The Cross-Country Motorcycle Ride June 1976

I am writing this in 2021, 45 years after the adventure occurred, just after having a conversation with Brett in which he innocently asked me if I have ever traveled by myself. I said, "Only when I was very young". Although I wasn't totally alone on this trip, it felt like it in many ways. So I told him about it...

I spent my senior year in the Air Force stationed at Nellis AFB in Las Vegas. I lived in the barracks along with 10 or so guys who also owned motorcycles. We were always hitting the rode to various local destinations.

The motorcycle pit outside our barracks

I had been reading a book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It described a motorcycle ride from Minnesota to Northern California, along with the thoughts of the author as the motor droned endlessly between his legs. I thought that sounded like fun, so I started thinking of the possibility of doing something like this to mark my re-entry into civilian life.

David rode a 650cc Yamaha, the same make and model as the one that I rode, only his was brand new and mine was several years old. He had been on a few rides in the Las Vegas area with us. He worked swing shift in the weapons release shop; I worked day shift. He lived with his parents who also lived in Las Vegas. For these reasons, I didn't know him very well.

We were both discharged, in May 1976. Somewhere along the line, we decided that we would ride cross-country right after we were released to civilian life. Coincidentally, he had a cousin in Minnesota which would become a destination.

Our bikes were rather small for long distance touring. Being 2-cylinder models, they had a lot of vibration. Also, neither of us had a fairing, or windshield. Imagine spending 2 to 3 hours at a time holding onto handlebars and staring into a 65 mph wind. UGH! I say 2 to 3 hours because that's how long we could ride with our 2.5 gallon gas tanks. We really couldn't get too far off the beaten path for want of a gas station.

The camera that I brought with me was a new Kodak Instamatic 'Pocket' camera. It had horrible resolution by today's standards, but it was very convenient at the time.

Here is a map of our trip, although we started with only a rough idea of our itinerary.

So, in June 1976, David showed up at the house on Pope St. in San Francisco, and we plotted the first leg of our journey. I think I gave him a brief tour of the city, then we headed north across the Golden Gate Bridge and up Highway 1.

Our first night was spent on the beach around Fort Bragg.

The next day we headed up through the redwoods. We didn't get far before I got a flat on the rear tire. We decided that the best way to proceed was to remove the rear wheel, ditch the bike and all of our gear in the bushes, and both of us ride back 15 miles or so to Fort Brag to fix the flat. It was incredibly difficult sitting on the back of his bike, holding on to the heavy rear wheel, while also holding on to the seat. It was early Sunday morning and nothing was open. But eventually we found a gas station where we could take the tire off the rim, patch the tube and fill it with air. Fortunately all went well and we were back on the road in a couple of hours.

We got rained on a few times. My bike is the one in the back. A year later I bought a bike exactly like the one in the foreground.

The next destination was Seattle to spend a few nights with my grandmother. We were there for the country's bicentennial, July 4, 1976. We watched fireworks from the rail at the top of the space needle. Strange, but I don't remember being freaked out in the least.

My cousin Tom was in town for one of the days we were there.

The next stop would be Waucounda, Washington, a bit off the beaten path, to visit Tom's parents (my aunt and uncle). We stayed a couple of nights.

Then we set a course to our next stop: White Fish, Montana to visit my Uncle Rene and his family. The shortest possible route would take us on a 'thin line' on the map which went over a mountain range.

A lookout station at the top of the mountain. It was vacant.

The 'thin line' eventually turned into a dirt road.

Note: Avoid thin lines on the map!

After twenty or thirty minutes on the dirt road, I glanced down between the speedometer and tachometer, at the ignition switch, to see in horror that my keys were no longer there! Apparently a design flaw allowed keys to be removed while the bike was running. They must have bounced out in the past several miles of dirt road.

I had to leave my bike running while I slowly walked back up the road looking and praying for my keys. My mind was racing for a what we would do if I didn't find them. It was getting later in the day, and David would probably have to ride back to civilization to get help. Hopefully he would not run out of gas. We hadn't seen anyone on the road for many miles.

In 15 minutes or so, EUREKA! I found my keys, right in the middle of the dirt road.

That could have turned out very badly!

We continued down the hill to the first gas station. Then we continued on our way to White Fish, Montana. I have no pictures of that stop but I have good memories of sitting in his house catching up and spending time with Jimmy and Gina, our cousins.

