Dirts recent story about his mountain bike accident recalled some old memories for me.
In my late 60's while living in NM and AZ, I towed a utility trailer behind my RV with an ATV and a 200cc motor cycle. The ATV was a Yamaha Kodiak model, 350cc, 4 wheel drive with the split transmission option of shifting all gears into a lower range for heavy going. The motor cycle was a Yamaha TW200 Road/trail model with the wider tires for handling sandy desert washes. I was well equipped to explore some back country sites that most people couldn't get to. Since my hobby was metal detecting, I primarily used these machines to locate hard to find treasure hunting sites. Or just to site see and explore.
The one thing I was missing was a riding partner. It is just not very safe to prowl the back sides of that western country by yourself. The vast majority of old guys around my age brackett and retired who treasure hunted and traveled and lived in RV Parks just were not the adventurous types in most cases. Or they had a wife who objected to them playing treasure hunting games with an old looney-tunes guy like me who was living in his third childhood.
Lots of those old guys would be just tickled pink to go help me metal detect some old mining or ghost town site that I had researched and risked my life to locate......as long as it was "safe" to get there and I could get them back in time for supper and the bingo games in the recreational hall that night.
And then I met Angie. She was a girl. And popular with all the bachelor types due to pleasant features and atheletic body. Angie was a retired school teacher from the east coast and was RV'ing the west in a quest for adventure.
I went up to the Rec hall one day to see if I could scrounge up some old guy to go riding with me. They were busy playing cards, shooting pool or throwing darts and declined my offer to ride my ATV while I rode the cycle. I was dissapointed. But as I stepped outside and was mounting my ATV, Angie had followed me and she said, "You didn't ask me."
I thought that was OK, maybe she could handle the real easy stuff on the ATV, so I loaded her on to the back and road her round and round the rec hall (just to impress the boys
) and all around the RV park explaining the gears and such on the ATV. Then I put her up front for a solo ride while I rode tight behind her, you know, just in case she lost the handle bars or something and round and round the rec hall and RV park we go again.
Angie was having a tough time working the throttle and shifting the gears and the ATV was bucking and snorting, stopping and starting, and all the time Angie and I were bumping and grinding up there on top. All in all, the day was shaping up pretty good. Some of the guys had even stepped outside the rec hall to watch and some of the old women had their noses in the air making sniffing sounds but Angie and I were having too much fun to pay them too much attention.
I took Angie out on some easy dirt trails at first, she rode the ATV while I rode the cycle, and then slowly promoted her to the slightly more difficult trails. One thing I really impressed on her was to keep a tight grip on the handle bars so that hitting a good sized rock would not wrench the bars out of her hands and make her loose control.
Angie became one of the best treasure hunting partners I ever had. She could even twist the knobs on a metal detector to where they were supposed to be. We traveled around NM and southern AZ together, she pulling her cab-over RV and me following behind towing the ATV and cycle. We enjoyed each others company and saw some sites that most folks dont get to see.
When we were out riding and came to a rough stretch, Angie would stop, look at me, and if I said "go ahead, you can do it," she would just give me that beautiful smile and off she would go. She had absolute faith in my opinion. And that is how I almost lost her.
We were riding near Greaterville, AZ, one day and we came to a large wash about 20 yards wide. A recent flashflood had removed all sand and dirt and most of the gravel, leaving nothing but large boulders and lots of volleyball to basketball sized rocks. Just a solid layer of boulders. I knew the crevices between boulders would grab the front wheel of my cycle and wreck me, converting me to a greasy spot on a boulder. And the same thing could happen to Angie on the ATV unless she just let it crawl slowly across in 4 wheel drive. At any rate, I knew neither one of us should ride it.
Angie, with complete faith in my opinion, pulled up beside me and looked at that wash, unperturbed by what she saw. "Can I ride that?" she asked in her innocent little way. "Suuuurreee, you can." I replied in a mocking, derisive way but Angie took it the wrong way.
"OK," she chirped, and off whe went.
She hit it too hard and too fast. I had never seen anything like that ride. The bash plate was taking a beating slamming those rocks and the ATV and it was bounding and leaping from boulder to boulder and Angie's shapely bottom was two feet off the seat most of the way across but she never once turned loose the handlebars in spite of the fact that they were whipping back and forth beating the hell out of her. The ATV whipped left, right, straight ahead, up and down, and eventually Angie rammed it up the bank on the far side. She stopped it, stood up on it, whipping her fist's at the air like a prize fighter and let out a scream of triumph.
"Come on over," she yelled at me. Boy, what a revolting situation that was. I looked at the bed of that wash. My boyish pride was nagging at me to go for it but common sense prevailed, I swallowed my pride, and informed Angie that I couldnt do it on the motorcycle.
"Sure you can," she encouraged me, "You said yourself that a motor cycle can go places an ATV cant." Girls never, never, forget anything you say and can read it back to you at he most inconvenient times.
"Angie" I pleaded, "this aint one of them places."
"You are getting to be an old fuddy duddy." she said. Even that didnt entice me to try riding that wash of death.
I finally talked Angie into crawling the ATV back thru the wash. Even that was a rough ride, often with things like the right front wheel on one boulder and the left rear wheel on another boulder and falling sharply forward and rocking and rolling and Angie with that girlish, "wheeeeeeee" sound. "This really is fun," she shouted.
When she climbed up out of the wash and stopped beside me, she asked why I didnt cross the wash. I had to admit I was afraid to.
She made one of them pouting expressions and said, "Ohhhh, Pooorrrr Baaabby." Danged women.
