading these I'm gonna be a lot more careful to check all those bees have been shooed away next time ! They really seem to like that Pledge smell.

 

[gixxerjasen]

I have a helmet with an inside flip up sun shield. Just driving out of an intersection in heavy traffic, wasp lands on the sun shield and cralls up inside the helmet. Boy did i get off the road quick.

Oh yea, just got on the interstate and see a bee crawling along the inside of my face shield. Nearly wrecked in my attempt to get across to the shoulder and stopped as quickly as possible. I then removed my helmet very carefully and threw it into the field next to me.

Another time, I'm leaving Downtown Dallas after work, and they are doing a bunch of construction on the road. As I pull up to an intersection with a bunch of cars I notice that the construction crew must have unearthed a huge bee hive because I and the cars are getting swarmed. While car guys are just like "Hey, look, a bunch of bees outside" I'm thinking...Holy crap, I'm outside WITH THEM!

After some frantic minutes (seemed like hours) at the light remaining as still as possible then hauling ass to the next light I notice that they are still with me. Wasn't until a couple of blocks (and lights) later that I finally clear the swarm.

I manage to get on the highway sting free and am all good when I shift around a little bit and must have moved my knee closer to the tank. Turns out I had a hitchhiker on the inside leg of my pants and the bugger stung me through gear and jeans and all. There was some serious slapping and brushing to get rid of him, which was then followed by a very paranoid ride the rest of the way home.

 

[John d]

I had a bee take a nap in my helmet years ago at a stop. I put the helmet back on, and guess what happened a 1/4 mile down the road.

 

[FJRPittsburgh]

I had a bee take a nap in my helmet years ago at a stop. I put the helmet back on, and guess what happened a 1/4 mile down the road.

Uh....I give up. What happened?

 

[schupperts]

I got my first this year in the groin area!!! The effects were felt for days. I dont have any actual photos but this one is pretty close...

 

[wheatonFJR]

Alot of these stories sound similar to my own experiences. However, there is a safety aspect to distractions...make sure you "fly the plane...and land it" before the distractions kill you.

I've had bees enter my helmet at the most inopportune moments, ie right in the middle of a fun day, wicking it up on a twisty road in Wisconsin.

I focused on what I was doing...made it through the curve, pulled over, stopped, put sidestand down, pulled helmet off...and that was hard to do with this angry thing inches from my eyeballs.

A certain Colorado FJR rider, Larry Winter (aka LA Winter), passed away from an extreme distraction...a bat flew in his jacket...distracted him enough that a collision occured with a truck. He died at the scene...leaving a wife and small children.

I want to think that thinking and learning about the dreadful consequences from poor Larry helped me to survive my episode.

We've all, or alot of us have had painful episodes with bees/wasps. In fact, I've taken undue schadenfreude reading the posts above.

However, just remember, ride the bike until it is stopped; focus on the bike until you can stop and properly spank that stinging scourge from hell.

 

[Bokerfork]

I got my first this year in the groin area!!! The effects were felt for days. I dont have any actual photos but this one is pretty close...

Worst Camel Toe ever!

Please don't do that again.

 

[TomInPA]

Sounds like a few of you are qualified for your bee strike patch in the sig line. I earned mine earlier this year when I killed a hornet with my face.