We arrived at Sport Wheels first thing in the morning and since Kim "the paperwork guru" wasn't there yet we decided to look around. Sport Wheels is a six acre motorcycle junkyard. I bought my first bike ( a yamaha 100 enduro) there when I was about 13. I am originally from the Twin Cities area so I have done a lot of business with these guys, getting saddlebags and racks for my full dressers in my youth. My dad started out by looking at the fixer upper touring bikes
and then we looked at the running bikes, Yes they had a couple more Seca IIs that just came in
After the paperwork was done I was given a tour of the bike by their mechanic. Sport Wheels made sure every bolt was tight, did an oil change, check the reserve petcock and gave me a list of all tread life left on the tires and pads measurements of the brakes. They also cleaned the carbs and resynced them. I also had them put a new battery in, just in case. They took my picture by my new bike, made me promise to call when I got to Michigan and sent me on my way. At this point you have to remember that I hadn't ridden a motorcycle in about 13 years and have never been on this type of bike. Mostly I had the full dress bikes from the early 80's. So I decided to go the long way round the twin cities. Basically I took the bike through stop and go construction, twisties, and long stretches of nothing but 55 mph driving. The freeway still made me nervous. 6 hours later of practicing the (new to me), art of counter steering, I felt fairly comfortable with the bike. (It took my dad an hour to get back).
Two days later we were to relocate the camper (we were there for a family reunion) to the opposite end of the cities. I decided to MAN UP and take the bike straight through Minneapolis and St. Paul. Basically any freeway that said east or south I took until I got to a road I recognized from my youth. I finally felt comfortable enough in the bike and myself, to start the trip back home. So,the next day I started home.
First Stop was Merrill, WI, home of my youngest daughter. I made the trip pretty uneventful except a little rain, and just outside of Merrill, I remembered the book and videos I had been using for training said..."Most accidents happen in the last part of the trip". So just as I thought about that, my arch nemesis (deer) went bolting across the road, I hit the front brake and swerved and the deer looked over its shoulder as it ran off into the woods.
The next day My daughter and I went for a 50 mile trip. Stopping at Chips burgers which I believe is almost a hundred years old burger joint.
We then stopped in Tomhawk, home of two Harley Davidson Plants, a got a picture of the bike and me in front of the Harley plant. The picture makes me look even bigger than I am so I wont post it. We then finished the trip with a two up drive on some twisties back to Merrill. I was very impressed by the two up capability of the Seca II. I had Sport Wheels turn the stock shock up all the way after reading the forums. Even with the bike near its capacity limit (if not over a little) we still had some travel and the bike handled like my daughter wasn't even back there. I left the next morning at 0630 to head home.
I stopped a couple hours later to get the first cup of coffee for the day a decided to gas up. Through out the trip the bike consistenly got 55 to 58 mpg. so fill ups were not painful even though I was running premium.
Then finally I got to the Michigan state line and had to get this picture which was texted to my wife.
The reason I texted this to my wife was that she was heading into Wisconsin on the same road, she was starting her vacation. It had been a week since we saw each other and we managed to hook up outside Sagola, MI for breakfast. Then she proceeded to go down to visit her relatives and my daughter in Merrill. (the secret to a long marriage is seperate vacations, one for me, one for her , and one for us.) we're going on 30 years next year.
An Hour later I was home. The Seca II is a very comfortable bike and everyone asked "how my back was", I have history of back problems but I had NO back pain just a sore ass the first day and a sore elbow the first day( i was leaning on my hands). The trip was a blast, the bike is a blst and is as much as you all make it out to be. This bike will always be in my stable of bikes.
Since I always like how magazines put the gear used in their trip reports I will do the same.
Gmax helmet
tourmaster Flex jacket
Walmart Saddlebags and tank bag
Life360 gps tracking app on android phone
glympse tracking app
1992 Yamaha Seca II 14,699 miles (with over 1000 new miles on it after a week.)
Sportwheels.com ( they have a layaway program)