Thursday: I went home at 2pm, after shopping for a couple of items of clothes I needed/wanted at noon, realizing I needed more time to pack and organize. So, I spent the evening sipping a few Pale Ales, making lists of things to pack and generally got everything done, saddlebags on the scoot/etc, for an early departure in the morning.
I'm mentioning all the towns, in case anyone who reads this gets out a map...
Friday AM: I got up, showered... and all that... dressed and was down at Dissmore's (IGA) by 8am to have coffee and meet Biker Bob, 1100 Shadow American Classic Edition(Ace) Purple and white with aftermarket Cobra slashed pipes. We talked about riding together, as we had our coffee and decided to have breakfast and the first fuel stop at Sprague. Headed North on 27 out of Pullman, through Palouse, and Garfield and then just south of Oakesdale and Steptoe Butte, highest point in the Palouse. Nice to ride up there after work, clean out the cobwebs with a sunset.
North on 195 a couple of miles and a left at Steptoe... another nice backroad through St. John and it connects with Sprague, just south of I-90. At St. John we ran into the first of three 10-12 mile sections of freshly laid asphalt... but for us, who started early, it was hot enough to be really 'tacky' and there wasn't any loose gravel, although a sign warned about that stuff. We had a light breakfast in Sprague... scrambled eggs and a butter horn... and this is where I gassed up and computed approx. 51+ mpg... whoa, never saw above 50 before! 8))) we had just cruised up at about 60, and the roads were fairly clear, not many downshifts for passing BDCs. It's nice to know I could squeeze 155+ miles out of my main before hitting reserve.
North from Sprague and it angles generally NW to Harrington... another section of fresh ashpalt, 11-12 miles then a flagperson, we waited 7-10 minutes and the young woman was talking a blue streak... me with ear plugs and a full face helmet, she was freaking out with spiders that kept crawling up her legs. On to Harrington, and then it angles back NE to Davenport and as soon as we head N. from Davenport... trees! and we can see mountains 8) this is more like it, cept here's another 10 mile section of fresh asphalt and now, it's close to 11AM and it is getting tacky... very apparent when we stopped to clean face shields. just after the fresh ashpalt the road gets close to the Columbia River/Lake Roosevelt and you approach Fort Spokane, looks like a great camping area... and the road is 40 miles more along the eastside of the river... in spots the entire surface of the water was absolutely calm... beautiful day for a ride and a nice road... some gravel in spots that we had to look out for, a lot of signs were up-warnings.
As we approached Kettle Falls, a WSP was heading south so we timed that just right ;-) then, as we gassed up and were ready to head west over Sherman pass on Hwy 20... another WSP was headed east, Lunchbreak? Hoped so, and also hoped we would have a 'clear' shot into Republic with no chance for a High Perf. riding award... Verra nice road, up to the summit... I left Bob, he cruised and enjoyed the scenery I passed 10-12 cages of various types and kept it in 4th gear between 7,000 and 8,000 rpm... fun, fun, fun... stopped at the summit and had a smoke, cobalt blue sky, crisp air at 5,000'+ elev.... Bob caught up and we rode on down into Republic... the last 6-7 miles had gravel but with L or R lanes with a hump of gravel in the middle... =8-O we slowed down to 40-45mph...
