XYZZY
Premier Member
Solo RALA 2.0 on Summer Solstice 2024 with Tour of Honor Clusters!
Don’t underestimate the nagging power of “unfinished business”. Last year, Lonnie & Antoinette (L&A) on their Bergman 650, me on my modern Vespa GTS 300, DNF’d the Ride Around Louisiana (RALA). L&A had to bail mid-ride to get home to their sick dog (the dog is fine, still needs regularly scheduled injections, but otherwise fine), while I continued on. I got my ending receipt three hours later than rules allowed. It would be another year before I earned my first Cert and the coveted IBA membership number. But the RALA was unfinished business for all of us.
In the meantime, L&A have leveled-up to a Goldwing, and me to an FJR1300 that was set up for distance by the previous owner, Justin, another IBA member. Six weeks after getting Zephyr, I earned my first cert, and L&A were anxious to ride together again... but how can we take a difficult ride and make it a bigger challenge??? Make it a Tour of Honor ride and shoot for Gold... 24 hours. Oh, and let’s do it on Summer Solstice! Solstice fell on Thursday, June 20th, so I took two vacation days.
We live 150 miles apart, so plans had to accomodate that, and include a rendezvous point that was on the base route. Minor complication that US Hwy 90 through that area is under repair. That stretch is gradually being upgraded so that it will eventually be I-49 all the way to New Orleans. We agreed to a rendezvous point and time. In a nutshell, I’d get my starting DBR in Gretna (Metro New Orleans) around 3am, and then sprint to the rendezvous, with a minor detour for my first of four Tour of Honor (ToH) visits. I wouldn’t need fuel at the rendezvous, but they would need their starting DBR. We’d take off together to Cameron. If you know that Louisiana is boot shaped, then Cameron is the heel. There we’d turn north and around DeRidder we’d both need fuel.
Let me stop here to say that none of this happened...
Lonnie is always in motion, and about two weeks before KSU, while doing chores in his yard, strained his back. He rested and was taking care of himself when, the night before the ride, he relapsed. He texted me at around my planned-bed-time, so I went to sleep recalculating. Should I postpone and wait for them? Should I go, but reroute due to weather? I could sleep in, and start on my own schedule... the world is my oyster.
The alarm went off at 1:30am, and I rolled out of bed, still mulling my routing options. Friends were riding in on Friday evening, and sleeping in would impact my weekend plans. I hurried through my morning routine and packed the bike. I was still re-routing in my head, but I already had optional plans for a solo attempt loaded into the Garmins. Instead of my starting DBR in Gretna, I got it in my own neighborhood. Instead of sprinting to Cameron, I sprinted to Venice. If Cameron is the back of the heel, then Venice is the toe, or the blade sticking out of the toe! Regardless, I never wanted to do Venice last, and I really wanted to do Cameron during the day, so this plan was going to be better, and the unanticipated bonus was that I never had to ride into the sun on the entire route.
The road to Venice is well maintained for storm evacuation. Flat, straight, divided, and roughly 70 miles from Hwy 90. What I didn’t anticipate was the heavy traffic between 3 and 6 am. There is a Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) plant under construction and it has thousands of Contractors driving big F-350 trucks. Traffic moved fast, and the only LEOs were doing traffic control at the construction site. In Venice, I skipped the “southernmost point” sign since the little road leading to it was likely flooded, and let’s face it... you’ve seen it once... you’ve seen it a thousand times. I took a photo in front of a Corps of Engineers building, and sprinted back to civilization. Getting back to the suburbs, a combination of LNG traffic, suburban commuters and road construction nearly slowed me down... nearly. Hwy 90 through south Louisiana was fine, and I remembered my ToH site near New Iberia, and then headed to the original rendezvous point. Adding the 140 mile round trip to Venice changed my fuel stop plans, so I fueled up at the rendezvous. I was right on schedule. The ride in the early morning to Cameron was perfect, and exactly why I wanted to execute this part during daylight. My planning decisions were paying off. Cameron had been under sever weather watch and was getting street flooding from strong offshore winds. I was able to pick a path through the standing water to get to my next ToH site without incident, and the adventure continued.
