Day 3

Sedona to Grand Canyon, AZ – 152 miles

With Abi’s bike already packed and him patiently watching SportsCenter in his room, I started loading my bike. As I secured my duffel bag, I noticed an antique truck in the parking lot. Rob, the owner of the truck saw me loading the motorcycle and came over to say hello. I asked him where he was going with that old truck, and he said he was living out his lifelong dream.

“My wife and I are just about finished with our fourteen thousand mile trans-continental trip in this old truck. It’s a 1931 Packer Model A. We left home in Oregon two months ago, drove across Canada to Nova Scotia, then down the East Coast, through Texas, and now we’re heading for home. We figured we’d add a few miles to stop off at the Grand Canyon. Why not?”

“That’s great!” I answered. “So, have you had any problems with the old Packer, and what do you do for spare parts if you break down? It’s not like you can go into the local NAPA for parts to a truck made in 1931.”

“Well, we really only had one major problem, and it was my fault too. The overdrive let go, because who knew you had to lube those things? Well I know it now. Anyway, we were up in Canada, and it was a holiday when it let go. So I took out the Model A owner’s list, and started making calls. Everyone I called was glad to help, and it didn’t take too long to locate the part, though it was in Ohio. So we rented a car, drove to Ohio to get the part, which the owner donated to us, drove back to Canada, and three days and 700 unplanned miles later, we got back on the road.”

Another hotel guest wandered up to the Packer while we were talking and asked Rob to take his picture next to it. Rob happily obliged the man. “Happens every day.”

Well, it’s not every day you meet someone living out their dream and driving a car older than they are across the country either. Then I asked him his best story of the trip.

“Well, I’d have to say all the great people we met. When we started out, we weren’t sure what to expect, you know? I mean, this thing is pretty old, so that was always a risk. There are some great people out there, like the Model A Owner’s on the list that were always willing to lend a hand or put us up for a night. We met more great people on this trip that we ever could have hoped to.” He paused a second then added, “Oh yeah, one other cool thing that happened, just a few days ago, we were driving through El Paso and it was just about to rain. Thousands of tarantulas were crossing the road heading for higher ground so they wouldn’t drown in their holes when the storm came. That was pretty cool.”

At that point his wife, a beautiful woman with a radiant smile came over and said, “C’mon Rob, let’s get going.” She turned to me and said, “He’ll stand here and talk all day if I don’t get him going. Nice bikes you guy have.” I guess we’re living out a dream too, but to be honest, my true riding dream involves a LOT more of the planet than we’d see on this ride.

We crossed the street to get some gas and Abi put some air in his tires. Filling my bike, I noticed something horribly wrong with Abi’s machine. As he was filling the rear tire, his bike decided to take a nap. Even though the natural resting position of a bike is on its side, it’s still a sickening feeling to see the underbelly of a motorcycle. Abi was fine, the bike suffered some minor damage. The bike just was tipped off balance because of the slight angle of the parking lot. I helped him lift the now battered and bruised Fireball, after first taking a few pictures. Nurse Fiona helped him tape up his broken turn signal, and we were on our way.

Route 89 continued to entertain, first following a meandering river through cliffs of towering red rocks, then through more great switchbacks as we climbed over 7000 feet to Flagstaff.

Fifty-six miles from the Grand Canyon, we stopped for more gas. An imposing looking figure sat astride his giant motorcycle in the parking lot. He had a walkie talkie attached to his handlebars, and a giant antenna on the back of the bike. A patch on his jacket read, ‘I am Captain Kurk Setz of the Starship Valkyrie. My mission is to explore strange new worlds. I come in peace.’ Another patch over his heart simply read ‘Vietnam Vet.’

Like dogs in a park, bikers will almost always go over and check each other out, though we don’t generally do the sniffing around part. I asked Captain Kirk what he was doing there. “I’m supposed to meet my friends in this lot.” The captain of Starship Valkyrie paused, as if listening to the wind for a second, “or at least I hope it’s this lot. Been here for a little while now. Maybe it was a different lot. Shit, I dunno.” Exchanging intergalactic peace salutes, we parted ways to seek out new life and new civilizations. Or at least some really good views.

Minutes later, we pulled into the Grand Canyon visitor center to get our first glimpse of the Grand Canyon.

Breathtaking.

We walked past thousands of Japanese and German tourists. This is common in every National Park I’ve visited. German and Japanese tourists outnumber Americans by at least ten to one. After climbing the observation tower for another spectacular view, and dodging busloads of peace-sign flashing Japanese tourists, cameras click-click-clicking away, we left.

Since the Grand Canyon is so amazing, instead of one word, I asked for a phrase to sum up everyone’s first impression.

Fiona: Holy Tuzigoot!
Abi: This place is getting Disneyified.
Me: Sushi, anyone?

