SHADOW RIDERS: Solo Ride to Delaware

A couple of months ago, my sister Jennifer texted an image of my niece Josie's school calendar with all the dates highlighted when a babysitter was needed. If you know me, I'm not good with kids, even family, I mean, I get along, but I don't understand them. Anyway, extremely mild feelings of guilt led me to make the decision to go out in October to babysit. I had written a letter to Josie asking her how cool it would be if her aunt rode her bike all that way. For sure a memory for both of us, right?

I watched the weather for weeks. Then days. I made arrangements to rent a car to drive out just in case, but I really wanted to ride my motorcycle there. Heck, it's more reliable than my car, cheaper on gas, "funner", and I had a whole day to get there. The weather ended up with no calls for rain, so I cancelled the car reservation and was determined to ride!

So I did. I packed and loaded my bike the night before. It was 45 degrees when I left at about 8:30am. on Tuesday, October 8th. I layered on the clothes and leathers, and Bryon had installed the wires for heated glove liners. I had hoped to leave by 8, but actually was getting on the bike when I realized I had forgotten to put on my chaps! LOL, Bryon ran in and got them, I put them on and was ready. Bryon took a couple of photos as I left. I've always traveled this country by myself, so this was no biggie, and much looked forward to.

I didn't take a lot of photos along the way there. I was riding 100 mile stints - and boy was it nice out there! The weather warmed up a bit into the 60s; it was perfect riding. My bike, Poseidon, loved the cool air in his carb. We were a team.

One of my first breaks was at a ubiquitous Sheetz for come cold coffee and a breakfast sandwich. Coffee good, sandwich shitty. As I was eating, an older woman approached me and asked if that was my bike. I said yes. She went on to say she used to ride with her husband and enjoyed it. She wished me well on my journey.

I journeyed on US-422 all the way from home to Ebcnsburg, PA where I caught US-22 west. I thought 422 might be boring because we travel it often, but it was okay, and who cares! I was free! I took US-22 for what was longer than I thought it would be; a four-lane highway too. It intersects with I-99 which I followed south. My goal was to get on US-30, the Lincoln Highway, at about Bedford, so that I could ride Bryon's favorite winding mountain roads that begin at about Breezewood by the turnpike.

One of the things we always wanted to do was stop at the Mountain House Bar on US-30; the view is supposed to be amazing as it sits at the top of a mountain. It does overlook a wide valley that is formed in a curve. I didn't go in, just stopped for photos. You can see in the one that the elevation is 2123 feet. The place sneaks up on you as you come up the hill heading east, but is on the right side; still it's easy to pass as it's also on a curve to the left and goes back downhill.

On I went. From the stop above to Gettysburg, I rode straight through, charging my phone along the way. I wanted to go through Gettysburg to stop at a bakery/coffee shop I had seen on all our trips there, but never stopped at. I get there and it's gone. Closed. Nonexistent. Boohoo! That's when I found out that my charging cord had been touching my pipe and burned into the wire (but still worked).

Gettysburg on US-30

It was from here that my directions were on roads I'd never ridden nor places I'd ever seen. I like that shit. The route I took continued in Pennsylvania for quite a while, then dipped into Maryland. I was going to end up on US-1 east, and that was to take me right past Eisenhower's Chesapeake Harley-Davidson. I plugged along and found it. I suppose it was about 6:30pm when I got there and just getting dark. I bought toys for the boys (chips, glasses, tees), and when I exited the store at 7pm, it was dark out. I still had a ride ahead of me, and has to get on US-40 to keep in the right direction.

I made it to my sister's place just before 8:30pm.
Poseidon and I did it; our longest solo trip.

Poseidon

Copper, this is all he does.

The next day Josie was off from school, so my job babysitting began. I also had to babysit the dogs and the cat (not really the cat, but the dogs, yes). One of the goals I thought would be nice was to take Josie somewhere, as I decided to rent a car while I was there. But my sister was a "turd in the punchbowl" (which Josie thought was hilarious and had to tell her mom what I called her) by scheduling a dentist appointment at 1:30pm. Ugh. Well, there was no chance of going anywhere and Josie wouldn't have anyway as she likes her home and neighborhood best. My brother-in-law, Waylen, came home and decided to stay awake to take Josie to the dentist. There wasn't much babysitting to do at this point

So before the dentist, we played on the trampoline! I posted a cool video of us jumping around on FB, and it was nice to be a kid. But boy, that is hard work! I started getting hot, had to pee almost immediately from the jumping, and so had to exit the trampoline. I came back for more, but the neighbor kids started showing up. I didn't even think about

neighbors - I had assumed wrong that it would be the two of us spending time together.