The highway I was on skirted the eastern edge of Lake Charles and got me to I-10 for a couple of exits to my highway to DeRidder avoiding a lot of red-lights. This is probably a good time to contrast my attempt on the Vespa with the attempt on the FJR. On the Vespa, the section between DeRidder and my final DBR in New Iberia included five gas stops. I was not carrying any real reserve fuel, and couldn’t afford to miscalculate, so I gassed up when it was available. On the FJR, I blew through the entire region on one tank. It felt like cheating. At Deridder, there was a “welcome” sign at a nice t-intersection where I could safely pull over for a photo op. I pulled out my Monster Miles flag and just like that, I’m on the board with that week’s scavenger challenge. It also gave me something worthy of uploading to my Spotwalla track for additional proof of my route, etc. So far I’ve traveled about 450 miles, and it’s not even noon yet. Everything has been perfect.
The next several hours of riding were completely uneventful. The temps were rising, so I found a gas station/diner and pulled in for a quick pit stop. Good pecan pie, fresh coffee, and a place to “freshen up.” It also gave me a chance to re-wet all of my evaporative gear. I was making good time, but remember, on a “Ride Around” you’re not likely to be riding the super-slab and grinding out miles. You’re going to hit red-lights and speed zones in every little town, so mind your speed and your stops. It was also in this part of the state that I noticed an icon on one of my maps indicating a RTE-X-USA location, and it was only a couple of blocks out of my way... what’s another 3 minute photo-op in the scheme of things?
I did get the opportunity to do a little stretch of interstate, and incidentally, this stretch has a higher speed limit than I’m used to... 75mph. I took every advantage to reclaim my pie and photo op stops! Lonnie is the state Sponsor for ToH this year, and used to work as an EMT, and knew of a mural in Vivian, La that honored first responders, so that was a bonus location that I wanted to fit in. The mural is really well done, but there was zero shade in the general vicinity. I kept all of my gear on while I did my ToH submission, and resubmitted to my Spotwalla track for a little extra proof that I made the extreme corner of the route, and back in the saddle again.
I had been fortunate so far that my ToH stops were not really out of the way, but that was about to change. I was going to need Monroe, La. to complete the state, and it was about 20 miles or so off the track. To top it off, I was heading into a reasonably sized city at 6pm. The mapping was good, and I made it to the site, which turns out to be sort of an Air-museum, and I definitely want to visit when I have time to enjoy it more. I had opted to take the diagonal track back to my base route in the spirit of doing the outline, instead of making up time again on the interstate.
It was on this lonely stretch of rural highway that I had my first bit of bad luck. There was a stretch of road with a little extra pavement just before a little bridge, and it appeared to need a little more irrigation, so I pulled over to do my part. I put the bike on the side stand and walked over to the right edge of the road, and while standing there I heard a noise behind me... Zephyr picked that moment to take a nap. Weirdly... it laid down on its right side! I scrambled to get it off the ground as my hydration bottle and ice chest were leaking. A good Samaritan pulled over to help, but I already had it under control. This little bit of bad luck caused me to have to stop briefly a number of times over the next couple of hours, and psychologically it just soured my mood. My mirrors are made to collapse, but my Clearwater lights are mounted with my mirrors, and that creates a hard-point that stressed the “stay”, a butterfly shaped piece of brittle metal hidden in the dash.
The adventure continued and I had one more ToH site to collect in Ferriday, La., best known as the birthplace of three famous cousins, The Killer, Jerry Lee Lewis, Mickey Gilley, and the Reverend Billy Swaggart. It had just gotten dark and The ToH site was along a busy highway. There was a shoulder to park on, but it would have been nice to have a real parking lot or pull-off to give a little distance between the traffic. Regardless, the stop went off without a hitch, and I was back on the road in a couple of minutes. At this point, I’m just short of a SaddleSore 1000, in about 19 hours. Not bad for a route that was almost all secondary highways. I was feeling good and pressed on.
