Not a Resource

Decided that both the bike and I deserve to rest for the day. We’ve done around 1,500 miles since pulling out of the driveway back home. It’s been a blast, but this is supposed to be a vacation and we don’t need to be home for two whole weeks. A day of doing nothing much feels like the right thing right about now.

Hit Shoney’s for a gluttonous buffet breakfast and then stopped by Walmart to see if I could find some of the elusive boxes of Winchester White Box .45 ACP. Sadly, they were out that, but they did have a little bit of many popular calibers and a single box of the Winchester .45 hollow points that I keep in my guns. They also had a bunch of long guns for sale. When they stopped selling them in my area several years ago I’d assumed that was a nationwide thing…

Monday morning I’ll hit the local dealership to fix my brakes and hopefully at least get my windshield raised. Then I think I’ll stay a few more days to run the rest of the EOM routes. Except maybe for #8, we were warned that mining loader trucks have been using the whole road in the Devil’s Triangle area and we should stay away.

Started the day with my windshield stuck in the down position. All the fuses seem to be good so either a connector has come loose, the switch is bad, or it is completely fucked.

Decided to run EOM Route #2. Somehow I end up leading 20+ riders from the hotel. Not a position I wanted to be in. On the way to our first mountain a group of four other FJRs passed me and at first I was happy to be following instead of leading.

Until we hit the twisties. I know well enough to “ride my own ride” — not to try to keep with someone riding above my comfort level — but with another bike in front of me it is hard ignore them an concentrate further along the curves. Out in front this comes naturally to me but following someone I have to really concentrate on ignoring the other rider and my ride suffers.

Luckily those people weren’t actually on our ride. At the first stop sign after the first mountain they went left, while I went straight with our original group of five. I didn’t know it at the time but the rest of the pack followed the group that went left and we didn’t see them again until we returned to the hotel.

Two of our group were riding two-up, and one of them was out-riding us all with his wife on the back. It was something to see.

Halfway through our ride, coming back down another mountain, I went to tap the rear brake pedal and it just sank. A few pumps got it grabbing again but was still weak. I try not to use much brakes in the curves but for the rest of the ride I did my best to avoid using them at all. This was especially challenging when we hit a stretch of the Blue Ridge Parkway with fog as thick as I’d ever seen.

Back at the hotel, it has been suggested that I try bleeding the brakes. I know that it’s not a terribly complicated procedure but it’s not something I’ve done myself before. The nearest dealer isn’t terribly close and is closed on Sunday anyways, so first thing in the morning I’ll be hitting whichever auto parts store I can find for a bleeding kit… but I’m not very confident that Sunday is going to be a riding day.