I decided to take the bike into Chicago BMW to have them look at it. As soon as I got up, I packed up my bike and headed for the dealership. It took me about an hour and half to wade through the traffic... Which, by the way, was worse than what I went through in New York! I got there early and found that they didn't open until 10. After working my way through the traffic, I now know why they open so late.
So as I was waiting, this guy rolls up on this old R100/7. He had his Schuberth helmet flipped up with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. This his how the dude drove up. When he began to talk, all I heard was one the guys from the SNL skit "Da Bears!". After he settled in...put out his cig and took off his riding gear, he looked at my bike. He said that what I was seeing is normal. If the seals were truly leaking, there would be a trail from the seal down the side of the fork. This was not the case. He then offered to top off the engine oil and air up the tires before I went on my way.
Now it was time to tackle the mother road...Route 66. I followed my GPS to the first way point of the route. Before getting there, I stopped at the Hinsdale Oasis for some espresso and to fill up my CamelBak. By the time I got there, I was sweating so much that it felt like I wet my pants. It was pretty much that way for the rest of the day. For most of the day, I was riding around in temperatures of about 95 degrees.
My first interesting stop of the day was for lunch. I stopped at the Launching Pad. It is a small drive-in type restaurant with the usual type menu. It's claim to fame is the Gemini Giant. I got a large iced tea to try and hydrate. To them, the large might as well been called a "Bucket-o-tea".
After lunch, I moved on to a stop at Caseys General Store to use the bathroom and the ATM. After eating at the Launching Pad, I realized that a lot of these businesses do not accept credit cards... Cash Only.
My next stop was at an old restored gas station. It was actually pretty cool to see what these old stations looked like back then. They had turned it into a souvenir shop where I bought my sticker for my boxes on this trip.
Route 66 consists of a bunch of roads that run parallel to the main interstate. In the case of today's ride, it was interstate 55 toward St Louis. I spent the rest of the day riding along these roads. One thing that stuck out was a street in Lincoln. It was actually called "Kickapoo". Things have to be pretty bad to name a street "Kick-A-Poo".
The last thing to share is that I ran into some serious rain at the end of the day. It was like someone was throwing shot glasses of water at my helmets visor. It came down for about 10 minutes but it was coming down so hard the road ahead looked hazy.
I guess that is it for now. I'll have more to post tomorrow so until then, I'll be seein' you from the road.
Total miles traveled today: 313
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Litchfield,United States
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