RUN FOR THE WALL Jean and Larry: May 21, 2018 - Day 6 to DC

WOW!! yet another beautiful day. It seems we are running behind the storms that are heading east.

Every day we have raffle, 50-50, auctions .... to raise money for the kids. We solicited a few extra hands today to tear tickets. Thanks guys!

Great breakfast. Nice place and plenty of room

During our morning meeting Eamon mentioned that Canada joined US in the Vietnam war. Today we have 4 riders from Canada, called North Wall Riders that will ride with us to the Wall.

Yesterday Eamon gave us a bit of historical information:

Australia has been in every war that the US was in. This has now been 100 years. He server for them for 1 year, 3 hour.... but who was counting. He said if we do not screw up, if could be another 100.

Jenny got this at one of the actions. Pretty cool.

Just to give you and idea of how close we are when we ride side by side. It is tight. Everyone needs to focus 100% of the time. This is truly a mission

AHHH first toll booth. I believe that someone picked up the tab on this

Several of the Artimas signs had these messages. Pretty neat

Next Toll booth.

Check out the cone ... they all had flags on them. All for the Run.

Here is the Run truck that goes with the ambassadors. They run ahead of the pack and thank the people on the bridges.

This is Walrus. sorry not to clear but he does not wear them at every exit ramp. These glove were passed to him from another Run road guard. He has since passed. Walrus will break them out once in a while. They are so easy to see as you come off the ramp

Heading in to Concordia, KS. This is a very small town and the love to see us roll thru. They bring everyone to show their patriotism.

Willie showed up as a surprise. He was originally in the same platoon as Larry and I during our FNG year. He was not able to make it but hopes to be back next year.

The officers that helped us today and will all the way thru to the state border. We love not having traffic on the highways as we come thru.

Lori is the coordinator for today. Such a big job.

Cops from state, county, city.... to get us across the state traffic free.

Parade formation with Missouri state flag.

Route Coordinator and quartermaster. They lead the pack in.

Platoon 1 brought the tail gunner up to ride in the assistant platoon place for the next run. Also move the assistance platoon leader to the platoon leader position. This is nice to mix things up a bit. Keeps everyone focused.

These 2 gentleman were from WWII. He stop and shook every hand as we passed up waiting for food. Very talkative. When asked how he was doing, response was "just getting older".

These were made by the kids. They also had the little kids take index cards and writes sayings on them. Example: "Have a good trip. Hope you have a happy day." Then they hand out the cards to the members of the pack.

Check out all the people serving. This is so nice as it really speeds up the line. Willie watch them set up and there were a few meetings going on to make sure all was set. Think about all these food stops. The number of people to fix the food ( and most of it is hand made), those serving it, clean up, table set up, beverages, deserts (oh my gosth, they are so good and all made by the town). I am sure that will at 5 more pounds on.

Cookie central. All different kinds. Of course I am a chocolate chip fan

Nate , Ken and Jenny, son arrived last night and will ride to DC with us. He is on the fuel team. Another family getting the next generation on board.

Love the little kids. Concordia always has lots of kids, waving flags and just being cute.

As we are getting ready to leave I see this little girl ..... here is our future all...

This is her great grandma. Her husband servered in WWII and love seeing the patriotism we bring out her her town.

We were riding with Catfish today and I noticed the numbers on the inside of his windshield. These are the exit number on the route today. Pretty good idea. Do not have to keep looking at papers like we do. As much as our road guards do, this makes it pretty easy.

Fuel team and the participants have really got this efficient now. Like well oiled machine.... well almost but pretty close

9 Mile is our assistant road guard leader. Here she is directing traffic after the gas fillup

Check out the little 57 chevy. This is their travel trailer. It was so cute.

Jacob, one of the Busch boys showed up to start the run today. Remember, not everyone can take all that vacation off to do the full thing. Many do just a few day. Glad to see you.

LOL Larry jumped in to help direct traffic to the pumps today.

Here are the rebel rousers. Jimmy and Judy. They are doing a great job.

This was so funny. He is trying to push it to jump start it. Not sure it is ever got started. The pack started rolling

We ended stopping on the ramp. The police officers had not yet started traffic. Here is the front .

Here are the rest sitting on the bridge, ready to get going.

EZ was the platoon leader when Larry and I were FNGs. Sitting there talking, he said his odometer just rolled over 100,000 miles.... WOW. And this was the second bike he has done it that far