The last leg, on a broken leg

We did it! We left Galveston! Some of you might have thought we would be there forever. We almost thought the same thing. In fact, we only limped out of Galveston, and forty miles from Mission, Texas, our final destination in the US, the exhaust pipes started to scream, pop, hiss, and breathe fire. However cool it may sound, we lost power due to the excitement.

While in Galveston, we had been trying to eliminate some erratic behavior in the tuning of our machine. The hard starts, the loss of mid-range power, and occasional failure to start. We came to find out, when everything was said and done, all we needed was one of Jen's hair ties--well at least to help with figuring out why we were failing to start. After our last job with Tim, on the West End of the island, we couldn't get the bike to start. I figured it was just the points acting up again. I checked for a proper spark first. None. So we followed the connection back through the plug wires, and to the coils; when I got to the kill switch and hardwired it, the bike fired up and ran. So I cleaned the contacts on the switch and reassembled it to work normally. With the bike running, we buttoned her back up and started for home. Once we got on the highway, the engine cut out. I had missed something, or had I? I looped Jen's fabric rubber band over the ignition's kill switch, helping the contacts in the switch complete the circuit and transmit the necessary twelve volts to the coils. It worked again. When we got home that night, I took the switch apart, cleaned it up real good, made sure all the parts were functioning as they should, and presto, old is the new, new. Well, almost.

The engine is still hard to start/won't start. Jet Ski Joe, mechanic extraordinaire, and friend of Tim, an Adventure Rider (Princess Jamaica), told me our hard starts have something to do with the scratching sound we hear when the engine is starting, and that it is an air leak. To find out where the air is leaking, he advised us to spray starter fluid around where the carburetors mount to the engine head. If the leak is around the intake valves, the extra fuel will cause a spike in the engines RPM. To check the exhaust valves we will have to hold a burning match up to where the exhaust pipes mount to the engine, and watch for any movement in the flame. This will tell what gaskets need to be remade or ordered to fix the problem.

During our last days in Galveston, I bought a sort of insurance policy. New coils, four in fact. I figured we had replaced almost all the other ignition parts, short of installing an electronic ignition. Two of these coils were meant to be returned. I was able to find some car coils that were a match for the coils already on the bike and needless to say, the ones on the bike are not the right ones. So, I also bought the right Hitachi type Cm 11 coils for the bike, from MikesXS and had them shipped to Mission, Texas. My logic was that we could return the one set we picked up in Galveston when the right ones arrived and no one would be the wiser. Why the hassle? The idea was that if we did break down, and we did need the new coils between Galveston and Mission, we would have them. Guess what? It was a damn good "policy" I bought. When we broke down, I found one of our old coils was leaking oil. I think this is what caused our backfiring, but alas, when I changed them out, the problem persisted. We checked our spark, it was great; reset the timing, and fiddled with the carbs a little bit. Before we called it a night, I could get the bike to start up for about ten seconds, and then it would slowly die out. It would allow me to do this every fifteen minutes or so.

So that is where we are at. Oh, and the best part. We got a ride to Mission, Texas. I wasn't sure what to say when Mike, the second person to stop and ask us if we needed help, offered to throw our bike in the back of his van. I assumed it would be too large, and too heavy, but we did it.

Again, so this is where we are at. The bike runs, but only for a few seconds. Is it the carbs, or is it the valves? The engine running says to me it is not the valves, but the carbs, and the dying off to me sounds like there is blockage in one of the jets on the carbs. I guess there is only one way to find out. Pics coming tomorrow, or whenever we are at an Internet connection that will allow us to upload our pictures.

Be well
Be welcome
Benjamin

Timing and Yardwork and Weight

The last few days can be characterized by being really cold, working on the motorcycle timing and yardwork for "the legendary" Rex Bell (he is legendary, I put that in quotes more to make fun of the way Ben refers to him).

We met up again with Tim from Adventure Riders and he helped us out by getting us an inductive timing light from his friend, who also drove Ben to the hardware store while the motorcycle's timing stuff sat in pieces. I spent the whole day being really cold, sick and miserable because we'd planned to keep warm by running around and doing landscaping for Rex or being inside and cleaning his house. Instead I pouted through most of the day, drew a picture of the motorcycle:

and read the book Ben bought me for Christmas, The Diary of Frida Kahlo. I love Frida Kahlo and if I said that anything less than 5% of this trip is about going to Mexico to see her childhood home and her home with Diego Rivera, I would be lying. I am still in little knots of joy about having seen the Frida Kahlo exhibit in San Francisco while we were there and kicking myself for not going to the Georgia O'Keefe museum in Santa Fe.

