Saturday morning was clear, sunny and crisp. The thermometer was hovering around 45 degrees when we pulled out of John and Caroline’s house. After about a 30-minute delay looking for Caroline’s jacket, which we never did find, we took of with J&C on their FatBoy and me of course on the Ultra. We made a slight detour to my temporary apartment where Caroline grabbed my extra leather and then took off up Westheimer (which eventually turns into FR 1093 west). In Fulshear we took FR359 north and stopped in at Dozier’s BBQ, WOW… an awesome sliced brisket sandwich, cole slaw and of course, a cold Bud. We continued up 359 to route 90 west, to FR359 north, again! In Pattison we picked up FR1458 and followed this really nice, twisty road through the country to FR3318. 3318 is a very straight road and has a very treacherous 90-degree turn completely covered with gravel. After the turn we went through plenty of open spaces (surprise, it’s Texas) to where the road comes to a T, took a left on Buller Rd, and pulled into Rifka’s Grocery store. You walk in and the heat is stifling, they have the stove on full blast, even though it’s now a comfortable 62 degrees. The locals are sitting around the bar, classic country music (Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, etc…) is coming from the jukebox and there’s a couple playing pool in the corner. We grab a few beers and discover that this place cooks up some great food, too bad we just ate. We asked a grizzled old man for directions, which he was more than happy to tell us (in a very broken, drunk Texas accent). Onto FR159 west, across the Colorado River, which was very muddy at this point, and on into Belleville where we re-fueled and seeing as how it was now about 67 degrees, I shed my leather and road in my T-shirt and Caroline asks if she can ride bitch with me because her ass is sore from the Softtail, she saddles up and off we go. 42 miles up the road is La Grange where we pick up 71 west, which is mostly a four-lane highway. We cross, a much cleaner, Colorado River and pick up FR 969 west which leads us into Austin. We eventually (5 hours after leaving Houston, Austin is normally a 2 ½ hour ride, if you don’t take the back roads) find J&C’s friend’s house and pull in for a beer and some pleasant conversation. I say my good byes and head down I-35 to Beverly’s Bar, (I found it on my biker friendly bar page). I pull in, park next to a nice full dress Harley, walk inside, grab an ice cold Bud, and walk back outside to chat with the local bikers. I started chatting with Jeff and his ole lady Sue (who had noticed my New Hampshire licensee plate), and in no time at all Jeff offers to let me bunk at their house for the night, I figure… what the hell why not, so we continue shooting the shit and drinking’ beer. Jeff asked me if I wanted to ride out to another bar, where there was a benefit for some guy that fell off a roof. Free food, cold beer, live music and good people were to be found… obviously I followed. As we start riding Jeff asks me to get on his left side as he has a glass eye in his right, I explain that I’m blind in my left and we make a perfect pair, with each other being on our good eye side. We pull into the bar (I don’t recall the name) sit down and Sue fixes me a plate of good old Texas BBQ. She comes bouncing back (did I mention that Sue has some of the biggest, firmest hooters I’ve ever seen) with her friend Meg, whom Sue says is very interested in me. Turns out that Meg is an extremely attractive, ex-stripper, who is married, albeit separated to a bigwig from the local Bandidos M/C chapter. I got my way out of that as politely as I could. I was introduced to Cajun and his ole lady Judy, who are great people also who decided they were going to the Roadhouse and did we want to ride along too. We stuck around talking to Pocahontas and “Traveling Travis” who is a very large biker poet/songwriter (Traveling is his real 1st name, turns out he was born in an 18-wheeler and his daddy named him Traveling) when some drunk ole crazy bitch, started yelling, kicking and screaming at Jeff, over her dog that she was choking the shit out of. After her dog was taken away from here and she was removed from the bar we decided to join up with Cajun. We stayed at the Roadhouse for one beer, shot the shit with Cajun, Judy and a few other bikers and we decided it was time to go back to the benefit. Well, Meg in all her glory first gets in a fight with Traveling, then starts punching some 6’ 5” 280lb monster (who told me earlier that he rides a sporty… picture that!!), who was polite enough to sit there and take it, though he was escorted out of the bar. Jeff’s eye was bothering him so he removed it and put on his patch and we decided to head back to Beverly’s, sit by the fireplace, watch Jeff show his eye to everyone and have a few more beers before heading home and calling it a night. I left at 9:00am the next morning though it was about 33 degrees and headed back to Houston. Where I ended up the the Dam Icehouse with 50-60 other bikers for some free food, cold beer and some great road stories. What a great adventure, great people, some good entertainment and most of all great riding.
