A friend of mine, Mr. Fusion, needed to replace his recently totaled Katana, curtesy of a Caddy, and he decided on a Ducati 900SS/SP. I fully supported this idea and he found what appeared to be a keeper down in Virginia. I told him I would run down with him to fetch it.
Thursday May 24 - Trip preparations
I borrowed a neighbors enclosed trailer to use and decided I better change the oil on my 9-5 which had the trailer hitch. While changing the oil I decided I should check the front wheel bearing since a strange sound had been coming from that side. The right front wheel bearing was toast, frick. That car wasn't going anywhere. I was supposed to be leaving Friday night after work. So, I called a friend that has a Honda Element with a hitch and we discussed and I was welcome to use it. Of course I had to take some berating but that's par for the course. Unfortunately for me he lives Downstate, I live Upstate. Just for the record, its not Upstate NY unless you are above I-90. The plan was I would drive from work in the Albany, NY area to his house, get the Element, drive back to my house to get the trailer, then back to NJ where Mr. Fusion lives. It would be a long night but that's okay, these are the type of trips that you remember.
Friday May 25
So after work I head down to my friends to get the Element and we would both return to my house to get the trailer. He didn't have anything going on that night so he agreed to go along for the ride and we would get something for dinner. I didn't bring any of my stuff because I left it in the trailer at home for fear I might leave it in the GTI after transferring to the Element. When I was almost to his house I got a call that my neighbor misunderstood when I needed the trailer and he needed to use it for the weekend. Now what was I supposed to do. So I called Mr. Fusion and told him what was going on. I told him to see if he could find a Uhaul in the area to rent a trailer. Well, we lucked out and they had one available and they were open until 8. I arrived at my friend's house, and we shoved off to Uhaul. In a way this was working out well because now I didn't have to travel all the way Upstate then back down to Jersey. However, since all my stuff was upstate I now didn't have my camera or any clothes for the next two days. That wasn't a big deal though and I figured I could pick up some cheap clothes at Walmart. We arrived at Uhaul to pick up the supposed motorcycle specific trailer. It was nothing more than a giant aluminum and steel trailer that had D-rings in the bed to latch down the bike. It didn't come with a ramp or straps. The nice Uhaul man hooked the trailer to the Element and we were trying to decide on something for dinner.
We settled on Asian as usual and decided to stop at this hibachi joint down by Woodbury Commons called Gasho of Japan. The building is pretty cool and is an old Japanese farmhouse from Japan that they brought over piece by piece. We were told the wait for 2 was about 20 minutes so we sat at the bar and ordered a couple drinks. I had a Zentini which was made with green tea liquor, Skyy vodka, and something else. I can't remember what. It was pretty tasty and by the time I was done our table was ready. We were seated upstairs and this place was packed. There were some other guests at our table. There was this annoying chick and her guido boyfriend who was drinking like a fish. I think he drank 4 or 5 small bottles of cold saki during dinner. She talked constantly and had her hair in a ponytail which she had to play with constantly. That's probably why her boyfriend was drinking so much. We both decided on the Master Chef special and some appetizers. My friend got a drink Tsunami which was a total chick drink and he was duly chided. The chef finally came over and I think he had a few too many sakis himself. When he went to do the knife trick he dropped the spatula. He didn't do any egg tricks, and no flaming onion volcano! What the heck! I know that stuff is cheesy but I come to expect it. The chicken and shrimp appetizer were a little over cooked but the steak was crazy good. The hibachi fried rice was just so-so. All in all it was decent and I would go again. We were there for what seemed like forever and didn't get out of there until about 10:00 I think. Then we stopped by Walmart so I could pick up some straps to tie down the motorcycle of which I already own some of but they were at home. Of course as soon as I left Walmart I remembered I forgot to get some clothes. Oh well, I could just get some tomorrow after we get back. I had to take my friend down to his work so he could get his other car to get back home. After getting lost a couple times and making some wrong turns on the way we finally got there around 11. I finally arrived at Mr. Fusion's house around 11:45. I was beat. I reeked like Hibachi and Mr. Fusion and Fusion's Girlfriend both told me so! We talked a little and hit the sack since we were supposed to be on the road at 7 the next day.
