Let me start this by saying I'm not known for the way I put my words, being a poet, or being a writer. I'll try my best to describe my trip, but its something where you just "had to be there.
I get off work at 10:00 Thursday night, jump on the bike and drive like a bat outta hell to get home. I grabbed my notebook and started writing stuff that I need on it, ya know shampoo, towels, deoderant, and a bunch of other junk including my plastic coffee cup i got from when i took my daughter to a girl scouts meeting. I'm not sure how you define a biker, but if it involves drinking beer out of a plastic girls scouts coffee cup, then i'm a biker full out. I threw all my stuff into some bags, got the tent, sleeping bag, and pillow out and packed them up on the bike that night. I ended up getting to sleep around 11:30 pm Thursday night. I tossed and turned the whole damn time anticipating the great ride i'm going to have in the morning.
I roll over in bed for the seeming to be 100th time and look at the clock the next morning, its 4:30 am. Okay, time to go, hopped outta my bed, literally. I almost knocked the wife outta the bed and hit my head on the ceiling because I was so excited. Did the everyday guy things in the morning, the three S's(sh$t, shower, and shave) if ya ever heard of em and got ready. I threw my lightweight leather jacket on, my bright yellow and black helmet on and started the trusty metal steed. It was about 55 degrees outside so she spit and sputter a bit, carbureturs' ya gotta love em. Let her run for about 5 minutes and was on my way.
My plan was to ride the Mississippi river road through Illinois along the whole way down to Kentucky. I got about 50 miles from home, turned onto the river road, went about 5 more miles, detour. I took that detour, got back on the road, not even 30 miles down the road again.....detour. This time I went to see where the road was closed thinking "maybe the water went down and they just haven't got the signs down yet." Unfortunately, I was very wrong. The highway was totally covered, including the whole town just about a quarter of a mile down the road. National guard was there helping people out. It was really a site to see, pretty depressing.... I took a couple pictures of it and turned back around to take the detour. Once again, took a detour, got back on the river road...another detour. Finally, I just said forget this(not with nice words) and headed east a little more to take a different highway away from the river south through Illinois.
The rest of the trip down was rather uneventful. I rode highway 67 all the way down to St. Louis, then tried the river road south of St. Louis again with detours and finally made it through Illinois. If you haven't driven through Illinois you aren't missing a damn thing. Fairly straight roads, flat, and farmland. I crossed over the Ohio river into Kentucky and everything changed. Tree's lined both sides of the road, Some turns here and there. It was beautiful all the way to the campgrounds in Tennessee.
I arrive at the campgrounds via Schristopher's directions and forgot exactly which way to go once inside there. So I stop at a bulletin board type thing to look at a map of the campgrounds and someone yells "Hey Baff." I turn to see a group of motorcycles and someone looking down at me so i wave back and hop on the bike and ride on up there. I can't remember the exact number of people that were at the campgrounds at that time, I think it was around 10 to 15, but every damn one of em came and shook my hand or gave me a hug. I felt right at home although I was a little more than 600 miles south of my own. We sat around in a big circle just talking to eachother the whole night as if we've known eachother for years. Shortly after I arrived a few others still were popping in. We had people from all over the country down there, Iowa, Arkansas, Virginia, California, Indiana, Tennessee, and Kentucky. I might of missed one or two, but you get the picture.
I learned all kinds of new stuff sitting in that circle....different uses for a rubber mallet, how southern people are raised, that you can drive 9 hours west without leaving the state of Tennessee,how quickly the rubber on the bottom of a boot can melt on your exhaust, just to name a few. Another thing I learned the next day sitting around talking with everyone is that turtles live in bathrooms at the campgrounds and they can be hours of fun. I did get some pictures of the lake, but other then that, i didn't get many pictures. I was too busy enjoying sitting and shooting the sh$t with all my friends. If you ever have the chance to visit Kentucky Lake in the morning when the sun is coming up, its beautiful. I got there a little later then that, but its still beautiful.
My return trip was totally uneventful. I took interstates pretty much the whole way back just to avoid all that detour bullsh$t. I was cruising along pretty fast and hardly got off my seat of my bike. I was rained on for about 100 to 150 miles on the way back, wind was blowing me all over the road, but it was a great ride once again. I put about 1200 miles on my bike is all. I got home and my kids all came running out to me and gave me huge hugs. Then they started whining and fighting. The sad part is I missed em so much the whining and fighting really didn't bother me. I went in and hugged and kissed my wife not thanking her enough for letting me take this trip. She says she missed me too, but we've been married about 7 years so i know better.;)
All in all it was a great trip. Thanks To Gene and Schristopher aka Shelly for putting this all on. You guys picked just a great spot to have it and did one hell of a job coordinating everything that went on. Thanks to everyone who came down there and made me "the yankee" feel welcome. I made friends and memories on this trip that will hopefully last a lifetime. A long trip, got home safe and sound, didn't get my "peepee whacked," and was sorry that i had to leave. I miss yall already..lol I also would like to thank the people who run this site. If it weren't for you none of this would of ever happened.
We talked about having the same thing next year, so if yall got the chance come to it. I rode 600 miles south to go to this one and would of rode double that if i would of known that it was gonna turn out like it did. Take care all, and hope to see ya in chat and at next years meet and greet or sooner.....
