After our OHV excursion we headed out for a ride on the Blue Ridge Parkway. We picked up the parkway in Asheville and road all the way to the top of Mt. Mitchell, our gps recorded an elevation of 6,671 - Mt. Mitchell is the highest peak east of the Mississippi. The mighty 200cc’s of our TW’s performed flawlessly all the way as if they possessed great strength (shhhhhh!). Here’s a link to our trip map in Google (note: map might expire after Nov. 2011 – here’s a screen capture .jpg).

(1) Start with the low hanging fruit. Leverage the utility and power of social media fully. The tools are free and easy to use.

(2) Identify people in your network who are “connectors” and get them to help you spread the word. Connectors are said by author Malcolm Gladwell to be people in a community who know large numbers of people and who are in the habit of making introductions. (src: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connector_(social)

(3) Create a personal connection with your audience/donors. We made our connection through motorcycles, people like motorcycles, they like adventure.

(4) Mention it to everyone you know. Everyone. And give them a reason to talk about it, “What?! You’re riding a dirt bike 2,000 miles!” People like to talk about that kinda thing.

(5) Make it easy to contribute. Give them options for contributing. Some can give money others can spread the word, but everyone can do something.

(6) And last let your audience in on the action! Allow them to participate. One example how we did this was through a live map on our website where our supporters could follow along in real-time as we took the journey.

Taking the slow, long way helps you to appreciate the intriguing to the dullest of geography, townscapes and vistas. There’s really nothing else to do when you’re riding a 2o0 cc dirt bike but watch the frames of your journey pass slowly by. It was an old lesson and a refreshing one – slow down, enjoy the ride, life goes on for a little bitty while. I think I’ll wheel the ‘ole bimmer down roads less traveled more often, just to see what’s around the next bend, not to get somewhere.

Your support of Riders for Health on our behalf made the trip a personally cherished adventure. It was a simple idea, but still we didn’t know if anyone would actually contribute. And wow! You did! My happiness and enjoyment is knowing that it wasn’t all about me, that together we raised $4,300 for health care workers who desperately need reliable transportation in Africa. Thank you.

I thought it would be helpful for you, if you’re considering a similar trip, to know what we learned and items we found indispensably valuable:

• Simple plastic sheets to cover bikes at night so you have a dry seat in the a.m. (if it rains)
• A supplemental seat cover to help cushion the buns (here’s what I used)
• Bicycle shorts
• Cramp buster
• Frequent breaks broke up road monotony , we stopped for gas about every 100 miles
• One big dry bag to put all your stuff in (note Mark did this, I didn’t and wish I had) – saves time loading/unloading and keeps everything dry vs. strapping a bunch of stuff on Beverly Hillbilly style
• Support of an amazing wife
• Good music
• Extra gas for peace of mind
• Sunglass holder on tank – I found myself constantly putting them on and taking them off so having easy access to them right on the tank was nice
• Lots of bungees
• Ram mounts for phone/gps
• Easily accessible camera with a rain cover (many come built in)
• Good weather
• Zip lock bags – cheap solution to cover phone/gps in rain
• Ear plugs!

Things you don’t need:

• Extra weight
• Highways

It feels good to say, “Yup, I road my bike around Lake Michigan.” Thanks for following our journey, for supporting a great cause, for telling your friends and for cheering us along. Stay in touch!

So glad to be home.

*First time to eat Shepherd’s Pie for breakfast. Out of a bag,no less.

*We traversed the longest anchor-to-anchor span bridge in the western hemisphere- the Mighty Mac.

*After 1100-ish miles of north-ish bound travel, we are finally headed south!

*We ate local Great Lakes whitefish and chips for lunch in Petoksky, MI

*Melissa is Molly’s friend (mine too!) Today melissa kept texting me mistakenly so this afternoon, she gave me my own contact in here address book, i am no longer “Molly/Other”. I have fully arrived, people. Yay!

*The Garmin took us on some pretty gnarly roads. Basically sand ruts for 5 miles. Took over 20 minutes and got stuck once, but we didn’t wipe out (barely). Lesson here: sand+motorcycle=sux

*we ended the day in Onekama, MI, with a great home-cooked meal at Ben’s college buddy Jared’s in-laws house topped off with a campfire, sunset over Lake Michigan, our laundry being done and killer accommodations in their pole barn. Thanks Mark and Sandy for being such generous hosts to a couple weary travelers!

Stay tuned tomorrow for many more riveting tales (and a few boring ones) from the road of Long Way Up.

As the miles passed by today, the scenery changed from that of corn and dairy farms to forests of pine and cedar. The topography stayed roughly the same however (rolling hills). And here’s the other thing – the high today was 75 degrees. Pretty much ideal. There were times today that I wished I had zipped in my jacket liner as I was on the brink of being cold (in the middle of summer-how great is that?!) The other thing different about today was the WIND. Holy cow, we got knocked around like a prize fighter’s punching bag. It was pretty cool to be skirting Green Bay and Lake Michigan off to our right most of the day. We saw a lighthouse and a whole lot of water… All said, it was another good ride, minus the now predictable mid afternoon back aches.

