After sitting up way too late last night, it was only the promise of missing breakfast that got me out of bed before 9am today. After breakfast, shower and packing we didn’t hit the road until after 11am :-(

With a short stop at IHOP (couldn’t resist!) for a very late lunch, we had a very tedious 300 mile freeway ride covering half the remaining distance back to Orlando. The scenery from I-75 is flat and very much the same right the way through Georgia, except riding through the maze of exits among the skyscrapers in Atlanta.

I’ve never seen so many people pulled by the cops, we saw at least half a dozen cars on the hard shoulder with a red and blue interrogating the driver. Just south of Atlanta drove through the first speed trap I’ve seen in the States, with a cop pulled onto the central reservation pointing a radar gun into the oncoming traffic. It’s almost like being back in England! Having said that, the speed limit is 75 along most of the I-75, and the country isn’t awash with Gatso cameras every few miles to fine you £40 if you’re a touch over the limit…

We reached headed right for another Howard Johnson hotel in Ashburn, arriving just before 6pm. It was sunny throughout the whole day, and neither of us needed any of the cold weather gear we bought on the outbound journey 2 weeks ago (timewarp post forthcoming ~Al). Even so, 5 hours of squaring off the tyres at 70mph we were pretty tired by the time we stopped.

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1. Day 1: Cherohala Skyway

So, that’s it for our trip to Tennessee. Two weeks gone in a flash. For some reason we booked a condo in Orlando from tonight, but even with the best will in the world it is going to take us 3 days to ride back to Florida.

Luckily we had packed everything last night since we were supposed to check out by 10am, and I didn’t wake up until 9:12am. D’oh! I guess I should have hit “snooze” instead of “shut up, I’m still tired” on my alarm at 7am. With some running around, brushing of teeth while getting dressed, and skipping inessentials like breakfast, we managed to make it out by a hair…

The last couple of times we’ve ridden into the mountains this week, it’s almost induced hypothermia. Thankfully, the weather has held out for us today. Even though we needed a full complement of jackets and gloves, it was actually pretty warm in the sun.

As soon as we pulled out of the resort, first stop: Gatlinburg Mountain Grill, for a hearty ham and eggs late breakfast to see us on our way through the days riding. We were fed, watered and finally saddled up and on our way proper before 11am.

The first part of the route through the Smoky Mountains National Park and into North Carolina was all the better for being in daylight, with brooks and creeks at the roadside peppered with an occasional waterfall from the rock formations. The roads actually weren’t quite so scary now that the ice had melted, except in an occasional tunnel or a deep valley (that made my butt clench heart skip a beat a couple of times today!). Cherokee and Bryson City, however, we had seen before when we rode back from Deal’s Gap last week (March 3rd, timewarp post forthcoming ~Al).

We crossed back into Tennessee and started the gorgeous ride along Cherohala Skyway around 2pm. Unfortunately, we kept stopping to take a zillion photos of the panoramic scenery along the way, so we didn’t reach the first pit-stop at the other side for almost another 2 hours!

I don’t know where Tave has gone in this picture… but perhaps 4 hours without a toilet break was torturing her unnecessarily ;-)

We’d secretly hoped that we might make it into Georgia today, but we had been told not to miss the Cherohala Skyway by: the staff of Gatlinburg Harley (a weird dealership — it has no bikes!!); barstaff at the Hard Rock Cafe; ShawnKing; not to mention various bikers we’d run in to through the week, and we certainly weren’t disappointed. 7 hours and 168 miles later, we decided to call it a day at the first hotel we reached on I-75.

We can makeup the shortfall on mileage tomorrow when we hit the interstate. Here’s hoping we can miss the traffic through Atlanta.

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1. FL 2 TN Day 1: Sunburn Injuries

By 10am we were already well over halfway to Columbia, but it was starting to get pretty cold, so we stopped at a gas station cum diner for a coffee to warm up. Watching TV as we hugged our coffee mugs to get some life back into our chilly fingertips, the weatherman said there was a 50% chance of snow-showers in Knoxville, TN (about 30 miles west of our destination, Gatlinburg) overnight and into tomorrow morning. Squinting at the map, it looked as though North Carolina was going to escape… Tave and I were contemplating giving up and going back to sunny Florida, but since our condo is already paid we decided to press on and only turn back if the roads became dangerous.

No sooner had we made our decision than the heaven opened, and huge sheets of rain were blown through the forecourt, soaking our bikes, our luggage and our enthusiasm. I dashed outside to push the Harleys under cover, and I was drenched just a minute later when I got back indoors. Stupidly, I had figured that the weather wouldn’t be drastically different just a few hundred miles north of Florida, and we hadn’t brought winter gloves, or waterproofs, and Tave was wearing sandals and no jacket. D’oh! Couldn’t have been much more wrong there.

