$600 Boots, $200 Pedicure, $900 Coat, and Oxygen Bar?
Bikers Not Welcome Here Since Malcom Forbes Bit the Big One:
Half snap pic's while we ride down main street, the rest look disgusted, like we have no right to this town of super well-t0-do. Little shops dot the main drag, selling all things ultra-expensive. One of my bros bought a $350 pr of ostrich cowboy boots in LA, back when times were better. At the time, thought boots couldn't get any more expensive, but we wuz wrong. A lady's set in the store, just regular leather w/a design.. $600. Nice leather jacket, nine big bills. No name restuarants setting up for dinner, with designer tablecloths, beautiful crystal glasses, & silverware..although ABM is sure the food is delicious, too expensive for a couple of broke Florida bikers who prefer brown & rainbow trout right out of the water, and into some hot olive oil. If we ate there, they'd probably count the place setting pieces before we left! Ha! Oxygen bar? At 10,000 feet, you could use some "O" (or is it O2?). You can simply take a deep breath, eat lots of iron, like rasins, & save your money. Some of the little nightly "cellar" bars look as if they might have wild nightlife, as a mini-me version of Paris, Rome, or NYC. We spent 20 bucks on a tee shirt, $3 on a slice of pizza, and split.
2 Mile Club:
Lizzard Head Pass, Mt Wilson Pass, welcome bikers to see what it's like to ride at 10,600 feet. The better half is sooo...proud... Almost 2 miles high, nearly almost always sunny, cold and windy. Snow filled tops becon the rider to stop & take pic's of the jagged peaks, some of which have taken on the look of "Hall of the Mountain King" spires. Just before Telluride is "Trout Lake", one of the most beautiful glacial hole lakes ABM has ever seen. The water is so clear, you can see the dropoff from shore. Fishing is allowed, but there are no overnight campsites. Bring a small rowboat, or fish from shore like the couple we met. They caught a nice stringer of trout from their lawnchairs. Scene from the road reminded ABM of a small-scale Lake Tahoe.
2 Miles up, rough on bikes, bikers:
Stopped in Rico, little mining town, halfway to Telluride, dropped in to the "Enterprise" bar, an old saloon with two giant pizza ovens. Their food is good, the beer is cold, the outside deck out back is a nice spot to warm up in the morning sun. Only one gas station, & all they sell is 86 octane. Trail bikers, road warriors everywhere. Met a frozen blond lady biker, on her 883 Harley sportster. Caught up to her on the way up to Telluride, doin' 30, nothin' on her head, she wuz freezin' to death. We had on leathers, with 4 shirts, still froze. August isn't the warmest month of the year up here, it's July. Local gardens got hit again this morning as temps dropped into the mid to upper thirties. The squash, beans, corn, etc grow like weeds. Just warm enough to put on the fruit, just cold enough so the bugs never quite get goin'. The taste is beyond belief.
What will bicyclists think of next?
Dude, imagine this: One skateboard strapped to each foot. One snow-ski pole in each hand. Now picture trying to push yourself up a mountain road with this weird contraption. Machocists? Yes. Most bicyclists are cool, smiling at us as we cut around them & cool the pipes to show respect, but some...cup their left ear, give us a disgusting look, & we give them the finger, that's more than they deserve.
Chopper Maintenance Time:
Rough running early this morning. She was fine yesterday. Had a bad gas hose in Sturgis, so figured it was a pinhole leak in one of the others. Replaced 'em, she still rough, like a plug had gone bad, but that was the first thing I did. She was acting like the accellerator pump was goin' bad, my day was being destroyed. Decided to take the derby cover off, & run a nail file board across the points (remember, the chopper is plugs 'n' points driven), and that did the trick. She fired up and ran fine. The one big disadvantage of running points vs an electronic ignition is, if there is even the smallest hunk of crap flying around inside the cover, & it gets in between your points, proper gap is negated, and you have a v-twin that sounds like one plug is bad. ABM needs another curve ball like a hole in the head, but we got this one fixed. Wanna run a carb'ed bike? Better know your way around a tool bag. In all honesty, I just got lucky, but sometimes a little luck is just enough to get 'ya on down the road.
