Sep 11, 2020 - National Park Ride - Davenport IA to Loveland OH

Yesterday we rode the last 30 miles into Davenport in the rain. Today we needed to leave early since the weather was going to be yellow and reds by later  in the morning.  We  left and ended  up riding about 2 hours in and out of the rain.  Nothing hard, thank goodness.

Today was the first day we had to gear up for rain in the morning.  The other days we had to because it was cold.

Jerry is ready to go.  Seat belt on and smile on his face.   :-)

Looked like this most of the day.

Passed into Indiana.

We saw some of this blue stuff for only a little while today.

Here the sun is trying to come out....ahhh check it out ..... corn...  LOL

Got into Ohio

And the last street here is ours.  Nice to be home.

Most  exciting part of the day was when we crossed a state line.... YEAH

WHAT A GREAT TRIP!!!!!!

Thanks to Ron for pulling it together, 

To Courtney for getting our restaurant and hotels, 

Larry for all the weather checks..... 

And I guess my part was to getting pics.  We had a blast !!!!

Hope you all love looking at the pics as much as I enjoyed taking them

Miles: 444

Temps: 57-72

Route: I74E

Destination: HOME

Total miles for the trip: 4803

Total states: 11

Total days: 14

Sep 10, 2020 - National Park Ride - Fairmont MN to Davenport IA

 Sooooo.... I guess you are wondering about our bike....  :-)

Forgot to mentioned that as we were riding 10 MPH on the side of the highway last night, the guys almost hit a skunk.  Just what we needed was another thing to deal with......

Well Ron and Larry decide to go look at it this morning since there is now more light than on the highway last night.  They pulled of the ECM (Electronic Control Module).  This also has the throttle in it. OK so here goes a non-tech person trying to explain this.  There are 6 pins and Ron noticed 1 was not in the same position as the other 5.  So he pushed it in.  Larry started it up and YEAH, there is power.  He rode it around the parking lot and "yes" it was running good. 

We go up and pack up and head back to the bikes.  Load up and helmets on.  OH NO!!!!  Ron says his battery is dead...lovely.  Larry pulls out his "jump-n-go" to jump it.  Then he asks Ron if his key fob is locked?  Sure enough, that was it.  Unlocked it and we are back getting on the bikes.

Crap!!!!  Bike back in limp mode.  Pulled the pin connector back out and sure enough, that pin had backed out.  Ron suggests to get a tooth pick to push in it to maybe keep it in place. He road over to Perkins and gets a few... YEAH!!!  back in business.  

 

Worked for a bit then quit. So he put it  in 3 of them. 

OK lets go to Perkins for breakfast.  Finish breakfast and DARN!!!  back in limp mode.  OK lets put tooth picks in every pin.  Sort of works.  Larry calls our Harley dealer to see if have any other suggestions.

Ron tweak the position of them and YEAH back up and running.

I am the keeper of the emergency tool kit.  Larry said we will ask Harley for an HD part number for this tool.  

They say there is a reason for everything.  I believe our delay was to meet this gentleman.  Even though it is now almost noon, we are about to leave and a gentleman comes up and sees our RFTW emblem on the bike. It has the symbol for Vietnam.

He asks if we have family member that server.  We said yes: Larry brother and our uncle.  He proceeded to give us a pin to be give to them.  It is a "Vietnam War Commemoration Pin".  Pins are for those that served 1955 to 1975.  He was only going to give out 300 and he is already up to 5000.  Very special. 

We thanked him for his service and for the pins... OK we are off.....

As we head out the road in the right lane is so bumpy, just like last night.  We think that may have been a factor in the problem for the pins to back out. Ok lets try the left lane.  Anything to keep those pins set.  Keeping our fingers crossed and saying prayers all day, kept us going until Davenport, IA.

Yeah we are now in Iowa.

It may be hard to tell in these pics but is was over cast all day.

Love the yellow fields. So much brighter with the sun.  I think most of them are soybeans.

Then with about 30 miles left we hit a light rain.  Looks like fog.   LOL

As we are almost finished for the day, we ride past one of the blades on the windmills. They average 107 meters or 350 feet.  WOW was this long riding past it.

