I will be at the Dragon next Fri, Sat and Sun (May 12-14) with my friend's veterans group (lots of Harley's..). Staying at Two Wheel Inn. If anyone else in in the area next weekend let me know.

No, it is good that you asked.   I thought about it and I am now taking off the 11th through the 19th, combining my normal days off on two separate weeks with 5 days of vacation.

Kickstand doesn't start until the 13th so if you wanted to go bedroll on the ground at Santeetlah a day early we could do that.

Now this is my current theoretical thinking, my big bike is tall enough and plenty solid enough to support one side of a lean to.  

Only purpose of the lean to is to keep the light rain or dew off of you while you are sleeping.  Tarp is the same thing I use to wrap the sleeping bag for waterproofing so that rides with me anyways.    Ride up to the free camping spot, gage the prevailing direction of the wind and set the bike up so a sudden breeze doesn't blow it over on you.   Attach and stake the tarp cover down, set the air mattress and bag up, go to sleep.

In any case, everybody all say when you are thinking about showing up at Kickstand so we can all be consistent on the show up day at Kickstand.   Leaving can be raggedy, but show up needs to be consistent with the man driving the trailer with the big tent inside it.

 
THESE EVENTS ARE IN PLANNING AND DISCUSSION RIGHT UP TO THE GO DAY -- THE CONCRETE HAS NOT SET COMPLETELY YET UNTIL IT IS OVER.     I am still plugging in names as people show interest, this gives us a tool for seeing who is really going plus the folks who are going can start the refinement process on dates and activities.

So far we got the following items left in the rough order of doing them.   Adding something is easy, talk it up some, put a firm date to it and we will see if folks are interested by if they sign up for it.



Lancer Oklahoma trip    extended to 19-28 May   Lancer,  Kenny G,  MM,  Springman,  Verslagen,  Justin,  Springman's BIL Steve,



Kickstand Lodge   June 14-18    Dave,  Oldfeller,  MM,  Stewmills,  RaleighGuy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZGNOB5m5Ro&t=166s
http://kickstandlodge.com/rates.html
From here it is a short hop up to the Dragon, and to all the really neat surrounding roads we love to ride.    For East Coast beginners, this is one of the closest (and the BEST) Southeastern trip possible.   Some have argued the area is the BEST BIKING IN AMERICA and I might have to agree with them.  

We also have a 1 day (2 man) prequel of sorts planned on June 12th with Oldfeller and MM going and checking out the Santeetlah Lake free camping, since until you have actually done it you really can't speak to it pro or con.



Indian Paintbrush Campground in Ty Denver  Late July  NEED FIRM DATES   Verslagen,  Springman,  old.indian, Thumperclone



MM's farm     Sept 8, 9 & 10    MM,  Oldfeller,  Dave,  Lancer,  StewMills



And here is a tool to use in locating some no cost camping when travelling to get to the rides:

https://freecampsites.net

It's a deal, June 12 camp out at Santeetlah, likely we will meet up at the Hub as a good place to meet.  

Need a meet up time, adjusted for local time vs Tennessee time of course.

For those of you in the Dragon area, be careful on this 4 lane stretch of 28 south of Kickstand Lodge headed southbound towards 74.  
https://www.google.com/maps/@35.3859895,-83.5787364,16.44z

I was clocking along about 65mph and all of a sudden the bike started getting VERY loose and I thought I had a low tire so I stopped and checked everything before I had an accident. Kinda scared me for a minute.  There were visible tar snakes but they rarely give me any issue, but apparently they are the mean tar snakes.  After I caught up with my two friends on big, heavy Harley's with fat tires they said they got thrashed around too and it got their attention real quick but they kept on going.

So...just be aware of that 4 lane section of road and don't hit it too fast and hard.  I think the left lane is a bit better so maybe avoid the right lanes if you can or at least slow down.

Gang, note that June 18 is Father's day. Is this going to pose any issues for the June 13-18 Dragon trip to at Kickstand Lodge?

UT-O

I might have to leave Saturday after breakfast ...  


I checked out the Santeetlah lake area Wednesday  .  
I found the free camp sites , all are right on the lake.
I found the pay ($15.oo -or- $7.50 w/discount) camps w/running water real showers and real bathrooms.  
I found the $35.oo cabins , they use the same bath houses as the $7.50 camp sites.   Cabins have two rooms , one with a FULL size platform for sleeping bags and one w/bunk bed stacked  and then a nice porch (sleeps two).

stewmills wrote on 05/18/17 at 07:44:47:


OK.  Sounds like no one has a big challenge on this other than maybe MM.  I'll have to check and see what my siblings have planned for pops. Likely I could need to leave out late Saturday night (after riding for the day has commenced) or early Sunday morning.  Don't count me out, just may have to lose out on riding any on Sunday.