From USA Today Weather:

Severe weather threat – On the southern end of the storm system, thunderstorms are rolling through parts of western North Carolina, western South Carolina, central Georgia, western Florida and southeastern Alabama this morning. Severe thunderstorm watches are in effect from eastern Georgia through western Florida. The main threats from these storms will be large hail and damaging winds.

10:30 came and went, and the rain wasn’t showing signs of letting up. We’d seen some hotels a junction back down the interstate, so we decided to call it a day and make a run for Orangeburg for the rest of the day. I left the scale on the map this time, so you can see how pathetically short a distance we’d covered…

We picked a hotel with a laundry, and when the rain abated briefly later in the afternoon got directions to Walmart for some fishermans wet weather gear, and Applebys for dinner. Pretty stylish, huh?

Here’s hoping the snow doesn’t stop us from riding into Gatlinburg tomorrow!

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Call me crazy, but I’ve really missed IHOP‘s Eggs Benedict for the six months we’ve been away, and was itching for the chance to set things straight at our lunch stop near Riceboro, GA. As usual we were able to pick up a hotel coupons booklet on the way out of IHOP, and found a decent looking hotel in Hardeeville, South Carolina to spend the night.

The skies grew grayer, and the air colder, as the day progressed, but we still had an hour of daylight when we crossed from GA into SC, so we decided to press on a little further. At a shade over 200 miles for the day when we arrived at the next hotel from the coupon booklet in Walterboro, it was starting to get dark, and we were definitely feeling the cold set in. Amazing that the weather can be so different only a few hundred miles further North than yesterday’s blazing sun!

The Rice Plantation Inn, Walterboro was quite a treat as it turned out. Despite the low price for the night, the room was large, clean and well kept. Better still, there’s a fabulous Steak House right next door, where we enjoyed a very American steak and baked potato dinner.

The weather forecast predicts rain storms moving into the Carolinas around noon tomorrow, so we’ll have to make another early start to cover as many miles as we can, before an early check in at our next stop to avoid getting soaked in the afternoon. Perhaps we should have found out how much colder and wetter it is in these parts before we set off from Florida in our Summer biking gear?

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Wow, if it wasn’t already crazy enough posting from the past, it looks like I’m jumping around randomly in time to fill in on my earlier adventures. I hope you guys are following me in Twitter so that you don’t lose track… ~Al Torigo

I’ve really missed the freedom of the road, and sad as I was to leave Manila behind just as I was starting to get into the rhythm of the place, it’s really great to be back on the Harleys again. Using points from the timeshare we bought in Sedona 18 months ago, we’ve booked a condo in the Tennessee Smoky Mountains National Park for 2 weeks starting on the 27th. That gives us 4 days of riding time to cover the 657 miles from Orlando to Gatlinburg, via both South Carolina and North Carolina.

Although we want to take our time and enjoy the ride, there are flood warnings for South Carolina and storms are forecast for Tuesday, so we plan to cover at least 200 miles a day from the outset incase we are held up by weather later on.

We made an early start this morning to give us time to return our hire car to the airport before checking out of the hotel and enjoying a leisurely ride to Daytona Beach for a late lunch in Tail Gators Grill & Bar at the intersection of Atlantic Drive and International Speedway Blvd. I ate alligator for the second time, washed down with a Guinness while I watched the custom bikes chugging by in the run up to bike week.

As if my hands haven’t taken enough punishment recently, by the time we stopped in Jacksonville, FL for the night, I noticed that while cruising along the A1A on the Fat Boy in the afternoon sun, I had burnt the backs of my hands pretty badly.

Note to self: Even if there is a nice cooling breeze while I’m riding in Florida, I still have to cake any bare skin in SPF50!

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Browsing wistfully at the Tom Tom Website, I was delighted to see that they now offer a new improved Rider v2 unit to supercede the original unit. Part of my horror at having lost my Tom Tom was the prospect of either not being able to replace it at all, or having to resort to buying a used one from ebay. Better yet, the v2 comes with an entirely new (and presumably more secure) mounting assembly and incorporates a security strap to prevent exactly the fate that befell my unit.

Regardless, I called the UK Tom Tom representatives and described what had happened, and am delighted to report that not only do Tom Tom products come with a 2 year warranty, but that they have said they might even be able to send me a replacement under that warranty. True to their word, a few days after the call I received a post paid package to return the broken mounting bracket, and a couple of days after that they acknowledged receipt of the remains.

