I’d decided to sell the beautiful, big, orange KTM 300 EXC dirt bike that took forever to fix. I listed it on Ebay and agreed to a deal with a guy from California. You can’t put a full sized motorcycle in an envelope or a box and ship it off. So, I found a place at the Louisville airport that would take it and fly it out if I put it in a crate.
Crating it was a story in itself, but I got it crated, loaded in my truck and got ready to take it to Louisville. To make sure all was well with the truck, I had the brakes done about a week before the trip. The guy from Ebay sent me a money order which I cashed and waited to make sure it was good. I left work at noon to take it to the airport the day before we were to leave for a Disney trip with the kids and Grandpa Doug. That’s when the fun started.
It was nearly 100 degrees on a hot and humid Kentucky summer day as I was going down the highway from Owensboro to Louisville at around 60 mph with an old Chevy pickup (with new brakes) and a motorcycle I’d already sold to someone else in the back. And then the left front wheel came off. Yes, literally and not figuratively, it came off completely (the whole wheel and tire set). The front left side of the pickup sank and I let off the brake.
I started praying immediately – not for me at first – but for oncoming traffic on the other side of the divided highway. Even though I was slowing down, that wheel was still traveling at about 60 mph and it started bouncing in the air and headed across the grass divider and into oncoming traffic on the other side of the road.
“Oh please lord, let it get off the road safely and not hit anyone.” I was pleading hard. Thoughts of injuries and me going to jail floated through my head. Somehow it miraculously weaved in between all the cars and made its way to the far side of the highway where there was a precipitous fall off into deep woods. Away it went into the deep, deep dark Kentucky woods east of Leitchfield. I did take note of the point of departure.
At that point, I realized my own predicament. I knew when the tire first left me not to slam on the brakes. If I had, the truck (with someone else’s motorcycle in back) would have likely flipped. So, I started praying for the truck to stop safely. It did and I was able to edge it off the road as it came to a halt.
I called AAA and they said it would be a half hour or more, so I decided rather than sit in the 100 degree, super humid heat to go hunting for a wheel down in the woods. You’ve read (or may have read) some of my snake adventures before and while this could have been one, it wasn’t. It was however, very deep woods with thorn bushes and possible ticks and fleas. I climbed down into the ravine and began the search. I’d taken particular note of what the other wheels looked like before I began the search, and really, how many whole sets of wheels and tires was I going to find down there right?
After just 10 minutes of searching in thorns, brush, leaves and weeds under heavy tree cover, I found it. I was so happy as I sweated and pushed that wheel up the ravine and out onto the highway. I got over to the truck and pushed it up next to the truck when I realized. It sure looked good down in the ravine but, that wasn’t my wheel and tire set!
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I cried out. Alas, it was a joke, the wheel was not mine.
So, back down into the ravine I went. I was starting to sweat pretty profusely as I was not dressed to go hiking in the woods. I was sweating like a mildly overweight business person in deep Kentucky woods on a hot, humid, 100 degree day looking for a tire (wait… that was too on the nose). After searching for another 5 minutes I spotted another wheel and tire set and ran over to it. “Yes, this will be it.”
No, it wasn’t mine either. At this point, I looked out over the wooded hillside with new eyes. It was like the experience one has when first discovering how to spot or identify something they previously passed by. There were… tens, dozens, scores of wheels and tires down there.
“I’m in tire hell!” I thought.
Then, out of all the lost wheels and tires down in the ravine, I spotted my wheel and tire set. I ran up to it. Eureka! This was it. I’d actually found my needle of a wheel in the tire hell wooded haystack. I heaved and balanced it up and rolled it back up the ravine, out across the highway and got there about the time the AAA person arrived to help me out.
I was soaked with sweat, but glad to find the wheel and tire set (which did help save me on the repair later) and to get the help to get moving again. We got the truck (with motorcycle) loaded on his big tow truck and delivered it successfully to the airport shipping company just before they closed so I could ship the motorcycle off and not delay our Disney vacation. The tow truck driver was a gem, but I’ll save that story for another day. He was truly great though and I’ve never appreciated my AAA membership more than I did that day.
Morale of the story – Make sure the brake repair man has adequately torqued the nuts on your wheels when he’s done.
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The next story in this series is: Tales from Kentucky #5: An Ordinary Day on the Boat
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