The day before, we hacked through the trees behind Rex's fence and pulled out all the bamboo, weeds and weird miscellany that had built up and bent over the chain link fence. Some of the weird things we found included a stuffed fish toy, a Bible half-eaten by bugs, and a lawn chair. Even more curious was that a lot of the other things we found were almost targeted at us: heavy duty thread, maps of the area, a collapsible water bladder, a sponge that Ben wants to use on the hydrogen booster, amongst other things. Whomever this stuff belonged to, this person was definitely an avid adventurer, or at least a recreational fisher (Or maybe our DOPPLEGANGER!!).

Today is being spent "Coming to Jesus" about our overall weight. If you aren't familiar with the colloquialism, it loosely means a not-so-happy ultimatum, repentance for sins, or a life changing experience. Ben is on the war-path and I am debating as to whether I should hide the band-aids from Ben. He has been threatening to toss all of them out (except for the Hello Kitty band-aids, which are a prized possession) to lose weight on the motorcycle. Periodically, he says he'll send his violin home to lose a few pounds, but then the look in his eyes when he says this would soften even a Scrooge and I need to then vehemently defend carrying the violin on the motorcycle--otherwise he might cry himself to sleep or lose a small part of his soul.

So I've been doing a little packing today to save the band-aids and the like, trying in an anorexic-style to make all of my stuff appear as small as possible. Ben tends to be meticulous about our packing, which I think allows us to get away with having all this extra junk, because it is condensed so tight and heavy. This has also been a problem because to maintain this balance, he needs to strap everything down super-tight, wearing out straps and smushing bananas in the process. Most of the time I can't even pull the straps tight enough to fulfill Ben's goals and he has to come around a second time to make sure nothing is going to fall off. My methodology follows that if I pack it neatly, but not excessively so, the size and the weight will be at an optimum point where it isn't too heavy and it isn't too full. I also do not like to eat smushed bananas, and tend to go lighter when strapping stuff to the bike.

We'll see what happens. I have been sick a lot lately and have been hoarding medicine like a hypochondriac-in-training. I might hide some of this stuff in my purse until we get on the road again and I can slip it back into its appropriate bag.

-Jennifer

Connecticut and back to Galveston

A few days before flying out of Connecticut, Ben spent several long hours on the Internet, trying to figure out how to get us a ride from the Houston airport to Conroe, TX to get the motorcycle where we'd left it at Katie's parents house. His last ditch effort involved posting onto the Adventure Rider forum and asking for a ride. Surprisingly, despite numerous other attempts on rideshare websites to no avail, we had over five phone calls one after the other with offers from folks to pick us up. At one point, while still in Connecticut, Ben turns to me and asks, "Hey--tomorrow. Do you want to get picked up in a BMW?" and I, thinking he is joking, replied, "Yeah, totally." He was serious and we were picked up in a BMW the next day by Billy, a member on Adventure Rider who was exceptionally flexible (or as the joke became, "pliable") in picking us up, taking us to Conroe to get the bike and then inviting us back to his house in Humble, where we met his wife (and the better half of the motorcycle duo), Anna.

They were wonderful and funny and best of all had a lot of good advice about what to see, particularly in Mexico, and some times for maintaining the motorcycle. All I gathered from it was: white lithium lubricant for the chain. I will swear on this tip until the day I die or until it locks up our chain and we go flying from the bike. The other advice I received was from Anna; she told me to go to Guanajuato, Mexico,

and you could tell by the way she recommended it that it was more than just a destination for her, but a place she really, really loves. They showed us some of their photos, and they are definitely the crazy adventure riders types that I aspire to be.

We spent a few hours in downtown Houston in the Museum District. The de Menil Collection was pretty amazing--it is a multi-building museum free to the public and created around a private collection of art spanning from the prehistoric all the way to the 1990s (with new acquisitions). The docents were jerks (running around, tapping their pens, chatting and staring at you like you're about to steal something), but that doesn't detract from the quality of what we saw there.

What kills me is that I didn't realize that Houston had such an outstanding museum district. When you Google 'Things to do in Houston' the first two things that always come up are 'The Galleria' and 'The Houston/NASA Space Center.'

