HeadLines2- American Voyager Association

Lunch at Fredericksburg Texas
By Richard Baxter
Posted 1/19/2010

Hey from Texas. For the past few weeks prior to this luncheon event- essentially since our October weekend in Paris (that's Paris Texas), I'd been having trouble keeping the battery up. The lead/acid battery was only about a year old & I'd kept it pretty much on a battery tender but ya never know how long one will last. Sealed gel battery was not readily available, so I got another traditional type battery. It was dry-charged but after adding the acid, I charged it for about an hour before starting the bike. It fired right up. I put Sea Foam in the tank when we gassed up upon leaving home.

Misting & mid-40s, SugarBeet wore her leather but I thought positive & wore the mesh jacket when we left on a dreary morning for lunch in F'burg. With the mist even behind the windshield, we were getting a little chilly, so we stopped in Burnet and put on the rainsuits. When I started back up, the bike backfired...

...when we slowed to turn around to go home (SWMBO), as I suspected that it would, the engine died on the center stripe of US281 & I coasted to the (now northbound) shoulder. Hit the starter button & not a whimper. It ain't the Sea Foam, it's the...(read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice)

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Southeast Regional AVA Rally

By Dave and Dot Wirtz (AVA Marketing and Ride Directors)

Posted 1/19/2010

Whew, I am glad that we live in the south and have extended days of nice weather. HOWEVER, with that being said we attended the S.E. Regional Rally in Palm Coast, Fl in Oct. Friday the weather was great, Saturday a little cool BUT Sunday was frigid. Sorry but the Sunshine Voyagers of Florida had no control of the weather. Was glad we got a couple of good weather days out of it all.

David & Honor Lee along with Dot & Dave Wirtz from the Palmetto Voyagers and Chairman of the Board Duane Ash from Idaho attended the rally hosted by the Sunshine State Voyagers and what a great time we had. On Friday the people from Kawasaki welcomed us to their tent along with ROK where they gave us a pizza lunch. After they had closed the tent up for the day they gave demo rides for AVA members to try a ride on the new 1700 Voyager. After the ride, they requested we fill out a survey sheet reference the things we liked and disliked about the new 1700. There was also a section for the passenger to fill out which was a real nice thought. Sometimes the passenger has a lot to say, both good and bad.

There were several influential people from Kawasaki there...(read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice)

Southeast Regional AVA Rally

By Mike Biggerstaff
Posted 1/19/2010

The 2009 AVA Southeast Regional Rally has come and gone. By the time you actually read this it will seem like ancient history but the timing of the last Voyager’s Voice was such that it was too late to get something in that issue. There were good and not so good aspects about the Southeast Regional Rally. It was good to see old friends from the Palmetto Voyagers, Chairman of the Board Duane Ash from Idaho, and the Riders of Kawasaki, and I’m happy to report that the Riders of Kawasaki took good care of us. ROK provided us a pizza lunch on Friday for lunch and that afternoon night there were rides on the 1700 Voyager set aside exclusively for those attending the rally. If you have ever tried to get a ride on a demo bike at a ROK event you know how special having set aside rides is. My thanks go out to Brian Gibson and the rest of the ROK staff. The bad news is that things at the Speedway were a ghost town compared to other events we have done there in the past. Many of the major manufacturers pulled out to include Honda, Suzuki, Harley and Victory. The only manufactures were... (read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice).

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Enchanted Tour 2009
By Dave Schani
Posted 1/19/2010

Like I often do for New Mexico events, I left directly from work Wednesday afternoon but this time a little earlier than I usually do. The weather forecast for my route had such high rain probabilities that I had briefly considered canceling my trip. I wandered through Llano and Brady avoiding most of the precipitation although I had a few minutes of steady rain and a few stretches of wet roads.

Kevin Sawatsky, Along the way the road goes through an area of pasture land dotted with huge wind turbines on both sides of the road - you can get quite close to them here. Approaching Sweetwater, I hit several more minutes of rain, however, I was able to continue at a speed that allowed the fairing of the RT to keep most of it off me. By the time I got to Sweetwater, the rain had stopped at least temporarily so I decided to continue to Snyder and spend the night there.

The next morning, I was on the road by about 6am. I arrived in Lubbock for rush hour but...
...Friday morning, after breakfast at the campground, we headed north into the mountains through Mora and on to the Enchanted Circle going through Angel Fire, Red River, and Taos. At the outskirts of Taos, we detoured west to the Rio Grande Gorge. Bud, Rod, and I had been there back in July during the AVA rally but for some of our group it was the first time.
Saturday was a real change of scenery from the day before. Our route initially took us northeast through the foothills. When we reached Ocate, we turned east. By now, the scenery was turning to relatively flat grassland. We gassed up in Wagon Mound and continued east towards the town of Roy, which was our planned lunch stop. There wasn't much scenery to speak of until about ten miles from Roy. At that point...(read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice).

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Voyage Home Report
By John & Brenda Herring
Posted 1/19/2010

Complete Article

My motorcycle has suffered from a severe case of neglect and is in need of some tender loving care that I have not been able to provide yet, so I decided to rent a motorcycle from Eagle Rider for our annual Voyage Home gathering.

Brenda and I left early Thursday morning for Irving Texas where the Eagle Rider franchise was located and where I was to pickup my “Harley Davidson Electra Glide Classic”. It was a pretty blue color thank goodness and not black. The bike was okay and it felt good to get back on a HD, but it did not feel okay enough to want one in place of my Voyager.

I got the paper work done and the rental paid for, checked out on the bike and headed off for Paris with Brenda following me.

We arrived at the campground and where there was a lot of activity with the entire group setting up tents and parking motor homes. The weather was cool and that was a blessing in my opinion. As was reported by others it really rained that night. The radio said we got around 4 inches of rain and the lake had rose close to 2 feet by Sunday morning when we left.

