The theme of this photo album is "Flipping the Bird", as in "Screw you, I'm here at
[fill in the appropriate scenic, panoramic, fascinating, historic, and/or profoundly moving location], and you're not!"
It's all in good fun (I sure had fun getting these pictures taken), and if any of these pictures offend you, well, screw you too! (LOL)

Details Of The Trip:

I packed my 1996 H-D Ultra Classic with a full camping kit. If I was going to camp out, I would do it in style! But I never used any of it, not once. I'll do a much cleaner packing job next time. It was about noon on Tuesday, August 5th, when I headed west out of Framingham, Massachusetts in a light rain, after having just had a new back tire put on my bike by the good people at my favorite Harley shop. I spent the first night in a motel outside of Buffalo, NY, the second in Madison, WI, and reached Sturgis at about 8pm on Thursday, Aug. 7th. The whole first leg out was a straight 2500-mile shot across the country on I-90. I made several new friends among folks renting other rooms and tent space at the house where I stayed in Sturgis. It was nice to ride with knowledgeable locals into and out of the badlands, all through the Black Hills, and to Devil's Tower in Wyoming. I left South Dakota on the following Monday, Aug. 11th.

Continuing generally west, I rode through Custer State Park on the way to Yellowstone National Park, riding every interesting road I could find in my HOG atlas that went my direction, and visiting Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse memorial on the way. Leaving Yellowstone from the West Gate in southern Montana, I spent the next night in Idaho. Bypassing boring Interstate 84, I rode equally boring U.S. Route 20 across Idaho to the top of the Columbia River gorge, which I took all the way into Portland, OR to visit a friend I'd met at the previous year's Laconia Bike Week. Then it was south on I-5 to the California border. At the first exit in California I left the highway and went straight across toward the coast (not very straight, actually, but beautiful riding country) until I reached Rt. 199 at the CA-OR border, staying that night in a motel with neither celphone service nor landline telephones available. I was incognito for sure.

Fortunately I was not left for dead by Gypsies or survivalists and the next morning I rode the length of Avenue Of The Giants (through the largest grove of the tallest trees in the world), picking up the 101 Freeway south of there and making my way across the Golden Gate and all the way to Monterey before stopping again. The next day, a Saturday, I rode Pacific Coast Highway all the way from Carmel to Pismo Beach (I had done it before in a car, but never on a bike), then cut back over to the 101 and rode the freeway as far as a friend's home in Thousand Oaks, where I stayed until Tuesday.

I headed east out of L.A., making it almost to the Arizona state line before stopping again. Route 66 was a disappointment, most of it seemingly either bordered by one run-down strip mall after another, or just plain missing. I picked up the Interstate again before heading into New Mexico to visit friends living in an "off the grid" community outside of Santa Fe. I never realized you could run a TV, VCR, computer, refrigerator, washer, and dryer, all off solar power. The Rio Grande gorge where I crossed it was as impressive as anything I've seen like it since the Grand Canyon.

I made my way across northern New Mexico to the Texas panhandle, then south to Dallas where I spent a night with relatives before heading off through Arkansas and Tennessee. In North Carolina I took a side trip down the famous Blue Ridge Parkway, noted for its many scenic overlooks. Seen one scenic view of misty tree-covered hillsides, seen them all. I spent the next night at my sister's home in Charlotte NC. Her husband had just bought a new bike, a Triumph. He didn't want to go for a ride together, though. What a wuss.

The next day I started north. I cut east to Norfolk, VA, to reach the southern terminus of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. I took the Cape May Ferry across Delaware Bay, and stopped in Jackson, NJ, to visit one of my oldest friends (I grew up in Lakewood, the next town east). The next day was Friday, August 29th, the last and most boring day of the entire ride. I took the Garden State Parkway to the Tappan Zee Bridge, then up I-684, to I-84, to I-90 (the Mass Pike) and home. What a trip!

Standing in the rain at the bike shop before starting out

All packed up and ready to ride! August 5th

Illinois is enforcing strict speed limits these days!

Typical cruising speed on the Interstate

Picking up the pace a bit

Now we're cooking!

Pedal to the metal - peg that speedo!

Flipping the bird at a rest stop on the way into Rapid City

Amazing South Dakota sunset 1

Amazing South Dakota sunset 2

Amazing South Dakota sunset 3

Flipping the bird with some new friends on the way back to Sturgis from Devil's Tower

A new friend flipping the bird while riding a way trick (carbon fiber frame) Confederate custom

A better pic of that Confederate. Talk about quick - it screws!

In downtown Sturgis, wild custom #1

In downtown Sturgis, wild custom #2

In downtown Sturgis, here's a decent Captain America copy

In downtown Sturgis, wild paint job #1

In downtown Sturgis, wild paint job #2

In downtown Sturgis, wild paint job #3

In downtown Sturgis, wild paint job #4

In downtown Sturgis, wild paint job #5

My Hog right where it belongs, parked in downtown Sturgis during the 63rd annual Black Hills Rally

Inside the Full Throttle Saloon and getting ready to burn some rubber, even wilder ride #1

In downtown Sturgis, even wilder ride #2

In downtown Sturgis, even wilder ride #3

This guy's flipping the bird at Jesse James

Flipping the bird in front of the Broken Spoke Saloon

Flipping the bird with some other new friends

A nice row of classic bikes in the back room of the Broken Spoke

Yet another colorful South Dakota sunset

Flipping the bird at Mt. Rushmore

Stopping on the road to flip the bird on the way into the Rockies

The Hog at Yellowstone National Park

Old Faithful flips its own bird

If I could park my Harley in my living room, I'd be flipping the bird inside my house too!

Welcome to California! Now go home.
(at least that's what the bumper sticker says)

Even a big bike looks like a toy in front of a 300 foot tall redwood tree.

Go for a putt down Avenue Of The Giants when you have the time

Entering the Golden Gate from the Sausolito end

Flipping the bird on Lombard Street
("the crookedest street in the world," or at least that's what the sign said)

Flipping the bird on Fisherman's Wharf
(that's Alcatraz in the background)

Taking a break on the Pacific Coast Highway

A much better view of central California's coastal cliffs just a few feet away

A geodesic dome house in Los Angeles County? It's the only one.

A closer look

Anyone wanna go for a ride in a '49 Caddy powered by a hopped-up small-block Chevy?

Nice view from the front yard

Nice view in that direction too

All the gear my Hog carried across the country, laid out on a Thousand Oaks, California driveway

Get your kicks on Route 66!

Flipping the bird riding through high desert country

New Mexico gets killer sunsets too

It doesn't get much better than this

Flipping the bird with a new friend at the Harley-Davidson Diner in Nashville

How about those Harley solo-seat barstools?

That's one bad-ass North Carolina Highway Patrol cruiser

Taking a break on the Blue Ridge Parkway

Each overlook has a better view than the one before

Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel #1
(notice the freighter heading across from the right?)

Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel #2
(freighter now straddling the tunnel)

Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel #3
(freighter past and on its way into port)

Goin' for a putt on a 17-mile-long bridge

Flipping the bird on the Cape May ferry

Our ferry's sister ship hauling ass the other way