Peoria TT races

What you will see at the Peoria TT!!!!Jim want's to sit over there!!



Chris Carr and myself..

Strolling through the pit's.

Lot's of people out here. More than I remember from years back!
The eventual race winner killing them in a heat race.




Mommy needs her own seat!!

Here's the detail of the race....
Here's the TT's home page...

Cheese trail

The camping weekend finally came last week and it was pretty good. The deal was to hit the cheese trail that starts for us in Monroe WI. Here's some info on the trail --- Tri County trail.

Little stop in Paw Paw IL to get a up close view of the wind generators for a true green power.

I can't understand why the people in Dekalb county are protesting the generators so madly. You have to be right under them to hear them at all. I can see that they change the landscape but in reality so did the corn fields. It used to be great plains of grass and trees, right! I don't get the fuss. Besides all this it's amazing how huge the blades are when your right there staring up.




We had to pick up a trail sticker to pay for the upkeep and use. only fifteen bucks for fifty miles of fun. The surprise at the gas station was Tigerlady was filling up and taking a break when we showed up. She used to be on open road radio here in Chicago about ten years ago. I think I creeped her out that I recognized her but I never forget peoples faces. I know I did meet her at a HD show and maybe when I worked at the Art of The Motorcycle at the Field Museum. Wow I just looked that up and it was ten years ago!! :O


Just a little gear adjustment since the trail was a little rough in spots.

I really liked the trail since the KLR isn't the most nimble think to ride. Simple trail and the surface is mostly crushed limestone. The only tricky parts was the gravel that they used to repair sections that varied from golf ball sized gravel to more crushed stone. The golf ball sized gravel was a little tricky when you would run into it at 30MPH and it was three inches thick. Can you say SURPRISE!! Lucky for the three of us all did some wallowing but no one dropped it. The sad part was we were the only motorcycles on the trail. All ATV's and Utility vehicles.


Now for camping---something that is not my favorite thing, only because I have a hard time sleeping in a place I can't lock a door to be secure. Got to get over that at some point.
We were gonna stay at the Yellowstone lake state park but they were maxed out. So we went down the street to Yellowstone Lake Chalet campgrounds. They only charged us twelve bucks for three tents and we had the whole back of the ground to ourselves.





The KLR all nice and dirty. I was aiming for any mud on the trail!! :) After we dropped all the gear we ran back to the tail and overlapped some of what we did with the gear and finished it off in Mineral Point. Just one shot of Yellowstone lake.


No point of camping if your not gonna have a fire.

Nice pic of the three of us chilling out after some beer. Tom (black shirt) looks weird in the pic because the heat from the fire is in front of him.


Gonna do this again at the end of September when the weather will give it's best sleeping temperatures.

Yerkes observatory and Meadowdale raceway

Today deal was to ride out to lake Geneva for breakfast and check out the Yerkes observatory.

Just a quick stop to pick up a buddy and throw on some more layers. Pretty crazy being August and having to dress warm. It was only 56 Degrees when we rolled out from my house. Usually around this time of year it's 65 Degrees in the morning and you hide in the house after lunch.

View of the lake where we parked our bikes. I've been to Lake Geneva before and I always forget why I don't want to go back. It seems like it's, lets keep up with the Jones'. If you know me at all you know this couldn't be farther from me.

The very cool stop was Yerkes Observatory. I knew we couldn't go in to check it out but I wanted to just take some shots. They just don't take the time anymore to put this much work into stone anymore.
Built in 1895!!


No it's not a Gargoyle it's a Chimera!!

The second stop was unplanned as my buddy and I rode home down RT31.




I don't think many people even knew the track ever existed. We walked the track for a little and it was so cool. The elevation changes were amazing. Just walking the Sections we did were pretty scary, regardless with a car or bike, Guard rails or not! They raced right next to this silo without any barriers. The one up hill climb is also a turn and a huge drop off to the side, that would be a bad off.
Besides all the safety issues I would of loved to see cars flying around this place..
here's a link....

Plainfield IL bike night

Notice :Plainfield bike nights are gone for 2010.
OK, for the last few years the local hog chapter sets up bike nights in Plainfield Il once a month and gets a good turn out every time the weather is nice. The problem you can tell is they don't seem to like the sport bikes and my ZX10R is one of them. So the wife and I slipped in on the KLR and no one seemed to notice. Just kidding but it does seem to be a bunch of HD's and that's about it.
It was pretty cool to see some of the really old bikes like the Indian eight valve bike. Super rare and was certainly trucked up to the show. I don't think it was a original bike meaning it was a pieced together bike since they were only sold to big time board track racers back in 1911. I have to say it was so clean and put together flawlessly.
The sad part was people walked by it like it was a old bicycle. The truth is it made HD move forward with engine design and make a strong brand loyalty that has seem to of lasted for generations.
needless to say I sat around for a while hoping for the owner to come back and kept staring at it.
He never surfaced, maybe next bike night..


Actually this chopper was only one of the few that were around and it was a martin brothers bike as far as I could tell. Very pretty bike but is not my style..


I'm really happy the wife came out for a ride since we don't do rides much anymore. I would love to do one more ride with her for dinner to the Chicago pizza kitchen this year. Driving Lake Shore Drive with her and the city is so pretty...

Next ride: Cheese trail and camping....