After that, we visited Glacier National Park, where my uncle told us of a recent Grizzly bear mauling. We didn't spend the night in the park.

Glacier National Park

We were so far north that I mentioned maybe heading up into Canada. David then told me he was packing a handgun in his bag. I assumed he was carrying it for his protection, but suddenly I felt a little LESS safe.

From there, we headed south and eventually hit I-90 and continued east through Wyoming. For what seemed like hours, we saw a strange, towering rock formation off in the distance. At a gas station, we asked some folks about it, and they convinced us that we should go check it out. It was called Devils Tower. Coincidentally, the following year the movie Close Encounters or the Third Kind came out in which Devils Tower played a starring role.

Devils Tower, Wyoming

Our next destination would be a short detour south off I-90 to see Mt. Rushmore and Custer, South Dakota.

Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota

We spent the night here, then headed a short ways south to visit the site of The Battle of Little Bighorn (aka Custer's Last Stand).

Custer's Last Stand

We headed east to Minneapolis to visit David's cousin. We stayed with her several days, where we (he) decided that it was time to head home. I had been day dreaming of visiting the iconic New York City. It would be 25+ years before I would finally see the North East for the first time with Chris, Brett, and Lindsey. 

We took I-80 all the way back through Iowa and Nebraska. I have no pictures of the trip home because it was extremely boring. Miles and miles of flat land and corn everywhere.

Outside Lincoln, Nebraska, my bike suddenly stopped running on the freeway. We pulled off to the shoulder and I begun to scratch my head. I learned very early in my mechanic education, that an internal combustion engine requires 3 things: Fuel, a timed spark, and compression. I knew it had fuel. The petcock (gas valve) was open and the tank had gas. Besides, when an engine runs out of gas, it sputters awhile, then stops. This time, the bike just stopped. A lack of compression would not be likely either. So a spark is most likely. An easy way to check it is to remove a spark plug, ground it against the engine block, and with the key on, turn the bike over. Sure enough, there was no spark to either plug. Turns out, my coil had failed. I borrowed David's bike, and returned from Lincoln in about an hour with a new coil from the local Yamaha dealer. Yay!

That should have been the final story to tell, but there is one more.

David and I slept on the ground every night, so every other day or so we would have to find a place to take a shower. Right around dusk, we pulled into the outskirts of Cheyenne, Wyoming and priority ONE was to find a shower! We eventually pulled into a train station and asked the attendant if there was a place close by where we could shower. He said that there were showers downstairs but they hadn't been used for quite awhile. But we were welcome to check them out.

We went down into the very dark and dingy basement, found a light switch which illuminated a single bare light bulb, and sure enough, in a very dank bathroom, there were two adjacent shower stalls. On the wooden plank floor of one of the stalls sat a very large lizard, about a foot long without the tail, staring at us as if to say, 'Can I help you?'

Not wanting to disturb the monster, we decided that I would shower first in the empty stall, and David would keep an eye on the lizard.Then it would be his turn.

I was raised with 8 brothers, so I learned at an early age how to spot an opportunity for a prank. As I showered, the wheels began to turn.

I quickly finished my shower, and David stepped in. I noticed that the lizard was standing his ground in the adjacent stall. Immediately, I found several squares of toilet paper and wet it into a wad. I dried myself as I waited for David to get his thinning head of hair lathered with soap, the most vulnerable posture any human can assume. When he did, I quietly approached him and tossed the wad onto his leg and yelled, "He's on you David!! The lizard is ON YOU!!"

With his eyes closed and head full of soap, David began to dance around, trying to stay close to the water to rinse his head and flail his legs at the imaginary lizard. After several seconds of this, I was laughing so hard that I had to confess that I was joking. He eventually finished his shower in silence. As hard as I tried, I could not keep from giggling.

The following day, we rode across Wyoming. We said our very abbreviated goodbyes at a gas station before we arrived in Salt Lake City. He didn't stop but headed south to Las Vegas. I spent the night on the Bonneville Salt Flats. I thoroughly enjoyed my next several days alone. I took my time as I traveled through the Nevada desert, into the Sierra mountains, through Sacramento, and finally into California. I was gone almost exactly one month.

Everything worked out perfectly and I still chuckle at the thought of David doing the lizard dance in the shower.