Fonzie

Good on you!

Looks like a blast!

Annnnnd so it begins.... Musical score for the movie...i.e...soundtrack

I wasn't even payin' attention to you Duane. I was too focused on fixin' my line & workin' to the outside edge I kept askin' him if it was my fault, since I was next in front of him, and almost went off myself. Afraid he either target fixated on my fiasco/bad line, or if I cut him off if he was up tight on me, when I wrestled 'Birdy back on the ramp??

Is he a friend of yours or Bry's, Case? R.I.P

Damn dude do write for a living. All the right punctuation and everything. Great write up. Awesome write up! am serious fonz....archive the photos and writing.......I see a book being published down the road..... Wow! That's some awesome write-up, Fonz! I need to submit my papers to enlist in the DTC. (Just register on our site for updates. Link's in my sig line) nice write up Fonz (as always). Great pics!!! ..nice write up fonz Thanx for the props everyone.....Glad you enjoyed it! I enjoy writing them up.....Kinda like re-doin' the trip all over again.....But especially when I know people enjoy readin' them as much as I enjoy puttin' it together

To those of us who are......Have a GREAT day!!!

How much earwax on them?!? Hey....Keep forgetting to ask you David J. Rosso.....Was that you & wifey I saw on the day of the Scav Hunt? Not sure where the hell we were at, but I pointed/waved at you. Stop light....You were right hand lane....We were getting in turning lane? IIRC correctly, we were heading toward Dick's at the time. I assumed you guys were doing it too, but then never saw you at finish line later, or your names on the team lists

Won't let me give you any more rep right now.....But this one made me chuckle on the inside

We're gonna have to get you out there with us one of these times! That's too bad....I'm kinda diggin' those top blue/white ones

We'd have to "break it in" for you ahead of time Gregg!

LOL.... Kyle... That's gotta be the longest post I've ever seen you make!

http://dysfunctionaltravelingcircus.freeforums.org/pony-this-afternoon-t172.html

Put my raincoat on now over my jacket, hoping it will keep the wind off me 'cause I'm still freezing, and about 3 hours from home yet! Only good thing about how cool it was all day, is that I never cramped up this trip like I usually do. I'm thinkin' it helped me not dehydrate as bad as usual. Plus I literally drank 3/4 gallon of gatorade. Say adios to Kyle & Duane, and the rest of us head west.....Next stop, Euclit. Stop for gas & farewells to Koz & John, then Sam & I head for Norwalk. I think it's ~ 3:30 now. 'Nother cop as we're pullin' out of the gas station & onto the onramp. He comes flyin' up on Sam's tail, as I wait 'til he's by to pull out behind him. Don't know who pissed in all their Wheaties today, but all 3 states seem to have eaten from the same bowl! That stretch of 90 from Euclid to Norwalk seemed to take forever. I literally kept catching myself about to nod off. Scary enough in a car, but surreal on a bike :shock: Sam got me through Norwalk & over to 20 from 90, then peeled off for home. About 4:30 in the morning IIRC as I begin the last leg by myself. Stop in Bellvue to top off, stretch & warm up a little before I knock out the last 70 miles. I'm so tired.... 18 & 224 are a blur. Sun starts coming up as I'm coming through Tiffin. Don't think I've seen a sunrise since I left the railroad, where I saw them so much, it was no big deal anymore, although it meant the worst part of the night was over. Pull into the garage around 6:00, and as I roll her in, the trip is stuck between 699.9 & 700 LOONNNG freakin' day!! But hey....We've all now got bragging rights that we rode to Niagara Falls & back in a day....And didn't just do the Clark Griswald, but got some serious tourist gawking in! All kidding aside......Kosmo was a fantastic tour guide!! I just thought we were gonna pull a Clark Griswald.....Check out the Falls there at Horseshoe & head out. I wouldn't have known about all the different observation points, elevators, trails, etc. We were there for a couple hours. Had we also done the Maid of the Mist......We probably would've been there for a couple more. It'd be easy for a first timer to spend an afternoon there.....Just on the American side It was a great day with friends.....Up until about 10pm that is I think we're already laughing about the whole ticket thing, and though I hate that Kyle went down, I am glad that he was able to walk away with relatively minor injuries. Hopefully a couple new panels, & the bike'll be good as new, along with his hand. Thanx to everyone for helping me celebrate my birthday this year, and makin' it one to remember! What started off on my 35th as avoidance of a milestone, has, in the last few years, morphed into this annual ride, and taken on a life of it's own it seems, while allowing me to meat & ride with some cool folks along the way Wikipedia link with all kinds of cool info & pix about the Falls....... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niagara_Falls Including this pic of the falls dry, during a restoration in 1969......

