The Weather Man…

Hey Hey Mr. Weatherman give me some good news for the weekend. The weekends are for riding. Snow and rain sometimes interferes with the ride. I Know, I know we need the rain, but Mr. Weatherman can you put your order in with Mother Nature to rain/snow during the week?

However, if we have a planned Ride Trip, we are stead fast regardless of weather. To be real though the Ride is much more fun when the sun is out and the roads are dry.

A couple two or three years ago we made Ride plans to Street Vibrations in Reno, NV. The Fall Rally is held in September so when we booked the rooms several months earlier we never thought we would be riding in a snow storm.

When we left our place in Placerville it was threatening to rain, so we were hustling to get over Donner Pass with no avail. We weren’t so lucky to out run the storm. At Gold Run the sky opened up and dumped on us. By the time we reached Nyack, CA where we stopped to defrost our hands but we didn’t stay long as it was snowing. When we got to Donner Summit there was a couple inches of snow on the highway but thankfully we beat the chain controls. CAL DOT are crazy strict on chain control, they wouldn’t have let us cross the summit.

It was pretty sketch at times in the slushy snow and ice but I have to admit it was so much fun. When we got to the hotel I was pumped with adrenaline. We did park the Rides and cabed it to the brewery though in attempt of staying warm and dry.

The next day was more of the same but it didn’t hold us back. We rode up to Virginia City to check out all the other crazy people and their Rides. If you never been to Virginia City, especially during Street Vibrations, you really need to treat yourself to a piece of history. Virginia City is an old mining town perched on a hill south east of Reno, NV. There are two ways in to Virginia City. To the North the road has longer sweeping turns and to the South the road has tighter twisties.

After parking our Rides among several hundred other Rides along the main drag, we strolled along gocking at all the other Rides. We checked out the various shops as we headed to the historic and famous watering hole “The Red Dog Saloon”, For equally famous Bloody Mary’s.

It’s usually pretty crowded but we have always been lucky enough to find a place to park our butts as most folks don’t sit still long when there are some fun twisties to Ride. We are no exception, after a quick Mary to wet our whistle, we were off to Ride. We headed south on HWY 341 to catch the better part of the Ride. If you go straight where 341 splits to 342, the road is rather straight and not as fun. 341 and 342 meet back up as you drop into Carson City. We hit the 395 heading north back to Reno. The weather briefly let up, so we all decided to check out the vendors on the strip. 

We made it back to our hotel just as the sky opened up and poured on us once again. We avoid the large hotels as a few usually become the club house for some of the notorious MC clubs. On this occasion at Hyatt Park our four bikes were the only bikes and the manager allowed us to park near the front door. Which was cool because they could be seen from the front desk for added security.

We got out of our wet riding gear and cabbed to the strip in search for brews and live entertainment. We ended up at our old standby “The Brew Brothers”. The wood fired pizza is the bomb and the Honey Blond is pretty damn good as well. The band measured up to the beer and pizza too and we couldn’t resist, we shook our booties all over the dance floor.

Meanwhile, the storm outside dumped a foot of fresh snow on the summit.

The next morning it was a glorious sunny day but frigid cold as the high desert can be. At breakfast we looked up the DOT cameras and it appeared I80 over Donner still was being plowed. We decided on heading south on 395 and taking HWY 50 through South Lake Tahoe as they usually don’t get as much snow. Epic inaccuracy, we were riding in two to three inches of slush on the pass between Carson City and South Lake Tahoe.

We rolled into SLT as human popsicles and stopped for a cup and to thaw.

When we continued out of SLT on HWY 50 and even though it was congested it was a really fun Ride on the west slope down into our cute little town of P-Ville.

Mr. Weatherman what say you for the weekend???

The End

Enjoy the Ride

BellsRides