This was our first of many Pie Rides to come. I have been absent from the site for a while dealing with life. Hopefully, besides still having to do out taxes, it has calmed down for a while.
Anyway, I saw the thread for this ride and thought we had to go. It would give us an excuse to go visit R1150GSRider and family in Austin. For those who don’t know us, he is my brother. I figured if I talked one of the kids into going with me, there would be no reason I couldn’t go.
After many back and forths about the route, it ended up being a total mess. Luckily, somewhere along the way, I e-mailed the printed directions for a route I had come up with to Rebecca. She saved the day. She went through the printed directions and used google maps to come up with turn by turn instructions. This was really helpful since I had loaded only a route proposed by another rider who wanted to lead but evidently was unable to make it. That coupled with the fact that I realized that morning that I could no longer read the display of my Garmin III Plus.
There ended up being four of us meet at the Exxon on I-10 and Racer Rd. It was a beautiful, muggy morning. Our plan was to leave promptly at 6:30. We finally left promptly 15 minutes late. It was a varied group. Two large dual sports, a cruiser and sport bike.
Having lived in Colorado County as a kid and still having relatives up there, I decided I could lead until we got to Fayetteville. Although, while sitting and waiting for the train in New Ulm, we decided that Rebecca would take over in Frelsbug so I didn’t hold people up between Frelsburg and Fayetteville.
Here is a picture of Heinsohn’s in Frelsburg, where my Mom bought my first pair of Cowboy boots.
At this point we were still doing pretty good, no u-turns as of yet. On 1291 I took over the position as the caboose. I really enjoyed watching the riders in front of me taking the 30 mph corners. I was truly amazed how much Rebecca has improved since the trip to Arkansas almost two years ago. Setting up for the curves, breaking before the curve and accelerating through the corner. John was a joy to watch also. Leaning into the curve, smooth and stable all the way through the corner.
Steve was another story. While he was smooth and stable, I had to back off to keep from getting shrapnel in my already failing eyes. He had his cruiser leaned over scraping away pounds of excess metal. He probably dropped enough weight to easily make up for the lunch and pie he ate.
Here we are in one of the straight parts of the road. I should acknowledge the photographer for this trip was my Daughter Erin. She did a great job and took many more pictures than I thought she was taking.
Here is a link to the whole gallery. She seemed to like taking pictures of cows. I don’t know if it was because she likes animals or she was thinking about the steak she was planning on ordering for lunch.
http://MrR1150GS.smugmug.com/gallery/1726502/1/84860631
It must have been a tiring morning, here is our photographer just east of Elgin. Or maybe that last u-turn was just one too many.
It could have been the route. It was not exactly the most direct route. That is what happens when you pick roads from streets and trips based strictly on how many wiggles they have in them. Here is where John decided it was his turn to lead. Much less dust that way.
Finally, after a quick phone call, I found our savior. My brother was riding the route backwards in hope of running into us. The only thing was he did not take the dirt roads. He must have had an earlier version of the route. He told us to make one final u-turn and head back east to FM 696. That we had crossed earlier. Although, the road we were on was so small, there were no marking signs for the intersection. I did make one more error trying to get to 290 to get back to FM 696 and we had one extra u-turn to get back to the freeway.
Here are our Pie Guides ready to take us the rest of the way.
Steve is contemplating what he would do with the puppy if he bought one of the Blue Heelers a guy was selling from his pickup at the service station.
Ok, I lied. I forgot we rode past East Street and to turn around once we got to the Hutto city limits.
Here are some miscellaneous pictures captured at the Gathering.
These two came all the way from Freer.
This couple arrived on matching Ducati 999’s.
Here is a requested picture. The t-shirt and sign on the wall say it all.
Here is what it is all about.
If anyone wants any of these pictures, you can download the full size version from Smugmug. The link for the gallery is above.
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