Heading Out On the Open Road

Well, i thought this trip would never start but on August 30 my dad and i had done our last minute packing and it was time to hit the highway, the Lincoln Highway. Not sure why my dad and uncle are so fascinated with this road...i could really care less if it was the first practical road to connect the east and west coast of the United States.

So, before we headed out my mom had to make us one final meal which consisted of eggs, bacon, and sausage.


i of course made a breakfast sandwich. i'll pretty much make a sandwich out of anything as long as there is bread available. Pretty sure i could eat anything between two pieces of bread, even Rocky Mountain Oysters.
After breakfast my mom had to pack a few more things in our bags such as rubber gloves because she heard me mention that one of my friends, brett, wore them under his riding gloves to keep his hands dry while riding...such she gave me about 30 pairs of rubber gloves...and she wouldn't let me take them out of my pack.

Originally my dad just planned on riding to Pittsburgh...Psh, not on my watch. If we're going on a biking trip we're at least leaving the state on the first day. So my dad and i planned on spending the night in Canton, Ohio.

While on the road my dad said he wanted to pull over to stretch his legs and grab a drink. For a change he could hear me perfectly through his headset and CB radio. While we taking a break another biker stopped for a smoke behind us. My dad being the 'social-biker' type went over to say hello tell the guy all about hour trip to San Francisco by taking route 30. My dad then asked the biker, Mark, where he was headed. He told us he was headed to Pittsburgh to meet a girl he met on the internet...

It took a lot for me not to bust out laughing because he just looked ridiculous in dirty jeans, t-shirt with a pocket, long hair, beard, and crooked. Mark then told us that hopefully this girl will be better than the last one he met on the internet...man it keeps getting better. He then went on about how this girl sells metric bikes and sue to sell harley bikes and hasn't been on the back of a bike for 20 years...More information than i needed to know, a lot more. Seemed like he really just wanted a girl to sit on the back of his bike and nothing more. Whatever floats your boat.

Took the first gas stop a little ways before reaching Pittsburgh. i still haven't found out what the deal is with my gas tank. It doesn't have your typical fuel gauge, its just five bars that run in a semicircle so i really don't know how much fuel i really have. Sometimes i'll get 35 miles before the first fuel bar disappears and other times it disappears after 7 miles....

i decided to bring a riding buddy, Babo. i wasn't quite sure if i wanted to bring him or not because i was kind of limited on space but i just couldn't leave him behind. i strapped him to the back with a cargo net and even gave him a camelbak incase he got thristy. Who needs a girl when i got Babo.
My Uncle Floyd said that there was a church my dad and i had to check out in Pittsburgh before meeting up with him in Goshen, Indiana. Knowing my uncle there was something different about this church. Its called The Church Brew Works. Its pretty much a church that has been made into a pub which i was totally looking forward to.

The beer was pretty good. i only had two since i was riding. The first pint was a Pipe Organ Pale Ale and the second was a Celestial Gold. The food was really good too.

After eating some perogies i dug into some Maryland Crab Cakes which were delicious.

Can someone explain this banner to me? Do they really have midgets running around playing football?

Even though my dad and i passed on dessert at the brew works to buy us some more time to get to Canton, we still found ourselves chasing behind the sun and wasn't long until we were riding in the dark. We didn't find a hotel until after 10pm. On our way to Canton we actually went through a part of West Virginia..managed 3 states in on day, not too shabby.