A little after 10:00 & cruisin' along at a nice clip. Just when I'm thinkin' that the trip is basically over except for the slab home, as we're almost out of New York already, and I may make it home around 2 or 3 at this pace.......I notice red & white flashers in my mirror. Hoping it's an ambulance at first, as they're not red & blue, & slowin' down while watchin' my mirrors to try & see if the others are pullin' over & if the lights keep comin', or stop. $$$HITTTT......Looks like everyone's pullin over & the lights are too :uhno: Koz & I end up a ways in front of everyone. Very dark, but I can see the silhouette of the trooper in his spotlight, slowly making his way up the line of bikes. Also see another cruiser pull up now, and holler over to Koz that that ain't a good sign for us. It's SO dark out, & Koz & I are far enough ahead & just out of his light, while he's working his way up, that I jokingly think Koz & I could probably roll our bikes up a ways, and flop them over in the tall grass & hide before he even realizes we're up here He comes by me & asks for license & registration, then goes up to Koz for the same. It's here I hear him telling Koz that he doesn't know what he's gonna do with us, as he shot some of us at 82mph, some at 84, & 85.....So he doesn't even know who was what I'm thinkin?!? Maybe we'll get off with a warning after all then, I'm hoping We're all wearing gear, pulled over quickly for him, and everyone's been polite so far from what I can hear, + he seems like one of the cooler LEO's I've ever had the "opportunity" to "mingle" with We all give him our papers, and I apologize to him & explain that they're all out helping me celebrate my birthday, and some of us are from over by Toledo, and we were just wantin' to get home. Maybe it helps, maybe it won't I'm thinkin. We take this time to welcome John to the Dysfunctional Traveling Circus , and I use the cop's headlights to put the liner in my jacket, 'cause I'm already freezing, and I'd even put my long john top on before we left the restaurant. Seems like we're sittin' there forever when he finally gets out of the car & comes back to us with some papers in his hands. I'm still hopin it's just written warnings, but he promptly informs us that we're gettin' tickets, and here's Kyle's & mine....But he's gonna do us a "favor" & write them for 78 so we get less points. I realize this IS advantageous to us, but I'm also thinkin' this is his "solution" to not knowin' which of us were goin' how fast He goes back to the car, finishes everyone else's (not sure why Kyle & I were deemed "lucky" enough to get ours first...Happy Birthday to me :roll: ) & then brings those back out. Finally ~11:00 we get back on the road, having lost any time we'd gained prior, and now I'm back to lookin' at 3:00-4:00 gettin' home :roll: Little did I/we know that there was yet more excitement to come for us shortly. We got off in a little bit at the next exit, topped off the tanks & swapped stories about what'd just happened. Decided to just take 20 over about 10-15 miles, before hopping back on 90, as we were only a few miles from the NY/PA border & didn't want to pay another toll for that little bit. Find 90 & start up the onramp. My line sucked, as I was on the inside too far, but got her to the outside, and as I think she's startin' to open up, I giver her a little more throttle to enter traffic. Howwwevverrr......I quickly discover this is a decreasing radius onramp with an almost 90 degree turn coming up, & having just blipped the throttle, I'm now going too fast to make this hard 2nd part of the curve & am now drifting off the side of the ramp, into the gravel, and aiming for the little grassy downhill. Hit the front brakes HARD while leanin' over & tryin' to keep her from straightening up too far, which I feel her doin'. After a bunghole pucker, a brown stain in my shorts, & a cussing session at myself about what a $tupid a$$ I am......Somehow, miraculously, I got her back down onto the ramp. Knees shakin', I embarrassingly turn around to look at Kyle & Koz who I'm figurin' are laughin' their a$$es off at me.....Except neither of them are there :uhno: Ahhhhh $hiiittttt.....Where'd they go?!? I start flickin' my brights at Duane, John & Sam. Sam pulls over & before I can even tell him what happened, he says "MAN....I almost bit it on that ramp!" I tell him me too, and that Kyle & Koz aren't behind me anymore, and I'm afraid something happened. He takes off to catch Duane & John, & I turn around to go back & find what happened to those 2....fearing the worst & praying for the best. I start back up the onramp