We saw some nice areas and interesting towns, one of them was Roxton, which had a great museum that was a working drug store for almost 100 years, in far northeast Texas and had a good time and ate some good food with a lot of Great Friends.

It was great to meet new friends visit with all of our old friends, so from deep in my soul I would like to ask all of them to Ride Safe and Wear there Safety Gear all the time, because when you need it, you need it.

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Ice Cream Run 2009
By Kevin Braddy
Posted 1/19/2010
(Complete Article)

The results are in for the Illinois Prairie Voyagers 2009 fundraiser contest for Children with Special Needs. The contest turned into a two-man race down to the wire between Dion Liphart and Greg Lawson with Greg Lawson eventually beating Dion by 15 points at the end. We would like to thank everyone who entered and participated and for those that donated money towards two very special causes near and dear to members of the Illinois Prairie Voyagers. Easter Seal’s (which has an Autism program in Rockford) received a donation and United Cerebral Palsy of Southern Illinois also received a donation from the club. Having a son with Cerebral Palsy and having worked with Autistic children as a teacher, I am proud of the effort our club put towards helping these organizations. Remember to try to make a difference with your club in 2010. Life is short and the impact you make can make a difference plus the added benefit of bringing and building your club’s camaraderie as you work towards making your community, region or state a better place for all. The following pictures show current IPV President Greg Lawson delivering a check to Easter Seal’s and newly elected IPV President Kevin Braddy delivering a check to United Cerebral Palsy of Southern Illinois. Remember, now is the time to plan your clubs activities for the upcoming year.

Thank you to all, Kevin Braddy IPV president-elect.

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New Mexico to Home- She Said
By Lacy Braddy
Posted 1/19/2010

This is funny because we aren’t used to the Bunkhouse yet and at times, I really feel like we are going to break it. We say so long to the “trees” and the camping neighbor that thinks our rig is “pretty neat” and started on the way for home. Did I mention the night before we left there was tornado type weather that came through our hometown in Illinois, so needless to say we were anxious to get home. We decided to see how far we could get the first day and play it by ear. I don’t know the exact route we took, because I was riding BITC…. I mean I was riding on back (deciding to leave the VStrom home from the trip, because our honeymoon was at the Red River Rally and we thought it would be nice to do a similar trip on one bike again HA). We were traveling through Texas and had the main bungee strap on the Bunkhouse cover break. FYI, traveling about 70 MPH the cover of the Bunkhouse acts as a parachute. Kevin got the bike shut down and over to the side of the road, and I McGyver’d it to last 50 miles to a truck stop, where we bought bungees and clamped it down Clampett Style! Somewhere in Oklahoma we called Bob and Char Jones to see where they were. Did I mention that their car and our bike had both experienced vapor lock symptoms while in New Mexico? We had decided before leaving for home that we would keep each other posted. One evening while coming back to the campground to show Rick and Becky Breit our Bunkhouse, we had vapor lock or so we thought. Kevin and I pushed the Gold Wing... (read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice).

New Mexico to Home- He Said
By Kevin Braddy
Posted 1/19/2010

...The trip out to New Mexico was really uneventful with the minor exception of the bike running hotter than normal, but the temps were also a lot hotter than normal on the way out. When we arrived at the campground we set up and enjoyed a swim in the pool. We then went to the Rally headquarters and helped with a little bit of traffic control as the bikes headed out for the Pre Rally rides and activities. One evening we decided to ride back out to the campground to show Rick and Becky Breit our new Bunkhouse, on the way out to the campground the Wing suddenly died as if it was out of gas. Rick volunteered to go get some gas for us. We decided to push the Wing down the road to a safer area that had a pull off. Pushing a Wing down the road is something I never wish on anyone. Curiously Bob and Char Jones were also experiencing automobile problems that seemed similar to our Wing’s symptoms. Jonesy and I reasoned that there was a conspiracy against the Southern Illinois members.

The last evening of the rally we attended the banquet and I was surprised to learn that our chapter had been awarded an award for Community Service. This meant a lot to our chapter especially after we had someone create problems in our club several years ago including the theft of money. This truly had inspired our club to try to be a beacon of light to the world instead of becoming jaded from this action. Anyhow, we met a lot of members that we had only had Internet correspondence with in the past and really enjoyed the rally.

When we arrived back at the Bunkhouse, we had just fallen asleep when the cell phone rang. It was a call from my wife’s brother that is on the Fire Dept. wanting to know where we were and if we are ok. Seems that strong straight line winds and several tornados had come through our area and hit the town of Iuka, which is half a mile from our house, really hard. We assured him that we were ok, but we then were concerned about...

...Somewhere in Oklahoma, I stopped for fuel at a truck stop. My wife went inside to use the facilities and get a drink. While parking the bike and bunkhouse trailer in the parking lot I was approached by a squirrelly looking man that asked me if I was heading to the lake. I guess he thought that my bunkhouse trailer was some type of boat. I informed him that we were headed home. The next fuel stop after dark in Oklahoma is when the night started getting interesting. It seems that a young man was in the women’s restroom inside the gas station. My wife decided to inform this individual that he needed to remove himself from the facility. My wife has a degree in Criminal Justice and was originally planning on following her family members and becoming a State trooper, so I’m sure she asked him nicely to leave.

The next thing I see is my wife standing at the front door of the gas station with a guy standing next to her talking at her, notice I said at instead of too her. She asked for my assistance to handle the situation and long story short this individual ran to his Honda Civic and told me I was number one as he drove off. I asked my wife at this point to be on her best behavior and to not get arrested due to... (read the rest of the story in the Jan/Feb Voyagers Voice).

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