YESTERDAY IN THE PARK.

Jim went to town to get a new battery and an alternator for the Bronco, and I stayed behind.  Our neighbor has a permanent site here. They’ve had people of all ages coming and going and one guy offered to sell me these two motorcycles for $50 bucks each.

I found out later it was his friend, not his father who offered to sell me the bikes. He laughed when I told him. His bike is worth $70,000  He and his wife took off for a big bike rally a couple hundred miles away in Idaho. The son told me his dad had a house near Bellingham, a great big Victorian with lots of maintenance needed. He and his siblings got together and decided none of them wanted to maintain the place when dad died, so they convinced Dad to sell it, buy this permanent site and retire from housekeeping at 84. He loves it. And, he gets lots of company. Interesting idea.

We take a brisk 20 minute walk every morning and this cute little rig seemed so appealing. The owner has taken excellent care of it and told me it is 40 years old. Super. Last night she had a ring of chairs around a portable fire. With a small rig, you spend most of your time outside.
By the time Jim got home it was parking time. Rigs were pouring into the park. Huge rigs trying to avoid trees and other rigs attempting to wedge themselves into spots meant for much smaller motor homes and fifth wheels. Jim and a couple of neighbors were acting as parking attendants, guiding people into tight spots. The park is full to capacity, something we’ve never seen before.  Jim used to sell memberships in Thousand Trails. One selling point is how great they are for kids. You can turn them loose to have fun and not always have to have your parental radar on.  And it is so true. The kids just have an all out blast here. Riding bikes, swimming, flying kites, using playground equipment, and taking part in activities at the family lodge. Something for every age. The place was jumping.

TIME OUT.

I didn't do anything yesterday but swim, read, paint and eat. I wanted to go to a polo game in Indio, but Jim wasn't up to driving anywhere so we just stayed home. The above sculpture I thought of naming Back Pain, or  Writers Block, and then decided on Constipated as in our activities were constipated yesterday. (This sculpture is in a Reno arts gallery.)

This unusual bench came from the same gallery. The first word of the bench spells Inhale.

And, again from that gallery, this is a water "dish". Rain collects in a circular trough near the center and holds water for birds or other small critters. Their "rock" collection is unusual.
Since my bike was stolen, I've been think a lot about bikes and this painting is one I liked really well but I've forgotten where this painting hangs.

I'm a fan of Rene Wiley and she recently did a series of paintings on bikes that I liked so I'll post a few of them. Her gallery is in Galveston, Texas on Post Office Street.

Her paintings are for sale on-line, as well.  This is Green Cruiser.

Colorful Cruiser.

Blue Cruiser.

I think I'll try to paint bikes, though yesterday I started with palm trees. The only problem is, I have yet to get another brush. Maybe today.
I'm hoping to do the Walking Off Pounds program again today at 9:00. The snacks I ate yesterday should disappear today, right?

CHEHALIS MOTORCYCLE MUSEUM

Downtown Chehalis has an excellent motorcycle collection located in the Hotel Washington. You enter the museum on the second floor of the hotel which in itself is a sight to see. Visages of its swanky past, gorgeous windows,  hardwood floors, an old key keeper like those you see in old-time  romantic movies where the lover peeks to see what room key the girl is handed by the hotel clerk. In the public restroom, each visitor is provided a thick white hand towel instead of paper towels. Now that is class.

The collection contains brands and types of motorcycles most people have never heard of. We met an avid rider, biker, camper, rv-er with his wife.  Watching his joy and overhearing his reminiscences was part of the enjoyment. He once rode a Flying Merckel like this one, he told me.


The guy talked about what a scary ride this bike was if you were the front facing passenger with no control of the bike.

The first belt driven machine I ever saw,though I learned many early bikes were belt driven.
First American bike. Note the wooden wheels/tires.

From 1960, a space age molded fiberglass model by Bowdon, only 522 were  made. Clearly an oddity way before its time. Like cars, motorcycles went through myriad designs before the standard machines we see today.

And this oddity.


Motorcycles have gone mainstream, they are safer, but I still  think of motorcyclists as the wild, daring ones, snubbing their noses at convention, wearing outlandish leathers and tattoos. The outfits of yesteryear started with leather boots, goggles and soon all  leather for warmth and safety. They started the traditions we see today.

Movies capitalized on that sense of adventure and daring.  A Harley Indian used by James Garner, Steve Mc Queen and other stars was accompanied by this letter of authenticity from the owner.

The machines are jammed tightly together and picture taking is difficult. The Sheriff of Calaveras County during the 1970‘s, Claud Ballard, was a Cherokee Indian born in Oklahoma Territory before it was a state. He showed me his Harley Indian that he road all the way to California in the 1930’s  looking for better work. He patted his badge and said “Not bad for an ole’ boy off the reservation.”

Roy Burke , a prize winning racer, beat the odds, doing what he loved.

This is his epitaph

Other related artifacts  make this a great visit.

Ads.

A truism, maybe.

The belt from a race car.

A soda fountain from the 1950’s brought back a few memories. The room holds a Wurlitzer juke box, a motorcycle repair garage set up, and a  Road Kill Cookbook just for fun.

Even if you don’t like motorcycles, you can’t help but enjoy this museum.

