Juniper Springs in Ocala National Forest made my heart hurt. It was so pretty that I didn’t know what to do with the emotions that boiled up. I hiked around for a few hours with confused emotions percolating, thanking God, cursing my lack of decent camera, feeling both lonely and whole in the same moment and simply being in awe of the tangled mix of tropic and aquatic beauty. Not knowing what else to do, I called my girlfriend and babbled on about how she needs to quit her job, her life, and fix things so that she can be here with me forever. I felt selfish for being alone with such beauty.

The campers next to me fixed the loneliness. The other campers balanced out the beauty with ugly.  An older couple, who have been boating around central Florida for decades, adopted me and we swapped stories into the night. Amazing folks. The other idiots at camp needed music, beer and profanity to enjoy their time in paradise and continued to pollute the night until nearly five in the morning. I knew it was time to go. After fifteen days of traveling and camping, mostly alone, I had lost my patience for fools and knew I needed to be alone again.

My plan that Saturday morning was to find the diner where some local riders were meeting on Sunday then make camp someplace close. Breakfast at the Dam Diner was awesome. It had been weeks since I bought a good breakfast and they didn’t disappoint. Strangers start conversations, waitresses know everyone, and smiles rule the day. It seems that southern hospitality is alive and well in small town central Florida.

Mid omelet someone calls out my name. It can only be one of the guys from ADVrider.com who I am supposed to meet the next day. Jerry was riding by, saw my bike, and recognized it from the pictures on our website. By the end of breakfast we were friends and he invited me to stay with him. He’s the kind of guy who has an open-door policy for anyone on two wheels with a saddlebag and a smile. Even though I was feeling the need to recharge my socializer with some alone time in the woods, I agreed. Definitely the right choice.

After stripping my bike of luggage, he jumped on his DRZ with full sand tires and we went exploring a sand track near his house. My giant pig of a bike with street tires does nothing but plow uncontrollably through the deep sand. It’s a ton of work with no guarantee of staying upright. Jerry let me ride his DRZ and I immediately felt comfortable blasting around, cranking through corners, hard on the gas and pinning it through the soft sections. There was no way I could ride with these guys with my street tires.

Jerry had a solution. Back at his place, we took off my front tire and spooned on an old knobby he had laying around. On top of donating a tire, he had a chest protector, elbow pads, goggles for my Aria, and a shop full of goodies for when I broke my bike in the woods. Jerry, his buddy Dominic, and I rolled on to the Diner and had breakfast with a cool Brit named Pete. By the time we were done with breakfast the parking lot was littered with KTM’s, DRZ’s, WR’s, and one silly guy on a giant KLR with a street tire. Yah, that would be me.

50 mpg on gravel is no problem, and the second gear wooded section with vegetation on top of sand was a delight. I was able to keep the lead pack in sight while getting used to my bike in the woods and figuring just what that knobby front tire will do. At every intersection the lead guys would stop till we all grouped back up then off we’d blast again. I was encouraged with the handling of my bike, even in the sandy sections. I still wasn’t riding a dirt bike and my back tire never gave me good drive, but I was able to keep the front under control and push my spinning rear around where I needed it to go.

A hard third gear crash reminded me just how much my bike isn’t a moto-crosser. We were barreling down a fast, wide trail of packed clay, ruts, and roots. The root got me. I hit it just wrong and it threw my front end way out from underneath me. The bike landed hard on its left side and I tumbled into the woods. I’m glad I had that armor on! I broke the clutch lever but otherwise my KLR was fine. This bike crashes amazingly well! I got it started in neutral, jammed it in first with no clutch and throttled down the trail to catch up with everyone. Again, Jerry to the rescue. He had a spare brake lever off another bike that fit my clutch mount. While I was bolting my bike back together, a fire ranger rolled up. They were doing a controlled burn in that section of the forest and we needed to get out of dodge. We blasted off to a safer part of the forest.

The rest of the day was an endless series of bog crossings, bottomless sand, and tree dodging. At a large log crossing, one of the guys dropped his KTM. Fuel poured out of it when he went to start it up. We tore it apart and saw that a coupler for the fuel injection line was broken. There was no way to fix this in the woods. I had the biggest bike with the biggest motor, so we tied the tow line to my bike and my bald tire towed the KTM out of the woods. That was as much work as the rest of the day put together.

It is amazing how a group of guys, of all different skill levels, age, income, and background can come together, ride, laugh, and team up to solve problems. The Florida Sand Fleas, as they call themselves, are one of the greatest groups of guys I’ve had the pleasure of riding with. Every one of them I would be proud to call a friend and would be honored to see again. Jerry in particular gets special mention. His generosity with time, space, parts, and help, make him one of the most wonderful hosts I’ve met. It’s guys like him that are the heartbeat of a vibrant community, and I’m honored to have been a part of it. Thanks guys for being a memorable part of my journey.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 6th, 2011 at 12:15 am and is filed under Ride. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.