April 28th- 30th, 2000

We thought we had prepared for everything. The day before, I got the bike and cleaned it up. The trailer was hooked up and all lights were working, and the bike was wiped down. We had just arrived home when Jack called about meeting us at the Chevron on Hwy 63, in twenty minutes. We finished last minute packing, and everything looked ready to go. Barbara was making last minute clothing changes and was about to leave the house, when I confidently turned the ignition key on the bike and pushed the starter button. To my horror, I heard the distinct sound of NOTHING. In panic, I rushed out to the utility room and produced my old battery that should have had a little charge in it. I hooked it up with battery jumper cables and again, nothing. Barbara came out of the house and didn’t like the look of the bike’s side cover being off, when we were supposed to be rolling toward the Chevron station, and on our way to a 1400 mile trip. I connected the jumper cables from my bike to my truck and with a quick tap on the starter switch, and the bike came to life. (WHEW!) Barbara has THAT look on her face. She is about to climb on a motorcycle that, just a minute ago wouldn’t even start, and ride some seven hundred miles up into the Smokey Mountains. I told her that I believed everything would be O.K. We just needed to charge the battery a little. We board the still running bike, and with everything ready, we’re on our way to the Chevron station. But Barbara still has that look on her face.

We pull into the Chevron station and find Jack and Cindy are already there. They buy a bag of ice cubes to put in the cooler on their trailer. We do the same. With ice in the coolers, sun block on our faces, Sun-sleeves on our arms, we are ready to roll. I turn the ignition key on. NOTHING. Jack brings out a tiny set of jumper cables and hooks them from his bike’s battery to mine. Low and behold, my bike comes to life, again. Barbara wants to go home, so we won’t be a problem for them on the road. Jack and I both seem to think that the battery just needs more charging time. So off we go. Time now, about 1 P.M. Barbara still has that “look.”

The day is bright and warm with very little clouds in the sky. As we roll out onto the superslab, we become comfortable, and begin to enjoy the day. At a refueling stop outside of Montgomery, Alabama, our bike fires back up instantly. Barbara can now begin to really enjoy the trip. We have a real nice ride to just this side of Atlanta, in Newnan. As the sun is starting to set, we decide to stop here for the night and begin day two anew after a good meal and a comfortable nights sleep. Supper is a handy walk across the 4-lane highway in front of the motel, to a shopping center and several restaurants. We decide on the Golden Corral Buffet. (Not many of these left, where we live) What a feast of good food. Sorry Jack, about the ribs. I had a few, and they were great and then they quit serving them.

As we get up the next day, we study the weather channel very closely. There is rain and thunderstorms ahead, but they look like they MAY be out of our way as we travel toward them. Hopefully! Breakfast is even easier to get to than supper, because a new IHOP is next to our hotel parking lot. Pretty neat, huh? After breakfast, we fuel up and make our way into Atlanta. We change to a north direction and the overhead cover becomes a patchwork of multi-colored gray fluffy clouds, with only a patch of blue every now and then. As we get into upper Georgia, the sky thins to gray and blue, but the temperature keeps going DOWN. We have been noticing many Harleys going our way for many miles. Where are they going? At a fuel stop in Murrayville, Georgia, near the Chattahoochee National Forest, we meet up with several Harleys and sport bike riders and ask them the magic question. They tell us that they are going to a two-day swap-meet in Cherokee, North Carolina. We will pass through there on our way to Pigeon Forge.

The closer we get to Cherokee; the noise level (Harleys) increases geometrically. This IS a lovely area, and we would like to return when it isn’t so “wild.” We travel a cold (32 degrees) Hwy 441 North through a part of the Smokey Mountain National Park. The sky is a cold steel gray overhead covering and the trees in the upper elevations are like sticks, because it hasn’t warmed up enough to start the leaf growing cycle, yet. Clouds even cover the tops of the higher mountains as we pass Clingmans Dome (elev. 6,643 ft), on the by-pass around Gatlinburg. Then the sky cover thins out and it becomes sunny as we ride down into Pigeon Forge. A quick registration at our motel, we unload just a bit, and then we hotfoot it to the Tennessee District rally site.

Jack makes sure that we all have day passes and runs his bike over to the Bushtec vendor area. Bushtec’s boss, John Preston, says that he will begin to work on Jack’s bike after the bike he working on, at this time. We quickly walk around the vendor area to see if there is anything that we just can’t live without. We find some cleaning supplies. Quickly the sky turns ugly dark gray to gray-blue to the north and we witness lightning flashes. The wind gets quite gusty and word spreads that the vendors will have to close up because of the approaching bad weather. (Uht oh!) Jack needs to get the trailer wiring harness installed on his bike and we need to leave soon to get out of the storm’s way. All is finally done and we head out, while very light sprinkles begin to dot our windshield.

As we’re riding back to the hotel, we agree to eat at Damon’s Restaurant, and go straight there, even in light rain. Jack and Cindy ate here before, when Jack got the trailer before this last one. In the wet parking lot, I try to hold my bike up when it slowly tries to fall on it’s left side. Jack comes to the rescue and the reverse gear is engaged. Thanks Jack! After a short wait, we are called in to eat. We slow down as we eat some terrific ribs, and watch the rainstorm make it’s way across the hills that surround us, through the large panoramic glass windows, by our table. The rain finally ends and we leave to head back to the hotel. It’s still early and we want to see some of the sights that are still open. We elect to ride the city trolley that provides transport through all of Pigeon Forge, and stops around most of the hotels, campgrounds and major shopping and tourist areas. Remember that old song about the man that went for a ride beneath the streets of Boston and never returned. We never seemed to get to where we wanted to go, and Jack seemed to be doing fine even with the headache he had. We had two different shift changes of bus (trolley) drivers. We finally asked to be let off by the Dairy Queen and then after eating a little ice cream, we walked back to our hotel. A good two miles.

The next day we head for Gatlinburg, where we ate breakfast at Hardee’s and then walk around all of the little shops. It was a little disappointing for me, since I was expecting more Smokey Mountain craft/souvenir shops like in Pigeon Forge. Gatlinburg was more commercial with Universal Studio’s and Warner Brothers and Ripley’s Believe it or Not, etc. Then there was the Space Needle observatory in the center of town. Everyone thought it would be a great time to go up there, except me. 400-ft straight up gives you a great look at the surrounding mountains and the city, but don’t look down.

Time to go. We travel to Deals Gap (Hwy 129 with 318 curves in 11 miles) and ride it. At the end (of the 11 mile ride), at the store, we have a discussion with an irate winger that rode behind us and wanted to go much faster on the ride, than we were going. It seems that he just wanted us to pull over on this mountain road and get out of his way. On this day there were MANY bikes flying back and forth along the gap. I guess I’m glad I don’t live in Marietta and run the risk of seeing this impatient and unsafe riding fool. The weather was heavily overcast and at the store a light bit of rain started to fall. This would stay with us for the next three hours. Evening found us in Cartersville, Georgia. The rain stopped and the sky cleared. Tired, and damp we all turn in early. Next day is beautiful, and a breakfast at Mickey D’s starts our day. All the way home we have great weather and Jack and I experiment with “red light to red light” (ask Barbara) riding. All total, we rode 1,267 miles. I need to check into that Air Hawk seat from Roho Industries for more longrange bottomside comfort. The ride was a lot of fun, and we enjoyed the company of our friends, Jack and Cindy. Barb and I are ready to travel back to Pigeon Forge and stay a week. And my battery. It performed flawlessly the whole trip. It’s still fine.

Larry Wolfe