I’m hoping that I’ll be able to report getting back a new unit in a week or two…

Opposite the Orlando Harley South Store, along SR-192 West is what appears to be a fun fair that is closed in the morning. However, a giant luminous sign in lights at the entrance cryptically declares Old Town, and upon going in there are all manner of period shops, bars, restaurants and arcades against the quaint little block-paved streets and sidewalks.

When we took our Harleys to be serviced as soon as we’d first ridden them up from Miami the staff told us that bikers from miles around congregated at Old Town on Thursday nights. It’s a pity that it took us almost 12 weeks to organise ourselves into going as it is only about 12 miles from our apartment, but when we finally looked in last Thursday it was a beautiful warm breezy evening and literally hundreds and hundreds (maybe thousands!) of bikes lined the Old Town streets, and filled up the car parks with 4 bikes in each space. We arrived around 8pm while the vast majority of bikes were Harley Davidson’s or choppers, but as we were leaving (around 10pm) hordes of sports bikes were arriving as the cruisers were beginning to thin out.

Every Friday night hosts a similar event for cars built after 1970, and every Saturday another event for classic cars and hotrods originally built in 1970 or before. Since the Saturday cars were built before the beginning of time I’d hoped to pay a visit on Friday to enjoy some of the muscle cars, but the thing was rained off by the intermittent storms we’ve been having this past week or two.

When we get back next year, we’ll certainly make an early start and visit these events at least a couple of times each. D’oh!

Already 2 days behind schedule, and making a 400 mile detour to take in some of the Florida Gulf Coast (ostensibly to avoid some bad weather), Tave was keen to add a visit to Sarasota to our itinerary. Since the fast route back to Orlanda from Naples along the interstates took us within 10 miles anyway, we decided that it would make a good mid-point stop for the journey home.

With an early start to beat the weather we were making good time, and reached Sarasota around 11:30am. While refuelling the bikes, I was surprised to discover that Sarasota had a bay area surrounded by several keys of its own! With barely a cloud in the sky we quickly headed to the nearest, Bird Key, where we stopped for half an hour to stretch our legs and admire the view. Notice the bottle of factor-45 sun block we are using up at a steady rate in the bottom right corner, and the John Ringling bridge behind me as I look out over the beautiful Sarasota Bay. If only we’d found these earlier, we needn’t have bothered with the South Florida Keys!

A friendly couple with a pickup full of dogs stopped to chat when they spotted Taves Street Bob, to suggest a stage 1 exhaust kit and chrome lower forks to finish the bike off properly. We discovered from them that the notorious hurricanes rarely make it to this part of Florida, and that he hadn’t seen one here in his whole life. Tave and I were both really taken with Sarasota, and plan to find an apartment here for a future trip. Orlando is a great central point from which to explore Florida, but is geared heavily to tourists and is not even part-way as pretty as many of the other parts of the state we’ve visited this time around.

After our short stop, we needed to quickly finish the rest of the journey back incase the weather turned. But, soon after getting back onto the interstate, I was devastated as my beloved sat nav leapt to its death, and smashed into lots of tiny pieces on the road when the plastic part of the bracket connecting it to the handlebars of my bike sheared off. As it is only a few months old, and has only been used moderately from the bike in that time, I’m going to try to claim under the warranty. The rider model isn’t made anymore though, so I’m not sure what they will be able to do. Gutted. :-(

All in all, despite (because of?) the traumas, our Florida Coast Road Trip has been quite an adventure, covering some 900 miles over the last 5 days. We’ve all had a blast, but I think I need to plan only 100-150 miles of scenic riding per day into our next trip to avoid the sunburn, and numb-bum we’ve endured this time around!

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With more than 600 miles and almost 20 hours of hard riding over the last 3 days, we wanted to make a gentle start to today before embarking upon the final 250 mile leg back to Orlando. After a late breakfast we packed up and went directly to the lovely beach pictured above, where Tave and Megan spent a happy 3 hours or so snorkeling while collecting a bucket load of shells and getting sunburnt on their backs ;-)

Around 2:30 the sun disappeared behind the clouds as we got back on the bikes and set off towards I-75 for a fast route home, but once again, within 15 minutes of starting the engines, the heavens opened for a real downpour. Considering how bright the weather had been so far, we decided to stop for food and try again, but even though the rain had stopped at the restaurant, we had only travelled 4 or 5 miles before we had caught up with it again. This time, the rain was hard enough to make for poor visibility, and it would have been foolhardy to continue, so we turned around and booked another night at the Best Western. Watching the forecast on television, we could expect a similar day tomorrow with sun and clear skies until noon, before more storms set in. We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and preparing ourselves for a sprint in the morning to get back to Orlando before the rain was to start…