Seat adjustment

Diane has an appointment to get her custom seat adjusted on Tuesday which gives us all day Monday to get to Kingston, WA from Seattle. Kingston is on the Olympic peninsula which means a ferry ride from Edmonds just north of Seattle. Although we waited until 9:30 to get on the road we still hit traffic and congestion on IH-5 northbound. Crazy traffic.

Although someone at the BMW dealership mentioned that motorcycles get to go first on the ferry, they didn’t mention the particulars so when we get close to the ferry we queue up with all the cars. A passing motorcycle rider slows down, says we don’t need to wait and to follow him, which we do. At the toll booth he mumbles something which I cannot understand through my ear plugs and takes off. Swell. So now what?

We park in the nearby parking lot and I go into one of the businesses and ask if they know the procedure for motorcycles. Nope. OK, I figure we have to turn back and get back in line :-(. At that point I see one of the toll booth workers taking a smoke break so I walk over and ask her what the procedure is for motorcycles. She tells me to not queue but to go straight to the loading dock, go into the building where the pedestrians and bicyclists get their ticket and buy our tickets.

Sweet! We get to jump in front. Once we buy our tickets we ride to the very front of the line waiting for the next ferry where there are already about fifteen motorcycles waiting. Right before we get to ride on the ferry the guy in front of me backs up his bike and breaks off my left turn signal. Duct tape here we come. Once we are on board, I take a look and as it turns out the turn signal is designed to come off the stalk without breaking so it snaps right back on. Whew.

Right before we boarded I saw another BMW rider on the side of the ferry waiting area with all his luggage off, working on his bike. I walk over and ask if he needs any help. He says he’s fine (his bike is running) just putting all his gear back on after the ferry guys jumped his bike due to a dead battery. Once he was on the ferry though he had to turn his engine off. Unfortunately, the bike battery hadn’t been charged long enough so his bike wouldn’t start once we got to Kingston. Since we had jumper cables with us we agreed to wait once we got off the boat to jump his bike. In the end, he decide to to play it safe, head back to Seattle on the next ferry and stay with friends.

We were off to find Rich’s Custom Seats shop. After locating the shop and grounds where we could camp (showers, fire pit, the works) we decide to use the rest of the afternoon to go for a little ride. Another perfect weather and riding day.

All of the next day is spent waiting around the shop to see the seats being worked on. Custom fittings and test rides. Originally only Diane, who already has a seat made by Rich’s was going to get an adjustment. However, since my Sargent seat was causing ‘butt burn’ after about an hour I decided to also have Rich make a seat for me.

Today’s route.