Roy and Laura started talking about a dual sport ride in the North Carolina mountains over a year ago.  At every event they worked, Roy said, “We should plan a ride,” and Laura said, “Some people can stay at my cabin.”  They finally figured out a date and planned our little Motorcycle Adventure Days for the weekend just prior to Myrtle Beach Bike Week in May.  We put out an invitation to all our Kawasaki friends (or Kaw Kousins as we call them since they’re all like family) and were really surprised at the response.   Dave was coming out from California on the way to Myrtle Beach – awesome!  Gray & Christine were coming in early from New York to make a week out of it.  Peg was riding the GPZ down from Boston, and Sue & Gin were coming from upstate New York.  Bill was trailering down from Pennsylvania and Danny & Lydia over from Tennessee.  Our group rounded out with the North Carolina contingent of Laura, Roy & Shirley and John.  Thirteen people coming from all over and meeting up for a weekend of riding and revelry.  How good is that?!

 Gray & Christine arrived late Monday night and started riding with Roy on Tuesday.  They rode over the mountain (or two or three) and through the woods, all over the northwest corner of North Carolina and over into Virginia to the top of Mount Rogers and back.  Shirley had to work the first couple of days that week and met the riders for dinner that night in North Wilkesboro.  Wednesday, the four of us stayed on the dirt roads most of the day, except when we rode down   Darnell Creek - literally.

Thursday we added Laura and Dave to our group.  Dave was driving the Kawasaki tractor trailer loaded with the demo stuff for Myrtle Beach and needed a place to park other than Roy’s steep driveway at the end of a dead-end twisty mountain dirt road.  Roy made arrangements with Greg at Brushy Mountain Powersports in Wilkesboro, NC (www.421powersports.com) to park Dave’s truck and off-load the KLR650 that had been strategically loaded at the back of the trailer.  Greg was happy to have the equivalent of a gigantic Kawasaki billboard parked at his dealership right on Hwy 421 for a few days and got a kick out of seeing all the KLRs gathered around it for a group photo.  We even talked him into coming up for dinner that night bribing him with the prospect of BBQ chicken.  Taking the scenic route from North Wilkesboro to Sparta for lunch ate up most of the afternoon and we headed back to Roy’s house to wait for the rest of the crowd to arrive.  We only squeezed in around 120 miles that day. 

Sue & Gin arrived in their RV late Thursday afternoon, followed closely by Peg and John just in front of the rain.  Roy moved the grill onto the porch and finished up the chicken.  The rain dampened the enthusiasm for a camp fire a bit, but the fresh-baked cookies made up for it.  We enjoyed dinner and fellowship and geared up for a full day on Friday.  Bill arrived Friday morning just in time to unload his bike and join the ride.  We rode some of Roy’s favorite back roads - 50/50 dirt and paved, up and down the eastern face of the Eastern Continental Divide.  We headed back to Wilkesboro for lunch and picked up Danny & Lydia.  Our group was finally complete.

 Shirley took the short (ok, short-er 50 mile ride) ride back to the house Friday afternoon with John, Laura and Bill.  John was cooking dinner and needed time to prepare, and Bill had been up since 1:00 am so he was ready for a nap.  Roy took the rest of the group south to Blowing Rock and jumped on US 221, a really fabulous motorcycle road, to the Lynn Cove Viaduct on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  They rode across the viaduct and took the BRP back to Laurel Springs with a short stop at the Moses Cone House where Roy allowed 23 minutes for shopping.  John had the hobo stew going and Shirley had the campfire roaring by the time the group arrived.  Laura and Dave threw the football around while dinner was cooking.  Bill brought out his Glock soft-shot air pistol (and they call us rednecks) and had Peg shooting at targets.  She’s watched way too much TV, so Bill corrected her gangst’a shooting style to the proper tactical stance.  The beer was cold and the stew was hot as we enjoyed a beautiful sunset.  Laura baked a batch of her fabulous home-made cookies to top off the night and we planned the next day’s ride.

 We took the scenic route over to Laura’s on Saturday morning to gather up the gang at her house and rode over Spicer Mountain to the other side of Sparta.  We took Hwy 58 over to Damascus, Virginia for lunch, then rode through Backbone Rock and over to Shady Valley, Tennessee (www.shadyvalleycountrystore.com).  We played there on US 421, which truly is “Meaner NA Stripe-ed Snake”, for a while before heading over to Mountain City.  We took Hwy 91 back to Damascus and picked up Hwy 58 again (it was so much fun the first time we wanted to do it again).  We took the narrow dirt road over to Green Cove and rode up to White Top Station at the top of the Virginia Creeper Trail.  We started heading back toward Roy’s house, in a round about way through Lansing and West Jefferson, North Carolina, with a photo op at Mount Jefferson State Natural Area.  Christine doctored up the leftovers in the refrigerator turning them into a gourmet dinner, then it was back to the campfire.  Rumor has it there were some tall tales told around the fire that night, but we were unable to confirm that.  The Weather Channel was predicting bad weather on Sunday, so several in our group took full advantage of the adult beverages Saturday night.  Who would have thought that Tequila shots would be the perfect compliment for s’mores?

 Sunday dawned cold, foggy and raining quite a bit.  Everybody packed up to leave, moving rather slowly and drinking lots of coffee.  We really enjoyed having our Kawasaki family visit our home and riding our favorite roads with us.  We had 8 KLR650s ranging from a 1995 “Malibu Barbie” model to 3 new 2008’s, two 250 Sherpa’s, and one very new 2008 Versys all decked out by Happy Trails in dual-sport style (www.happy-trail.com) .  We put a bunch of miles on those bikes with absolutely zero issues – approximately 500 miles Friday and Saturday alone – and had a wonderful time.  The group was just great, the weather was awesome, and the scenery was incredible.  After replacing some worn-out tires and ground-off foot peg feelers, we’re looking forward to doing it again.  Maybe a Fall Foliage ride in October…