The Misadventures of Ian Heller

I arrived home this evening at 8:30PM to joyous hugs and wags (Penny and M.Mutt, respectively). 

I know this sounds like a broken record (using the metaphor “broken record” dates me, doesn’t it?), but today’s heat was the worst yet — 102F as a high and a long period of 100 degrees through most of Tennessee. 

Also: my first significant rain happened with two showers, each about 10 minutes in duration, both within two hours of home. I was so eager to get home, I didn’t even stop and put on my rain gear. In fact, I didn’t use the rain pants at all during this trip and I only used the rain jacket once — to help stay warm on a cool morning in Montana. 

I had an interesting conversation with two elderly gents (meaning they were older than me by at least 10 years) at a rest stop in Kentucky. One guy was riding a ’92 BMW and the other a new Harley. The BMW guy start chatting with me before he even parked his bike — he was very friendly, asked a bunch of questions, etc.

The Harley guy was friendly but not quite so outgoing. He listed off all of the Iron Butt contests he’s entered and, when I told him I was riding 6100 miles in 12 days, he replied, “That’s not up to Iron Butt standards. I rode 8800 miles in 11 days.”

It was cute, not rude (you had to be there) but I really am not interested in trying to put on those kinds of miles on a regular basis. Here’s why: you can only put thousands of miles in a handful of days if you stick to the Interstate and that’s the most boring place to ride a motorcycle. I wanted to do this trip because such a thing has been on my bucket list for awhile. And I truly love riding motorcycles. Give me mountain roads and I’ll ride all day every day. But endless interstate miles? No thanks.

It’s late here and I need to sleep — back to work tomorrow. I’ll write some follow up posts soon.

Goodnight.