Last Ride Summer 2015 (September 20, 2015)

Last official Summer Sunday (Fall starts Wednesday) and it was a beautiful day. Took a ride starting with Riverside Drive, one of my favorite Sunday rides. Very peaceful with light traffic though along the river a lot of joggers, walkers and bikers (in this case bicycle would be the operative term). They are nice though and the views are remarkable. Also nice, was cool enough to wear a light jacket. As you can see at left it was a nice day to ride.

Rode out onto Old Gun Road (which runs right off of Riverside. I assume these are the "old guns"....well one is a Civil War cannon, and the other is a "gun mold". They did make cannon in Richmond, not sure how this ended up in the James River where it was found over 100 years later, sure there would be a good story. No way to ever know though. At any case, another neat part of riding in the area of the river. Just a fun area to be in.  

Ended up down on Midlothian, where I got this photo of the Awful Arthur's Seafood. Its a good place to eat, Richmond has a few good sea food places though they tend to be rather high dollar or else places like Captain D's/Long John Silver (not that there is anything wrong with that...have eaten at those last two many times in the past, and will in the future). Lunch though was at Firehouse Subs not far from my apartment. A short ride and the last ride of Summer was over after 42 miles. It was a fantastic summer of some good riding. Nothing to be sad over though, Fall is one of my favorite times of the year to ride. Looking forward to the roads ahead.  

Labor Day Ride (September 7, 2015)

 Labor Day took another ride. This was Cary Street on that day...this ride was around 8AM. Pretty much everyone was still in bed, a good time to ride. This is a fun section of Richmond with a lot of stores and restaurants. Some of the best food in the city can be found here.
I love early rides, and Labor Day was a beautiful day to do so.
Rode around this area a bit, and even got off the motorcycle and rode around for a bit.

This was taken on Monument Avenue, is my motorcycle in front of The Robert E. Lee statue. He is on Traveler his horse, and I was on mine that day.
Monument Avenue is very interesting, in that there are a lot of Civil War statues and even one of Arthur Ashe who was from Richmond,
There are also some very old houses and it is a very beautiful street.

Finally made a stop at Tredegar where I got a photo of the old armory and the cannon in front. I am not a fan of the Southern cause, but I do enjoy history.
Richmond is a great historic town with not just Civil War but a lot of Revolutionary War history. I love to explore it, and see the sights to be found here.

Test Rides Post Repairs (September 5-6, 2015)

Excellent ride on September 5...had gotten the bike back from the shop a few days before. They had fixed the overheating problem (which happens more often than I realized...in fact there was another bike in the shop with the same problem, and talked to someone on the Vulcan Riders Forum today who had the temperature light flash. Told him (as did others) to check it out.
Anyhow the ride started with a stop at Richmond International Raceway, which was getting ready for the race (which happened on September 12)...always a nice place to visit.

Rode out after that to Gaines Mill Battlefield. Like that for a couple of reasons; one is that the history of the place is  just amazing..the Civil War is our bloodiest war, and two...the roads out there are just remarkable. Twisty country roads...other than the asphalt the soldiers would probably find this place, as well as very nearby Cold Harbor, to be familiar. Much of the earthworks remain. In fact at Gaines Mill there is a photo of one of the scenes from back then where you are looking...very little if any change.
From there rode back into Richmond and back to Velocity. Thanked again my mechanic for the job she did on the bike. Did cost quite a bit but as noted she did some extra and the motorcycle runs like new. I really, really am happy with the work done.

The following day took a short ride out to Riverside Drive (and parts of Richmond) but love this place on a Sunday morning. Very peaceful with runners and boaters and just quiet out there. Beautiful road as well...and the James is always nice to see.
Nice to have the motorcycle back. Writing this a week later...this weekend has been pretty wet...had big storms on Friday, Saturday and even a bit of rain on Sunday. So did not ride this weekend, but it is there waiting for me. Even got a bit of a touch of fall, looking forward to the rides coming up.

Back in the Saddle Again (September 3, 2015)

Well here is the scorecard....$332,52 in parts, $369 in labor...tax and antifreeze....comes to $729.26. Pricey but first real mechanical problem in the 10 years I have had this bike. I like Velocity who also fixed my taillight problem a while back, and did tires and brakes last year.
I still feel lucky as it could have been worse. Did some other work...said the bike needed new spark plug wires and for sure it does feel a lot stronger now and smoother. So that was a good call.
Sure felt good to be back on the bike again. I did not ride it very long, This was mainly to the weather forecast (which it did not rain) and the fact the really hard day at work was today.
Hoping to take the bike out on a good test ride tomorrow as that will be the start of the four day Labor Day weekend. Plan to start with some short rides and gradually make them longer as I go to see how this motorcycle is doing after its problem. That though will sure be a lot of fun...have missed this.