We had secret Santa at the place I work today. I got a pretty cool gift, from someone I don’t really know that well. She figured I was into bikes and she just happened to nail one of my dream bikes. It’ll probably always sit prominently on whatever desk I may sit in from now on.
I can get sentimental over certain shit; a good war movie, a new road I’ve never been on, that look my dog gives me when I come home, the national anthem, and a beautifully made motorcycle. What she gave me was 1940-1942 Indian four, and that was one of the most beautiful motorcycles ever made.
The real deal. Those fenders and that tractor seat. An inline four engine… This baby even had rear suspension.
Indian started making the four in 1928, and with WWII, they ceased production in 1942.
Anyway, kinda cool I thought. I hope all you biker pricks out there are having a Merry Christmas!
Traditionally, I’ve always been a Christmas guy, and have never really given a holiday nod to a thanksgiving. I don’t really love turkey particularly. Yams and potatoes cause you to take naps, and being trapped at a table talking to relatives you don’t know because of tradition isn’t really my thing. There’s that green bean casserole — I can get excited about that. It’s good when the green beans are fresh, and whomever makes them happens to throw in bacon and puts in some of those fried onion strings. Yeah, I love that.
But That’s just food.
My Steelers never play on thanksgiving; The Lions are boring and although I love the state of Texas, the Dallas Cowboys can eat a bag of hell. That’s where the nap comes in, traditionally.
That’s just the day itself. On any given day, you can make a turkey and find sports on TV….
I gotta say, I am thankful for what I have. Life is pretty good. Especially this year.
Here’s what I’m thankful for:
My family — the lot of em. They teach me, pretty much daily.
My wife. 28 years of her, and she of me. I got lucky there.
A grand kid! Can’t wait to see what that brings.
My Job — I found my niche early, and am still doing what I love to do.
My bike — It’s paid for, and in the garage.
America. Just… America. The constitution is a beautiful thing.
I have less than some, and more than a lot. Either way, if you’re thankful for what you have, it propels you for the future.
Since Easy Rider came out, almost 50 years ago there has always been the question on what happened to the Captain America bike. There were two; one was blown up and burned at the end of the move, and given to Dan Haggerty who supposedly rebuilt it. The other one (which appeared in most of the film) was stolen before the movie was even finished filming. There’s also been a handful of people who claimed to have put together the original bike, and I’ve found most to be problematic.
I think those bikes are long-ass gone.
The rumor that I tend to believe is that the remaining bikes were stolen by a certain 1% bike club, as a bit of payment and maybe even vendetta against Peter Fonda for events that happened during the making of “Hells Angels on wheels”.
Easy Rider took a year to edit and then premiere. Bikes are stolen and sold, fairly quickly for money. No one knew the bikes were going to be famous or that Easy Rider was going to be a hit, any more than all the other dozen B-movie motorcycle films that were showing up as the 3rd feature in drive ins all over the country. They certainly didn’t wait an entire year to find out. They were stolen, and they were sold, more than likely parted out.
Several people have popped up over the years (including Haggerty) claiming to have the original bike, and eager bike historians have bitten on the bait. Some were endorsed by Haggerty and even Fonda, who later back-pedaled on the endorsement. Haggerty has sold more than one “original bike”.
My take is that they’re long gone. Ray Charles could seen that, when you take in the circumstance and history of Easy Rider.
But a few weeks ago my friend Manchester Paul (whom I’ve ridden the Easy Rider route with) sent me some info on an Original Easy Rider bike that actually comes with some proof.
The original script had Billy and Wyatt as carnival stuntmen who were going for the big money by making a big drug haul. You see hints of this in the opening scene, where they show up on dirt bikes. They were headliners baby!
Bonhams Auctions in the UK got Fonda’s original 1968 Bultaco Pursang 250 MkII. It was sold, for an undisclosed amount, complete with an invoice from Bultaco Western to the Pando Company. Matching Numbers on the engine and frame…. I thought it was pretty cool.
