It's 11:17pm, I'm on my third, no, fourth cup of coffee, the diner is far from busy. Since I arrived there have been eight other people there at one time or another, mostly they are kids, kids, well late teens,early twenties, all with too much metal in their faces and clothes that don't fit, on purpose, and their conversations center around drinking and vomiting. They are doing their best to impress each other and the girls are doing most of the talking. After a while a mother and daughter arrived, neither fit in with the rest of the patrons, the mother looked to be in her forty's and dressed nice...real nice. It was hard to keep your eyes off her, she exuded class and sexiness, But that is not why I was here, I was there to meet the boys from the Iron Butt ride.
At 10:32pm the trio was at Bridgeport, stopped for a stay awake coffee, They were at mile 978 of the 1000 mile ride. Evert mentioned that after the 1000 they might go for the 1500, a 1000 mile Iron Butt is called a Saddle Sore, the 1500 is a Bun Burner, a 1500 Gold is a Bun Burner in 24 hours. They expected to be back to the E Troop State Police barracks in Montville. From there they were to meet me at Norms for Breakfast at midnight.
At 1140pm, twenty minutes before the expected meeting time there are five people in the diner, the talk has quieted a bit, people are mostly stuffing their faces. The diner it self is just holding it's own, a couple years earlier if they had a $500.00 night they would have wondered where everyone is, now..a $500.00 night is a busy night.There are two people working, a cook and a waitress. Low cut black top, beautiful eyes, the mother quietly talks to her 20ish daughter. Two more young girls, young and dumb, arrive and take a booth.
11:49pm the trio has departed E Troop for the ride to the diner.
11:52, the mom and daughter have left, leaving me to look at our nations useless youth, a waitress yacking on a cel phone and a large cook. The cook has a tendency to tell you stories of his life to impress you, the stories lead you to start thinking about shooting yourself to get them to stop.
Seventh cup of coffee and eight cigarettes later, a middle easterner is talking too loud in his cel phone,two Navy boys arrive, Sunday rolls in and seven minutes later so do the Harleys. Late for their midnight estimate but whats seven minutes after a thousand plus miles.
The group came in and except for Steve they looked worse for wear. Tom and Evert look miserable, all shed their riding gear and move into the booth, time to eat. Tom doesn't need a menu, he has been thinking about French Toast and Kielbasa for over 200 miles. The food served the talking begins.
The ride was to start at the State Police barracks on 395, when Evert arrived Tom was sitting on the front step, a couple intoxicated people had decided to stop to use the Police bathroom, both were arrested for DUI, neither was happy, there was a robbery somewhere and the Police were busy, they would not be able to sign the Trio out for the ride, so they headed for the Montville PD Barracks. Evert had previously made arraignments to use the "Official cars only" turn around, he mentioned this at the meeting, he sent an E-mail to the riders about it, for all that Tom got the privilege of going 7 more miles than the others because as they pulled into the turn around he missed it which meant he had to get off the next exit.
They arrived at the Montville PD Barracks and found no one there, after knocking on the doors they said to hell with it and left.
As they entered 395 they found they were followed by two Montville cars, they cruised about a mile when one car passed them, it pulled ahead and both cars lights came on. The bikes moved to the shoulder between the two cars. The Police approached with hands on their guns, Steve went to talk to them. Turns out they had seen the bikes depart the barracks and wasn't sure what was going on so they investigated. Free to go the Trio headed out. Two of the riders had cameras with them, but neither thought of the cameras, the bikes and the Police until afterwards.
The headwinds heading west were terrible, so much so that when the directions changed they found that the tail wind really increased the fuel mileage. The wind was like a constant hammer on the front of the bikes and buffeted the hell out of them.
They ran into a couple sprinkles but other than that they stayed dry so the wet was not an issue. Cold on the other hand was a different matter. All three of the riders had their heated gear with them in case they needed it, the only problem was that the first lap was the coldest and the only one of them to actually be wearing the gear was Evert. Evert found that having the gear on afforded no real bonus against the chill though, the reason for this is that while he was wearing the gear he had forgotten to plug it in.
Rubenstien lost out on the privilege of giving up the gas pump pin, A detour because of a closed road forced the group to take a longer route to regain the planned route. This detour almost cost the ride. The trio pulled off to take on gas with their bikes banging on fumes. Tom's bike gave up, without fuel Old Red stopped running. Luckily the momentum he was carrying allowed him to coast up to the pump, if you don't have to push or call for aid, you don't get the pin.
Evert led most of the ride, around 800 plus miles of it but somewhere east of Waterbury on the return trip he started to fade, the headlights behind him were a distraction, he was losing focus, literally, he would begin to drift, Tom would call him on the radio, "Right Evert". Evert would come back on line. After a few such occasions Tom called him, "Evert, You alright?"
"We need to Stop" was Evert's reply. That was the coffee stop that he was at when he sent me the invite to the Midnight meal.
The entire ride not counting arriving at the start point or the ride from the finish to Norm's was 1046 miles, (Except Toms and his additional 7).
As far as support riders from the Club, there were none. A few had said they would join in for a lap to show support but none did. There was only the three, three men on a mission. But that isn't to say there was absolutely no support, there was one case of support unlooked for. That came in the Shape of a member named Les Cropley. This support wasn't planned at all, as a matter of fact Les had no plans of joining the ride because he didn't know about the ride. What Les did know was that he was riding along and all of a sudden there were three Club patches in view. Club Patches where there usually are none, so he pulled in with them at a gas station to investigate.
After eating and talking the three of them put their gear back on, jumped on their bikes, said goodbye and headed home to bed. Just like in the morning and the ride to the ride, Steve would have the longest ride home.
I asked them if the ride was fun and was told "No", Ev rode for the Memory of Jack Shoalmire who had passed and Steve and Tom rode in support of Evert. I asked that even if the ride was not fun was it good riding the ride.
Tom gave the answer, "It was twenty hours of misery".
For myself I can honestly say I am glad I had to work and was not available to participate, sure it would be nice to say "I did the Saddle Sore". but beyond that...there looks to have been no joy.
klay
One thing I will say is, Don't believe them, They were tired and sore, running back and forth over the same roads with buffeting winds fighting them. The truth of the matter is, with anything in life, it is the doing something that is important. The human mind is a wonderful thing, it forgets pain, forgets tiredness, and disregards tedium. What they did on Saturday will be enjoyed once they sleep and forget. The mind remembers what we enjoy and from the smiles, no matter how tired those smiles were...they had a good time. Had each one done the ride alone, it truly would have been miserable, But together...They have stories and comradeship...
They had a Great time, and when they've slept...that's all they will really remember.
I mean really...Does anyone in the Club really think they had a good time on the Alaska and New Foundland trips? Rain, cold and misery...They had a blast.
klay
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