Weekend Ride

[Eric <st@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Wow - take a few days off and the list goes silent.... for those of you 
that asked, no - there was not a digest published on Sunday - believe it or 
not there was actually a 24 hour span with no messages sent ! A first since 
the start of the list. I for one was out riding.....

I found out last week that my parents were planning on attending a writers 
conference in Key West this week. My dad arranged a rental through Harley's 
fly and ride program so he was going to hit Miami to pick up the bike and 
then ride to the Keys. As I haven't seen him for over a year and a half, I 
decided it was the perfect opportunity for a surprise. Got all the info on 
his flight and headed off early Saturday morning for Miami Harley. After 
some really thick fog and a nice downpour in the Ft Lauderdale area, I made 
it to the shop. I walked in the shop and they had a couple of female 
greeters and they both came up to me and whispered "Nice bike...." After my 
dad arrived we pulled the bike around to the side of the shop where he was 
loading up. The service manager caught sight of it and came out to check it 
out. After he was done he ran inside and dragged two others out. This 
parade of Harley people continued for over 30 minutes - I swear everyone in 
the shop except Peterson (the owner) sat on the Sprint. If nothing else it 
was refreshing to see such a warm reception from a group that is normally 
biased against anything but American made.....

The ride through the Keys was awesome - no challenging roads, but the 
scenery by far made up for that. We stopped for lunch at my favorite BBQ 
spot and were interrupted by someone inquiring about the Sprint. He was 
from Montreal and had not been able to sit on one yet so I went outside 
with him and let him sit on the bike and answered some questions. As we 
were talking I asked if he had internet access - he looked at me and said 
"Triumphnet?" After a few high5s and a handshake it turns out we have 
emailed each other a few times -  how's that for the power of the Internet 
? He promised to join the mail list on his return from vacation...

Got up early Sunday morning (4:30am) for the return trip. The nice thing 
about running that early is that you don't get stuck in the slow moving 
keys traffic. Stopped in Islamorada to watch a really impressive sunrise 
and then continued off towards home.

Not a bad way to spend the weekend..... ;-)

- - Eric


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