Here’s the notes on the Auction:
Peter Fonda is a genuine motorcycle riding enthusiast and so when contemplating the task in his own movie, as his character Wyatt, of riding a chopper, he did not hesitate. But you can bet he jumped higher when engaged to also ride this Bultaco for a Pursang is an agile, go anywhere, lightweight that spells fun and turns on a sixpence…unlike Captain America!
To put into context, Bultaco’s premier model in the USA, the Pursang, was a powerful 250 cc comp model. It was a winner in virtually any type of high-speed-based off-road event. The Pursang range was later expanded to 360 cc and 370 cc, and reduced also to 125 cc.The boat-tail 250 MKII pushed out 34 horsepower from the crate and with the standard 5-speed was thought to be the fastest 250 in 1968. Warning: Do not let that high pipe burn your right leg!
This Pursang – now repainted and restored but still in ‘film used condition’ – is one of two bikes supplied by Bultaco to Peter Fonda’s Pando Company for ‘movie use’ in Easy Rider…see the invoice from Bultaco in the bike’s history file. Wyatt rides this Pursang to the La Contenta Bar to ‘do a deal’ in the very first scene. Billy, Dennis Hopper’s character, is riding a CZ motocrosser in the very same scene. From then on in the two are riding a pair of choppers.
When its hot down here, you have to make the most of the weather you have. It was too hot to ride the 600 miles I wanted to see, so I took the car. Scout the perimeter, I thought… I can always ride it later. I don’t mind re-seeing a thing.
a couple of months ago I was able to bust out and go scout that perimeter. I’m a bit behind on my blogging, life being what it is, so this report is a bit late.
Road trips being as they are, I had some time on my hands, so I made a video introduction for this one.
The best road trips always come with a loose destination in mind. Most of what I find turn out to be my favorite trips are what I find a long the way, not what I set out for. You don’t even really need a great destination, you just have to have some curiosity and a willingness to explore. If you have that, you can always find something good. I headed south, toward Yuma to the territorial prison.
Ever seen 3:10 to Yuma? I watched both the original and the remake the day before, just for shits and giggles. I wanted to get a little sense of the place. They’re both pretty good.
I spotted this as I was heading out of town —a Maricopa County railroad water tower. You can’t move things on rails without a lot of water. Rusty, Riveted and old — Pretty cool.
I hit highway 8 toward San Diego. Yuma was my next stop, and the Yuma territorial Prison. Yuma is pretty cool; as I came into town the streets were named after fallen police officers Veterans who’d served in WWI and WWII. People that needed to be remembered…. Very cool.
To the left is the guard tower, to the right in the original prison entrance.
The original prison entrance took in its first inmate on July of 1876. It served the area for 33 years, when Arizona was just a territory.
Message received; Just go to work. Yuma didn’t like you being a Bum.
From 1867 to 1909, over 3,000 prisoners walked here.
Where you served the hardest time.
The Isolation ward was carved out of the side of a stone hill.
Yuma Territorial prison is now a historical museum, after closing its doors in 1909.
I left the prison to go check out the historic Yuma Downtown, and a bridge I’d spotted from the Prison hill;
in 1912, Arizona became a state about the time that Henry Ford had made enough Model T’s and American’s were wanting to explore the continent. Crossing the Colorado river was a problem. Before this, you had to cross the river by ferry. This was the first bridge that crossed the Colorado river, and was sold as the ocean to ocean highway.
I left Yuma, and crossed the Colorado river to make my way toward California.
Back in 1990, I was a kid who was just discovering route 66 and set out to see what it was all about. I went to Amboy California and bought a postcard of a 1 lane, wooden plank road from a man named Buster Burris, who owned Roys Cafe. He told me some stories about route 66 back in the day that have always stuck with me, and further fueled my desire to explore. I’ve never seen a plank road before, and I’ve always wanted to.
The postcard that inspired my road trip
It’s still there: A wooden plank road. Back in the early part of the 20th century, crossing the desert between Yuma and San Diego was a challenge. The solution they came up with to cross the sand dunes of Southern California was wooden Plank Roads.