The next section of the trip was a real mixed bag. The next required city was Simmesport, about 65 miles south of Ferriday. Along here the route hugs the Mississippi River. A good portion of La Hwy 15/River Road is unusual for the fact that the road runs near the top of the levee instead of at the bottom. I was keeping my speed above my 42pmh “break-even” rate, but there was tall grass on both sides, and I had every expectation of seeing wildlife. Zephyr is equipped with Clearwater lights and they worked as intended. I spotted a pair of dear standing in my lane, but I had enough advanced warning to slow down and downshift into first gear in time for them to safely escape into the tall grass. About ten minutes later I saw an unusual oval shape/shadow in the left lane. As I got closer, my lights cast different shadows and I realized it was an alligator, with its mouth wide open facing me... we passed each other without incident, but this is one of my real fears... hitting a gator, and ending up on the ground with him!
If the wildlife wasn’t bad enough, the southern half of the highway is under repair, and part of it was scrapped down to hard-pack earth with construction equipment parked here and there, and I was starting to get tired. I’m not sure I even maintained break-even speed for 20 minutes or so, but I’m here to tell the tale, so nothing bad happened. Simmesport is actually not on the base route, you must turn off of the base route and travel about ten miles to get inside the city limits, and take the same road back to cross the Mississippi River near St. Francisville.
Here is where I made my first routing mistake. The smart choice at midnight... 21 hours into the journey would have been to stay on the well marked main State Highway, La 10. But I thought I knew a shortcut... I’d even take the shortcut recently... but of course, there are two shortcuts, turning it into a residential long-cut! Mischief managed and I rejoined Hwy 10 and headed east, but I was getting tired, and this isn’t the interstate, so no truckstops with 24/7 fresh coffee. I came up on the quaint little town of Jackson, La., noticed the police cars parked near the town square and decided that’d be a safe place to grab a nap. My thoughts of a 24 hour Gold level Ride-Around were abandoned before Simmesport. One of the cops noticed me parked there with all of my gear on and checked on me... he asked if I was taking a nap, and I gave him a thumbs up. He turned off his flashlight and let me be. A little less than two hours later I popped up, cranked the bike and resumed my adventure. Thankfully, I had the presence of mind to get a DBR. I was still under 24 hours, and I had exceeded 1100 miles, so just in case.
I continued on Hwy 10 across the state, and even with THREE GPS’s running, I got to the town of Franklinton, and mistook it for Bogalusa and turned south. Bogalusa is a required way-point, Franklinton is not. I knew I wasn’t thinking clearly... I pulled over at a fire station to double check my route. Sure enough I had to backtrack through Franklinton to get to Bogalusa, and resume the perimeter ride. Turning south at Bogalusa, the sky in the east was starting to get lighter, and by the time I got to Slidell, it was the beginning of rush hour. I treated myself to a cup of coffee and a bite to eat, then jumped on the interstate to avoid all of the red lights in Slidell. The remainder of the ride was all familiar local roads.
I got to the gas station in my neighborhood, and wouldn’t you know it, the gas pumps were out! The store had power but the pumps were dead. I went into the store and grabbed a $2 candy bar and waited in the long line of folks buying who knows what (it wasn’t gas!) to get my ending DBR.
By the numbers, according to Scenic.app, 1274 total miles, 28 1/2 hours total, 23h 20m riding, and 5hr 7min of breaks. My ending DBR was receipt number 6. One station didn’t give a receipt, so I went to a second station to get my 24-hour-just-in-case receipt. Compare that to 16 gas stops with my Vespa the year before. Like I said, it feels like cheating.
The IBA Premier Scorer offered the nested SS1K with ToH as one ride, and the Ride Around La. as the bigger Cert. Oh, and they noticed that I had earned Mile Eater status and are sending me that Award, lagniappe*.
*pronounced Lan•Yap, borrowed from Spanish it’s like the 13th donut in a baker’s dozen... a little something extra.
So, there is still unfinished business... I think circumnavigation of Louisiana in 30 hours is possible on a Scooter, and I plan to find out.
