RUN FOR THE WALL Jean and Larry: Sep 10, 2020 - National Park Ride

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.