Open Barn Doors

After a day in Nashville I went over to Taylorsville, KY and spent the evening with my sister Betty and her husband Carl. They certainly have built themselves a nice nest there with a partially underground home and a huge shop. Betty continues here genealogy projects and Carl is way into his CJ-3 Jeep project. They had just returned from a Jeep outing in Utah.




I unloaded the Sportster and road up to Ohio for Gary Mac's annual Open Barn Doors party. I arrived on a Wednesday and it had started raining 30 miles from his place and I arrived wet around the edges. It continued to rain off and on until Friday evening and the ground was very saturated. But Saturday, the day of the party, the sun came out and the wind with it and started to dry things out. It was still an inside party though. Gary and I built a wine glass holder over the bar and I helped with the clean up and decorating. The boy needs a barn keeper!


Then the long trip home. I returned to Betty and Carl's, loaded up the bike and spent the night. The next day I went over to Charleston and spent the evening with daddy and Ron and left out after coffee at Boomland with daddy's clutch. A long driving day on Tuesday and Wednesday and I arrived mid afternoon at Pueblo, CO to pick up a 2010 Triumph Bonneville that I had bought on ebay. Then I made it down to Raton, NM that evening and finished up on Thursday evening back home.

This was my first extended trip with the Vixen and it performed well. There are still a lot of little things that need attention, but I have plenty of time to see to them.

King Biscuit Blues Festival

The Deco design Hotel Seville in Harrison, Ark was a delight to stay in and we enjoyed dinner there and made some new friends.

We visited Eureka Springs and had lunch in the old downtown area and had to add on some home made dessert. Lots of motorcycles there as it is only a short ride from Fayetteville. The loop on the old highway 62B was lined with Victorian homes and tall trees - very attractive. The Springs are not note worthy and had names like Black sulfur and Arsenic. This chapel is located a couple of miles west of Eureka Springs and is very interesting, both the story behind it and sitting inside of it with music playing in the background and looking at all of the trees outside.

Next stop was Helena for the King Biscuit Flour Hour Blues Festival. We had arranged to meet up with Bill, Joe's brother-in-law on Tuesday. We caught up with him at the campground and I went to pick up my Vixen motor home. We had a very spacious camp spot on the edge of town and we met several other campers. We took Bill's truck and toured over to Clarksdale, Mississippi, and the Shack Up Inn, where we had camped two years ago. The place had expanded quite a bit and is worth stopping in when you are in the area. Thursday we went to the Festival and stayed all day. We were all disapointed with the style of music being played. I was counting on old style piano and guitar slow strumming and singing, but it was more high energy electric guitar and drums with a bit of rap/blues singing. We did finally find some buskers (street performers) that met our expectations.


So Friday morning, I decided to move on, the Festival just wasn't doing it for me. Joe and Bill concurred and we took the long way back towards Nashville, Joe's home. The tires on my new to me trailer looked a bit low and on checking, one had 6 lbs and the other 10 lbs, both showing major cracking on the outside. The trailer was 6 years old and barely used, but the tires had rotted in the sun. So two new Goodyears from very helpful people and we were on our way, only to have the trailer hitch break off of the Vixen when we pulled into a gas station. Luckily, this didn't happen while on the road as we could have done some major damage to the bikes. $50 and an hour later and we were good to go, this time with a second safety chain tied to the frame of the Vixen.


This is in front of Joe and Diane's home in Southwest Nashville and Bill's Airstream on Saturday. I left later to visit a friend of mine east of Nashville.

BBBQ

We met up with the Daniels, our third cousins in Fort Smith. Joe and I had last met them in 1955 just before they moved from Cape Girardeau to Fort Smith. This is Pat on the right, her husband Cosby Hodges on the left and Tom Daniel in the middle. The youngest daughter, Julia was also there. We spent the night in their luxurious home on the golf course and we all went out to dinner. Anne, the fourth family member and my childhood favorite, died from cancer about four years ago.

The Bikers, Blues & BBQ bike rally in Fayetteville, Ark is supposed to be second only to Sturgis in size. We heard numbers like 300,000 but it must be very difficult to get a good head count as no tickets are required. There is a ton of bikes though, all throughout NW Arkansas. We camped at Dan and Debra's place in Fayetteville, a 30 acre hilltop that was a 20 minute walk from downtown. The rally itself was mainly vendors and outdoor music, the fun part being just watching people and bikes parading up and down the main drag which was closed off to cars. Lots of custom bikes and different creations. Our hosts are currently building a low energy house and we enjoyed their company and interaction.

We had had enough of the noise and congestion by Saturday afternoon and rode over to the Buffalo River and camped at the Steel Creek campground, making some friends and throwing horse shoes. The temp has been in the mid 40's at night, so we don't hit the road til 9 or so.

Sunday, we toured Eureka Springs and continued our habit of eating BBQ and catfish. Sunday night we checked into the 1929 restored Seville hotel in Harrison which had special rates for bikers and met some of the local characters in the hotel bar after doing our laundry.