The local riding crew got our first group ride of the season in today! We are not really a club, but just a bunch of guys from the neighborhood that like to ride together. We gathered at the donut shop (which belongs to one of the riding group) and took off at about 11:30 for a 140 mile (round trip) cruise north of Pittsburgh. There were 13 bikes in all and a couple of the guys had their girlfriends/wives along for the ride. Our mayor and a couple of retired cops from our community were part of the group, as were a couple of the local fire fighters. The rest of us are aquainted as class mates from school and around the neigborhood, so it's a good group of people to ride with.

The plan was to stay off the interstate and main roads as much as possible and just take it easy on the scenic back roads on our way to a popular restaurant, then head home by way of equally scenic and less traveled roads.

All was going well until we ran through some metal scraps, apparently from a shattered mail box along the side of the road (no idea how it got shattered...I didn't even notice it myself). A couple of miles later, and about 15 miles short of our destination, we stopped for a flashing red light at an intersection, and one of the riders who had his girlfriend along on the back of his 09 Ultra discovered he had a flat tire. An inspection revealed a hole about 1/4 inch square (big enough to cleanly push a key into the hole) so using Fix-a-flat or just a sealant would be useless. The tire needed to be plugged or patched. Argggghhhhhh!!!! TRIP OVER! Call the cavalry to bring the trailer and haul the bike home to fix the tire.....sigh.....

But wait! As we were sitting along side the road at the crossroads of a small community, and trying to assess the situation, a fellow wearing a Harley Davidson shirt came walking slowly down the road toward us to see what the problem was. When he was told about the flat tire he indicated he had tire plugs and a compressor in his garage, about 200 feet further up the road! Brian (the one with the flat) fired up his bike and eased it up the road to the garage. Within a half hour they got the bike jacked up, tire plugged (with the addition of a little "Slime" too, I think) and reinflated. After a short test ride to make sure the tire was holding air, we all mounted up, thanked the good Samaritan, and continued on our way. As a side note, ironically, the good Samaritan's bike was almost identical to Brian's.

We arrived at our destination, double checked Brian's tire and headed into the restaurant to eat. Lunch was great and the rest of the ride was enjoyable and uneventful, though we did see the result of a bad traffic accident in the opposite lane on our last leg of the trip on the Interstate highway. We all returned safely to the donut shop to tell stories about the day to a couple of riders that couldn't make the trip today.

All in all it was a good first group ride of the season, thanks to the kindness of a fellow Harley enthusiast who happened to be at the right place at the right time! Some might even say our little guardian angel was watching over us today.

My thanks on the part of the group to that gentleman that saved the day, and proved to me that there are still good samaritans in the world and there really is a special comaraderie among Harley riders!

 

Cool, thanks for the good news. That is the way it should be. Kudos to the good sam.

 

I have found, reading this forum, that Harley Owners pay it forward.