(no subject)
This last weekend I went down to San Luis Obispo for the Rides of March scooter rally - it was awesome!!
I rode there and back, and with the rally ride, I did a total of 600 miles on the scoot in the 3 days. This was definately the longest riding I've ever done! Luckily the gel butt pad I had ordered came in in time. It helped, but still, that much riding is really tough on your body.
Quite a few of us rode down together as a group from the bay area, and there were also some solo riders and a few small groups that went down other ways. There were, hmmm, at least a dozen of us? We went down on the 25 from Hollister for most of it. One of the SLO guys, Mark, met us there and later on, took us in probably the last third on some great back roads. It was an 8hour ride down, but that did include quite a few stops, but boy was I sore the next morning.
I was bunking in with two other gals who are on modernvespa.com, and we all had a great time. We do go over to the meet up Fri night at the Madonna Inn, but didn't do the ride to the bar down in Pismo. We were all pretty beat from the ride, and wanted to our drinking in the comfort of our own hotel, haha. Drinking occured in our room the first night, we had a complaint call at 10pm (too friggen early in my opinion, still we quieted down a litte) and packed it in around 11pm.
The next day we all met up at SLO Vespa, had a pancake breakfast, and went on a FANTASTIC 100mile ride (about 5hrs). I can see why this is many people's fave rally. The roads and the scenery were amazing. There were 105 bikes on the ride, and only 3 minor prangs, with just minor scooter damage. The ride leaders were great about safety, although there was a spot where the group ended up split in half (seperated at some lights) but we found each other again. There was one road that was wicked muddy for a stretch, and everyone took it very very slow (that's where at least one of the prangs were). We ended up at a park for bbq and the raffle.
Again that night we skipped out on the rally meetup to go to a bar, and we went out to dinner for pizza then retired back to the hotel (first at the hotel next to us where a few of us were staying), then back at ours, but not our room this time!
the next morning we went out for a nice breakfast, then went over to the meetup spot. We learnt that a couple of people got arrested last night, DUI - riding their scooter the wrong way on a wrong way street, and then public intoxication. One of those was the guy laughing at his bud getting arrested for the DUI, haha. We said goodbye to the group (who were doing another ride that day) and then hit the road. A few of us went up 101 aiming for higher speeds of around 65mph, the rest of the group were going to go back on 25, but weren't sure how to get to it, so they did 101 too, just at lower speeds and more stops. We had stopped for gas and lunch and they must have gone past us as we passed them on the road later. We had also passed them earlier, as they had left before us.
Today I pretty much did nothing, enjoying the rest after all that riding and beer drinking! Chris called me this morning at 6:40am, a little earlier but I didn't mind! He gets back Wed morning.
I didn't bother taking pics, plenty of people were taking them already. Here's where they are starting to be posted
http://scoot.net/gallery/2008/03/ridesofmarch/
I hope I'll be able to go to this rally again, it was great. I decided somewhat last minute to go, seeing as I won't be able to go to Scootouring in Sacramento this year, inlaws will be visiting
I rode there and back, and with the rally ride, I did a total of 600 miles on the scoot in the 3 days. This was definately the longest riding I've ever done! Luckily the gel butt pad I had ordered came in in time. It helped, but still, that much riding is really tough on your body.
Quite a few of us rode down together as a group from the bay area, and there were also some solo riders and a few small groups that went down other ways. There were, hmmm, at least a dozen of us? We went down on the 25 from Hollister for most of it. One of the SLO guys, Mark, met us there and later on, took us in probably the last third on some great back roads. It was an 8hour ride down, but that did include quite a few stops, but boy was I sore the next morning.
I was bunking in with two other gals who are on modernvespa.com, and we all had a great time. We do go over to the meet up Fri night at the Madonna Inn, but didn't do the ride to the bar down in Pismo. We were all pretty beat from the ride, and wanted to our drinking in the comfort of our own hotel, haha. Drinking occured in our room the first night, we had a complaint call at 10pm (too friggen early in my opinion, still we quieted down a litte) and packed it in around 11pm.
The next day we all met up at SLO Vespa, had a pancake breakfast, and went on a FANTASTIC 100mile ride (about 5hrs). I can see why this is many people's fave rally. The roads and the scenery were amazing. There were 105 bikes on the ride, and only 3 minor prangs, with just minor scooter damage. The ride leaders were great about safety, although there was a spot where the group ended up split in half (seperated at some lights) but we found each other again. There was one road that was wicked muddy for a stretch, and everyone took it very very slow (that's where at least one of the prangs were). We ended up at a park for bbq and the raffle.
Again that night we skipped out on the rally meetup to go to a bar, and we went out to dinner for pizza then retired back to the hotel (first at the hotel next to us where a few of us were staying), then back at ours, but not our room this time!
the next morning we went out for a nice breakfast, then went over to the meetup spot. We learnt that a couple of people got arrested last night, DUI - riding their scooter the wrong way on a wrong way street, and then public intoxication. One of those was the guy laughing at his bud getting arrested for the DUI, haha. We said goodbye to the group (who were doing another ride that day) and then hit the road. A few of us went up 101 aiming for higher speeds of around 65mph, the rest of the group were going to go back on 25, but weren't sure how to get to it, so they did 101 too, just at lower speeds and more stops. We had stopped for gas and lunch and they must have gone past us as we passed them on the road later. We had also passed them earlier, as they had left before us.
Today I pretty much did nothing, enjoying the rest after all that riding and beer drinking! Chris called me this morning at 6:40am, a little earlier but I didn't mind! He gets back Wed morning.
I didn't bother taking pics, plenty of people were taking them already. Here's where they are starting to be posted
http://scoot.net/gallery/2008/03/ridesofmarch/
I hope I'll be able to go to this rally again, it was great. I decided somewhat last minute to go, seeing as I won't be able to go to Scootouring in Sacramento this year, inlaws will be visiting