Today my 2007 CVO Ultra FLHTCUSE2 nicknamed 'Jester' went to a new home. I bought the bike new in November, 2006. And yes it was to be my last new Harley so I lavished it with goodies - Legend Air Suspension, Traxxion front suspension, stage 1 upgrade and even a color matched Bushtec Turbo +2 trailer. I suffered with it through the beta testing phase of the early 110" motors and the horrible gear ratios of the 2007-2008 cruise drive trannys before getting it all dialed in.
But I persisted as it did and it transported my wife and me in style for over 96,000 miles covering all of the lower 48, nine Canadian provinces and even an excursion into Mexico long enough to get a photo.
Like many of us I form emotional attachments to my bikes - inanimate objects though they may be they each have a distinctive personality. We name them, lavish attention on them, become anal about maintenance and which oil or tire or whatever is better for them. So it is a bit sad when the time comes to part ways.
As they say the only constant in life is change. Our most recent road trip was to the CVO Redwoods Run and beyond, way beyond. We were gone for 32 days and covered almost 8,000 miles. When we got home I kind of felt like Forrest Gump when he stopped running. If you recall the movie he started running and ran and ran until one day he just stopped.
Now I am not going to stop riding motorcycles! We still have our 2012 CVO Ultra FLHTCUSE7 but I don't think we'll be riding these marathon like trips as before. We have accumulated almost 300,000 miles on our Harleys since we enrolled the first one in the H.O.G. mileage program in 1999. And before that on our metric cruisers as best I can reconstruct we have an additional 150,000 miles or so.
We've been blessed to see so many wonderful sights on our Harleys but when I think back on the challenges of riding in the cold, the wet, the heat, the bad roads I say to myself 'been there, done that' hundreds of times over and I think I'm ready to be more of a 'fair weather' biker from now on.
So here's to Tom, Jester's new owner in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And yes, I did introduce him to the site so hopefully we'll see him here. I hope you have as much enjoyment with Jester as we have and here's to many, many fun filled miles.
Jerry
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Topic: Mixed Emotions (Read 3837 times)