Chapter 6: Arriving in the USA

Damian and Brendan arrive in America and pick up their motorcycles.

Damian recounts; We flew direct to LAX from Melbourne then caught a flight from LAX to Dulles airport to meet the guy I purchased my K1600, Virginian John.

I had phone conversations and communicated via emails etc., when purchasing the bike, so I knew he was a funny bugger. He greeted us with a bunch of wilted flowers at Dulles airport at 5:30am. I knew we were going to get along well so I threw them in the bin!

Virginian John had picked up the bike Brendan purchased 2 months earlier in Richmond, VA and was storing it at his place with mine. We used this first week of our trip to set up our newly purchased BMW K1600 GT bikes and get used to riding on the right side of the road. I found the transition easy for most part of the ride. It was easy when traffic was around because you could just go with the flow.

With no traffic at intersections, we had to take our time, in Australia we look to the right give way then the left, it becomes habit. It’s the opposite in the US. That was the only hard habit to break, the rest was all easy.

We had a great time riding in VA, WV, and NC with John while staying at his home. The local riding through oak tree covered mountains with rivers and streams flowing is a great memory and we will do it again. We rode to Harpers Ferry where we walked the town and read the Civil War information of what took place there.

John also introduced us to a diner breakfast. I went with the “Big Breaky”:

• 2 Eggs over easy
• Bacon and Sausage
• Potato hash brown thingy
• Grits (what the hell, they can be thrown out)
• 2 Pancakes with Butter (they should be on a separate plate)

Virginia John saw I wasn’t too impressed with the dry pancakes with butter so he reached over and got the maple syrup and poured it all over my breakfast saying, “this is how you eat it “.

My thoughts “maple syrup is for pancakes ONLY, it doesn’t belong on bacon, sausages or eggs". I quickly learned diner breakfasts had to be kept limited or I would be arriving back in Australia weighing in at 200kgs.

The Virginia, West Virginia North Carolina riding was an eye opener seeing the old homesteads with American flags everywhere and the road conditions were unbelievably good. This gave great confidence to Brendan and I seeing how well maintained the Roads were all over America.