The Galleria is a SHOPPING MALL. The Space Center isn't really in Houston, or if it is, it is only because Houston is the size of many former Soviet countries. Ben and I also ran into the Houston Children's Museum for the hour that it was open, but we were treated like creepy, second-class citizens because we didn't have any children in tow. I am only 22. I am obviously still interested in how phones work and other industry-sponsored exhibits about oil, money and engineering. If you're ever in Houston, don't be turned off by the illustrious Galleria, although I secretly wanted to go see it, because I can only imagine how fabulous this place must be if it is THE BEST PLACE IN HOUSTON.

Now, we're back in Galveston; which is more and more like home everyday. This is bad when you are on a road trip, but good when you really like the place and the people. We're here until Tuesday, because the bike needs some er, maintenance and so we can do a couple of days of glorified yard/hurricane work for, as Ben likes to proclaim him, "the legendary Rex 'Wrecks' Bell." It's like doing yardwork for Bob Dylan or Lucinda Williams, I guess.

Kisses, Jennifer

lets get on with it

Wonderful. That is usually what i have to say when i get good news. Great news in fact. I just found out that I did in fact buy a battery with a warranty!!! Wonderful. NAPA auto parts was more than accommodating when I called them and let them know that the battery that I bought from them less than 4 months ago was dying. They told me that the battery had a 12 month warranty, and even though I didn't have my receipt, they would be happy to give me a new battery on warranty. So in the same breath I must thank our wonderful Couchsurfer friend Katie from Galveston TX for letting me borrow her car to go and drop off the old battery and pick up the new one. Thanks Katie!!!!



In addition Jen and I decided that we would go ahead with the purchase of the battery tender. We decided on the Deltran Waterproof 800 battery tender. The idea is that whenever we have stopped at a city and are working on the bike, or on financing our trip, we can keep the bike's battery plugged in and keep it charged, but not overcharged. I have the new battery plugged in right now in Conroe TX.



That brings me to the final note of this post. We are in Connecticut right now. Jen's family brought us up here for the holidays! While we are here we are having our boots resoled with Vibram soles. This will give our cowboy boots the traction we need to get through the Andes, and the Amazon. While still looking good enough to attend dinner parties and work banquets, biker rallies, and paint the inside of a house. Like this interior we completed at our friend Jet's house. It is a western themed room with this great Blaze Folley picture hanging on the wall.

So let the reminiscing begin. We will be in Connecticut for 3 weeks. almost as long as we were on the road from Seattle to New Orleans. Have we told you about that trip yet???


Benjamin

Galveston-->Conroe-->??

Tonight is our last night in Galveston for a while. We went to Pho 20 (ha, ha) for dinner and we saw Margaret and Travis there. And so we ate first dinner with them. And then Lindsey and Sandra walked in, but we were about to leave, so we didn't have dinner with them. Ben and I know maybe fifteen people on this island. And four of them walked into the same restaurant tonight.

Then went to the Panaderia on Broadway across from the Vietnamese restaurant and got some really delicious pastries. The best part was that the lady running the cash register didn't speak English and for like the first time EVER (except with maybe Mama Anaya, my childhood friend Liz's Ecuadorian mother) Ben and I got to speak in Spanish with someone who actually wanted to talk to us in Spanish! This may sound like I am being a ridiculous gringa, because, well, I am. But to be able to have someone listen to you and be nice to you and speak slowly for your benefit is just SO GOOD. Like warm fuzzies. Because she was thrilled that we spoke Spanish (however badly) and pleased that we took the effort to talk to her even though someone was willing to translate for both sides. We were thrilled that she would take the time to listen to us and was so nice and understood that our toddler Spanish required us to speak stiltedly. Or maybe it was just because she was such a sweet lady and she smiled at us and you don't get people this nice on an everyday basis selling you these huge delicious pastries called "besos" (kisses), "concha blancas" (white shells), and "tortugas" (turtles). Then we went back to see Katie and have second dinner/dessert which was vegetable soup (oh so good on a cold night!) and delicious pumpkin bread with a million mini chocolate chips. I am still ill from over-eating two hours later.

We are going to be coming back here soon though, for the Galveston Song Off! on a Wednesday after the New Year. It is tentatively looking like it is going to be held at the Old Quarter Acoustic Club down by The Grand Opera House during Open Mic Night. In case you or someone you know would like to participate: you have to write a song about Galveston. I, being totally inept at "real" music, am making a song for tape. Similar to how some songs are made for a string quartet, this is a song that I am making on Audacity and that I am going to burn onto CD so that I can hit play and stand there awkwardly as everyone stares at me.