A postcard, from back in the day
I crashed for the night and
I left, and headed toward the Salton Sea.
Gristons cafe. I gotta think they slung hash here, and knew their regulars by name. Open 24 hours.
The salton Sea to be honest, was pretty underwhelming. It’s a massive lake, the largest in California and was never supposed to be there, but a breach from the Colorado river filled the valley with water in the early 1900’s. It became a resort town in the 1950’s, filled with Motels, restaurants and Homes. As the lake has no outlet, it slowly started killing the fish, started to smell and the resorts died.
I showed up and checked them out, but the structures that were left were either collapsed or filled with Graffiti, and I lost interest and decided to start heading back to AZ.
Ehhh, bring a gas mask.
Places like Bombay Beach and Salton city are always cool until some dickhead vandal finds them. They lose the vibe….
I’m always up for the Patton Museum, and headed for Chiriaco summit, just outside of Indo. It was closed, but they look like they’re expanding it and doing a complete re-model. I was ready to get home anyway, so headed down the 10 toward home.
Sometimes, its the little things that just make you happier than hell.
My 2nd oldest just drove herself to work. She went from me wondering how I was going to get that much insurance, to owning her way around the road. At least, that’s how I saw it. She took my Dodge truck through busy traffic into her Job at Burlington coat factory.
It’s a victory….Way nice…. I’m a pretty proud dad right now.
I’m up at 5 Am on a Saturday. Hell, I was up an hour ago at 4. Most people joke that’s what old men do, but I’ve been doing that since I was 10. I don’t know why.
When they finally finished filming Easy Rider, Dennis Hopper took the footage to his home in Taos New Mexico to begin editing it. It took about a year, and hopper had the film down to 3 hours long, which included a long police chase scene. He wouldn’t budge when they suggested he cut it down to a standard length film, but he finally relented and they edited it down to 90 minutes, in which the chase scene was cut out. This picture is from a photographer who traveled with the film crew, and to my knowledge, have never been seen before. I have hundreds of these never before seen pictures that I’ll be showing on my Instagram account over the next few weeks, with some of the stories behind them.
I haven’t ridden much lately. It’s pretty hot outside. It hit 118 degrees a couple of days ago here, which is pretty damn hot. On a bike, in the wind, thats like 130 degrees. I’ve done it before, and it never really turned out that great for me.
I’m not bitching; I love it. It beats the living hell out of snow in the winter. You don’t have to shovel heat off your car, or your doorstep. You don’t slide sideways into a ditch, because of heat.
These are the times for an air conditioned car. It’s 108 today, and that’s more like it. It’s that extra 10 degrees that’ll kick your ass on a long ride. In another month, It’ll be time to bust out the bike and go ride a place and see something new.
Never been to Alamagordo… Or Madrid New Mexico. Or white sands…. I’ve been kicking those places around to ride out and have a little look-see. I can feel a ride coming on.
Pretty much my whole life, I’ve made fun of country music. I laughed it off as corny and even a little too simple for my tastes. I’ve liked a few artists; Dwight Yoakam, Johnny Cash, a little Alabama or a country/pop crossover song here and there. Mostly, nothing I’d admit to.
I think it all started with that trip across the Texas Panhandle. I found some old classic country riding through there, and it just seemed to fit the territory. No big deal; I enjoyed the hell out of those miles. That was a few months ago.
I came home, and lived my life.
Now all of a sudden, The last couple of weeks, for some reason all I’ve been listening to is country music on the way to work. I found this playlist on my Amazon Prime account on my phone that sync’s up with my car and its been Patsy Cline, Merle Haggard, Buck Owens, Loretta Lynn… shit I’ve heard, but never listened to. Even some of the new stuff; yeah, it’s simple and even so corny sometimes I wince a bit when I hear it.
Yeah, I think I’ve had a stroke. This stuff all of a sudden sounds good to me.