Don’t underestimate the nagging power of “unfinished business”. Last year, Lonnie & Antoinette (L&A) on their Bergman 650, me on my modern Vespa GTS 300, DNF’d the Ride Around Louisiana (RALA). L&A had to bail mid-ride to get home to their sick dog (the dog is fine, still needs regularly scheduled injections, but otherwise fine), while I continued on. I got my ending receipt three hours later than rules allowed. It would be another year before I earned my first Cert and the coveted IBA membership number. But the RALA was unfinished business for all of us.
In the meantime, L&A have leveled-up to a Goldwing, and me to an FJR1300 that was set up for distance by the previous owner, Justin, another IBA member. Six weeks after getting Zephyr, I earned my first cert, and L&A were anxious to ride together again... but how can we take a difficult ride and make it a bigger challenge??? Make it a Tour of Honor ride and shoot for Gold... 24 hours. Oh, and let’s do it on Summer Solstice! Solstice fell on Thursday, June 20th, so I took two vacation days.
We live 150 miles apart, so plans had to accomodate that, and include a rendezvous point that was on the base route. Minor complication that US Hwy 90 through that area is under repair. That stretch is gradually being upgraded so that it will eventually be I-49 all the way to New Orleans. We agreed to a rendezvous point and time. In a nutshell, I’d get my starting DBR in Gretna (Metro New Orleans) around 3am, and then sprint to the rendezvous, with a minor detour for my first of four Tour of Honor (ToH) visits. I wouldn’t need fuel at the rendezvous, but they would need their starting DBR. We’d take off together to Cameron. If you know that Louisiana is boot shaped, then Cameron is the heel. There we’d turn north and around DeRidder we’d both need fuel.
Let me stop here to say that none of this happened...
Lonnie is always in motion, and about two weeks before KSU, while doing chores in his yard, strained his back. He rested and was taking care of himself when, the night before the ride, he relapsed. He texted me at around my planned-bed-time, so I went to sleep recalculating. Should I postpone and wait for them? Should I go, but reroute due to weather? I could sleep in, and start on my own schedule... the world is my oyster.
The alarm went off at 1:30am, and I rolled out of bed, still mulling my routing options. Friends were riding in on Friday evening, and sleeping in would impact my weekend plans. I hurried through my morning routine and packed the bike. I was still re-routing in my head, but I already had optional plans for a solo attempt loaded into the Garmins. Instead of my starting DBR in Gretna, I got it in my own neighborhood. Instead of sprinting to Cameron, I sprinted to Venice. If Cameron is the back of the heel, then Venice is the toe, or the blade sticking out of the toe! Regardless, I never wanted to do Venice last, and I really wanted to do Cameron during the day, so this plan was going to be better, and the unanticipated bonus was that I never had to ride into the sun on the entire route.
The road to Venice is well maintained for storm evacuation. Flat, straight, divided, and roughly 70 miles from Hwy 90. What I didn’t anticipate was the heavy traffic between 3 and 6 am. There is a Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) plant under construction and it has thousands of Contractors driving big F-350 trucks. Traffic moved fast, and the only LEOs were doing traffic control at the construction site. In Venice, I skipped the “southernmost point” sign since the little road leading to it was likely flooded, and let’s face it... you’ve seen it once... you’ve seen it a thousand times. I took a photo in front of a Corps of Engineers building, and sprinted back to civilization. Getting back to the suburbs, a combination of LNG traffic, suburban commuters and road construction nearly slowed me down... nearly. Hwy 90 through south Louisiana was fine, and I remembered my ToH site near New Iberia, and then headed to the original rendezvous point. Adding the 140 mile round trip to Venice changed my fuel stop plans, so I fueled up at the rendezvous. I was right on schedule. The ride in the early morning to Cameron was perfect, and exactly why I wanted to execute this part during daylight. My planning decisions were paying off. Cameron had been under sever weather watch and was getting street flooding from strong offshore winds. I was able to pick a path through the standing water to get to my next ToH site without incident, and the adventure continued.
