Bringing It Home

Last week I wrote about my second rental experience and how Bob over at New Rider Rentals had offered to sell me the V-Star 1300 I had rented. My wife and I pondered the idea for about 1 hour before we decided “hell yeah”! “Lets Go For It”.

On Saturday we woke up early and had a quick breakfast with my youngest daughter. Afterwards the 3 of us got in the car and drove up to Pembroke Pines to meet up with Bob at his shop. I had already spoken with Bob throughout the week on the details of the sale. Basically Bob would be renting me the bike with an option to buy within 2 years. I would insure the bike, maintain it and pay him a small monthly finance fee. Without getting into too many details about it, it is a very good and fair deal.

We got to Bob’s shop at about 10:45am and he had all the paper work ready. We went through the details of the deal again, signed the papers and talked about bikes for a while. After he gave me the keys and owners manual, I asked him about what warranties were still valid on the bike and when was the next service due. Bob had all the information written on the back of the owner’s manual and referred me to a good mechanic near his shop.

My wife and my daughter took off to my mother in-law’s house while I hopped on the bike and took the same route I had taken the two prior times I had been here. West on Pembroke Road up to Flamingo, then south to my mother in-law’s house. It was a really nice day. Great for riding. It wasn’t too hot, or too windy, and traffic was almost non-existent.

Bob had rented the bike two days earlier and had not had a chance to clean it before I bought it, so when I got to my mother in-law’s house my wife already had a bucket of water with car washing soap and a sponge waiting to clean her up. She had also stopped by the auto store and picked up some chrome cleaner. Since this was my first time washing a bike, I decided to call my brother in-law to make sure if there was anything I needed to be careful with. I couldn’t reach him so we carefully made sure we didn’t spray too hard with the hose and took our time getting her clean.

After we washed the bike and dried it, we put her away in a safe place. My wife & I live in an apartment building which doesn’t have any security gates or guards, the thought of leaving the bike there made us nervous. My mother in-law lives in a single family home with a big back yard. Since my wife’s sister already stores her boat and RV at that house, we decided that it would also be the safest place to store the bike. The only downside to that is that anytime we wanted to ride; we would have to drive about 10 minutes to my mother in-law’s house to get the bike. Not very good for those times when you get that spur of the moment desire to ride.

Also, getting the bike in & out of the storage area is not going to be easy. That’s good as a security deterrent, but a hassle for when you want to just get out and ride. In the end we decided that we weren’t going to be taking the bike out so much unless we planned it. It’s a small price to pay to be sure your bike is as safe as can be.

My wife and I had decided to spend the rest of the weekend with my 14 year old daughter (who lives with my ex-wife). She’s not very interested in bikes but rather teenage boy bands, so riding was out of the question for this weekend. My wife and I however made plans to ride out the following weekend (July 4^th) to Sugarloaf Key which is about 20 miles north of Key West. So Saturday we spent the day by the pool with with family and friends. On Sunday we had planned to go to the beach with my wife’s sister and brother. My teenage daughter however had different plans. She decided she preferred going to the mall with her friends instead.

While my wife headed out to the beach with her family, I took my daughter home to her mother’s house. I was going to drive to the beach to meet up with my wife and her family but I decided instead to take advantage of the day and take the bike. I drove back to my apartment and picked up the keys to the bike, grabbed my bike gear and drove to my mother in-law’s house.

Now here’s where keeping your bike stored away from your home becomes a hassle.

When I got to my mother in-law’s, the gate was locked, and my wife had the extra set of keys, but she was already at the beach. Luckily my step son was in the house sleeping; however he sleeps like a log and it usually take a hurricane or some other natural disaster to wake him up. I jumped the fence, knocked on his bedroom window repeatedly until he finally got up and opened the front door for me. I rushed inside the house and grabbed the extra set of keys for the gate.

After spending a good 10 to 12 minutes maneuvering the bike out of the storage area I was finally able to get the bike out from the backyard and onto the driveway. I checked the gas and ran through my usual pre-ride check list and headed out onto the main road.

My plan was to take the shortest route which meant a lot of highway riding. I would take 826 east (which is notorious for having crappy drivers), up to I-95 then south to Key Biscayne. The whole trip would be about 25 miles with 85% of it on major highways with speed limits ranging from 55mph to 65mph. This was going to be a challenge for me in terms of nerves because up until now I had only ridden about 5 to 7 miles on the highway.

As I began my trek to the beach on hwy 826 it wasn’t too bad. Traffic was not heavy at all and I found that could now deal with the wind drag a lot better if I kept my speed at 55 to 60mph. However once I got onto southbound I-95, things started moving a lot faster. In Miami people drive very aggressive instead of defensively. Everyone seemed to be going 80mph. I found myself battling against trying to keep up with the rest of the traffic and going slow enough where I wouldn’t loose my nerves.

At one point I was going 70 on this 55mph highway yet cars were still flying by me as if I was at a crawl. My mind started thinking about all kinds of bad things, like; “what if I hit an oil spill”, or “what if the bike breaks and throws me off”. For the first time since I began riding I found myself not enjoying it, because I was too worried about what might happen. I wasn’t even worried so much about the other cars, but more about if the bike mal-functioned and slipped from under me. I finally decided to slow back down to 65 mph and say “the hell with the rest of them”. I was going to drive at my own pace.

When I got to Key Biscayne my nerves settled down, and I began to enjoy the scenery. Just like last week, the ocean breeze was light and the view of the bay on either side of the road made me think about how lucky I was to be able to enjoy such a wonderful life. “It was all good”.

I got to the beach and spent about an hour eating BBQ chicken and sausages before my wife said “lets go for a ride”. So we hopped on the bike and drove further into the island towards the town of Key Biscayne. We rode around looking at all the expensive homes with their elaborate architecture and landscape. We even stopped by the house where one of the scenes for “Scarface” was filmed. Then we headed back out to the beach.

I hung out at the beach till about 6:45pm. I didn’t want to be riding at night, so I said bye to everyone and headed back towards my mother in-law’s house. Back another 25 miles of high speed highway riding!

By this time there was a lot more traffic on I-95 as I headed north. I was cruising at about 65mph when a guy in a Porsche pulled next to me, honked the horn and cut back into my lane in front of me. I didn’t know if he was honking to say hi or because he thought I was going to slow. But I had already made up my mind I was going to drive at my own pace. Beside it’s not like I was going under the speed limit or even at the limit. I was easily traveling 10 to 15mph over the limit.

By the time I got to the house and put the bike away, the knot in my stomach had subsided. I knew that I was going to have to get more highway miles under my belt before I would start to feel comfortable with it. Well next week I think I’ll get all the highway experience I need when we head out to Sugarloaf Key. That’s going to be a good 150 miles each way with more than 95% of it being highway miles.