Okay, now that I've had time to at least partially recuperate, process pics, let the trip digest and settle down, I'm gonna sit down and try to write it out.
Going from Dallas to Roanoke, on the excellent advice of many here, we detoured to Cherokee, NC and rode the first (Or last, depending on your orientation) 85 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway.
Loved it, have to go back and do the whole thing sometime. Glad we did it (And the road through Great Smoky Mountain National Park!) in lieu of US129, no regrets there at all.
I could take a month and just ride around that area and still not get all the good roads I suspect.
From Asheville we superslabbed it to Roanoke where we found Valkyries!
Many lies were told, friendships were rekindled or made, faces were put to names, etc...
And then there were the nightly raffles with Vanna White Jr proudly running prizes out:
I was ever so gently admonished for being a little TOO generous with my arm stretches while distributing 50/50 tickets...
Some pies were auctioned off for a great cause (Seeing Carl go from one end of the room to the other enticing the high bidder with a free sniff was just a bonus!)
With the generous financial assistance of my table mates we were able to get this plate of painfully delicious sopapilla cheesecake (That Kali is STILL ranting about how awesome it was!)
After the pies were bought and consumer, there were some Karaoke shenanigans (But I wasn't NEARLY inebriated enough to get up there myself! You're welcome...)
For one of our day trips around the area Kali and I headed out to the National D-Day Memorial. That was one you didn't want to miss.
From there we wandered around a bit, rode a little of the VA part of the BRP. It was beautiful as well, and fun, but the NC side definitely gets top marks.
There were long stretches of thick pea soup fog. Luckily I love that kinda stuff, kept me on my toes, and luckily also there was almost no other traffic, but it definitely made for an interesting ride!
Back at the hotel, the spot out front became one of the main social gathering spots (Until the hotel decided to threaten to call the cops on us for imbibing in a non-imbibing approved spot, but oh well)
Have to wonder if this sign had always been there, or if they put it there just for our "benefit"?
The fruit infused waters they (almost) always had in the front lobby I initially thought were gimmicky, but will admit I quickly became a fan of. (Especially the watermelon!)
I usually don't do group rides, but Kali was requesting we do at least one since she'd never been in one before, and I'll admit there is a certain thrill to having the roar of bikes all around you, so we did the group ride downtown to the Transportation Museum for the block party.
Lots of cool old cars, airplanes, bicycles, and trains. And more trains. And model trains. And big trains. And BIIIIIIIIG trains:
...and cake!
Loved this pic of a lone Valk on the deserted streets downtown headed back from the museum:
We made the trek up to see the Roanoke Star, and the lookout over the city.
I think you can just make out the host hotel in this pic from the overlook:
We did the poker run in there somewhere (First one of those I'd ever done) but evidently left the camera in the saddle bags the whole time. The route was amazing, loved it!
Back at the hotel.... Man, they'll let anyone in here!
And suddenly, it was Thursday night, the week was almost over, time for the final evening's festivities:
Confirmed... They really will let anyone come here, no matter how untrustworthy they are!
Awards were awarded:
Speeches were made:
Goodies were raffled off:
Surprisingly good food (I thought at least) was eaten:
But alas, we had miles to go the next day, so we called it an early night and packed up and prepared, said our first 15 or 20 rounds of goodbyes, got up good and early Friday morning, had a quick breakfast, and said our final goodbyes to Inzane VXIII:
But as I teased in an earlier post, the adventure wasn't quite over with, at least not for Kali.
There is but a single skydiving center in the USA that will allow someone under 18 to skydive, and there are some paperwork hoops we had to go through to make it happen (Mommy had to mail me Kali's birth cert and a notarized affidavit from her promising not to sue and that she gave her okay). That skydiving center is sorta kinda halfway from Roanoke to Dallas just outside Memphis Tennessee.
So off we went Saturday morning.
Not only did we have to jump through some hoops for this to happen, the drop zone did too. They had to drop out of the official US Parachuting Association (Which is ironic, since the guy who owns and runs the drop zone is the national director OF the USPA), and there is only one instructor that will take minors, he's an Australian guy who had to give up his US Skydiving license, he jumps under Australian rules. The US parachute companies wouldn't allow them to use their rigs for this, so they imported a tandem setup fro France to make it happen.
But it happened.
Twice.
Initially Flamingobabe had toyed with the idea of riding out there with us and jumping as well. While I look forward to her making her first jump, this probably isn't the right dropzone for her. I don't know the story, but there's a stuffed flamingo hanging form a noose in the building.
Kali getting initial ground training from her instructor:
And there goes my baby into the airplane with only a one way ticket. That'll put a lump in a parent's throat!
Let's do this!
Playing a quick game of Rock Paper Scissors with the cameraman:
And all too quickly it was time to deploy the parachute:
And back on Terra Firma:
The first coherent words out of her mouth were "CAN I GO AGAIN?!?!?!" so yeah.... She went back up and did it again.
For anyone still following along, if you'd like to see the video of Kali's jump, that can be had here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IN_BPf3j_YM&t=1sAnd if I somehow didn't post enough pics, ALL of my pics are on my website (Including the hi-res versions of any you might want a copy of)
http://www.serk.net/2018-pics/The Inzane ones are in the images_27 through images_55 folders.
Apologies for not getting more pics of the rides or that sort of thing, for me the joy of Inzane is the people. The roads were awesome, but the opportunity to get face time with a few hundred of my closest friends is the real draw for me.
I'd been dreading making this post, knowing that once I put the pics up, the trip is well and fully over, but alas, it appears to be time.
Thanks for everything to everyone, and I really REALLY hope I can swing it to make it again next year!