The highway I was on skirted the eastern edge of Lake Charles and got me to I-10 for a couple of exits to my highway to DeRidder avoiding a lot of red-lights. This is probably a good time to contrast my attempt on the Vespa with the attempt on the FJR. On the Vespa, the section between DeRidder and my final DBR in New Iberia included five gas stops. I was not carrying any real reserve fuel, and couldn’t afford to miscalculate, so I gassed up when it was available. On the FJR, I blew through the entire region on one tank. It felt like cheating. At Deridder, there was a “welcome” sign at a nice t-intersection where I could safely pull over for a photo op. I pulled out my Monster Miles flag and just like that, I’m on the board with that week’s scavenger challenge. It also gave me something worthy of uploading to my Spotwalla track for additional proof of my route, etc. So far I’ve traveled about 450 miles, and it’s not even noon yet. Everything has been perfect.
The next several hours of riding were completely uneventful. The temps were rising, so I found a gas station/diner and pulled in for a quick pit stop. Good pecan pie, fresh coffee, and a place to “freshen up.” It also gave me a chance to re-wet all of my evaporative gear. I was making good time, but remember, on a “Ride Around” you’re not likely to be riding the super-slab and grinding out miles. You’re going to hit red-lights and speed zones in every little town, so mind your speed and your stops. It was also in this part of the state that I noticed an icon on one of my maps indicating a RTE-X-USA location, and it was only a couple of blocks out of my way... what’s another 3 minute photo-op in the scheme of things?
I did get the opportunity to do a little stretch of interstate, and incidentally, this stretch has a higher speed limit than I’m used to... 75mph. I took every advantage to reclaim my pie and photo op stops! Lonnie is the state Sponsor for ToH this year, and used to work as an EMT, and knew of a mural in Vivian, La that honored first responders, so that was a bonus location that I wanted to fit in. The mural is really well done, but there was zero shade in the general vicinity. I kept all of my gear on while I did my ToH submission, and resubmitted to my Spotwalla track for a little extra proof that I made the extreme corner of the route, and back in the saddle again.
I had been fortunate so far that my ToH stops were not really out of the way, but that was about to change. I was going to need Monroe, La. to complete the state, and it was about 20 miles or so off the track. To top it off, I was heading into a reasonably sized city at 6pm. The mapping was good, and I made it to the site, which turns out to be sort of an Air-museum, and I definitely want to visit when I have time to enjoy it more. I had opted to take the diagonal track back to my base route in the spirit of doing the outline, instead of making up time again on the interstate.
It was on this lonely stretch of rural highway that I had my first bit of bad luck. There was a stretch of road with a little extra pavement just before a little bridge, and it appeared to need a little more irrigation, so I pulled over to do my part. I put the bike on the side stand and walked over to the right edge of the road, and while standing there I heard a noise behind me... Zephyr picked that moment to take a nap. Weirdly... it laid down on its right side! I scrambled to get it off the ground as my hydration bottle and ice chest were leaking. A good Samaritan pulled over to help, but I already had it under control. This little bit of bad luck caused me to have to stop briefly a number of times over the next couple of hours, and psychologically it just soured my mood. My mirrors are made to collapse, but my Clearwater lights are mounted with my mirrors, and that creates a hard-point that stressed the “stay”, a butterfly shaped piece of brittle metal hidden in the dash.
The adventure continued and I had one more ToH site to collect in Ferriday, La., best known as the birthplace of three famous cousins, The Killer, Jerry Lee Lewis, Mickey Gilley, and the Reverend Billy Swaggart. It had just gotten dark and The ToH site was along a busy highway. There was a shoulder to park on, but it would have been nice to have a real parking lot or pull-off to give a little distance between the traffic. Regardless, the stop went off without a hitch, and I was back on the road in a couple of minutes. At this point, I’m just short of a SaddleSore 1000, in about 19 hours. Not bad for a route that was almost all secondary highways. I was feeling good and pressed on.