CHINA LOADS

Mary

The Chinese people manage to get nearly everything done from their cycles, be they two, three or four-wheeled human-powered vehicles. I saw big loads on two wheelers, such as whole families crammed on one bike, but nothing as amazing as these. I’ve posted them once, but after the fun of exploring my trip to China, I thought it would be interesting to see them again.

Makes you wonder how these fragile flowers could possibly be loaded.

If you look at the background, you can see that this was taken in Shanghai.

I think this is a woman pedaling.

Shanghai again.  Notice the English street sign.

In China, vehicular traffic travels very slowly and there is less of it, or these people would never make it across town.
Wouldn’t they make a mint in the U.S. working for moving companies, teaching how to pack things?

Obviously one man does the jobs;  no help ever in sight.

No bike, but human powered.

THE HENRY FORD MUSEUM, DEARBORN, MICHIGAN

Henry Ford was like many of us, he liked to collect "things". When titans of industry collect it touches every walk of life: invention, history, work, employment, people, machines and how they changed and grew America. Sectioned off into themes, Truth and Justice, Jewelry, Pewter, and Prefab Housing- those are the places we didn't get to. Art, Sue, Jim and I must have walked ten of the twelve acres under one roof, because the transportation and wheels of industry collection is immense. When you walk in the door, you are face to face with one of the biggest train engines ever made, the 1601, an Allegheny, built with two engines working in concert. Its 76 feet long and could haul 27 million pounds of coal up over the mountains at a fast clip of 60 miles an hour.

A surprising number of successful electric cars, including some made by Ford, were in this museum. In fact, his wife liked the quiet, easy starting car so much, he bought one for her from a competitor after he quit making them. It was considered a ladies car from the start. They didn't have much range but distance wasn't an issue when the roads were bumpy and people didn't travel far from home.

 This electric car was one of Henry's. He sold a lot of them. Others were much earlier models from the late 1800's made by small companies that faded in time.

The convertible that Kennedy was killed in, with the steps on the back for the secret service. A top was made for it from bullet proof glass and President Reagan used it.

The first motorized school bus made was assembled by an employee of Ford Motors. He built a box with bench seats and attached it to the bed of a Ford Pick-up. It fell apart on the bumpy roads. He quit Ford and began making buses in earnest on a Ford Chassis and started the Bluebird Bus Company that still makes school buses today.

 Every Day the museum is open,  a new Model T is assembled on the spot with the help of people visiting the museum. It will run when finished, except, it has no gas in it. They build one each day and are now on their 845 one.  Not only do you get to see it put together, and sit in it, etc. but a mini assembly line floats above with the parts for a complete car hanging on wires overhead and moving to their position on the line.

Besides just about every imaginable vehicle, their development, engines and builders, the museum contains unusual vehicles of interest such as one of Charles Kurault's motorcoachs from his famous television show, On The Road With Charles Kurault.

  And Hector Quevora's Model A, driven from South America to Detroit  because his son wanted to see the museum. There was an early diesel-electric hybrid, from the 1920's I believe, if memory serves me, and every early bicycle and tricycle known to man. 

 Consider this "ten speed".

And this home made model with a fancy eagle head bar.
It was actually bikes that led to flight as Oliver and Wilbur Wright tinkered in their bike shop.

This model of the Kitty Hawk has the actual fabric from the real Kitty Hawk.

 There were many women pilots, including barnstorming daredevils in the 1930's. It only seems like Amelia Earhart was the only woman flier. Bessie Coleman was the first African American Woman in the world  to get her pilots license. (In 1921.)
Then there were the bizarre things in the museum, such as a sealed tube with the last breath of Thomas Edison captured in it. And this letter from Clyde Barrow.

Clyde Barrow so admired his stolen 1934 V-8 Ford that he wrote Henry Ford a congratulatory letter about his "fine car."  Not long after this letter was received by Ford, Bonnie and Clyde were shot to death in that very car.

He lived wild and free until the guns brought him and his Ford to an end.
Then the little oddities such as this sheet music in the museum.

Jack Frost wrote two songs about the Ford, You Can't Afford To Marry If You Can't Afford A Ford and I Didn't Raise My Ford To Be A Jitney.  What a hoot!

I got a kick out of this ad with the sorry looking Amantha and her Cod Liver Oil fan.

And when you read about the wheels of industry? They really were wheels.  Gigantic wheels, that turned turbines and kept those early steam engines pumping. 

The oldest known remaining steam pump is in this museum. You will find farm equipment, huge combines and corn planters and threshers, both old and fairly modern. There are craft shops here for younger people to learn how to run and maintain and build working machines of all  types.

If you are traveling with kids, there are a number of places in the museum that have kid's activities. Here kids are making vehicles that can be tried out on a couple of slide roads.

Or maybe you might simply want to wrap yourself up as a hot dog in the Oscar Mayer Wiener exhibit.
We certainly could have spent another day in this museum. We started the day with breakfast with Art, Sue, Art's parents and a friend, Lillie. And ended it with the Lambart's traditional Sunday dinner at home with Art's parents.

In fact, Lillie, on the right, wrote a song for Faith Hill, the country singer. They were waitresses together when they were young girls.
For more pictures, check out the link below:
http://picasaweb.google.com/1579penn/82210FordMuseum#