Saturday May 26
We got up around 6, showered and were on the road by 7. No way did I think Mr. Fusion would be ready to leave at 7. There is normal time, and then there is Fusion-time. You need a whole conversion slide ruler. If he says 10 minutes its 30. A 9-10pm arrival normally means 11. Anyway, today he was ready. We were making pretty good time and stopped somewhere in Jersey for breakfast. We got a couple breakfast sandwiches from BK and I got a coffee from Starbucks. Mr. Fusion ordered some kind of caramel latte half caf double caf with a twist of lemon thing. We made pretty good time on the way down to Virginia. We pretty much just followed I-95 most of the way to I-495 or something. I can't really remember since we were following the GPS. We hit a slow down somewhere around DC/Virginia area. We missed a couple turns here and there because we were talking so much and not really paying attention. We arrived at the owner's house around noonish. His name was Tanner. I was a pretty cool dude and has a RC50 track bike. He has decided to give up street riding in favor or track riding.
Here Tanner goes over some finer details of the bike
We made some small talk, and checked out the bike. It was everything he said it was. The red was amazing and really popped. Tanner went over the bike with Mr. Fusion and we got the bike loaded up on the trailer. Tanner did most of it since he was most familiar with trailering a bike.
Mr. Fusion was very proud.
Saying our goodbyes we head out for some lunch. This area was complete mall sprawl. So we decided on Chilli's, which I had never eaten at.
We decided to sit outside so we could keep an eye on the bike, plus I think Mr. Fusion just liked gazing at it. We had a real friendly waiter. We were discussing F1 and the upcoming Monte Carlo GP and he asked if we were talking about F1. We said yes and he began talking about it too and taking a seat at the empty table across from us which I found funny. I asked him was he was doing watching F1 since he is a southern boy and he should be watching the good ol' boys of NASCAR. He laughed and said he was actually from West Virginia so he should definitely be watching NASCAR. Just then his manager came out and he immediately sprung up from his chair. The manager just smiled and went inside. So we both had some kind of BBQ burger that was pretty tasty. I had a Dos Equis and I can remember what Mr. Fusion had. When we got the check the waiter only charged up for a coffee and a soda instead of out beers. That was pretty cool so we left him a good tip. I'm sure that was all part of his plan. We continued on out journey north to Jersey. The trip back was uneventful. I could tell we were both getting tired as we were talking less and less. We stopped a couple times and finally arrived back around 8pm or so. I did not feel like going to the store to buy some clothes so I decided I only had one more morning to go so I would just forget purchasing of clothes and revel in my stench. We discussed what to do for dinner. I could have just hung around and ate pizza because I didn't feel like driving. Rob and Mr. Fusion decided we were going to go to Lees somewhere in Jersey. Rob drove us in the hot Benz. He wasn't really driving that fast but it felt it in the back of the Benz and I suddenly had a Princess Di flashback so I asked him to slow down. We got there and after we parked to punks came out hollering something about the food sucking and there being roaches. That didn't deter us, what fine Jersey establishment wouldn't. When we got inside this place was supposed to be Polynesian but I would say it was mostly Chinese food. The interior was interesting and looked old school tiki hut hawiain or something, Gilligan's Island. I guess these themed restaurants used to be pretty popular. So after dinner we went back to Mr. Fusion's, Rob went home, and everyone crashed.
Sunday May 27
Sunday I got up and Mr. Fusion woke up about 30 minutes later. He made some coffee and Pop Tarts. We watched F1 then I hit the road to return the Element to Rob and the trailer to Uhaul. Then I hit the highway back upstate. As you may recall me mentioning earlier I didn't have any clothes to change into over the last two days and I was feeling pretty nasty. That was probably one of the best showers ever. It was almost like coming home from camping.
All in all it was a good trip and my friend got a great bike.
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