Corn huskers football is big in Lincoln Nebraska.
Just back from dinner at one of the sports bar & Grills. They did over 5,000 meal tabs, and over an additional 2,000 drink tabs Saturday. That was just one sports bar in the Hay Market district. Bar tender was saying it was a mad house. Same story at the local convenience store. They closed at 1:00 a.m. and people were still trying to get in. Glad I wasn't here. According to them it was a total mad house.
Today was awesome. Met up with a buddy from Indiana for a tour of The Museum of American Speed. https://www.museumofamericanspeed.org/
Wow! It is huge (think he said 6 acres under roof on three floors), and so diverse that it doesn't get repetitive. Spent 2 hours on a guided tour, and two additional hours walking around. Found this very cool carnival ride sidecar. Highly recommended. 👍
Ended up using the phone for navigation. Just too easy. If this pattern keeps up, the rig will probably get an Android Auto screen, and the Zumo will go in a pannier for backup.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
Today was day one of the Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail adventure. Talked to a park ranger at the National Park Service building in Omaha, NE. The foyer also serves as a L&C visitor's center. I've been trying to figure out if there is a navigable land path for this. Between Lewis & Clark they pretty much walked the entire route.
Turns out the only "trail" is via the rivers (except where there was no way for them to use a river).
With that out of the way, I spent a bit of time exploring the area. Building & grounds are pretty impressive.
Next stop was Fort Atkinson to visit the site where L&C had the first official opportunity to speak with Indian tribes on behalf of the U.S. it was here that Clark thought a fort would make for an excellent trading post (hence how Fort Atkinson came to be).
Fort Atkinson covered way more ground than I expected. The parade ground area is huge.
Final stop of the day was Souix City, IA to see the resting place & monument for Sergeant Floyd.
A few things about this make me raise an eyebrow. First, they dug up and moved poor Floyd three times. Finally resting him under this Junior sized "Washington's Monument". Seems a bit over played to me. Unless they wanted the world to know that Sergeant Floyd was well endowed (he is under the base). 😉 Very nice monument with a great view of the Missouri River.
Next couple of days will be mostly travel. Not much exciting happened until deep into the Dakota's.
Found the Zumo XT has a History Channel App. It had the NPS facility & Fort Atkinson. Used it for both of those trips. Used Google to get to Floyd's monument. Also will use the Zumo for tomorrow's navigation with a custom tailored route.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
A bit over 3,000 miles on the rear tire, about 3,500 miles on the front tire, and just under 4k miles on the sidecar tire. All 3 tires show right at 6/32" tread depth left.
Rear is pretty flat with slightly more wear to the right side of the tire. So need a bit more lean out. I'd still consider it bare minimal for the street. Especially combined with the dirt oriented knobby on the side car. It is pretty easy to power slide on the street in either direction. That may be were a bit of premature wear is coming from... 😇 Very happy with the technical off road performance.
Front is still somewhat round, and no signs of cupping yet. Still no issues with wobble, which is nice. Better grip & compliance than the Shinko E705. Way better than the Shinko on both fire roads and technical off road.
Sidecar tire center knobs are wearing on a severe angle due to toe in. Okay fine. At least it will wear out before it dry rotts off the rim. lol. I like the performance off road. Very confidence inspiring on off camber technical stuff (sidecar facing downhill especially). It really aids in the grip of the whole rig.
There is still a long way to go on this trip. Hope they last until it's back home.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
West Bend Recreation area on the Missouri river in South Dakota. Campsite for the night. Man the river is wide! Like the Mississippi down south. No wonder they thought there would be a Northwest passage. Windy like Kansas, but at least no mosquitoes like the Corps of Discovery had to deal with. 👍
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
Made it to Fort Mandan yesterday. This is the point where things started gettiing exciting.
Small fort, big winter.
One common theme has been the winds & heat. To that point the same is true today. The wind in Kansas was pretty strong, but not as strong & gusty as it has been in North Dakota.
After checking out a local camp ground, and finding no relief, I decided to finish the Trek at a later date. So I headed south. Got caught in a big storm with a lot of lightning. Kept thinking of Miles' experience. Ducked into the first available gas station & waited it out.
Found the tires are very competent in the rain. 👍
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
If you decide to head further south toward Central Nebraska, let me know.
Otherwise if you head into Nebraska, I can recommend Carhenge in Alliance, Ashfall Fossil Beds National Monument near Hemingford, Toadstool Park and Ogallala National Grasslands in NW Nebraska and Scott's Bluff National Monument in Scott's Bluff. All are very worthy of a visit.
ETA, mustn't forget Fort Robinson State Park near Chadron and the Museum of the Fur Trade in Chadron.
Illegitemi non carborundum est!