and am not seeing anything. Did I mention already how damn dark it is tonight??? Get to that tight part of the onramp, and still not seeing anything/anyone....Whewwww....that's good....Maybe they missed the onramp & kept going straight on 20 then???.....How am I gonna catch them & the other guys goin' in the opposite direction now??....WAIT....what's that?!?....Koz & Kyle sitting on the very end of the concrete wall....I only see one bike though, where's the other....wait....there's Kyle's down at the bottom of the grassy hill between the onramp/offramp....Is Koz's rear end smashed up....Which one went down then.....Both???....No...I think Koz's looks OK....Why's Kyle's just sittin' up down there with the lights still on & he hasn't brought it back up yet??.....What's this on the ground...Someone's armor??? All this is riflin' through my head in very short order. Go over to them & find out that Kyle also got caught by surprise with the decreasing radius, and didn't fare as well. You can see in the gravel/dirt where he must've locked it up as he went over the edge. What I thought was an elbow armor in the dark, turned out to be his right hand mirror case, and he says he thinks his hand is broken, as it hurts & is swollen already :? Sam, Duane & John find us now, as well as a couple guys who stop in their pickup with a cruiser in the back, to see if everyone's OK & offer help. John goes down & tries to get Kyle's bike up the little hill, but apparently it kept dying on him when he moved the bars. Come to find out, it had something to do with the kill switch. He finally gets her back up on the road, and we cross over to the offramp & head back down to the McDonald's parking lot, where the light is better & we can assess the damage to him & the bike. Kyle's got a pretty bad scrape on his elbow & forearm, and his throttle hand is swollen. Koz proceeds into the gas station to buy some first aid supplies & proceeds to doctoring Kyle up. He may not have the credentials of Chuck....but Koz makes a damn fine mother hen!! I give him some ibuprofen to help with the impending pain. He protests he can't feel anything, but I remind him that's only because of the adrenaline, and that'll soon be wearing off. Bike has some cracked plastic on the front right lower, & tailsection, plus that mirror I'd mentioned earlier. Mechanically seems to be OK. We ask him if he wants to go to the hospital, grab a hotel room, or continue on.....He replies "Let's ride!" I ask if he wants to take a couple laps around the McDonald's lot first to make sure the bikes roadworthy....He replies "Let's ride!" His glove won't fit over his hand anymore, so I ask if he wants to grab some leather work gloves from the gas station. He says he's hoping the cold numbs it up so he can't feel it anymore. Air temperature is mid 50's right now....Colder than that at speed :? Soooo we roll out heading across Pennsylvania. I forget if it was PA or OH, but a local cop rolls up on us. I'd noticed Koz dropping waaaay back, and now figured out this was why. His headlights looked like he ducked into the rest area, & then came back out once the cop was by, but he claims not Cop comes by me in fairly short order, but slows to keep pace with Sam in front of me. Then he pops on his side light at Sam for a minute....I'm guessing to check his license plate on the swingarm bracket??? Turns the light off, and swerves over into Sam's lane, just across the stripes. I start yellin' in my helmet, but then he goes back in his, & speeds up to check out John IIRC. Suddenly he starts braking, and whips into the median turnaround. I swear.....We saw more cops on this trip than all our others combined! Duane had said he was gonna peel off for home at 11/Ashtabula. I'm thinkin' how bad I'm freezin, and my legs need a stretch already, when the others must've felt a break was needed as well, 'cause everybody pulls over on the shoulder of the offramp. Someone comes back & tells me Kyle has now decided he wants that hotel room after all, and will trailer the bike tomorrow. He tells me his hand is hurting so bad now, he can't grip the throttle anymore. Duane leads us to the hotel, and Kyle gets checked in. John gets his bike put away, and we carry his gear & escort him up to his room. I'm torn at this point. I feel like we're leavin' him behind, but there's really nothin' else we can do; Mother Hen Koz already ran down the hall & got him a bucket of ice, he says he doesn't want anything from the carryout, and he's not riding tomorrow anyways. But daaayumm....That room felt nice & warm!! Guess we could've offered to tuck him in all snuggly

