My friend Joe has been following my adventures since they started. He's always looking for an opportunity to join in the fun. Well, it worked out this time. The plan was to meet him in Camp Hil PA and ride down to the beginning of Skyline Drive, a national parkway through the Sheandoah mountains. During the planning stages, we invited my friend Mike to also join us, since this is virtually in his backyard and he's a Goldwing rider. Joe is a new Goldwing rider, and boy does he have a pretty ride.
The plan was to avoid as much of Harrisburg's Friday morning commute as possible, so we met at Friendly's just off the intersection of 581 and 15. I pulled in first and Joe had sent me a message that he was running behind. Since it was already 11 and the kitchen was closing out breakfast, I ordered so I could have breakfast. As usual, I left the house without eating. This is a common theme. There was no mistaking Joe pulling in on a very pretty blue Goldwing. We caught up as had a hamburger and got on our way.
Since Mike couldn't join us, we decided to plow right into Skyline Drive instead of spending the night and doing Skyline on Saturday. This was really good for me as I had to be at work on Monday and I really didn't want to a thousand miles on Sunday. It's not the distance that bothers me, it's the lack of contingency time. Traveling with Joe was awesome. He'd never been up on Skyline and was absolutely amazed at the landscape and the scenic overlooks. I encouraged Joe to stop as much as he wanted to, take pictures, etc. The view from Skyline Drive is truly remarkable. I'm hopeful that Joe goes back and takes Mary with him. There is other good riding in that area, like Rt. 50 from Clarksburg WV to Winchester Va. That also affords some spectacular riding and scenery. I don't recommend that route when 2 up, unless your passenger is really into curves.
Our plan was to start looking for a place to stay as we neared 7pm and we started as planned. As usual, and despite what the park sign said, there were no vacancies on the mountain. One thing that I've learned in all the riding I've done is that no matter how tempting it is to ride to a town on the map, it's always better to ride toward interstate. Towns may not have any accommodations, or for that matter food; whereas, interstates generally do. In the US, and particularly on the East Coast, you can almost always find a place to stay, gas up and eat within 10 miles once joining the interstate. Here, the tempting little town was probably about 5 miles closer than the interstate, and it was getting dark. Both of us had a long riding day. It was time to find something definite, not poke around.
We found a place to stay in Harrisonburg VA. We weren't but a couple miles from the University. We quickly dumped our gear in our hotel room and went off for a Mexican food dinner. It was a fantastic day with fantastic sights and fantastic company.
The next morning, we ate breakfast and split up; Joe to go home and get some work around the house done and me to continue the ride back home. Here's some pics.
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About an hour or so off the exit, another K1600GT pulled up along side me. It's rare to see another K16 rider. There just are not that many of them out there. This guy was riding with me for a very long time. I was wondering about him. He had what appeared to be a new bike; but, he had Wunderlich crash bars on the front and back. Those are always aftermarket. He had a paper NJ tag on the back and unfortunately, he didn't have a Bluetooth headset on. I looked and I would have paired with him. I was curious about his setup. At some point, he motioned to me and asked me if I wanted to grab lunch. It was lunch time; but, I was just about to split off and go East. It worked out that he was also. I agreed and we found a restaurant.
So, his story was that he got a great deal on this bike in NJ; so good in fact, that it was worth flying up there to get and ride back. He was returning to Atlanta. We decided to ride together to Columbia South Carolina, where he would split off.
Shortly after he split off and started heading to Atlanta, it started to rain. There was a bridge ahead and I stopped very quickly to be able to put on rain gear under the bridge. When I got back on the bike, I had an oil warning light. This was disturbing. I pulled into the next gas station and checked the oil. It was bone dry. I put in about 7 ounces to get a reading on the dipstick. This was really disturbing. I had the bike serviced 4,000 miles ago. There should be no reason that I lost that much oil. I recognized that there is a possibility that I'm not checking the oil properly. This is a very complicated bike. I also did not want to overfill on oil.
The rain storm was heavy. People were pulling off the road and a South Carolina Trooper who was getting gas next to me said he recommended that I stay off the road for 15 minutes after the rain stops to let the standing water drain. Good advice.
That night, I made it to Savannah Georgia. I could have gone on; but, there were storms ahead and storms behind. This was a good place to stop for the night. When I got up in the morning, I checked the oil again. It was bone dry again! I added the rest of the quart and I still did not get a max reading on the dipstick.
When I got home, I inquired of my BMW MOA friends on FaceBook and they said there is a specific procedure for checking oil, do that. I did and the reading was about the same. The possibility that I can see is that when they did my 36,000 mile maintenance, they didn't fill the oil all the way. Now, I'm paranoid about oil levels and check every ride.
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