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DAY Last
The Exit

RIDE OVERVIEW:  Today we were supposed to be riding our bikes to Gonzales...it didn't happen.  We spent the day instead trying to get everyone on their way home.

Well, unless you live in a vacuum, you've probably figured we were scrambling today to get everyone on departure flights before Ivan gets to the coast.  As I type this, I'm sitting in white trying to get the staff out of town on Tuesday afternoon after delivering everyone to the airport or motel, but we are on an interstate parking lot just outside New Orleans.  The state has closed the inbound interstates and made all lanes outbound traffic, but it doesn't seem to be helping much, but I'm sure we'll get moving soon.

This morning we woke early to get everyone to their rescheduled flights either out of Baton Rouge or New Orleans.  In hindsight, taking people forward to New Orleans may have been biting off a lot since we had to make a couple of trips that virtually took all day and everyone in New Orleans was trying to get out of town.  We probably should have focused more on Baton Rouge departures or even Jackson later in the day, but people had already made new flight plans so we worked hard to make it all happen.  Inbound to the New Orleans airport wasn't too much of an issue, but getting out of town after we got there was almost impossible.  People already were in evacuation mode and were bumper to bumper exiting the city.  I think by the time everyone saw how serious the locals were taking this storm, they were confident we'd made the right decision to abandon our planned ride into Gonzales tonight.  I hate it we didn't get to complete our journey down the river as the final 30 miles are really a good finishing ride...but not this year.  As we are leaving town, the mayor is talking about 8-10 inches of rain tomorrow and high winds.  Hopefully, New Orleans won't get a direct hit, but they are preparing for the worst.  The unfortunate fact is, someone along the coast is going to feel the full brunt of this storm.

Last night, I made up a ride plan to get everyone to their flights...Karen and Brantley took a full load with luggage to New Orleans at 8:00.  I took the second load at 9:00 to meet later afternoon flights.  The plan was for Karen and Brantley to return to get the remaining riders who were staying overnight in New Orleans at around noon, but they weren't able to get back to St Francisville until about 1:00 due to the heavy traffic in panic mode scurrying to get out of town.  I planned to stay in New Orleans until they got there so we could leave for Montgomery Alabama in the afternoon.  With all the traffic they didn't get the second load to N.O. until after 4:30 so we got a pretty late start for home.  After that it was how to get out of town ourselves?

I'm sorry we didn't have time to say proper good byes, but I think everyone understood the urgency in our departure.  We did get everyone to the airport in time for their afternoon flights and were able to wish everyone well.  The last item was to make sure the last riders who had Wednesday flights were checked into the Airport Best Western Motel in New Orleans...Buzz, Steve O., George (all left), Karen W. and Don H.  Nothing more for us to do but evacuate ourselves.

It didn't take long for us to realize it was going to be a long night of driving to get anywhere we could find refuge.  There were several shelters on our way, but we decided to try to get to Montgomery (My house) before we stopped.  There wasn't a motel room available south of Memphis TN so we were pretty much committed to either drive all the way or sleep in the vans till morning.  We spent the first 2 hours parked on I-10 (below right) trying to get out of town but by the time we got to I-55 north, we got to moving pretty well.  We had to take I-55 which was about 100 miles out of our way because we couldn't go eastward to I-59 or I-10.  All inbound traffic was halted and the only interstate lanes open were leading out of town...so we had to go west to get home.  Finally, we rolled into Prattville around 2 in the morning...we were seeing little furry creatures crawling all over the insides of the vans and on the highway before we got home, but they all seemed to be under my eye lids when we finally stopped in my driveway.

The next challenge for me to drive up to Lexington to meet Barbara and to get my daughter, Niki, married on Sunday.  Guess what?  Ivan is supposed to be overhead Kentucky Saturday sometime.  I'm not through with this storm yet!  First thing is I need to get some sleep before I tackle that trip and return to Prattville to get ready for Fast South.  As I type, I've got Karen and Brantley (Left) sorting through all the stuff we've unloaded out of the vans to see what we need to take out to LA next week for the next ride.  If I can stall a little longer to finish this page, they may get it done before I get out there.  This may be the only time we have to do this work as the storm is supposed to be overhead Prattville tomorrow and should still be packing some pretty good winds and rain when it gets here.

This wraps up another ride.  I'll say in closing that we really enjoyed this group.  I personally will miss Keith and Craig's little kibitzing back and forth trying to outdo each other.  Other things I'll miss will be Cynthia's smile; Don's heavy bag and floppy knees when he pedaled; Steven's sense of humor; Buzz's Mardi Gras beads on the roadkill; The Killer Bs; Dick's laugh; Marilyn's awesome riding; England John's accent; trying to catch Jack, Julius, Topper, Mark, and Scott with the mechanic's van; Tootsie Roll Tom's seat; the five gals at the front of the buffet lines; Don's outdoor trivia; Nancy's 'eyeball' jerseys; Clark's helmet hair; Karen's striped shorts, Steve Os positive attitude; and all the other quirks and personalities we encountered with this group.  Most of all, I'll miss the fun we had everyday just getting down the road.  As they go their separate ways, I hope they'll look back on this ride as a success in spite of the uninvited presence of our friend Ivan.  Good bye to them all and I wish them all well and hope they'll ride with us again someday...someday drier.

Lastly, I want to thank you all for following our progress down the river.  The thing that keeps this site going is the feedback I get from riders and friends that enjoy following us every day.  I hope you'll come try your hand at long distance riding someday and that you'll pick ABB as your touring company.  Until next trip (Fast South '04), on behalf of the office and on road staff, take care and keep the rubber side on the pavement.  I'd better get out there and help Karen and Brantley.  See you next trip.  M

HEARD ON THE ROAD TODAY:  "Let's get out of here!"    "Good time to go."    "Good bye"