Our most urgent problem was we needed lodging for the night. For some reason, Tusayan is the only town within fifty miles that has hotels. Strange to think of the difficulty of finding lodging so close to one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World. We pulled into the Tusayan Quality Inn lot with high hopes. Fiona went in, because we’ve found a pretty girl always has a better chance of getting a room and/or good deal then a smelly, bug crusted biker. As she negotiated for a room, Abi and I were immediately surrounded.

Older, name tag wearing tourists were being herded from the hotel lobby onto a tour bus. Many of the men paused by the bikes. The wistful look in their eyes said it all to me. Bus tours suck. A few asked us questions as their wives yelled, “Hurry up and get on the bus already!”

The Quality Inn had three expensive suites left, by the time we discussed it, one of those three was booked. Knowing the dearth of hotels past Tusayan, we scoffed up one of the two remaining rooms. Throwing open the curtains, I was amazed at the view from our expensive suite. No, not a great view of the Grand Canyon, our room overlooked a cluttered junkyard behind the hotel.

 Our Lovely View. Is that the Brady Bunch Family Station Wagon?

Half an hour later, a very manly and masculine looking bright yellow Jeep picked us up at the hotel. Our driver, Larry was completely decked out in leather, including chaps, with an Indiana Jones hat on his head. This guy looked like quite a character in his cowboy costume. Thank God Chip, the Pink Jeep driver didn’t dress like Larry. That would have been too much.

We picked up two other women, and the tour started. Larry broke into his introduction speech as we turned onto a dirt road. “I wandered into the office one day and they asked if I could drive a Jeep. I said sure, how hard can it be? That’s how I got this job.” I don’t believe he was giving us the typical tour driver line, I think he was serious.

One of the woman that we’d picked up said, “I hope this isn’t one of those tours where we look at a bunch of plants. I’m a member of the American Horticultural Society, and I don’t care to see that stuff.” I guessed she was also a member of the National Blabbermouth Society, maybe its president.

Nevermind what anyone else wanted to see, Blabbermouth had spoken, and not for the last time. But that was OK, because poor Larry didn’t know much about the plants and trees he was showing us anyway. He would point out a pine tree and say, “There’s a good example of a pinion tree.” Blabbermouth would cut him off, “Uhh, no Larry, actually, that’s a juniper.” Larry replied, ‘Well, you might be right, that’s not really a good example of a pinion pine, but I’ll find ya one, I swear.” Not one to give up easily, he parked the Jeep, head swiveling and bobbling around, determined to find actual examples of the things he was talking about, but rarely was successful.

Sunset was fast approaching. Blabbermouth almost constantly talked and talked and talked and talked at us. If she wasn’t talking, she was bitching at Larry that we better not miss the sunset. Our poor driver finally gave up and said, “OK, I better step on it so we don’t miss the sunset.” Suddenly, Fiona spotted some elk. We had to scream at Larry to stop the Jeep, because Blabbermouth had commanded him to get moving. As we sat there admiring these giant animals, we heard one of the elk ‘bugling’ a haunting cry warning the other elk in the area that humans are nearby. This close encounter was something that all but one passenger enjoyed.

“Uhh, the sunset Larry, we better not miss it!”

Larry, now clearly frustrated by Blabbermouth said, “Seen enough? If we don’t get going, we’ll miss the sunset for sure.” Abi spotted something on this admittedly boring trip that actually interested him, so he asked Larry what some maroon plants were under some trees. Not wanting to get shut down by Blabbermouth once again, he just replied, “I dunno.”

Even with Blabermouth’s constant bitching, we still missed the best part of the sunset over the Grand Canyon, the so-called golden hour before sundown when the light on the canyon walls is most dramatic. When we’d booked the tour, it sounded like it would be four wheeling down into the canyon for a unique experience; instead we watched the end of the sunset from a public lookout area that we’d passed on the ride into to Tusayan.

The twilight ride back to the hotel was cold and windy and once again we didn’t have helmets on, though this time it was because we were in a Jeep. I wished for my helmet more in that Jeep than I had for the cold ride back the previous night in Sedona, because it would have muffled Blabbermouth’s nonstop drone. Under the seat we found an old ratty blanket to keep warm. Blabbermouth talked and talked some more, and we all nearly fell asleep from boredom. Everything the Pink Jeep tour was; exhilarating and incredible – this tour was not. In other words, it definitely didn’t rock.

 The Amazing Larry – A One-Of-A-Kind

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Author: frenchy

One Response to “Cross Country 2.0 – Day 3”

1. RayW says:

   December 27, 2007 at 9:05 AM

   Great ride stories. Met some older folks similar to the ones you met with the Madel A. Mine were driving an old MGTC though. Met them at a rest stop on the Ohio turnpike on a cold drizzeling October day years ago. They were riding with the top down in spite of the weather. I chatted with them a bit and offered to help them put the top up. They declined saying it wasn’t any warmer in the car top up or down and once they were moving the rain went over the top. So off they went all bundled up in blankets having the time of their lives.

   RayW
   (from the FJR forum)

   Reply