I promise this will be the last post dedicated to my vacation on the Harley but this was too good not to share.
On the next to the last day of our trip we were in Dubose Wyoming, a quaint little town with a mining history, a definite country flavor and a great little restaurant called the Cowboy Café. We woke to a temperature of about 34 degrees. In case I haven’t told you , I am a fair weather rider. I hate to be cold and anything less than 70 degrees on a motorcycle is cold, at least to me. I suggested we wait awhile before pulling out to let it warm up a little (or preferably a lot) . Of course, the boys scoffed at that idea. We needed to get on the road even if we had to brush the frost off our leather seats.
Imagine my glee when we discovered neither bike would start. I was told not to hurry to check out of the nice warm motel room. I disguised my bitter disappointment.
I was also asked to pull out my tablet and research possible reasons for a motorcycle not starting in 30 degree weather. (Now, I could have told them the reason without the help of the world wide web – it was too darn cold! But I kept that wisdom to myself.)
In my search for information I stumbled on a Harley Davidson chat room. A rider from Alaska had asked if anyone had advice for getting a bike to start on a cold morning. The first response from a sympathetic fellow biker was, “Move to Californy.” I knew right then I was going to love this research.
I started reading the responses aloud, getting more and more tickled as I went. One guy said to use a blow torch. We didn’t have one so I offered my hair dryer. They didn’t bite. Another very wise Harley owner said “try again next spring”, sage advice if you ask me. There were more, but better than the suggestions were some of the slogans the bikers had added to their responses. Here are just a few:
“I have taken a vow of poverty. If you really want to irritate me, send money now.”
“Everyone has to believe in something. I believe I’ll have another beer. “
And the one that had me rolling on the motel bed, “I asked God for a motorcycle but then I realized that’s not how God works. So I stole a motorcycle and asked for forgiveness.”
Now that one did get a bit of a smirk from my husband and an actual chuckle from my brother in law but they both decided I could turn off the computer at that point. I guess they weren’t finding my research helpful.
In the end they pushed the bikes out into the sunshine and we waited half an hour. They started right up on the next try. That half hour gave me plenty of time to build up my layers (seven in all counting the camisole all the way out to the leather jacket), to wrap a scarf around my throat three times and to double up on my socks. Of course, within three hours I was stripping off layers at every stop until I was finally down to a t-shirt.
The comments on that chat room site may not have helped a lot with troubleshooting the problem, but they sure raised my spirits. I was still chuckling a few hundred miles down the road. In fact, just thinking about it brings a smile to my face today.
It was a great trip. I loved the changing landscapes, the special time with my husband and my brother in law, the relief for a while from the pressures of home and work, and the freedom of sailing along in the sunshine and the fresh air. But, in the end I loved that final leg up our driveway, being greeted by the dog who leaped and barked a welcome, the family who raced across the field to give hugs and hear all about the trip, and the sweet tug of home.
Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young— a place near your altar, LORD Almighty, my King and my God. Psalm 84:3
