This weekend, my buddy Randall and his new wife came down from Dallas and stayed with us. He brought his motorcycle, hoping that we would be able to get out and ride.
The weather didn’t look like it was going to cooperate, rain being the theme of the last week, but the weatherman came through for us and predicted a nice day; that’s to say it was going to start out cloudy with the sun coming out and the temperature reaching 71 degrees.
We woke up at the crack of nine, a bit fuzzy-headed from our previous night’s frolicking, but steadfast in our determination to take the bikes out. After much lollygagging, mostly by me, we couldn’t take it any longer and we donned our leather. It was almost noon. The temperature was a bit chilly, but bearable and the promise of upcoming sunshine spurred us on.
We fueled up and left Cedar Park, headed out FM 1431 to Marble Falls. It was nice, scenic ride, all things told, but in Marble Falls, we pulled into a convenience store to warm up a little and rehydrate.
From there, we took US 281 north and then headed east on Park Road 4. From the moment we left the convenience store, we could see that the sun was trying hard to come out. The short bursts of sunshine gave us hope and we continued on, enjoying the vistas of Park Road 4 and the castle. When we got to TX 29, we again headed west, Cooper’s Barbeque in Llano being our ultimate destination.
We stopped about seven miles from Llano in hopes of getting a glimpse of the bald eagles nesting there, but they were shy and the foliage was still too dense to get more than a glimpse of their nest.
From there we headed on into Cooper’s and some of the best barbeque in the state. There were about 30 or 40 bikes there when we pulled in. We ate and had a little hair-of-the-dog in the form of a frosty beverage made from malted barley. Of course, we bought too much barbeque and had to bring some home.
When we stepped back outside, we were greeted by warm, sunny weather. Randall announced that it was 64 degrees, a bit shy of the promised 71 degrees, but we weren’t complaining. We loaded up and headed out, travelling back on TX 29.
We were barely past the eagle nest when we noticed we lost the sun, and with it, a few degrees in temperature. Now, that may not sound like much, but on a motorcycle at 70 mph, that’s getting pretty chilly.
We stopped in Burnet to refuel and warm up. We stopped at the Dollar Store so D’anah, Randall’s wife, could get a scarf. Soon we were back on the road and headed home. We didn’t stop again until we were back in Leander. We were supposed to stop at a birthday party on the way home, but we were just too cold. In fact, we were nearly frozen by the time we got home.
But, we did clock in just over 140 miles for the day, in spite of the nasty weather. Overall, I’d say it was a lot of fun.
