Woke up about 6, drank some coffee and called Stanley Steamer to see if he
wanted to head out to Grits and Groceries. I had to leave a message, Steamer was
out watering the garden...
I had a couple of horses to feed before I left, and then I remembered that
the Grits and Groceries folks like to close for a week or two around the fourth,
so I hit their web page, and sure enough - gone fishin until the 19th...
I left a "they're closed" message on Stanley's phone and hit the road towards
peach county...
A lot of people think SC 11 is a special road, but after you've ridden it about twice
it is the most boring road in the world...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Carolina_Highway_11Today I figured out that last few backroads needed to avoid 11 all the way
from my house to Cleveland SC... (that's a pretty long way
)...
When I popped out on 11 in Cleveland, I stopped for a ham biscuit at the little
gas stop, it's always busy, the kitchen is manned by a bunch of grandmotherly
ladies...
I headed on down the road, taking numerous detours down roads-not-before-taken,
a good lazy old ride. Got some peaches and corn and a melon (cantaloupe) way
out where hwy 9 crosses hwy 11 - gotta love Valkyrie saddlebags. Some other times
my peaches have been kind of bruised from the ride home in the saddlebags - today
I filled the saddlebag with plastic grocery sacks before I left - they make great padding
and my peaches arrived home unbruised.
I talked to Stanley from the peach stand... he was out antiquing...
I stopped and dipped my feet in this creek for a while. I took this picture while on a ride
a couple of years ago, I didn't take my camera with me today... but it hasn't changed much
in the last 200 years...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poinsett_Bridge
I guess it must have been around 100 degrees when I got back near home, I was out
about six hours and 200 miles. Last thing I did was stop at the Victory/Kawasaki/Suzuki
dealer and ordered some RideOn for the new rear Avon that showed up the other day -
gotta get ready for InZane. I noticed a tiny ring of escaped fluid on my left fork -
hope I don't spring a leak on the way out to Arkansas.
While I was out I got a call from 2ToneValk - he thought he saw me out near his neck of
the woods, someone else must have been running around on a Red and White out there...
After I got back into the air conditioning, I made some tea, cut up a tomato from one of Carolyn's
plants, and made a sandwich with some of her home-made bread, cooked up some corn
and cut up the melon... yummy...
What a good day - last Saturday I was doped up on hydrocodone and suffering
from bursitis, today beat the snot out of that
-Mike