The next section of the trip was a real mixed bag. The next required city was Simmesport, about 65 miles south of Ferriday. Along here the route hugs the Mississippi River. A good portion of La Hwy 15/River Road is unusual for the fact that the road runs near the top of the levee instead of at the bottom. I was keeping my speed above my 42pmh “break-even” rate, but there was tall grass on both sides, and I had every expectation of seeing wildlife. Zephyr is equipped with Clearwater lights and they worked as intended. I spotted a pair of dear standing in my lane, but I had enough advanced warning to slow down and downshift into first gear in time for them to safely escape into the tall grass. About ten minutes later I saw an unusual oval shape/shadow in the left lane. As I got closer, my lights cast different shadows and I realized it was an alligator, with its mouth wide open facing me... we passed each other without incident, but this is one of my real fears... hitting a gator, and ending up on the ground with him!
If the wildlife wasn’t bad enough, the southern half of the highway is under repair, and part of it was scrapped down to hard-pack earth with construction equipment parked here and there, and I was starting to get tired. I’m not sure I even maintained break-even speed for 20 minutes or so, but I’m here to tell the tale, so nothing bad happened. Simmesport is actually not on the base route, you must turn off of the base route and travel about ten miles to get inside the city limits, and take the same road back to cross the Mississippi River near St. Francisville.
Here is where I made my first routing mistake. The smart choice at midnight... 21 hours into the journey would have been to stay on the well marked main State Highway, La 10. But I thought I knew a shortcut... I’d even take the shortcut recently... but of course, there are two shortcuts, turning it into a residential long-cut! Mischief managed and I rejoined Hwy 10 and headed east, but I was getting tired, and this isn’t the interstate, so no truckstops with 24/7 fresh coffee. I came up on the quaint little town of Jackson, La., noticed the police cars parked near the town square and decided that’d be a safe place to grab a nap. My thoughts of a 24 hour Gold level Ride-Around were abandoned before Simmesport. One of the cops noticed me parked there with all of my gear on and checked on me... he asked if I was taking a nap, and I gave him a thumbs up. He turned off his flashlight and let me be. A little less than two hours later I popped up, cranked the bike and resumed my adventure. Thankfully, I had the presence of mind to get a DBR. I was still under 24 hours, and I had exceeded 1100 miles, so just in case.
I continued on Hwy 10 across the state, and even with THREE GPS’s running, I got to the town of Franklinton, and mistook it for Bogalusa and turned south. Bogalusa is a required way-point, Franklinton is not. I knew I wasn’t thinking clearly... I pulled over at a fire station to double check my route. Sure enough I had to backtrack through Franklinton to get to Bogalusa, and resume the perimeter ride. Turning south at Bogalusa, the sky in the east was starting to get lighter, and by the time I got to Slidell, it was the beginning of rush hour. I treated myself to a cup of coffee and a bite to eat, then jumped on the interstate to avoid all of the red lights in Slidell. The remainder of the ride was all familiar local roads.
I got to the gas station in my neighborhood, and wouldn’t you know it, the gas pumps were out! The store had power but the pumps were dead. I went into the store and grabbed a $2 candy bar and waited in the long line of folks buying who knows what (it wasn’t gas!) to get my ending DBR.
By the numbers, according to Scenic.app, 1274 total miles, 28 1/2 hours total, 23h 20m riding, and 5hr 7min of breaks. My ending DBR was receipt number 6. One station didn’t give a receipt, so I went to a second station to get my 24-hour-just-in-case receipt. Compare that to 16 gas stops with my Vespa the year before. Like I said, it feels like cheating.
The IBA Premier Scorer offered the nested SS1K with ToH as one ride, and the Ride Around La. as the bigger Cert. Oh, and they noticed that I had earned Mile Eater status and are sending me that Award, lagniappe*.
*pronounced Lan•Yap, borrowed from Spanish it’s like the 13th donut in a baker’s dozen... a little something extra.
So, there is still unfinished business... I think circumnavigation of Louisiana in 30 hours is possible on a Scooter, and I plan to find out.
