Corn plantation for Sam

here are pictures of the cornfields around my home for my good friend Samuel.

Back in Peoria.

We made it back to Peoria safe and sound yesterday evening around 6pm .

We had stopped in Davenport for our last gas up and water stop - when you are in the wind on a 80+ degree day, you need a lot of water.

When we got back on the road, we hooked up with a "bird dog", that is to say a driver that passed us doing well over the posted speed limit.

This allows us to use that driver as a bird-dog, we let him get a 1/4 mile in front of our group and then tag along watching for his brake lights if he sniffs out a police officer sitting alongside the road.

We were able to make excellent time on the final leg in Illinois. Illinois was the only state we rode in where the speed limit was 65 - all of the rest were 70 or 75 mph.

I am getting the pictures that I took with my Nikon ready for the web  - the scenery is beautiful but the camera is very dirty and there are a lot of specs of dirt visible in any shots that have lots of sky on them.

I showed over 5100 miles (8200 Kilometers) total in the 11 day trip. This one was more grueling than I suspected, due mostly to the twisty mountain roads most of the way, which require a lot more attention. We also saw a large variation in temperatures - colder in the mountains and hot and humid in the plains.

The Keg

Conrad Mt.

Glacier

Kalispell Mt

Heading into Glacier park today.

Montana.

Whete you can ride your atv on main in front of the sheriff.

Duck and alligator

At GW Hunters in Post Falls Idaho. Buffalo buger, elk steak and buffalo top sirloin coming up!

Buck factory.

Missed being able to take the tour. Joe Houser came down to say hello.  Nice place.

CJ Buck and Kevin Pipes came out to say hello.

Kai/Kershaw tour in the books.

Awesome time. Jim and the folks at Kai rolled out the red carpet for us.  I can report that the 777 is being made and progressing. There is an unbelievable team of artists working on the project.

New tire mounted

Thanks to Nathan and the folks at Sports Plaza. Great prices too!

Trickles All American Cycle.

I had taxi take me to wrong shop.  Met a heckuva nice bunch at Trickles.
They work on anything, but specialize in Harleys.  Nice shop and friendly people.. Now waiting for taxi to take me to the next shop.

Tire off.

Ready to go at 10 am.

Houston, we have a problem....

50 miles outside of Portland Oregon, Fat Bastid started wagging it's tail at 70 mph. The rear tire lost air as a belt broke and punctured the rear tire. I could not get a plug to work so that I could nurse him into town.

Tire is toast. Waiting for tow into hotel. Will remove tire tomorrow and have a nrw tire lined up for 10:00 am three miles from my hotel.

Bastid in The John Day Fossil Beds.

Gorgeous road, no othet traffic.

Oregon is awesome!

Beautiful roads and forests.

Elena wanted more action.

Might have better data today. Into Oregon!

Ontario Oregon.

Saw the Craters of the Moon today. Interesting.

Elk Country Inn

Very clean and well kept.  Russ parked his bastid next to a sprinkler, so his got a complimentary wash.

Chief Joseph Highway.

My favorite of the trip so far. The scenery was fabulous everywhere.  I like Chief Joseph better than Beartooth. Both are spectacular.

Jackson Hole

Nice little town, no wal mart though. Now I know why kmarts are going out of business, I syruck out on every item on my shopping list. Found spicy apple juice though.

Canyon Village. Yellowstone

JK SSS at cabin b3. They keep these cabins up very nicely, very clean. No tv and spotty cell. Perfect.

Chief Joseph's Horse

Enjoys some spirit.

Fun with tourists.

Last night we went out to see wildlife. We went to a valley overlook and it was a stinking ZOO!

Literally traffic jams over people seeing a bison or elk.

We went to a roadside turnout and stopped just to get out of the crowd.

We then all three took out our cameras and began pointing and looking excited as if there was something in the woods.

We got several carloads of touristas to pull over to have a look.

JK in Yellowstone

Of course I have some cutting tools. My JK SSS.

Old Faithful

It went off for us. I guess it is pretty reliable.

Teaser shot

I have been taking pics like mad today, with my dirty old nikon.

Here are two teasers taken by shooting Russ'  netbook with my phone.

We did 1060 miles yesterday, 510 today.

Yellowstone is big. We came in at a southeast entrance, then it was over 40 miles to our cabin!

We ran up on a large bison trundling down the middle of the two lane park road. You let a 1600 lb bull bison have his lane choice.

JD and ibuprofin for the evening meal.

Best

mqqn