The Rattler...

 

We did not watch any TV last night - when I got up this morning, the Sunday news shows were full of the assassination attempt on Trump.  I don't get political here and can be friends with those on either side.  This is horrible - it makes me sad for the state of our country.  While I have said that I would be inclined to vote for "None of the Above," this is only going to create more rancor.  That's all I have to say on that.

Another day, another ride.  There is no "Schedule of Events" with this gathering... seems to be 50 people going 20 different directions.  It's not like we need someone to guide us around - we do fine on our own.  But, being in an RV park 5 miles away from the motel where most of the people here for this gathering are staying, puts us out of the loop.  There are some scheduled rides, but from what I've seen, it is a lot of, "We're going this way..." kinda riding.  As such, Joan and I took off on our own today to ride "The Rattler."  Sounds ominous.  On the riding map we got at the Visitors Center, this ride was said to be... "difficult."

Other than the fact that my Apple Maps didn't want to hold onto the routing I put in, the riding was mostly pleasant.  A couple places where the road surface wasn't good, but 98% of the ride was fun twisties.  I've heard some people say this is a better ride than Tail of the Dragon... mostly because the traffic is light, I think.  At some point while we're here, we will ride the 80 miles to get to the Tail of the Dragon, then ride it back and return to the motorhome,

I did shoot some video, but the shooting situation isn't as easy as when I'm riding solo.  When Joan and I ride together, I wear a different helmet - one with a communication system in it so Joan and I can talk.  When I ride solo, I wear a helmet that I've set up for shooting video, with a chin mount for a camera and a place to clip a microphone.  The last thing Joan needs to hear while we're riding is me blathering on to narrate a video.  So, at some point, I'll record a voice-over audio track on some of the video I shot today.

That said, the riding was good.  We're both tired.  When we got home, I made burgers on our electric Blackstone griddle - first chance we've had to use it since we left home.  And after that late lunch (we didn't get home until 1:30 in the afternoon), I did a fairly quick rough edit on the video portion of what I shot today.  It's still "cooking" - it takes a while to work, process, and export the 360 video.

I'm thinking there will be a group ride this evening for a photo at sunset.  We'll see how that plays out.

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Here's how it played out...

 And, looking the other way at what would have been the sunset...

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After over 2 hours of slow uploading to YouTube, here's an edited video of our ride today...

A shot of Candace and Win at that sunset gathering.