So since I’ve had a plenty of time to sit and think over the past 1000 miles of backroads, I’ve been pondering the nature of rural/small town life versus that of big city living. There are a bunch of observable differences in things like attitude, character, community pride, patriotism, aesthetic, etc. I have few theories as to the underlying causes for these differences, but it’ll probably need to wait until I’m not typing with my thumbs.

So right now Ben and I are sitting riverside by the campfire in a deserted state park in the Upper Peninsula. The sun is about to set so I think now would bs a good time to jump off the iPhone and enjoy this picturesque evening and good company.

Exceeding our goal is definitely the highlight of LW^.  It will make the second half of the trip, the largest chunk of miles, more enjoyable! Tomorrow we’ll embark on the last 1,300 miles – up around Lake Michigan and down the east side eventually winding our way back to music city (and healthcare city) USA, Nashville, TN.

This morning we took it easy and enjoyed some local Wisconsin cheese (shipped way, way too much home) and stocked up on supplies needed for camping (which might or might not include more cheese, you guess). Then we headed back to Airventure to see the sites, we stayed late and saw the sun set across the thousands of loved and hand-built airplanes from around the globe. Many pictures, but without a computer to edit you’ll have to stay tuned in the coming weeks as we get them online.

We may not be able to post right away over the next few days because we’ll be in remote areas as we head up around Lake Michigan. We got extra tubes, oil and supplies (read: cheese) so we’re feeling good about hitting the remote roads. Can’t wait to head out early tomorrow and see what we see. Shake n bake.

p.s. picture at left is of the TW’s next to a pair of BMW GS 1,200 …sissies.

My grandfather and father were pilots and my grandad used to fly here to Oshkosh from Montana every year in an open cockpit bi-wing plane with a leather cap and goggles on his head. This was back in the early 50’s, during the initial few years of this very airshow. I think my grandpa was a true “man’s man” and by attending Airventure, I get a better picture of the kind of man my grandpa was.  In addition to being a pilot, he also rode motorcycles… and I’d like to think that he would really like this Long Way Up adventure of ours.

It should be noted that Ben is also a pilot and this is his 5th year coming to this show. (my second year) He is really in his element here and his love of flying is certainly infectious.

Well, this evening at dusk we had a beautiful ride back to the college dorm where we’re staying. I’m telling you right now, the light up here at sundown in simply amazing. Driving by austere farmland, bathed in that pink/orange glow is second to none. We ended up driving extra slow just to make the moment last as long as we could. Then as we were getting close to Fond du Lac, we realized that a monstrous full yellow moon was just rising in the East. It was a like the bow on top of a perfect gift / ride.

I’ll admit that I’ve enjoyed not having to put 300 miles behind me on that buzzy little motorcycle today, but there’s part of me that is itching to get back on the road and hit the Upper Peninsula to see what we’ll see. But Wednesday will be here soon enough.

We hope your week is off to a good start… Til next time we meet, let’s keep the rubber side down, shall we?

]]> http://www.crema-coffee.com/www.longwayup.us/?feed=rss2&p=410 0 http://www.crema-coffee.com/www.longwayup.us/?p=398 http://www.crema-coffee.com/www.longwayup.us/?p=398#comments Mon, 26 Jul 2010 13:08:42 +0000 ben http://www.crema-coffee.com/www.longwayup.us/?p=398 Our trip includes an important stop at www.Airventure.org, we’ll be here Monday and Tuesday. We’ll hit the road again Wed, until then stay tuned for many pictures of shiney hand-built planes from around the globe. 

Get bored? Go check out my Airventure pictures from past years and learn more about the good stuff that general aviation is doing here and here.

When we turned north we started to fight a strong headwind. The small TWs had quite a time trying to keep a 55mph pace. I’m sure we looked comical at least, tucked down on the bikes to hold our speed. It felt like we were moving backwards almost, definitely not going anywhere fast. We were a little concerned running them wide open throttle (WOT) for such a long period but all is good - despite the hard run we haven’t used much oil today.

We hit Yorkville, Illinois, about noon and were excited to see some familiar faces, my father and mother in law, Ray and Connie, with son Jake, who just aced the motorcycle safety foundation course (note to self: I should take that course). After a quick lunch and mechanical consultation with Ray, who is our chief LW^ mechanic hand picked from the multitude of applicants, we pointed the mighty TWs towards Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. Why Fond du Lac? Dur! The best pizza ever, Joe’s Fox Hut on 2nd Ave. That AND for www.airventure.org – I’ve been coming to this aviation mecca for 5 years. More about that tomorrow.

And that was day two!