april 08, 2009 12:52am
September 1, 2008 Rainy day hunt for a
Monday September 1, 2008.
Rainy day hunt for a Dispatch Bike.
I had heard of a old Dispatch bike in the back of an old trailer in a place called Canning NS from a big guy the day before at the Worf Rat Rally while I was manning the booth. His name was Blaine. So I started out for Canning NS at about 7am.this day. The day was very gray and cloudy. But I was on a mission to see if I could find this old Triumph dispatch bike that Blaine seemed to thing was still in the back of this old trailer on a abandoned piece of land. I said to him the day before are you sure its still there he said “nothing changes much around here” so with that I was on the road.
Well wouldn't you know it, the rain started about a half hour into this two hour ride {one way}and I got a little wet. The weather had been s—t this year and why should today been any different. So I stopped for a cup of tea and talked with a couple of locals at the gas station. The rain seemed to be slowing down so I headed out. Canning was about 10 klicks down the road from the gas station, so it wasn't long before I was in town. I stopped at the corner store for directions and the lady told me that I had pasted the place I was looking for {that figured}. I went back to the street that Blaine had described to me as a dirt road( I knew I was in trouble because the road is now paved) and started knocking on doors. The first guy I talked to was at the rendering plant. This place stunk bad. I had trouble standing inside the door talking to this man. But he confirmed that I was in the right area. So I went to the next house on the road and asked the young man who answered the door if he knew of an old trailer in the area, he said no and he also told me that the road out front of his house had been paved for at least seven years. So I asked him if I could take a look in the back 40. I rode my bike back into the field, for those of you who have not seen my bike it is a show bike with a five thousand dollar paint job on it. As my friend Mel Fisher says drive it like you own it. Remember that the ground is wet, I got into the field as far as I dared and decided that I should turn around. I thought to myself if I get stuck back here I'm in trouble, then I thought of Harry our VP dispatch rider from WW2, he must have seen lots of days like this. He rode though the mud and rain from Italy to Holland but there was one big difference, no one was shooting at me.
I made it back to the road with a little fish tailing on my way out. So I went to the next house, it turned out that the lady was the daughter-in-law of the guy who owns the rendering plant. I thought, that is why they can live so close to the honorable smell, they own it. So I went to his house and he didn't know anything about the bike. But I had the name that Blaine had given me, I told him the name and he gave me an address of the family. So I went there, very nice people but no bike. They gave me the location of another family member that may know something, so off I go to his place. By the way the family invited me in for a cup of tea. So I'm off to the next house, he didn't know anything about a bike but he had a name of another family member that may know something about the wayward dispatch bike. So I head over to his house, nobody home. I went next door to see if he knew the man beside him, he told me that the guy had just left. So he called his Dad to see if he knew anything about this dispatch bike, he didn't. We exchanged phone numbers, just in case. A couple of times that day I thought I would get lucky put it was not to be. I wanted to surprise Harry with an old bike that he could ride in parades and to special events but it was not to be this day, maybe soon.
I started back to Digby from Canning and wouldn't you know it , RAIN all the way back. I arrived to find that I had missed an appointment that Sue had set up and the day was over at the Rally. It was all OK because the ride had taken a round out of me and I was beat. Before I had a little nap I watched some old Red Skelton shows on disk. Let me say this don't go back and watch old shows that you liked in the past, let the memories stay the way you remember them. I made my entries and hit the sack.
