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Originally Posted by Sarris
Whats up with the bike? Did you break down? Give us the scoop-de-poop.
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OK, first things first:
Seems like all the people I was supposed to meet are some variation of John !!
To John in Indiana: I missed you at work. Sorry, will try again on the return.
Bike is fine, I think. It just developed a slight oil leak near the top. Hope it's just the inspection cover gasket. Only used about 3 oz of oil but the brown stains on the left side fins and slight smell of hot oil worrys me a bit. I probably could have ridden it back home but didn't want to chance it. Alas, that leaves me without a ride to visit the folks I wanted to see. Maybe they will find something easy and fix it today.
Except for being HOT, the trip down was fine. US 41 is an excellent route. Good road; almost no traffic most of the way.
I will NOT be taking the Beal's Gap run north of Monteagle on the way back. If you like the twisties, it's great BUT.....if you have no experience with mountain roads OR your last experience was on a different bike or with different tires, you might be in for a BIG surprise on the GZ.
I like the way the GZ "falls" into the sharp turns in town; a little lean, a little push on the bar and ZIP, you're around the corner. This is NOT, however, a good trait to have in the twisties.....if you aren't used to it !!!! It feels like over-steer until you get used to it...........which I'm not going to worry about much since I plan to avoid them as much as possible in the future.
The bike handled beautifully everywhere else. If I could see all or most of the way through a curve I was fine. That old saying about not teaching an old dog new tricks is NOT true but.......it is very hard for an old dog to UN-LEARN his old habits.
Overall MPG so far is 73; about what I expected.
At this point, the weather report doesn't look good for going back at the end of the week so I might be staying longer than expected.