Our ride to the South Central Rally

[watchman]

This is also posted on the main ride board!

Saturday, May 2nd, Liz and I headed out on a weeks vacation/motorcycle ride. Our plans was to ride the Natchez Trace Parkway and then swing around and attend the KawaNOW motorcycle rally in Eureka Springs Arkansas.

We toured south through Missouri's secondary roads and enjoyed the blooming trees and flowers with there wonderful aroma's. Finally needing to make some time we hit the interstate highway systems and headed for our first nights stay at Jackson, Tennessee. We ran into some rain just south of Sikeston and had to endure it for about 30 minutes. Long enough to test my new rain pants and make a mess of the bikes.

The next morning leaving the motel was the low point of the trip. While turning onto the up ramp to interstate 40 I hit something slick and lost control of my bike. Do to the wet roads and a water puddle I was only running about 5 mph but the bike suddenly disappeared from under me and I found myself lying on my on my back on the hard blacktop. The bike was not hurt but I fell directly on my old steel hip and left forearm. Liz said she has never seen me jump up so fast as she was far enough behind me to see what had happened and avoided the area. She got her bike parked out of the roadway and helped me pick my bike up and get it out of the road. After checking out the bike and getting my bearings we headed on up the ramp and continued our trip.

We got on the Trace about 80 miles southwest of Nashville and enjoyed the rest of the day as the sun peeked out and the day warmed. The Trace has lots of interesting history and we soon got caught up in reading the different information signs along the route. As the day faded away we started we decided not to push further and spent our second night at Tupelo Mississippi.

The next morning we continued our adventure but as great as the Trace is, for us who are avid fans of hills and curves we where finding our selves becoming bored with the ride. We had seen lots of Ravens/crows, a few turkey's, several turkey buzzards, really up close at times and only one deer. Realizing that we did not have enough time to ride all the way to Natchez we cut our ride short at Jackson Mississippi and headed west on I-20 through Vicksburg into Louisiana. At the city of Monroe we turned north on hwy 167 and spent the night in El Dorado, Arkansas.

Our original plan was to ride up Arkansas scenic hwy 7 to Hot Springs but with 8 inches of rain in the area the day before we found hwy 7 closed just north of Camden. We detoured east, picked up hwy 9 and continued on to Hot Springs. From Hot Springs we continued north on hwy 7 to Russellville. Just north of Russellville we turned off on hwy 27, hitting hwy's 16 and hwy 9 again taking us to Mountain View to spend our 4th night out on the road.. If you are like us and enjoy hills and curves these last three roads would be a treat for you to ride.

Leaving Mountain Home we picked up hwy's 14 and 341, both great rides. Not in a real hurry to get to Eureka Springs we turned back southeast on a different piece hwy 14 and ate lunch in Marshall. On the advice of some friendly local people we rode south on hwy 65, turned onto hwy 254 and continued west turning on hwy 16 to hit hwy 7. We rode hwy 7 north to Harrison and then west on hwy 62 to Eureka Springs and Rally headquarters at the Rider's Rest Motel.

I will stop here and do a second report that will include the Rally and our trip home.

Everyone take care.

Jim

[rallyjunkie]

Sounds like you had a great trip Watchman..Glad that your minor spill didnt cause you injuries or the bike.

[foztex]

Thanks for the info...