506 miles, 11.4 hours.

We needed to be in Winchester to return the Harley no later than 4pm today, so we had to leave Marinda's house very early. We were on the road by 6:15am- in fact, it wasn't light as we were leaving.

It was odd to be on two bikes. Tamara has been riding two-up with me for a long time, and only riding alone when we are near Portland. I don't think she has done a solo 400 mile day in several years. (the solo leg of today's trip was over 420 miles for her)

Leaving at 6am meant that we'd have plenty of time for stops. We found a nice little place for breakfast called the Triangle Waffle House in Dunn, NC. The food was fairly tasty.. and we were hungry. Our next stop was for a little roadside nap. We checked into the Iron Butt Motel for 40 minutes. We just laid our jackets out in the shade of some trees on some soft grass and laid down. We both napped well, even though we got bitten by some bugs. Still, it was better than falling asleep while riding.

We also had a lunch stop. So, with stops, we rode 427 miles in 8 hours and 50 minutes. That averages to 48mph, which is really good for Tamara (and not bad for me!).

Okay, I should really discuss my feelings on the Harley. I'm not a cruiser guy, and I make a lot of fun of the Harley-Davidson bikes and culture. Like BMW, it's a brand where people really buy into the name more than the bike's capabilities. I'm the opposite of that, so it's hard to understand. Having said that, I wear BMW gloves (because I like the fit), I've been to several Harley factories, and I was at the Harley-Davidson museum in its opening month. So I don't have as much of a problem as some people may think.

Anyhow, the bike. The Electra Glide is a very large, heavy bike, and it doesn't really live up to its theoretical level of luxury. For instance, the windscreen and fairing are large and put you in a bubble, yet they give a horrible amount of buffeting. It sounds like you are in the middle of the bass drum section of a marching band. The second problem is the heat. Being an air-cooled motor, wrapped in tupperware, it means the engine doesn't have a lot of airflow to cool off. So all the heat is pumped out the right side of the bike, onto your leg. I can't imagine how it would feel without boots and moto pants!

After returning the bike in Winchester, we got to ride 2-up on our own bike into DC. We stayed at a the house of a distant friend (i.e., someone we'd never met). He lives in a fantastic row house just north of downtown DC. Tamara and I are both fans of architecture and especially the residential density and form that a row house gives. So it was very neat to stay in a restored row house that was over 100 years old, especially since it had a two-car garage. It was very nice of Chris to let us stay at his place, considering we'd never met, and we really only had a website in common.