Missouri Madness (Lewis and Clark in reverse)

This would be the first leg of the 2nd trip (first trip was to Long Pine, NE). We spent a day after getting back from Long Pine trying to decide what to do about the bent rim and bad tire on the 1972 Cb500 and another day working on the alternative. As you may have noticed in the picture under the HWY 2 bridge into Iowa, we are now riding two CB750s. The one i have is the 76 project bike that we bought.

We took a nice ride along the loess hills along the Missouri River in Iowa. These paved roads were great for riding. Lots of winding roads, bluffs, trees and wildlife. I think we had more than a couple close calls with deer in the area. Definitely a ride i plan to take again this riding season. the 76 CB750 didnt have a luggage rack so i was difficult to get the pack to sit straight without tipping from side to side in the wind. After about 300 miles i perfected the technique. The first picture was taken at the Rock Port exit in MO while i was debating whether to buy some illegal fireworks and pack them on the back. At the gas station i decided to buy some food and supplies for our stay at Big Lake that night. I best things i could come up with here was a bottle of BV and a few dusty cans of spam and spagettios.... yum

We made it to big lake that night just before dark. I was a nice place to camp with running water and free indoor showers! we cooked our Delicious spaghetios and spam over the fire and washed it down with a plastic cups of Black Velvet and coke. i decided i would do i once over look of the bike i was riding. oh wow, i was missing part of the master link on the O ring chain! not good. not sure how it managed to stay on during the last 300 miles. good think i was prepared and brought an extra chain and master link. after inspecting pre-opened "band new" box the parts came in i noticed that it was missing the clip that i was missing on the bike in the first place! thanks alot ROD you ass (of Rod's powersports) Eric had to make a 3 hour round trip the next day to St. Joe MO to pickup a $9 master link for the chain... and were off

here are a few more pictures of the camp site at Big Lake. Eric made a healthy breakfast of trailmix, powerbars and mulberries.

Nice view of the country side from the county hwys and roads. word of advice for those riders looking to get the most from there motorcycle trips, STEER CLEAR OF THE INTERSTATE AND MAJOR HWYS.

Well we ran into our first sign of bad luck at this point on the trip. We decided to save time by jumping on the interstate on our way past St. Joesph MO. i nearly lost my pack and almost ran out of gas because i was paying more attention to not getting ran over by the crazy interstate drivers. we pulled over for gas and as i was adjusting my pack the bike rolled off the kickstand and fell into the gas pump. the bar end mirror broke and the pump itself didnt fair to well. i asked Eric if i could borrow his other mirror in the mean time. about and hour later the bike fell over again and broke the new mirror. 7 X2 years bad luck is the last thing we need. never again will i trust that kickstand.

We are jumping forward here with these pictures of Harry S Truman Lake. We endedup riding late into the night the day before. we had trouble finding a place to camp so we settled on a small lake near Harrisonville? i think that was the place. anyway it was a great spot to meet the cream of the crop locals at 2 in the a.m. at one point a car pulledup and Eric and i went to check on our bikes. we chatted with the couple who were a bit under the influence and ready for some drunk nookie until we so rudely interrupted. after a long night with cars and locals constantly stopping by to skinny dip and get it on, we hit the road destined for Clinton MO. It was a long hot ride getting to Clinton but we decided to press on and here we are at HST Lake at the headwaters of Lake of the Ozarks.

After a few hours at H.S. Truman lake we decided to see his dam. It was a hot day somewhere in the mid 90's and we refuse ride in shorts and go shirtless like those incompetent crotch rocket riders. This wasn't much of a problem until we reached the lake bridge under construction. It was a long wait under the hot sun... on a bridge... in the middle of a lake. Eventually we did endup in Warsaw and met some friendly people with some back woods accents. We discovered some nice wooded and windy roads in the area that were great for riding.

Harry's dam was a neat place and we made it minutes before they closed the gates to the observation area. We were only there a short time out of fear that we might get locked in. That was our day at the headwaters of Lake of the Ozarks. We decided to try to make it all the way to Lawrence KS before dark to meet some friends of Eric's. It would be a long ride, but with Speed Racer leading the way we were bound to make it there by night fall. Here's a picture of a sign we saw when entering Kansas. Great, I was in need of some new muck boots!

It was a fast paced ride through Kansas but the paved county roads were great. Once we reached the final straight shot to Lawrence we took advantage of the no helmet law. It was fun for about the first 10 minutes until i realized how much I enjoyed the safety of a brain bucket over my noggin.

It was a good night in Kansas sleeping with a roof over our heads in the air conditioning. We were on our way back to Lincoln Nebraska with 200 or so miles to go. The ride through Topeka was nice and we avoided the toll booth and interstate on the way there. We didnt catch any scenic roads on the way and the area was starting to look more like Nebraska. Weather was on our side for the entire trip, well exept for the heat. The wind was blowing hard from the north west when we reached Nebraska and it was taking its toll on me and my lack of a windshield. About 45 minutes from Lincoln I had to pull over and take a break. It was rough going but we made it back and had a stop at the Silver Spoke Saloon.