I decided to get out of the wind completely. Managed to run into a pretty good storm just west of Bismark though. lol Man, the winds were blowing the heavy rain horizontal. Lightning going off all around. Thunder loud enough to vibrate in my chest. Thinking of Miles, I quickly got off the freeway and into a Cenex gas station/convenience store to wait it out. Walking in, the first thing the cashier said was; "I was just thinking how bad it would be out there on a motorcycle!"
I will say the tires were impressive. Every vehicle was getting blown across the lanes, and the sidecar was stable. I was twisting hard on the bars to keep in the lane, and the tires kept gripping with confidence even with the lane looking more like a river than a freeway. So that was cool.
Decided to spend the night in Rock Springs WY. That's about 140 miles from home. Once into southern Wyoming the heavy winds took a break, and the riding was beautiful. Today I left Rock Springs and came through Flaming Gorge to include the loop over a really pretty dam.
Fridge of Fame Magnets from this trip. Turned the Joyce Canfield key chain into a Fridge magnet as well.
Just a bit over 3,400 miles for this Summer Vacation 2.0. Since the trip ended at least two weeks early, it's time to get back on the horse, and get back in the hunt to adopt a new Volunteer Therapy Dog partner, and sidecar monkey. Super-Muttress passed away last December, and I have been missing her terribly. Pretty special dog to hunt birds, and do therapy work. So it may take a while to find the next Super-Mut(tress).
Our Graduation Picture after we passed the Alliance of Therapy Dogs tests, and observations back in '19.
Side note: This is a great program, with a lot of opportunities to solicit smiles, and hear great stories. If any of you have an interest send me a pm, and I can explain. It's not near as tough as it sounds to pass the tests. Just patience, and a willing partner.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
Scott, having confidence in your tires is a really big asset, and gift.
Knowing that they will do exactly what you ask them to do, inspires a rider to enjoy the ride that much more.
Flaming Gorge is a rider's paradise.
Two Million Mile Rider
Exploring the World in Comfort
I got chased down the road by a bull moose in Flaming Gorge back in 2022. I'd like to spend a week there camping and exploring.
If you decide to head further south toward Central Nebraska, let me know.
Otherwise if you head into Nebraska, I can recommend Carhenge in Alliance, Ashfall Fossil Beds National Monument near Hemingford, Toadstool Park and Ogallala National Grasslands in NW Nebraska and Scott's Bluff National Monument in Scott's Bluff. All are very worthy of a visit.
ETA, mustn't forget Fort Robinson State Park near Chadron and the Museum of the Fur Trade in Chadron.
You are speaking my language for sure! 😎 Thank you for the great insights on an awesome state. 👍
Not sure yet what I'm going to do to complete the Lewis & Clark Historic Trail. Other than the adventure will re-start around Lake Sakakawea, ND. From what small portion I've done it seems like the perfect vehicle for this route would be a VW Camper Van, or something similar.
What I might do is utilize the truck or Jeep with one of those tents that attach to it, and then pull the trailer with SYZ inside. Or use a Toy Hauler travel trailer. There is a lot of incredible riding in the Pacific North Wet, that I want to explore with the sidecar. So it will come along for this journey, but it won't be the primary vehicle. I'm just starting to think on this now, and won't get back to the L&C trail until next year, so plenty of time to consider options.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
Reading the latest issue of The Sidecarist, and noticed I'm not the first one to run the Motoz GPS rear tire. Ken Conrad's BMW/DMC rig is the Calendar photo, and it sure looks like the same rear tire. I need to figure out if he is on this site and reach out for his thoughts. 👍
If you haven't seen it yet, the photo is stunning! 🤩
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
I got chased down the road by a bull moose in Flaming Gorge back in 2022. I'd like to spend a week there camping and exploring.
My sister vas once bitten by a moose...
I got chased down the road by a bull moose in Flaming Gorge back in 2022. I'd like to spend a week there camping and exploring.
My sister vas once bitten by a moose...
For reasons that are not entirely clear, the above post was NOT made by Smitty 901. It was, in fact, Thane Lewis who mysteriously found himself logged in as Smitty 901 this afternoon. The persons responsible for sacking the persons responsible for the Swedish subtitles have been sacked.
Illegitemi non carborundum est!
That did have me some what confused .
Also I had to sign in again today to get in same yesterday.
Sounds like a case for Moose and Squirrel.I got chased down the road by a bull moose in Flaming Gorge back in 2022. I'd like to spend a week there camping and exploring.
My sister vas once bitten by a moose...
For reasons that are not entirely clear, the above post was NOT made by Smitty 901. It was, in fact, Thane Lewis who mysteriously found himself logged in as Smitty 901 this afternoon. The persons responsible for sacking the persons responsible for the Swedish subtitles have been sacked.
Hold my keyboard and watch this! 🙃
