“Now I Can Call Myself A Biker”

We had stopped at a place called Chandler, Oklahoma, at the State Armoury, (this is how the Americans spell it.) Interpretive Center. It was a museum and gift shop as well as a welcome break from the downpours. As we left, we did the usual thing, queuing at the junction, waiting to pull out and I was last to go. I was right behind Neill. ‘Ok’. I thought, watching the traffic, looking for a chance to pull out. ’Yes, clear to go.’ And I nearly did the classic ’boot up the behind’. Because Neill hadn’t gone ! And I had ! My immediate reaction was to pull up the front brake. Big mistake. The bike slipped on the front wheel and went over to the right. Neill had pulled out and had gone at this point leaving me totally embarrassed as I had to let the bike down with its sheer weight. It rested on it’s crash bar while I got off and positioned myself to lift the old girl back up again. The Road King weighs about 355 kg., quite a lump, but some how I manage to muster up enough strength to lift it. No damage, only my pride. Just goes to show that although the Road King has ABS as standard now, it didn’t have a chance to work with a road that slippery. The others had pulled over to wait for me, so I soon caught them up and we were off again. We stopped for lunch at a fast food sandwich bar, not one of Gary’s best. But I think it was a case of ‘might as well stop here, get out of the rain, have something to eat and try and dry out a little‘. This was as good a place as any. During that afternoon, on one stage of the head to foot soaking, another ’stair rod’ phase, we were stopped at a set of traffic lights. A black Mustang pulls up along side of me in the lane to my left. The window goes down and he shouts across to me, “Are you crazy or something ?” “No, I’m British !” Was my reply. Our last fuel stop of the day was at a filling station along side the interstate. The ’’Cherokee Trading Post ’, was round behind it, together with a car park and picnic area. On the other side of this, there was a fenced enclosure. Living here was a family of North American Bison. The male was a handsome beast, massive great head and shoulders. The female was a lot smaller and not nearly so impressive. Her calf could have been from any breed of cow as it was too young to give away its true species and identity. The trading post was full of all sorts of native Indian gifts and hand made crafts. Never seen anything like it before. Hand made pots, paintings, traditional clothing, necklaces, beads, head dresses, stuffed animals, knives, etc. etc. We crossed the south Canadian River on the William H. Murray Bridge. It’s called the ‘One Mile Bridge.’ Built in the 1930’s, it has 38 spans and is nearly 4,000 feet long. It was an engineering marvel at the time. But as with all these pioneering projects, by-passed towns such as Calumet, Geary and Bridgeport and in no time at all became ghost towns and casualties of this progressive, never ending construction. Short stint down the interstate now to Weatherford, and not a moment too soon. We parked up round the back of the hotel and was almost right outside our rooms for the night. Bill, aka, Dudley performed his usual trick when parking his bike. The way he did it today, reminded me of the way I saw Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear park his scooter on one of his TV programmes once. He’d pull up the brake, come to a halt, get off the scooter, not bothering with the stand, and just leave it on it’s side on the ground ! I think our Bill had gone passed caring by this stage, he was just having fun.