Reposted from........ http://dysfunctionaltravelingcircus.freeforums.org/post1622.html#p1622 Home......21 hours, 700 miles, 3 states, 1 "international waterway" & a speeding ticket later Odo just turned 700 miles as I pulled in the garage If I ever see the eastern side of the state again in my lifetime......It'll be too soon!! :uhno: All of us standing on the side of the highway last night, waiting to find out our fate, reminds me of that joke about "A good friend will come bail your a$$ out of jail in the middle of the night when you've done something stupid.....Best friends are sittin' right there alongside you sayin' "MAN....I can't believe we did that $hit?!?"" Gas to ride to Niagara Falls......$50 Trolley ticket 'cause tourguide Koz walked poor Kyle into the ground.....$1 Eating an entire cow @ Texas Roadhouse......$20 Speeding tickets with 5 of your buddies while still 2 states from home @ 11pm......PRICELESS So Kyle gets to my house & we're on the road leavin' town at 8:45 on the nose 'Birdy sportin' her new tank bag. John jokes later in the day asking if everybody on the board has this same tank bag, as he, Kyle & Duane also have the same one. I get a phone call from Sam A. today askin' what kind of tank bag that is, as he's thinkin' about gettin' one now too......If he has any $$ left over after paying our speeding ticket We decided that we need to make a couple additions to the DTC Bylaws....... 1) Purchasing a Rapid Transit Recon 19? tank bag is also a pre-requisite for induction to the Circus 2) Getting a group speeding ticket with us qualifies you for admission......Unless of course it was your fault to begin with that we got pulled over Unbeknownst at the time....Last good picture of that side of Kyle's bike Head over to Norwalk for the meat with GoJira. Quick tank top off, and we're on our way. Grab Kaustubha & John "Turbo810" in Euclit, then over to the very tip for Duane. Find him lounging on his bike sunnin' his guns....or what he thinks qualifies for man muskles Hop, skip & a jump to Pennsylvania. Got to see WAY more of Erie than I really wanted to, as we learned we should've taken ALT 5 instead. Roads finally start gettin' more fun on the other side of Erie & on up into New York. Only get to catch glimpses of the lake here & there (riding along Lake Michigan & Huron 2 years ago was more scenic), but some nice sweepers & baby twisties that we were able to "play" in I had told the guys earlier that when we hit the NY state sign, I wanted us to stop & get a pic. What seemed like forever later, when we're gettin' our groove on, I'm thinkin' we HAD to have passed & missed it already.....BAM....There it is......Right beside a golf course parking lot. I think we got some quizzical looks as we lined the bikes up & I went out to dodge the sporadic car for a good shot, with the guys "claiming" they'd let me know when I was about to get run over Continue on up 5 toward Buffalo. Pass a cop on a Harley the other way. He doesn't wave at me, but the guys say he did to them. Forget which town we were in, but come over a little rise to find a car not too far ahead of us at a dead stop turning left. John shows up in the lane next to me, up front. I figured he ran out of stopping room & changed lanes. Find out at our next fueling that he & Duane conducted a physics experiment and found that an Akropovic can is apparently capable of stripping off Hayabusa decals & paint at high speed, while only getting a scratch on itself......And that Duane is able to assume the fetal position while moving on the bike, and is no longer an atheist :shock: Buffalo was very picturesque across the bay, as we came up on it on 5. Would've made a great backdrop for some pix of the bikes! Koz took the lead through Buffalo & on up to Niagara, as he says he's always up there taking family/friends to sightsee. He knows it so well in fact, I think we were doing the Grand Prix of Buffalo.....I had a hard time taking my eyes off the road to check out the scenery/skyline Get to the Falls, and park the bikes. Unfortunately, this was as close as the bikes got to the Falls, so no sweet pix with them in the background......... We all should've known somethin' was up when Koz changed his boots for some tennis shoes.....But I don't think any of us thought much of it at the time. In the future I know I'll pay more attention to his chosen footwear & when/why he's making a switch First he takes us over to Horseshoe Falls........ One Duane took of me with the blackberry....... Up a big hill, and a mosey on over to the next observation point. American & Bridal Veil Falls as seen from our 2nd tour stop, with a Maid of the Mist down below. You can't really see Bridal behind Duane in the first shot........ The Maid sailing past American & Bridal on her way into Horseshoe....... Duane, Sam A, John, Kyle & Koz in front of the American & Bridal Veil Falls. Bridal are narrower, & closest to us....American are bigger & in the background........ 'Nother one Duane took of me on my bb..... Canadian skyline in the background, after we hiked over to the other side of American & Bridal...... Another walk, & over a bridge to get to the other side of the American & Bridal to this observation deck. There's an elevator that takes you down/under the falls to another viewing area, but unfortunately we got there a couple minutes after they closed the elevator. Kosmo also said there's a walkway that leads you to the bottom of Bridal Veil, but that we'd get very wet when we got down there, so we opted to skip that one, as it was kind of cool all day....high 60's Koz, GoJira, & Turbo John. Kyle's ankle/achilles is still hurtin' from an injury couple months ago, and all this walkin' was reaggravatin' it, so he opted to stay below in a nice shady spot Not sure where Duane was for this one??? Maid coming by the observation deck on her way to Horseshoe. American & Bridal on left....Horseshoe dead ahead. Canadian skyline in background...... Take a trolley ride back to the bikes, and after a couple hours of sight seeing, hit the road for dinner. John's got a buddy up there who gave us directions to the RoadHouse. Food was good, and staff was awesome. There's a Hard Rock right there by the Falls, which Koz recommended, but we'd shied away from it fearing tourist price gouging (and I knew I'd end up spending even more "souvenir $$" there, on top of dinner 'Specially since I just ate at the one in Washington D.C a few weeks ago, and would need another pilsner to add to my collection :mrgreen: ). Probably a wise decision in light of expensive events later that evening, but part of me still wishes we'd just sucked it up & let them rape us Probably could'a got some cool pix with the sign in the background Eatin' some bovine at Texas RoadHouse Need....Bigger....Table! Though this one is poorly lit without the flash......I seem to see Sam in the back, givin' the waitress "the Shocker" After the guys marvel at some girl who, as one of them described "was 4' on her feet, & 4' 3" if she were layin' on her boobs" ....We head for Ohio ~ 9:15 :shock: I took a wrong turn right off the bat (insert jokes here ) so John took over the lead and got us headin' the right direction.... HEY....I thought we WANTED to be heading west!

Roger Just hadn't seen you for awhile Keith, and wanted to make sure you were OK

Should'a shanked 'em

Hope him, or none of his buddies read this board.....Or you just lost your advantage of surprise

HAAA! Sounds like new girl's got some stories to share!! Congratulations Ben!

Make sure you've got a designated driver Koz!!

I will admit that NKY has nice roads, but they can't compare with Coshocton roads. That was 408 miles of a fun day there.I did 700 miles Saturday Left at 8:30.....Got home 21 hours later @ 6am

You're actually posting one of your "Double Super Secret Ride Maps" Nick?!?