Day started out where yesterday ended, in Amherst, Ohio. First 177 miles of the trip went fine. But then things got interesting. I was tooling down the freeway at 80 miles an hour when all of a sudden the bike started drifting left and I couldn't turn out of it. I slowed down, was able to get control of it around 40 mph, and rode another 1/2 mile. Then the bike started tracking right. I pulled over and stopped. I had a flat rear tire.
On the tow truck bed.
At mile marker 130 on I-80 and heavy traffic.
I looked up cycle dealers near me and first call was to Cole Cycle. They gave me a name of a company that could tow my bike, so I called them. While I was waiting I looked up nearest Honda Cycle Dealer. There was one, 35 miles away. I called and asked if they had a rear tire for a Goldwing. They said yes! Good news. Then I asked when they could put it on. They said July 27! I explained I was driving through, was not local and they still would not budge off of July 27.. So when the tow truck came by, I had the guy take the bike to Cole's. My plan was to take an Uber to the Honda dealer, buy the tire then take it back to Cole's and have them install it. But I discovered when I told the tow truck driver my plan he said "What is Uber?" I asked if there were taxi's? Nope. So I got there with the bike and asked if they had a tire for my bike. After checking, they said no, but they could get one in an hour. The owner drove over to the place to get the tire in some pretty heavy rain.
The 85 year old owner of Cole's. He prayed for me when I told him about my ALS, a very nice man.
Heavy rain
More heavy rain.
So I had the bike repaired there. It took about 5 hours from the flat tire to back on the road again. And the good news? I missed all the heavy rain. And when the bike was ready to go, this is what it looked like from the front of the shop.
And where you see the sun shining? That is the direction I was heading. So I took off and missed all the rain that had just spend two hours soaking the area I was in. My luck didn't hold up though, I rain into rain on the North side of Chicago and rode in it until I got to Madison where I found the sun again. I had a ton of fun with Matt and his family and friends but it is good to be home.
Russ