The Sun was back this morning Steve was obviously sleeping of course. Mike and I held hands and had a séance to keep the rain away and it worked!

Just to prove our theory that Mac (Steve) was our black sheep, we received the following note from his wife Dawn early this morning:

“Around here we blame everything on Mac also!

Weather in Illinois is fine - no rain in sight since he left on Monday! Have fun.
Dawn (Mrs. Mac)”

Now you can see what we were talking about yesterday!       

Anyway, we had a great ride today and found some real nice roads. We took Highway 60 out of Lexington and it was one of the best roads we have been on since we crossed the Mississippi! It was full of turns and we passed the Blue Ridge Parkway just past Buena Vista Virginia but the roads we were on rivaled that famous piece of tarmac! I found myself calling to Mike on our communicators with and astounding “WEEEEEEEE!” as we rode through turn after turn. I then found that I wanted to go a bit faster than the bikes should be pushed loaded like they are and Mike and I both wondered just how much the tires could take. We decided that this is not the time to find out! Mac told us later that he was scraping his sidestand on occasion in the turns. This road runs right through the state but the section from Lexington to Richmond is a real blast on a bike.

We stopped in Richmond at Honda House where we met up with Denny Ray, a Honda District Service Manager, who set up a welder for Steve to get his Exhaust system taken care of. Steve took the exhaust pipe off and went to the welder with Denny.

Mike and I washed our bikes while we were at the dealership. The bikes were a mess from the day before riding in all the rain. Mike says, “It doesn’t make any difference if you ride in 1 mile or 100 miles, the bikes are a mess when you hit rain”. Well, 175 miles makes them pretty messy I’ll tell you. We have been pretty good about keeping up on them and felt guilty by riding them on a sunny day in the condition that they were in.

They really do look pretty good once they are cleaned up.

The folks at Honda House were very accommodating for our surprise visit. We first met with “Syke” at the dealership and he is a vintage kind of guy and we had some great discussions about old Honda’s and some of his rides. His wife Patti came by later but Mike and I had already left so we did not get to meet her. She talked to Steve about her S90 that she has had since High School. We looked up their website and I snuck a couple of pictures off of it. Sorry we did not get to meet Patti, but happy to have met with Syke.

We left Steve at the shop while he was putting the bike together as it looked like we were going to get more rain. I told him that there was no sense for all of us to get wet! Chris Gruszkos (Hardcore Ducati nut), and Kerry Abrams helped Steve get a broken bolt out of the frame and get the bike back together. We should also mention Jim (GM) and Kenny (SM) whom we did not get any time with but they allowed Steve the space to work on his bike and also let us clean our bikes.

Mike and I headed out of town to get a Hotel and found some more tunnel trees and also crossed the James River as we approached Historic Williamsburg to settle into our Hotel. We scheduled extra time throughout the trip in case we needed to do something with the bikes but we have had no problems that have caused any delays. Therefore we are ahead of schedule (a good thing!). We will change the oil in the bikes for the last time for the remainder of the trip tomorrow and prepare for our trip to the Atlantic Ocean on Saturday with Dave Hunter and the HRCA Chapter from Honda of Norfolk. We’re not sure if we will upload on Friday since we have nothing really planned. We’ll see! 

After we dip the front wheels in the Atlantic Ocean, we have only two more HRCA visits planned, Asheboro (Cycle Center) and Monroe (Iron Horse) North Carolina, then it’s off to the Honda Hoot to catch up with Charlie Keller and the gang!

Today we rode 224 miles and that brings us to 3616 overall miles during this trip. We are getting close to the end of the ride and we talked earlier tonight that we could remember talking about being on the road for so long, while now we see the end coming to a close very rapidly!

Finally, back on June 3^rd, we were fortunate enough to meet Ronnie Kimbell while we were in Farmington New Mexico. Ronnie fixed us breakfast prior to our departure on the 4^th and cooked breakfast on a cultivator disk! We did not mention that Ronnie was scheduled for open-heart surgery after meeting with us. Well, we just heard from Ronnie and he is doing fine and recovering at home now. Mike and I wish Ronnie the best and we’re sure that he will have a full recovery and will be back riding soon. 

Till next time…