We went to Dunkin for coffee and donuts before the dentist. After that, we went to Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch. Josie at her first buffalo wing in mild sauce and liked it! Now that's a red-blooded American kid right there!

Thursday Josie had school, so Waylen and I decided to ride our bikes down to Rommel Harley-Davidson in Smyrna. It was yet another beautiful day, and the ride was less than an hour there. The women running the apparel section were very friendly. I'm told that a huge HD store is to be built, one of the biggest ever.

In the afternoon, I waited on the front porch for Josie when her school bus came along. She wasn't there long when she asked if she could go to Bella's house. Yeah, whatever. She left; I read my book. We went to dinner that night at the Metro Bar.

Friday, Josie was off of school again; I really thought there was a chance of us driving to southern Delaware to see the Great Cypress Swamp. Nope. She wouldn't leave. After some words of "encouragement", it was useless. Waylen wanted to get seafood for lunch, so we drove to Chesapeake City, a small old inlet town. We ate at the Chesapeake Inn which has a bunch of outdoor seating and a bar on the marina. Again, a beautiful day and the food was excellent.

Well, Saturday rolled around and we just had to go to the Amish Market for their best-in-the-world donuts. Seriously, just go to Middletown for the donuts on Saturday morning. The cream-filled are like melting clouds of fluffiness, and the lemon was overloaded with lemon, and oh boy, the blueberry fritter is better than blueberry pie!!! They look ordinary, but are above and beyond.

Jennifer suggested we take Josie to Rehoboth Beach on the Atlantic. I had suggested Henlopen a little more north because it didn't have all the touristy shops. We ended up at the touristy shops in Rehoboth. And the ocean. It was packed! It's a nice place; we had been there in the past on an off day in winter once when nobody was around. When in Rome...so we ate some fried fish and chips from some wanna-be British place.

Then the beacon of light from a gaming room called out with the words "Skee-Ball". It was game on! That's my favorite. You got two plays for a quarter, so I put in a dollar. We didn't think it would end, and then ended up putting in more money. Jennifer played, and Josie tried and was the only one to get the ball into the 100 hole. Lucky kid. THEN a woman gave us a bunch of points because she didn't want the cheap toys. When Josie saw what she could get we had to play a little more, and got more than enough points to get the Whoopie Cushion!

Next we went to the water. An endless ocean is a thing of beauty and wildness. I could sit for hours just staring at and listening to the water move. The colors were like the ones I painted over the past winter. Nature is embalmed with glory.

The seagrasses were drying out and windswept. The horizon was low and long. Geese flew out yonder and we played in the waves.

At the beach there are stands with showers to wash off your body and feet. Josie was supposed to press the button for the foot level spout, and hit the overhead one instead raining down water all over! It was funny! After rinsing off, I got some chocolate custard at Kohr's, and Josie got candy at the Candy Factory.

We walked around for a bit going into some shops. Found books, earrings, jerky, and t-shirts.

I found two of my favorite guys who graciously posed for selfies: Zoltar and Poseidon.

Saturday night: I packed my bags and loaded my bike so I could take off at 8am. I love my sister and niece and bro-in-law. But I was ready to go home.

Sunday morning: We ate leftover donuts with fresh Starbucks coffee. It was cold out as expected. I dressed up and mounted the horse. Jennifer woke up Josie so she could say goodbye. As I was backing my bike out of the garage, I told Josie that I loved her. I backed out more and said, "I'm going on an adventure, Charlie!" and she giggled (we had watched and laughed together over the Charlie the Unicorn video).

I got on the street and waved goodbye. And that was it.

I made a route to get me home quicker, and ended up getting home in 10 hours. My route took me through Lancaster, PA, where I had never been before so that was cool. It also took me to Hershey, PA where I had gone as a child with my grandmother Ruth. I took nice breaks at a Starbucks and McDonalds, as well as at a Giant grocery store where I had a sub, banana, and pomegranate tea. It was at the grocery that another older woman approached me and said it was nice to see me riding, as she used to ride when she was younger. She was nice and wished me well. There are good people on the road. I made it to I-80 who knows when, but I hightailed it into the setting sun and made it home when it was still light out. I missed Bryon and the cats and our awesome same shit, different day amazing life and home.