Long, windy ride

This past weekend had me going on a long (and windy!) ride through the countryside surrounding Bloomington.  Most of the roads we went on were 40mph - I may have been riding at full throttle quite a lot - but gosh, it was beautiful out.  I could have done without the wind pushing me around the road, though.  Bryan and Gina on their Stellas weren't getting pushed around quite as much, as those things are heavy, but Ross and Mary Alice and I on our Buddys, we were at the mercy of the wind.

We rode out to Lake Monroe - the area there between the trees, well, that's supposed to be a road, but as you can see there's been some flooding.  We were planning on riding through here and taking a less steep way back into town, but the water was waist high, so we all got to chug back up some very steep hills on the way back to town.  It was fun, though - and I enjoyed each and every one of the 40 miles I put on my scooter on Saturday.

Current odometer reading: 711ish

First long rides of the season

Saturday was Hoosier Ride's first ride of the season!

It was great to get out and ride, even though we had a small group.  It was pretty much limited to the usual small group of riders that come out religiously every weekend to ride, with one new addition - my friend Gina, who just got into the world of scootering.  (And she jumped right into it too, with her first scooter being a bright red manual-shifty Stella, which is sadly in the shop right now but should be good to ride on Tuesday!)  We went out to Cascades Park, one of my favorite places to ride to, and then made our way out to Griffy Lake.  I'm still not too sure of myself when it comes to riding to Griffy, as I'm unfamiliar with the roads there and tend to go a little more slowly when I don't know where I'm going... and I'm already going pretty slow, haha, as I'm riding a 50cc scoot.  I still had fun, though!

I ended up taking a lot of pictures - while the trees are still all bare, the day was beautiful.  Blue sky, warm temperatures, delightful fresh air.  And yesterday was a repeat of that!  So, I ended up riding solo on Sunday.  I went out on Old State Rte. 37, past Cascades Park, until I hit the edge of my comfort zone and decided to turn around and head back.  I don't have the best sense of direction (you should see me try to give directions to someone, it's ridiculous), and so I try to stick to places I know well.  Yesterday, though, I was feeling brave, so I figured I'd do a little exploring - which turned into a 12 mile round-trip ride.  Add that to Saturday's ride - around 22 miles total - and you've got my scooter racking up quite a bit of distance just this weekend alone.  It's been ages since I've put more than 3 or 4 miles on my scooter in a day.  

You have no idea how happy I am that it's riding season again. :D

Current odometer reading: 636.6 miles

The beginning of a new scooter season

Well, it's the start of a new scootering season.  My third one, to be exact.  And this new scootering season is accompanied by a somewhat new scooter - Mia.  She's a 2014 Genuine Buddy 50, in the glorious Seafoam color.

Mia!

She's the one in front, with the spirals on the front and a coffee cup on the floorboards.  She's the second scooter I owned (my previous one was a 2009 Honda Metropolitan, which I barely put 1750 miles on before I realized I needed something different), and I've customized her beyond belief.  I've swapped out her chrome bits for matte black, styled her up with some pretty black swirly decals, and added crash bars and a luggage rack - in flat black, of course.  She's a pretty striking scooter, especially when compared to her other Seafoam Buddy sisters.  (There are four other Seafoam Buddy riders in Bloomington - two of them and I form the Seafoam Buddy Brigade)  At this point she's just shy of 600 miles.

I'm going to document all the long trips I take with her here in my blog, as well as other Mia related stuff.  I do love talking about my scooter, and scootering in general, and as I can't exactly continue my other scooter blog (Go Scooterlou!, which was focused on the Honda Metro), nor ramble on excessively on the shared scootering blog I write (The Lady Scooterist), this'll probably be a good outlet for me.

Tomorrow's the first ride of the season for my scooter riding club - currently called Hoosier Ride, but there's some talk of changing the name.  We'll find out tomorrow if we're still calling ourselves Hoosier Riders or what.  I plan on bringing my camera and taking plenty of pictures, that's for sure. I'm excited to be out on the road, that's for sure.  It's been a long winter, and I didn't get much chance to enjoy Mia before the leaves fell and the snow struck (and those stupid polar vortexes, don't get me started on them).  So, expect to hear lots of rambling from me in the coming months about riding!