Oh what a day!
Sold the last of my Valkyries last week
, but life goes on...
Contacted by a gentleman named Lee from the Flint, MI area who was interested in my I/S. Agreed on a price after describing the Valk's condition (he has owned two others). Told him how about a month ago, while rebuilding the carbs the Valk fell over out of the chock in the garage; scratched up the fairing slightly, but really scratched up the right saddlebag. Had that repaired and repainted, looks great. Agreed to meet in Toledo, OH on Friday the 6th to make it his.
Fast forward to Friday. Loaded the bike on my open trailer to take to Toledo (we were going on to Chicago, so no riding it there). Loaded in the chock, tuned around to get the ratchet strap and BOOM.. over she went, this time on the left side! Looked while it was still over... looked like it went over onto the crash bar and highway peg. Waited about 15 minutes for JoJo's ex-husband to stop over (picking up our grandson) to help me pick it up.
We got it upright and now see that the left side of the fairing has a 2 inch crack in it and it scratched all to hell. The left side of the trunk in also scratched to hell! Called Lee and told him about the damage and offered him $500 off the agreed price for repairs... he was fine with that.
Onward to Toledo, now in paranoid mode watching the bike closely willing it to remain upright.
Met Lee and he was happy with the bike and the $500 for repairs. Since he had a cashiers check, I gave him an envelope with the cash. All was well and off he drove into the sunset.
About an hour later, somewhere in Indiana, Lee calls me. I answer with a bit of trepidation. Lee informs me that he got to a gas station for a break and pulled up to the pumps. He was digging some stuff out of his pocket and forgot to put the kickstand down. OVER SHE WENT.... AGAIN!!!!!
Now the left side saddlebag is trashed to match the damage I caused 6 hours before. Oh, and one of the desmog plugs blew out the motor while he was tooling down the highway!
He took it in decent humor and to my surprise, he said that he took the envelope that I gave him out of his pocket and found that it contained $600, not $500. Lee assured me that he would be sending me the extra $100 back...
After all the Valkyrie had been through that day, and Lee now having some work in front of him to get it back into original sold condition, it was very refreshing to see his good humor about things and his honestly. Would have been really easy to not say a word about the extra money and just walk away.
Good karma to you Lee and good luck with your new Valkyrie!