Half snap pic's while we ride down main street, the rest look disgusted, like we have no right to this town of super well-t0-do. Little shops dot the main drag, selling all things ultra-expensive. One of my bros bought a $350 pr of ostrich cowboy boots in LA, back when times were better. At the time, thought boots couldn't get any more expensive, but we wuz wrong. A lady's set in the store, just regular leather w/a design.. $600. Nice leather jacket, nine big bills. No name restuarants setting up for dinner, with designer tablecloths, beautiful crystal glasses, & silverware..although ABM is sure the food is delicious, too expensive for a couple of broke Florida bikers who prefer brown & rainbow trout right out of the water, and into some hot olive oil. If we ate there, they'd probably count the place setting pieces before we left! Ha! Oxygen bar? At 10,000 feet, you could use some "O" (or is it O2?). You can simply take a deep breath, eat lots of iron, like rasins, & save your money. Some of the little nightly "cellar" bars look as if they might have wild nightlife, as a mini-me version of Paris, Rome, or NYC. We spent 20 bucks on a tee shirt, $3 on a slice of pizza, and split.
2 Mile Club:
Lizzard Head Pass, Mt Wilson Pass, welcome bikers to see what it's like to ride at 10,600 feet. The better half is sooo...proud... Almost 2 miles high, nearly almost always sunny, cold and windy. Snow filled tops becon the rider to stop & take pic's of the jagged peaks, some of which have taken on the look of "Hall of the Mountain King" spires. Just before Telluride is "Trout Lake", one of the most beautiful glacial hole lakes ABM has ever seen. The water is so clear, you can see the dropoff from shore. Fishing is allowed, but there are no overnight campsites. Bring a small rowboat, or fish from shore like the couple we met. They caught a nice stringer of trout from their lawnchairs. Scene from the road reminded ABM of a small-scale Lake Tahoe.
2 Miles up, rough on bikes, bikers:
Stopped in Rico, little mining town, halfway to Telluride, dropped in to the "Enterprise" bar, an old saloon with two giant pizza ovens. Their food is good, the beer is cold, the outside deck out back is a nice spot to warm up in the morning sun. Only one gas station, & all they sell is 86 octane. Trail bikers, road warriors everywhere. Met a frozen blond lady biker, on her 883 Harley sportster. Caught up to her on the way up to Telluride, doin' 30, nothin' on her head, she wuz freezin' to death. We had on leathers, with 4 shirts, still froze. August isn't the warmest month of the year up here, it's July. Local gardens got hit again this morning as temps dropped into the mid to upper thirties. The squash, beans, corn, etc grow like weeds. Just warm enough to put on the fruit, just cold enough so the bugs never quite get goin'. The taste is beyond belief.
What will bicyclists think of next?
Dude, imagine this: One skateboard strapped to each foot. One snow-ski pole in each hand. Now picture trying to push yourself up a mountain road with this weird contraption. Machocists? Yes. Most bicyclists are cool, smiling at us as we cut around them & cool the pipes to show respect, but some...cup their left ear, give us a disgusting look, & we give them the finger, that's more than they deserve.
Chopper Maintenance Time:
Rough running early this morning. She was fine yesterday. Had a bad gas hose in Sturgis, so figured it was a pinhole leak in one of the others. Replaced 'em, she still rough, like a plug had gone bad, but that was the first thing I did. She was acting like the accellerator pump was goin' bad, my day was being destroyed. Decided to take the derby cover off, & run a nail file board across the points (remember, the chopper is plugs 'n' points driven), and that did the trick. She fired up and ran fine. The one big disadvantage of running points vs an electronic ignition is, if there is even the smallest hunk of crap flying around inside the cover, & it gets in between your points, proper gap is negated, and you have a v-twin that sounds like one plug is bad. ABM needs another curve ball like a hole in the head, but we got this one fixed. Wanna run a carb'ed bike? Better know your way around a tool bag. In all honesty, I just got lucky, but sometimes a little luck is just enough to get 'ya on down the road.
posted by americanbikerminute at 12:40 PM
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