Welcome back to the third installment to the 2012 Tin Butt bike run sponsored by the Bayside Rider Club. Something I forgot to mention is that this is also a charity event. Riders are to bring a toy and there is another run on Saturday to the Metropolitan Church in Tampa on the following Saturday to deliver all the goodies. More on this later.
This is my documentation saying I was there, and it was pretty neat, too. We got a free drink by showing her our route direction sheet, and she gave us all these as proof we were there. Nice place.
Another one of my rear-view mirror shots that I have practically perfected from first trying it on our BFE runs.
Beautiful day for riding back in the hinterlands of Florida. Its an odd state: there are parts that look just like the country out by BFE and then there is scrub crap that even rattlers wouldn't live in, to swamp, to some good hills, to desolate open spaces. And that doesn't even include forests that we rode by.
This is the Yearling Trail area of Marjorie MacKinnon Rawling's The Yearling, which was a Pulitzer prize winning book and movie. It's much like Illlinois' Lincoln Trail up north. We were about 30 miles away from her home but this whole area is given the royal Yearling treatment.
Something I also need to say is, it's relatively difficult while riding a bike to reach for a camera, turn it on and then manhandle it so one hand can hold the camera, steady the flapping cloth handle and then point and shoot the damn thing all at once. So if this picture looks ho-hum, think of the skill and danger it took to bring it to your computer.
Anticipation is also important. One sees something that may be interesting, getting camera ready and set, then its just an ordinary truck with something maybe not so ordinary on the back. Well drilling?
Correction: A kind reader has stated they believe this is a truck that pours concrete to hard to reach places.
This is the Ocala National Forest, a 383,000 square mile forest of scrub pine which is the southernmost in the US. It is home to some endangered species, apparently not deer because the hunters were out in force all parked along the side the road all over up in this part.
I didn't take this picture, but we saw many bear crossing signs, I wasn't ever fast enough to have the camera ready, so I got this one off a Flicker page from Florida, and I am assuming it was taken in the area we were in.
More of the Ocala National Forest.
Sometimes it just doesn't work out but at least in this one you can see me holding a camera in the rear-view. Such skill. Such dexterity. What a dedicated blogger.
You may have to click to enlarge this one. It was huge building with massive acreage. Horse farm perhaps?
Interesting old wooden tressle-type bridges along here.
Our 2nd mandatory stop was Cactus Jack's in Salt Springs somewhere. They advertise it as the "Best Watering Hole In the Forest" and it was a pretty cool place.
Nice bar ambiance.
What this money means I don't know but the bar maid looked tough and wouldn't advise anyone messing with the dough.
Some of the riders in the group.
One of those bars where there is something to look at everywhere.
Even a tree that grew up through the floor and they just made a table out of it.
You might think I'm kidding about the geezers and their Goldwings, but here you have Bill who is at least 86 on the left and Fred, from Germany on the right who isn't too far behind. Nice guys and run as fast as they can. Fred told me that he wanted to ride a motorcycle when he was a kid, but his father forbade him. He said they were too dangerous, and then when his Father died, he finally started riding. I asked him if we could magically bring his Dad back, would he go for a ride with you, and Fred said, no, definitely not. He simply did not like them. It stemmed from an accident Dad's buddy had when he was a kid, and he died.
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