Checked into the motel... before we went to the fairgrounds... nice motel, clean, and the beds were just fine on my back. The lady who checked us in, didn't have the usual story of motorcyles... she related to when she rode a scoot, friendly. Then, I went to the car wash w/Biker Bob... guess the wash is part of the cruiser thang, and got the bugs off-ah the scoots... headed to the fairgrounds... Al Carson and friend, one of many WLers who are 'characters,' a VME guy, with a bunch of old brit bikes, were checking people in... sign the release form that basically sez you accept responsibility for yerself. no problem... headed over to the cook shack about a hundred yards to the left, at the gate there was a big rectangular area for camping... sat down annd started mingling/BS'ing, people would ride in, and I'd walk over to say hello to old friends, say hello to new ones. Terry Powell showed up with the home brew... Mickey Lyngholm rode in with one keg on her Magna from Montana... I think, maybe it was transported from Spokane(?) regardless, her Ginger home brew was killer. More and more WLers kept riding or driving in... and Guy started cooking the Buffalo meat burgers around 5pm... nice leaner than beef, chips and salsa, potato salad, etc. There was a bunch of picnic tables by the cook shack and running east to west to the south of this campground area, is a stream, running by... great facilities. It cooled off quickly as the shadows got long, so I was glad I brought my sweatshirt in my tank bag. It had been a long day... and the brews, so, I went back to the room and was in bed my 10pm, Bob was already snoring. I turned on the air conditioner and by morning the stuffiness went out of the room. Never did use the hot tub facilities(hrs were 8am to 9:30pm), busy doing other things!
Saturday: Got up early in order to check out breakfast at the Fairgrounds... arrived at 7AM, as Bob and I had volunteered to be the sign-in please/release forms for Saturday AM... but we ended up just keeping a watchful eye out and any new arrivals were pointed toward the cook shack and someone would get them to sign in and sign them off the GatherBoss's/ GuyP.'s list Breakfast was pancakes and eggs... then Martin and Carol fired up their deep fryer and made Beneights(sp?) - light, sweet pastry, w/powdered sugar... yum.
Sat around BS'ing most of the morning, walking around camp, saying hello, meeting new people...
later in the morning...
Various groups started going out in two's, three's, & four or more for various rides. HMarc led a group to Grand Forks for the russian ethnic Dining. Scott Larson and I went north and then cut across over Deep Creek summit... beautiful country, not as high as Sherman Pass but a verra nice road... and I could tell Scott hasn't been riding as much as I... I left him in the twisties and had to wait for him on the straights. I also think his tires were in need of replacement. We went back via Sherman pass... he had a deer run out just behind him... I hit the brakes, wanting to be an observer instead of possible participant. The deer, bounding down the left embankment & working at deer speed must have been trying to jump over Scott and his scoot becauuse it went airborne and went into a graceful pirouette, hooves flashing, BUT, just after Scott had passed by... then we came upon the crap on the road again and slowed to warp one, as we hit the gravel and clear ruts hwy 20 east of Republic.
We got back at 1pm and I changed into shorts and sandals, ballcap... Tom Dietriech, had broke out his gigantor slingshot of surgical tubing and was flinging water balloons... Dah Pope went over to use the pay phone and ended up being a target for the balloons. Devious Pope finally caught one intact and made a frontal assault on the launching team... great fun... I wandered, made it clean across the flowing stream... Sarah Schilke and Pat Loughery both slipped and got completely wet.... which looked like a good idea, so, I did too... Wendy D. was sitting in a chair in the stream, reading a book, started alking with her and after 10?15 minutes, Rolland walks over and offers mexican (red) margueritas(with real cactus juice)... definitely sipping drinks, Wendy and I agreed, wow, makes yah pucker...
Biker Scum kept showing up all this time, and as I think about it... and this will be various campsites walking west from the cookshack and going in a roughly counterclockwise big old circle... Tom Dietrich(COncours 1000), CarlP (newer Concours 1000) and Rhonda with Carl's sister Karen in the van, The One True Beth Dixon (borrowed Duc. 900SS, Jeff Earls, Sarah Schilke, the colorado contingent, incl. Ed Guzman on a Ducati, Alan Fleming on a Suzuki GSXR EX-WERA race bike, Andrea Widdison rode in on a GS500 Suz. furthest (330 miles), she had ever ridden, she sat on my N'Hawk and said it was more comfy. I guess she's ready for her next bike, the next step up... she talked about a 600 Katana. HMarc and friend Wanda... Art Ellison from Colville with friend, Kat (they cooked breakfast omelettes sunday morning, Terry Powell and Lauren, Jim D. and Mat, Ski... SteveP and Winifred, Mark Alpen, Ellen C., friend Wendy D. Squid and 'cesca, T. Wilson(Moto Guzzi V65), Dan Arnold (beautiful R1100GS BMW Black), JonM and Dragon caged it since the H-D wouldn't fire... Jon talked about getting a new Triumph! Dave and Peg (met them at last years' lolo pass assault-great people, got his userid@node), Dave's buddy, Tom had a new Triumph Daytona Gloss BLACK! AHAHAAAAAAAAAH!!!! I LIKE IT!!! and the montana contingent, Mickey Lyngholm, hubby and son and friend... oh, and the band Anwan showed up and parked near the stage east of the cook shack.