IT IS GOING TO BE THE BEST!!! I WILL POST IT HERE AFTER IT DEBUTS.

Anyways. We're off tomorrow for Conroe, Texas to spend the night at Katie's house (Katie is a Couchsurfer and our current "neighbor." John is her boyfriend and the Couchsurfer we're staying with who lives next door.) I heard there is going to be a bonfire and it is going to be cute and I imagine because everyone is musical (except me; except when I get to sing "The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow" while inebriated) there will be music, too.

More on that when it happens. In the meanwhile, I am skirting cleaning work while Ben cleans to "Hey Jude." I imagine his little black turtleneck sleeves are rolled up and his handsome, muscular arms are in soapy water. Ahem. :D

Also! A photograph of home from Jared, who I guess is in New Orleans right now?:

If you can't figure it out, it is the streetcar (I presume the St. Charles line) decked out for Christmas. It always has little garlands tacked to the forest green exterior, too and it rattles up and down the track. It is just adorable and makes me miss New Orleans and everyone I love in it.

One of my least favorite things about travel is missing the people and places you've visited, even if it was just for a short period of time, sometimes just a layover. Facebook photographs are even worse--all of your damned friends having fun without you; the photographs are almost taken close together enough that you can see the jerks dancing in their kimonos if you flash through the images quickly enough. On certain days when the wind hits you with just the right amount of chill and humidity I can be brought back to a midnight stop at a railroad station on the border of France and Spain or a particular day in Connecticut where I was working on the high school newspaper or a cold winter bike ride in New Orleans in glitter eye makeup and a ridiculous outfit (not necessarily Mardi Gras, probably just any old Friday night). And sometimes I am even transported to the lousy days that I'd rather not remember. Whatever and whenever they were, I am a sucker for nostalgia and I leave a little piece of myself everywhere I go and I just can't seem to collect them back up. I think Galveston is growing on me like that.

Love, Jen

Might Go Back Down To Texas

I'd like to stay but I might have to go to start over again
Might go back down to Texas, might go to somewhere that I've never been
And get up in the mornin' and go out at night
and I won't have to go home
Get used to bein' alone
Change the words to this song
Start singin' again

-Blaze Foley

So Ben and I are finally getting our act together and starting to write a blog about our motorcycle journey. We have a lot of anecdotes to relate already--it doesn't seem worth it to record what you're doing until at least a baker's dozen worth of folks tell you that you should be writing down your experiences (and taking notes for your 'expose-all memoir' to appear at a later date).

Right now we're in Galveston, and we've been working a lot of miscellaneous jobs to make a bit of cash before we hit the road again. We're for all intents and purposes broke, but with pretty fabulous credit for youngins' (22 and 26, respectively). So like all good Americans, we hold true to the founding tenets of the American dream and spirit: We believe we live in the land of the brave (which explains why we're foolhardy enough to try to make it down to Tierra del Fuego, the southern most tip of South America) and we live in the home of the free (credit).

For those interested, we're riding a 1976 Yamaha XS500. To me, what that means is that it is very small, brown, and old. We stick out like a sore thumb at the Galveston Motorcycle Rally, where we've been working for the past two days at a food booth. We are the oldest bike I have seen thus far, and I think the only Yamaha (although I've seen the guys with the Yamaha leathers on, so presumably they are not flaunting Yamaha gear in a sea of Harley aficionados just because they want to get the shit beaten out of them. I presume this is what motorcyclists do in their spare time, because that is what the television has taught me.)

What is really great about having our cute, sweetheart of a vintage motorcycle (her name is unofficially Bonnie), is that we meet a lot of really great people in really odd ways. Folks love to see us riding a 1976 motorcycle because most of the old guys and gals remember riding them and loving them. And as for the young guys and gals, well, they think we're crazy! for riding such a old beast. We meet a lot of good people who wish us well and we tend to have a lot of good karmic interference. This will probably be a major theme of our trip, as everything tends to land into place in really great ways. Without wanting to jinx it--while setting up a thematic element for this blog--the universe conspires to help us. And by universe, I mean lots of really good folks.

Ok. That is the end of the first entry. The rest of it will be easier than this. And hopefully we will catch up with all our reminiscences from our starting point in Seattle/Southern Oregon, down to New Orleans and out to Galveston. We've already been on the road since August. What a long, strange trip this will probably end up being. Maybe.

Love,
Jen