The Ride of Life: "ROLLIN' ON THE RIVER"

I had been looking forward to this ride for over a month, all the Chapter members really said it was a must to go! Here we go on an over-nighter! This was another great trip. We headed out on Saturday morning and I think we split up into two groups due to the size so that it would be a safer ride.

Here we are waiting to leave in group two:

We got on the road and headed east then south, we went out to US52 then headed south on State Road 9, this was a beautiful day for riding and the excitement was building, all the hoop la is beginning to set in. 52 the scenery was ok nothing exciting to report, but it was nice to be out on the open road.

Once we started heading south the roads got better with curves and beautiful scenery. Here are some pictures of some of the curves and canopy views along the way:

During this phase of ride I throughly enjoyed this as it was hot and the shade provided much needed all natural air conditioning :) we went through roads that I had not been on before, it was getting close to lunch time and I was getting hungry, on the way we saw a castle like building on top of a big hill, I tried to take some pictures but the building is a little hard to see, I couldn't quite tell if this was a house or some sort of Catholic building, here take a look for your self:

We went to a little place in the country can't remember the name of the place but it was an awesome lunch spot and they had a buffet where the fried chicken was out of this world, best damn fried chicken I have ever had! I stuffed myself full like a hungry pig! I really shouldn't have done that because I was not comfortable for the next hour on our way down to Madison, Indiana

Now it was time to get back on the road, some of the members were only going as far as the lunch spot so we said our goodbyes to them and started to depart to move forward to our final destination "The River Boat Inn". Leaving the restaurant one of our new riders took a fall, others stopped to help her get her bike upright and she was on her way, little did I know this would be another day of mishaps. Shortly into our ride one of our friends took a spill in the middle of the road, it scared me at first because I realized who it was. He wasn't hurt just his pride. I could breathe a sigh of relief. We headed onward, it was decided that we needed to stop at a gas station to fuel up, take a break and rest for a little bit.

We ran into some more curvey roads and canopies which was nice cause it was one HOT HOT DAY, and storms were brewing and headed our way unknown to us at the time. Here are some pictures of our ride going towards Madison, IN which was our final destination:

This curve was a little scarey!

As you can see from the photo above these roads got very curvey and this one actually made me a little nervous. Being a passenger you don't have any control over anything and it's times like these that make me all the more determined that I want to learn to ride my own. That way I can be in control, but it has it's down side to because when your the one in front you don't get to take pictures or look around at your surroundings, you have to pay very close attention to what is going on around you and with other vehicles that may be coming around the bend. I do enjoy my backseat an aweful lot and I would be crushed not to be able to take the pictures that I am used to taking. Pictures say alot! So here comes the river views! We pulled off again at another gas station to fuel up and I decided to look at my weather app on my Iphone 4 because the sky to the west of us was not looking to nice and I wanted to see what was coming our way. You can't tell by the pictures below that anything was going to take place because I was taking pictures to the east

We loaded up from the gas station and started making our way to Madison, IN about 15 minutes into the ride it cut loose with rain, and high winds, everyone slowed down to a crawl due to the wind was so bad that it felt like it was taking us sideways instead of forward and the rain was hard although it felt good and cool it didn't feel good on the skin. It is like a bunch of needles pricking your skin and that hurts a little, the rain, wind and lightening lasted about 10 minutes but seemed longer. Once we made it through that we were very close to Madison. We finally made it to the "Riverboat Inn" drinched and tired we checked in. We unloaded the bike and went up to our room, to my surprise it was quite nice, two queen size beds, a sitting room with a TV, bathroom and full eat in kitchen. It was nice and really and the price with tax was around $110, what a deal! We dried off, changed clothes and headed down to the main area where the festivities would take place. It is around 6pm and the rain poured out of the skies, my husband and I were undecided as to what we would eat for dinner, some people were going to the Shrimp House across the field from the hotel, others ordered Pizza. While waiting there came the sun and a rainbow and then out of nowhere there appear in the sky next to the one rainbow it was a DOUBLE RAINBOW, this is a rare site and yes I took pictures. In talking with a few friends we decided to go with John and Shiz, Dan and Marcy into town to have a nice relaxing dinner with Marcy's sister and brother-in-law. It was a local sports bar, the food was good and so was the company.

Dinner in the town of "Madison"

This was going to be a once in a lifetime experience, Marcy's brother-in law is somehow connected to the famous boats that run "The Madison Regatta" on the Ohio River during the July 4th weekend here in Madison, IN, this race is a yearly tradition and he decided he would take us to see one of the boats that they house in his warehouse. Again I'm not sure how they are connected but he works on this giants. Below are a few pictures of this gian speed boat, who would have known that they are so big, I was amazed and taken back at the size of these things, it turned out to be a pretty cool evening.

Again another history lesson. Learn something new on just about every trip. We all got back to the hotel where the festivities were underway, let the PARTY BEGIN! the rain had stopped and it was turning into quite a fun evening as you will see from the pictures below everyone had an awesome time and I will do again next year. We got to know some faces that we had seen at prior chapter meetings but didn;t know thier names, this chapter group is an awesome group of people and we have become quite fond of everyone. We has a blast, singing, chatting, joking!

Our Director of the HOG Chapter 1 Group

Well the night came to an end and Jeff and I headed out and up to our room. We turned on the TV only to find that at the Indiana State Fair the Grand Stands had collapsed just before the Country Music Group "Sugarland" was to take the stage. The storms were so severe that it litterally blew the stage down on top of spectators, this was a sad night as we found out that 4 had been confirmed dead and many more seriously injured. The storm that blew through Madison after midnight was a bad one and it got really windy and the rain was hard, I was concerned about the motorcycles outside in this storm. We got up the next morning and I called my mother-in-law that lives with us to find out if everything was ok at home and she said it was but that we might want to check the roof when we get home just in case. She had stated that was probablly the worst storm she has been up with in a long time. Once satisfied that everything was ok, Jeff and I loaded up the bike and took off for breakfast because we heard the breakfast at the Inn was not that great and we didn't want to take any chances. We got back to the Inn to met up with everyone, while waiting for everyone to finish breakfast Jeff and Bill were observing the damage that last nights storm had done to the grounds at the Inn, they both headed down the steps to the lower deak where a flag pole was bent in hald and the American Flag was dragging the ground, thier military instinct kicked in and they took the American Flag off the pole and folded it up, it was like they were both still in the service, you could see the respect in thier eyes and the love in thier hearts as they completed thier task to bring the flag up to the Inn and hand it off to the ladies at the front desk. Below is a picture of them and you can see the pride in both of thier faces.

We all got loaded up and headed out, we went across the bridge to Kentucky and stopped a the gas station to fill up for the morning. While there, one of our friends had some bike trouble and headed home one of the other couples went with them in case they broke completely down, our motto is "Leave No Rider Behind". Also pulling into the gas station were old model "T"'s from the local car show that went on in Madison the day before below are a few pictures of them.

We were headed up to Rabbit Hash Kentucky this was our second time in this neat little hole in the wall town. Some ate lunch and others just enjoyed going into the shops that were there and reading some history sign on the town. This is the town where the Mayor is actually a dog named "Lucy". After that we headed back up north towards home, it had been along couple of days and I was worn out and ready to get back to see my dogs. Below are some the rest of the pictures that I took along the way home: