This is our second year of participating in this event. It is sponsored by a group of Viet Nam vets who happen to ride motorcycles and they have their own motorcycle group. This is the 21st year for this.
The vets raise money all year long to buy new flags for the Viet Nam Memorial in Cody and the second weekend in July they hold a rally to replace the old flags. It is alot of fun and I have met some very colorful people. I have a new friend, I call her Pinky and she is from Casper. She told me what her name is but I can't remember. Can't describe Pinky you will have to look at my photo I have of her. She is quite the character.
It costs $70 for a couple to participate in the whole event. It starts on Friday night in Casper. I think the majority of them meet in Cheyenne, but as a whole the group meets in Casper. For your registration fee, you get two nights camping, a prime rib dinner in Cody, t-shirts and flags. The VFW in Thermopolis serves them a lunch on Saturday afternoon. Also on Saturday they have a poker run and Meeteetse is one of their stops.
We meet up with them in Meeteetse. We ride with our friends Jake & Aletha Moran and this year with Wes & Denise Lambert. Our friend Dick Russell rode with us to Meeteetse then he went on to get back home after lunch. We meet Mom and Grandma at the Cowboy for lunch and some visiting as we wait for the group to roll into town.
We get to Cody early so that we can check in and get a good campsite before the mob arrives. This year we were at a new campground as the original one is closed. We stayed at The Ponderosa, which is next to the museum and right in town. Got our tents set up and I got all the ribbing about my tent. We have one that you can stand up in and it even has a closet. The others have little pup tents. Our friends call our tent "the condo".
This year we didn't get to visit with Grandma as she wasn't feeling well. Will get a visit in with her this summer when things aren't so busy and we can go to the house.
Got our visiting in before the group rolled into town, then some more visiting while they had about a 20 minute break in Meeteetse. Grandma's boyfriend Ted was there and he wishes Grandma the best. He met her two years ago and just started talking to her. He even asked is she would dance with him. Grandma went with the flow. Ted is from Spokane WA and he tells his family and friends about Gracie, especially his mother who is only 93.
Saturday night we get a prime rib dinner at Cassie's. It was good and they sure do a good job serving about 200 people, not to mention the other customers. The other customers don't seem to mind when we take over, but we are only there for about 1 1/2 hours. Didn't win any prizes and Gary didn't win the raffle of a pistol.
Sunday we wake up bright and early, mainly from a bird waking up us. It was the loudest bird I've heard. Got moving around and packed up for the ride home. We ate breakfast at The Sunset House. It was within walking distance from the campground. Very good food. Then it was just sit and wait.
At 9:00 am we all headed to the fairgrounds to line up for the parade through town and to the Memorial which is by the airport. The parade started at 10:00 am, we had police escort. Needed to with about 300 bikes roaring through town. Not many people on the streets, but there were quite a few.
Had a small memorial at the wall. In November one of the flag poles was knocked down by a windstorm and hasn't been replaced. That has some of them upset, that the pole is not replaced. The govorner is going to get alot of e-mails and other correspondence about the flag pole.
Had a great time and we had nice weather and spent time with good friends. There was only one incident where a woman in a white SUV tried to take us out. We were on our way to Meeteetse, when this woman decided to pass about three cars on a blind curve and she had the solid yellow line. Gary told me to hang on because we are going for a ride, he was going to take the ditch. Fortunately he was able to get over to the shoulder, while the woman kept going. We were the lead bike. She received alot of hand gestures. Gary gave her all of his fingers, while our friends gave her a couple more.
1 comment:
It was a fun time and watching all those bikes come down the hill is impressive. I love it. The "local" fellow that talked to Gary in front of the Cowboy wasn't anyone the locals knew. But the old cowboy at the Chocolatier's was George. I talked to him later when the group was leaving.
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