Jack, Richard and I (Randy) set out on a two week motorcycle adventure. Our trek took us thru many states as we make our way to two VROC rallies in Wisconsin and South Dakota. On the way, we traveled thousands of miles on our bikes. We saw dozens of little towns and see lots of people we know; and don't know. Here are a few pictures that show some of our milestones along the way.

Hope you enjoy the trip... we did !

It's our first day out and we're just getting our barings. Here we're at a fuel stop (in Tennessee or Kentucky) and decide to stare at the bikes for awhile. :)

Our first day out, we pass thru Georgia, Tennessee, Kentuck, Ohio and Indiana. We stopped for the night just north of Indianapolis. Great weather and easy traffic.

At one point, we saw 400 miles of corn fields. A lot of corn!

While on the road, we decided to eat healthy so as to keep up our strength. This country kitchen in Illinois was great! Just like grandma's cooking. 

Our first stop in Wisconsin and Jack already makes a new friend. Jack carried the conversation most of the way. 

We arrive in Boscobel... unarmed. If I had know their seriousness about turkey hunting, I would have backed my shotgun. 

We make our first stop at the local watering hole and park the bikes right in front. Then we look around the quaint downtown and finally find a great place to eat ( The Vale Inn Cafe). Little did we know that this would become our home away from home. We ate almost all of our dinner meals there and we had many visits to eat 'PIE'. Their pies were homemade daily and very very tasty. Always, quite the contest to see who would get the last piece of the daily special. " Chunk was the winner most of the time given his keen strategies and well thoughtout execution.

This is the view of the upper Mississippi Valley as seen from Pikes Peak, MO. The river as clean and looked nothing like the Mississippi that I remember in the south. 

On our day rides, we would cross the upper Mississippi River and spend time in Missouri. On this occassion, we caught a ferry ride back into Wisconsin ($6). Neat stuff.

We visited Prairie Du Chien, Wisconsin and the buckskinner days event. Lots of people in native dress, crafts and art. I never thought of Wisconsin as pioneer territory. I was always thought of them as the cheese state... dairy, milk and ice cream. 

Lots of furs and animal skins. These are coyote pelts and warn by the buckskinners as headgear. Needless to say, no animal rights activists attended.

Hand made outdoorsman knives. 

On a day ride south of Boscobel, these giant's lined the roadway. To the right (outside the picture) you could see open fields for miles. There was a 20-25 mph crosswind.

A huge dome atop the courthouse in Lancaster , Wi town square. Quite impressive.

We spent some time in Lancaster, Wisconsin and found these two fellows. They were great. We had a 10 minute conversation with General Grant and he was quite knowledgible. A festival was being held around the town square. Little did we know that Lancaster was the site of the first Civil War monument.

A nice VROC cookout in Boscobel brought the Mayor to thank VROC for visiting his fare city every year. Years before he had personally lobbied the city council to allow a motorcycle group to hold their rally there... And in all the years that had passed... there were no regrets.

We left Boscobel heading to Duluth MI. More Wisconsin open sky and farmland.

Duluth Minnesota was our start point for our ride around Lake Superior. This is an Iron Butt ride where we would go completely around Laker Superior (1000 miles) in 24 hours. These are the only two pictures I took during the ride. It took us about 23 hours to complete the ride and for 95% of the ride, this is what we saw... asphalt lined by dense forest. Cold, wind, deer and darkness. Upper Michigan at 3am on a June morning is downright chilly; roughly 40F degrees. We worked thru all these factors to finish the trip. Jack and I agreed that this was the toughest Iron Butt we had ever done. It was a good experience and we're all looking forward to get our certificates and pins.
P.S. I was in the lead and saw 10 deer along the road that night; only one was dead.

The day after our Lake Superior ride, we slept, rested and relaxed in Duluth MN.. It is a really nice town with a re-vitalized downtown area. Chicago-styled pizza was just what we needed to re-charge our batteries. We had eaten so much we could barely walk. We slept like babies before our long ride to Custer, SD.

This carving was in a brick wall in downtown Duluth MN. Their were heartland scenes of harvesting, farming and mining. Very special...