In my late 60's while living in NM and AZ, I towed a utility trailer behind my RV with an ATV and a 200cc motor cycle. The ATV was a Yamaha Kodiak model, 350cc, 4 wheel drive with the split transmission option of shifting all gears into a lower range for heavy going. The motor cycle was a Yamaha TW200 Road/trail model with the wider tires for handling sandy desert washes. I was well equipped to explore some back country sites that most people couldn't get to. Since my hobby was metal detecting, I primarily used these machines to locate hard to find treasure hunting sites. Or just to site see and explore.
The one thing I was missing was a riding partner. It is just not very safe to prowl the back sides of that western country by yourself. The vast majority of old guys around my age brackett and retired who treasure hunted and traveled and lived in RV Parks just were not the adventurous types in most cases. Or they had a wife who objected to them playing treasure hunting games with an old looney-tunes guy like me who was living in his third childhood.
Lots of those old guys would be just tickled pink to go help me metal detect some old mining or ghost town site that I had researched and risked my life to locate......as long as it was "safe" to get there and I could get them back in time for supper and the bingo games in the recreational hall that night.
And then I met Angie. She was a girl. And popular with all the bachelor types due to pleasant features and atheletic body. Angie was a retired school teacher from the east coast and was RV'ing the west in a quest for adventure.
I went up to the Rec hall one day to see if I could scrounge up some old guy to go riding with me. They were busy playing cards, shooting pool or throwing darts and declined my offer to ride my ATV while I rode the cycle. I was dissapointed. But as I stepped outside and was mounting my ATV, Angie had followed me and she said, "You didn't ask me."
I thought that was OK, maybe she could handle the real easy stuff on the ATV, so I loaded her on to the back and road her round and round the rec hall (just to impress the boys
) and all around the RV park explaining the gears and such on the ATV. Then I put her up front for a solo ride while I rode tight behind her, you know, just in case she lost the handle bars or something and round and round the rec hall and RV park we go again.Angie was having a tough time working the throttle and shifting the gears and the ATV was bucking and snorting, stopping and starting, and all the time Angie and I were bumping and grinding up there on top. All in all, the day was shaping up pretty good. Some of the guys had even stepped outside the rec hall to watch and some of the old women had their noses in the air making sniffing sounds but Angie and I were having too much fun to pay them too much attention.
I took Angie out on some easy dirt trails at first, she rode the ATV while I rode the cycle, and then slowly promoted her to the slightly more difficult trails. One thing I really impressed on her was to keep a tight grip on the handle bars so that hitting a good sized rock would not wrench the bars out of her hands and make her loose control.
Angie became one of the best treasure hunting partners I ever had. She could even twist the knobs on a metal detector to where they were supposed to be. We traveled around NM and southern AZ together, she pulling her cab-over RV and me following behind towing the ATV and cycle. We enjoyed each others company and saw some sites that most folks dont get to see.
When we were out riding and came to a rough stretch, Angie would stop, look at me, and if I said "go ahead, you can do it," she would just give me that beautiful smile and off she would go. She had absolute faith in my opinion. And that is how I almost lost her.
We were riding near Greaterville, AZ, one day and we came to a large wash about 20 yards wide. A recent flashflood had removed all sand and dirt and most of the gravel, leaving nothing but large boulders and lots of volleyball to basketball sized rocks. Just a solid layer of boulders. I knew the crevices between boulders would grab the front wheel of my cycle and wreck me, converting me to a greasy spot on a boulder. And the same thing could happen to Angie on the ATV unless she just let it crawl slowly across in 4 wheel drive. At any rate, I knew neither one of us should ride it.
Angie, with complete faith in my opinion, pulled up beside me and looked at that wash, unperturbed by what she saw. "Can I ride that?" she asked in her innocent little way. "Suuuurreee, you can." I replied in a mocking, derisive way but Angie took it the wrong way.
"OK," she chirped, and off whe went.
She hit it too hard and too fast. I had never seen anything like that ride. The bash plate was taking a beating slamming those rocks and the ATV and it was bounding and leaping from boulder to boulder and Angie's shapely bottom was two feet off the seat most of the way across but she never once turned loose the handlebars in spite of the fact that they were whipping back and forth beating the hell out of her. The ATV whipped left, right, straight ahead, up and down, and eventually Angie rammed it up the bank on the far side. She stopped it, stood up on it, whipping her fist's at the air like a prize fighter and let out a scream of triumph.
"Come on over," she yelled at me. Boy, what a revolting situation that was. I looked at the bed of that wash. My boyish pride was nagging at me to go for it but common sense prevailed, I swallowed my pride, and informed Angie that I couldnt do it on the motorcycle.
"Sure you can," she encouraged me, "You said yourself that a motor cycle can go places an ATV cant." Girls never, never, forget anything you say and can read it back to you at he most inconvenient times.
"Angie" I pleaded, "this aint one of them places."
"You are getting to be an old fuddy duddy." she said. Even that didnt entice me to try riding that wash of death.
I finally talked Angie into crawling the ATV back thru the wash. Even that was a rough ride, often with things like the right front wheel on one boulder and the left rear wheel on another boulder and falling sharply forward and rocking and rolling and Angie with that girlish, "wheeeeeeee" sound. "This really is fun," she shouted.
When she climbed up out of the wash and stopped beside me, she asked why I didnt cross the wash. I had to admit I was afraid to.
She made one of them pouting expressions and said, "Ohhhh, Pooorrrr Baaabby." Danged women.
Sunny was asking about the other lady in a past post. Vivian, wasn't it ?? I like the sounds of Angie better although it'd be foolhearty to rule out a former Vegas showgirl. Always been kind of flexible that way.
....and sending a picture of the ATV.
Both were highly eddicated, had masters degrees plus, and believe me, I have been bad mouthed by the best. And them two girls didn't larn all them words they used in college either.