at this point, I realized it was going to be a long day... and I went back to he motel room 2:30pm, showered with a 45 min. nap... changed clothes, and returned at 5pm about 30 min. before they started serving the dinner of chile and cornbread. and the deserts... I'll be dieting this week to make up for that splurge...
Annwyn put on a fine show, after the awards ceremony which Bill already told about... I watched for a while, drifted back over later and talked with JonM, Dragon, Dave and Peggy for a while... it was dark and late, there was a small camp fire, people sat by it... I saddled up and returned to the motel at 10:30pm which was interesting with a tinted face shield in the dark! Took a hot bat and soaked, watched ESPN and fell asleep...
Sunday: Got up earlier than Saturday as many would be heading out... packed the saddle bags, and tank bag, made sure I didn't forget anything, turned in the key and picked up a couple of cups of complimentary coffee, as Bob was still rumaging around... told Bob he'd do the final check outta dah motel... and would meet him there.
None of the grocery stores were open, they open at 8am?! sheesh, small towns... there was a mini-mart I finally located, gassed up the scoot so I was ready to boogie... I got to the fairgrounds by 7AM... bunch of people eating breakfast, various tents coming down, people doing morning things...
Breakfast was Art Ellison serving and his friend, Kat, cooking ham and onion omelettes... along with Guy doing pancakes... excellent chow, as each meal was for this Gather... I also had small cans of apple juice that I had chilled in the fridge at the motel.
I walked around afterwards saying farewells/til next time... mentioned Lolo Pass or lunch in Mizzoula on Labor Day weekend to some, and there was some interest...
Biker Bob wanted to go back via Idaho... so he could ride w/o a helmet and do the cool cruise... I wanted to go west down through Wenatchee but then would have faced a hot ride across the oven of the mid-basin... no takers... Jim D. and Matt, fellow Honda 4 boyz from Pullman wanted to go back the direct route via the Keller Ferry but I didn't want that ride, already did it in June... So, I hooked up with Dah Pope and we went east over Sherman Pass to Kettle Falls, on 10 miles to Colville then continued east on 20 to Tiger, then we went south, where Bill had a great max. brake test with a deer coming across the road, as he as passing a toyota... to Newport... we ran into Tim Keane (new Triumph Tiger "DP" moto) as we gassed up... so we took a break and stepped next door at a pizza joint, for SALAD, no offennse to the eats at The Gather(tm) but not too much rabbit food... lots of meat and ranch breakfast stuff, and brew 8)
It was getting very hot... we negotiated the street from hell, DIVISION, in Spokane without getting separated... stopped at the start of 27 headed south where for the first time... I took off my leather, doused my t-shirt and then shoved the hose in my helmet soaking everything.... it did help... then we followed 27, had a pucker with some soft asphalt on the road that catches on fire (rubber tires ground up in the asphalt and road bed) North of Oakesdale, then, on to Pullman and home... after a shower and a relax... I went over to da Pope's for the brew he offered and a post-ride chat... had a nice homebrew, arh! Good!... and as I left, Pope even gave me a compliment... "yah, ride a good wing" not the scoot, but a good job of riding together, following, at a consistent distance... we only did 60-65mph on the straights, well, we did hit an obligatory DOD nominal on one long straight...but we would twist it up in the curves... unlike the 50+mpg, hangin' with dah Pope and his FJ1200 got the mileage per gallon down to 38+ ;-)
The end of the telling of my first Gather(tm) '96...
Randall (BlackBear) Mietzner