Days 4 & 5

The howls from the readership have been heard.  You want your blog posts!  Sorry to have missed a Day 4 post, but there has been entirely too much fun to have, too many old friendships to renew and too many new friendships to establish.  Thus, a combined Day 4 and Day 5 summary.  

Day 4 was spent gathering the freshly fed KC crew and zipping northward up the highway in search of Iowa.  In search of the greatest concentration of corn anywhere.  After a run of a couple of hours, the crew pulled into a gas station, in search of the elusive 91 octane.  It seems that the American midwest has decided to ditch the all-important Harley fuel, replacing it with corn.  A noble, yet entirely misguided approach.  It's the motorcycle equivalent of feeding tofu to Michael Phelps.  Having found such a station, the rough, tough bikers on their rumbling, imposing Harleys, pulled in as fascinated onlookers gawked at the awesome display of chrome, thunder, and leather.  Whereupon two of the nine riders promptly rolled their rumbling imposing Harleys on their sides.  Not bad - at least 75% of the  crew managed to stay upright - including, of course, Mutt & Mutter.  This dubious achievement was promptly recognized by awarding the Shark Tooth of Shame to the recipients.  

Shrug and Mrs Chainsaw display the highly coveted Shark Tooth of Shame

Having recovered from this supreme display of motorcyling skill, the group settled in to get some cool refreshing liquids, whereupon Mark was approached by a woman who introduced herself by declaring her wish to allow to smell his..........pipe.  Seems his tobacco reminded her of a special someone - probably another highly skilled rider.  

You want to smell what?????

Eventually the group made its way to Le Claire, Iowa where over 130 fellow Road Glide pilots were pulling in to settle into their encampments.  Le Claire is a beautiful small town, some might even refer to it as bucolic, for that is how small, charming towns are described.  Apparently bucolic also means town overrun with bugs.  To say that the bugs are thick might be a bit of an understatement.  The bugs are so thick that the hotel staff literally scoops the bugs off of the sidewalk in the morning.  As proof, the following photos are offered:

Those are may flies, which confuses us greatly, as May passed over six weeks ago.  The bugs appear to be making up for lost time.  Does this bother us?  Not in the least.  You know those motorcycle people - the more bugs, the better!  

Things we learned these past two days:

• We are not running out of corn anytime soon.
• The overly exaggerated Canadian use of the term "ay?" is in fact NOT overly exaggerated.
• The human body is physically capable of of sweating out twice the amount of liquids taken in.
• Chicks dig pipes.