These pics are one sitting in a rest area.  Wow!!   I would hate to have to drive one of these.

So we end the day with all tooth pics still in place.  

If you happen to read this, say a few prayers we make it home.

We stayed in rain gear and full winter clothes all day.  Looks like maybe a warmer day tomorrow.

Miles: 365

Temps: 45-57

Route: I90E, I34S, I80E, I74E

Destination: Davenport, IA

Sep 9, 2020 - National Park Ride - Interior SD (Badlands National Park) to Fairmont MN

So we are getting a little tired of this cold weather.  LOL  It was 37 when we woke up.  Here is Joe's place from the front porch as  the sun was coming up.

As we leave the Park, I tried a few more pics.  

                                         Still seeing lots of cattle.  

We have seen lots of acres of sunflowers.  It is about 1% of Minnesota crops.

We crossed the Missouri River.

We watched these clouds all day long.  Larry had weather up on the bike but lucked out that is was ahead of us.

OH Yeah, guess what.... more corn.... LOL

We saw these once in a while.... so since I was bored a little, I decided to count them....

There are 17 in a row and 2 rows.  So 34.  

Fun fact:  They are about 1000 each..  Soooo 34,000 pounds, 17 tons

We stopped to see George and Kathy in Sioux Falls for a late lunch. George used to live next to Ron and was a Vietnam Vet.  It was great to catch up with them

Yeah, we are now in Minnesota.

Beautiful sunset.  And we had less than 25 miles to get to Fairmont, MN for the day.

Then our bike went into limp mode....... OH SH** !!!  Larry got it restarted once and we got about 15 miles further.  Then it died again.  This time he could not get it reset after about 6-8 times trying.  The bike will go 10 MPH in this mode.  At least we could get off the expressway riding on the side.  I 90 is a very lightly traveled road and we made it to our hotel in about 40 minutes.  Tomorrow will be interesting.  

We had no more planned stops on the way home .... except now the Harley dealer.  

Miles: 392

Temps: 37-45

Route: I90

Destination: Fairmont, MN 

Sep 8, 2020 - National Park Ride - Rapid City SD to Interior SD (Badlands National Park)

Woke  up today looking at the weather. Saw that Red Lodge got 3-5 inches of snow and Beartooth Pass was closed because of snow. WOW!!!  We were just there a few days ago and in the 80s.

Check out Ron's  Bike.   Little bit of snow

Poor Jerry must have been cold last night.

Larry took the bike into the Harley dealer for an oil change.  Look what I found.

Ron and I headed to Sturgis while Larry was waiting on his bike.  Check out the snow.

Sturgis population is 6627 except for 10 days during the Rally and it is 1/2 million

Some of the bars.  

Main Street.  This is where a lot of the bike are during the rally

Headed to Full Throttle. It is about 10 miles out of town.  This is one of the famous bars during the rally

Cabin: seemed like there was 100.  Mostly for the rally

This is a bar, pretty cool

Inside the bar.....

This was impressive...

Larry and Ron discuss our route.

Heading to the Badlands National Park.

See all these signs for Wall Drug..... They have everything

Got into town.....This place has everything.

Inside reminded me of Traders World.  Definitely a tourist trap.....

Now heading into the park and guess what we see..... a bison..... right at the gate

He is right by the bush

Drove right past it.

So many different rock formation we have seen on this trip and these are just as cool. Since is was pretty late in the day , the pics just do not show the true colors.  Sorry.  Hope to get a few in the morning as we drive out.

This animal is tagged.  Some are tagged to keep track of them.

I am riding  with Ron.  This is Larry.

We are spending the night with my cousin that works at the park.  Right before we get to his place we see these sheep.  Pretty cool!!!!!

Here is Joe.  Severed us a great dinner and we had a blast catching up with him. 

 THANKS JOE!!!

View out his back door.  Pretty AMAZING!!!!

Miles: 168

Temps: 39-45

Route: I 90 

Destination: Interior SD (Inside Badlands National Park)