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| There's a lot of sittin on curbs during gas breaks. |
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| ...and finally, NEW ORLEANS !!! Perfect temperature and hospitality from Ed, our buddy Pete's dad. |
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| He was as good at being a tour guide as he was at hosting our motley crew. |
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| Mike cooked up a great breakfast. The unending love from Herald, our trusty iron skillet. |
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| The morning coffee session is heightened with the chicory flavor of New Orleans |
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| Did I mention the perfect weather?? |
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| And the fabulous presence of Tig. She just happened to be passing through on her own cross country adventure. |
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| Ed found her a helmet for our unladen ride through downtown. |
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| Sunlight strobing through sprawling oak trees and spanish moss, above ground cemetaries, romantic front porch balconies, and streetcars--perfect. |
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| Beignets and coffee at Cafe du Monde |
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| Sunset thoughts overlooking the Mississippi river bridge. |
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| Bourbin street |
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| Tank's cousin Dale. He picked me up the night before and we rode through empty New Olreans streets. It was the first time that the young generation of Tankersleys have ever ridden together. I guess we're carrying it on. My grandma and pa moved to New Orleans from Tennessee on a Harley with saddlebags and $100. |
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| The next day, he escorted us out of town. From a long distance relative to a good friend. |
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| Map session in a motel the morning Slim left. Deciding our destiny. It was a sad break up, because we love Slim. He's so good to us. We had ridden west from New Orleans through the cajun country bayous. We had an amazing seafood dinner as our last meal, slept, and then watched Big Slim blast off into the bitter cold that seems to hunt us. He made it all the way home that day. Perspective...It had taken us over a week to get to this spot. 1700 Harley Street Glider--fast. |
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| Slim took our winter gear back to Knoxville to alleviate the burden of carrying warm gear. How badly we need it one more day, oh well. Mike's friends Teresa and Luke took us in at their beautiful Houston apartment. They are amazing people incredible hosts. This is Theresa and her friend Amanda. |
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| We grilled up burgers in the magical Big Green Egg. Tasty |
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| Dinner number 1. Number 2 is in the works. Mike is fixing up some deep dish pizzas in Herald (the iron skillet). |
We are staying in Houston again tonight because both of our headlights blew while cruising at the mighty speeds of 65-70mph. Too many volts are going to the light. So our hunt now is to find new bulbs and voltage regulators. For our machines, that's no easy grab. We also wisely left with no extra points either. We would like to remedy all of this before we cross the border. The idea is to leave tomorrow to get to Corpus Christi and stay at Luke and Teresa's beachfront condo to wait for the parts. I sure hate when that happens!
