Its been three years since Darren's accident and this is a short write up for the memorial ride.
A small group of us met at the usual rally point with the plan to ride the same route originally planned for the day of the accident. We had a quick bite, some coffee, then gathered up for a safety breif. All were tenured members of the group so we made Micheal promiss to keep both wheels on the pavement and the breif was cut short. Robert said a short prayer for our group, the weather, and the bikes and we were off.
 It was a little overcast but the temp was nice, the roads were dry, and the traffic was very light. As we exited the highway to start on the twisties we picked up John, who almost missed the ride due to the time change. We wound our way south clocking about 85 miles to the first gas stop. Along the way the ride leader nearly caught a low flying hawk and we found a rough patch in a left hand sweeper, but otherwise not much to talk about. We took a quick break and headed to the accident scene.
We parked the bikes just ahead of the accident site hoping that any other bikes who might happen along would see the bikes and slow down to see what was going on. This might provide a little more safety for our group in the ditch as well as keep other riders from having an accident in the same location. This particular corner has taken many bikes and several lives. We gathered around the plaque made for Darren and talked a little about him. Robert said some insperational words then lead us in a nice prayer. He followed by blessing the site. Once everyone had a moment we headed into town for lunch.
 Once in town we grabbed some lunch at one of our favorite BBQ joints. The food was great, the pie was wonderful, and we had a good time BS'n as usual.
(sorry the image is so dark, the reflection off the plates is kinda cool though)
 We stopped again on the way out of town just to top off the tanks of those who didn't fill up earlier (those with a bit more than 100mile range like myself). Then we hit the twisties again making our way back north. The sun was out and it was warming up but the breeze while moving was cool, traffics was still light, and everything was great. We did find a guy along a back road somewhere who thought a V6 Camero could outrun a ZX10. He was wrong!
Our group started breaking off at major highways along the way home. Yards had to be mowed, company was in town visiting, one guy came in from north Dallas so he had some extra ground to cover before he was home. I made it home just after 3pm with right around 200 miles total round trip. It was a great day and I'm sure Darren was with us from start to finish. |