I went the greater part of my life without really knowing my brothers. I’d imagine that probably sounds wierd, but 10 years can be a big difference. I was 16 when I moved to St George, and our lives really never hooked up. We’ve all got our own lives, it just is what it is. So when Pat called me to hook up in Phoenix on an unusually warm indian kind of summer ride in phoenix, I was pretty pumped.
Head To Kingman – Thursday
Left around 3 to make it to kingman. Last time I rode to kingman in March, I froze my nuggets off. This time, the weather was just nice, and the ride went pretty fast. Made kingman by around 10. Grabbed some food, and hit the sack.
Head to Phoenix – Friday
woke up, fueled up and headed to phoenix. It was about 50 degrees when I left, but knew itd warm up heading south so I just made miles. The ride was awesome. Called Pat in Wickenburg, and by then it had warmed up to 70. Found the Hotel, and found pat working on his new bike about 10 blocks away. Pat bought a beautiful bike: an 08 limited edition 105th anniversary Heritage Softail Classic, and got his wife Staci a good looking matching sportie.
We didnt screw around too long, loaded up and headed out to Scottsdale. Hit up a couple harley shops, Went to a place out in cave creek that I’ve never been too, had a couple of greasy burgers and a few beers and shot the shit. Ended up at the pub next door to the hotel for a few single malts. So basically, 2 short harley diehards drinking scotch and riding alot. Easy peasy japanesy.
Side note: Registering your motorcycle in Arizona, especially Phoenix has HUGE advantages. FREEWAY ACTION SHOTS! How cool is that? The Great city of Phoenix took this nice shot of Pat, but for some reason I wasnt able to make the shot:
They emailed it to him for a small charge without even asking. Phoenix is good like that. Pffft.
Titan Missile Museum
Woke up, and hit another dealership on the way out of town heading to Tucson. Then it was open Road. We switched bikes and had my first shot and checking out a six speed transmission on Pat’s new ride. It was smooth. The whole bike was smooth. He had it set up just like he liked it, including a nav which came in pretty handy.
Our first stop was pretty damn cool. The Titan missle Museum in Tucson. One of 3 left in the world (IIRC). We took the tour and I gotta say, was one of the cooler museums I’ve ever been in. The redundancy of the security, and a glimpse into cold war operations was really insightful. The 2 tour guides had actually worked at similar silos, and the tour was top Notch I thought. For 500 bucks you can spend the night there. I *WILL* do that before I die. I just need 500 bucks and robyn to go with me. The latter is gonna be tough…. (she’ll do it).
We then rode up to old Tucson. I gotta admit, I wasnt that prepared for it and missed more than I wished I had. We had an hour or so, since it was close to closing time, and I blew through it too fast. Pat is more of an old western afficinado and knew way more of the old movies that had been filmed there, and had been there a few times, but still, it was pretty cool. Knowing a few of the old movies that had been filmed there would have really been an experience. I need to watch a few more, and go back.
We headed back to our hotel in tucson, had a quick dinner and hit the sack.
Pima Air Museum – Friday
Epic Day. I’ll admit it, I love museums. I almost dont even care what kind — some are obviously better than others, but this was one of the best also. Pima Air Museum. Spent about 3 1/2 hours there and definately another place to go back. I think they had every major period plane you could think of, including one JFK/LBJ’s Air force one, which was the last prop driven air force ones.
Today was a bit cooler, and some wind too. We bombed out after bumming some jumper cables from the staff and headed out to get back to Phoenix. Just outside of PHX you could see a storm brewing, so we opened up and stayed ahead of it and got back to phoenix with enough time to head to Harolds in cave creek to have some food, fix some server problems back home. The city of Phoenix also got another couple of good snapshots of pat and I riding in Loose formation:
Pat paid alot for these pictures, figured they should be at least shared with someone. Utah is like Argentina apparantly, if you can get back across the border theres no Extradition of convicts. Worked for butch and sundance anyway, untill they got shot. They never sent me a fine.
2 days of hard riding, we got to the hotel and crashed.
Monday, March 3rd 2008
Pat had to get back to Salt Lake, and I had to get home so we parted ways after a good weekend of riding. I found out that Pat and I ride about the same way: we like historical stuff, we both get bored easy, and we both don’t mind alot of saddle time. The more actually, the better. It made for a great weekend, and screw the fact that he’s my brother, He’s just fun to ride with. We’re going to do more of this. Hopefully the dunn brothers section of this blog gets big.
I stopped several times to make sure shit was going well at the office, since I really should have been back to work. After that, I just opened it up and tried to make time
Theres a couple of standards i’ve always kind of measured rides by: 1) If the temp is under 90 degrees, the wind gets cooler. 2) If its over 90 degrees, the wind gets hotter, and 3) 55 degrees is the cutoff for long rides. This ride made me rethink that. 55 degrees is good for an hour, but after a few hours it starts to get colder and colder. I had every intention of getting back to St. George, but as I got closer and closer to Kingman, and weatherband radio was telling me that it was going to be 40 degrees with 30 mile an hour wind gusts, i decided to stay another night and head out in the morning. I hate riding at night anyway. I got a room at the holiday inn.
Tuesday, March 4th 2008
when the temp hit 50 outside around 9, I got the hell out of dodge. Don’t like being away from the office that long. The ride home was decent. Took the road behind vegas through Lake mead, overton and was home by around 3pm.
Total: 3 states, 4 days, 1,129 miles
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You can feel it starting to turn in the mornings. Its cooling down. The normally perfect 8AM ride to work requires a jacket now. So when I needed to head up to Salt Lake to take care of some family matters, and coupled with the fact that my bike is a third the cost of what itd take to drive my truck up, I jumped at the chance to spend the day riding to Salt Lake. It may be the final time this year.
I met pat just outside of eureka, I met up with Pat after riding through a 4 inch high grasshopper massacre, that for a while made me think my tire was flying apart. My leathers were yellow, and my bike was covered with bugs, but only completely, and only the lower 6 inches of my bike. I was like moses parting the red sea of locusts, which of course is a combination plague. Moses couldnt have done it I dont think, but street glides can. Its just how I believe.
