Julie's Ride!

By "Red" Naylor

For my story to take any meaning it must be clearly understood that Jacob Marley was dead.. Oh! Wait that is a story for a different time and place. For this story we have to go back in time, but only as far as nineteen eighty-five.

It was July around the 17th and it was hotter than the hubs of hell as I went past the airport. I live in Sacramento California and we don't worry about the heat in July until about 105 and up. This was up, close to 120 on the pavement.
I was going up to Oregon to visit an old shipmate of mine. I had just taken delivery of a brand new "Wing" a Honda Gold wing GL1200 to be more precise. Now this bike had every bell and whistle on it that them slick Japanese types had ever thought of.

I saw it in a bike mag and I went to my local dealer and began the sales dance we all go through when we buy a new bike and want the best deal. Ok ok I should have done that, instead I asked them how much, they told me and I gave them the green. Well not the green money but and green AMEX card. They said I could not use it but I had them call AMEX and they said it was approved. (I had done all that before I went to the shop and wanted the longer warranty by charging it on the card.) My insurance guy faxed them a binder and I was off and running.

This was the most fun time, as you all know that first ride home from the dealership. When you check the bike out. I rode it to work the next day. Big mistake. From my home to the office is 8.2 miles. I rode to Stockton and back to my office and put 120 miles on before I did a lick of work.

I made a plan with my old Navy buddy Nick to come see him and chew over the good old Navy when the ships were wood and the men were steel. Well that's what each generation of sailors tell to the ones who come behind. Our plans were loose I was going to call Him at home when I got near Portland and we would agree on where to meet and what to do after that.

I was riding past the airport and there was a girl walking on the side of the highway with her thumb up looking for a ride. I was riding alone so I pulled over on the shoulder and took a good look. She seemed to me about 20ish with long blond hair that almost matched the helmet on the SE wing.

I asked her if she had ever ridden on a motorcycle and she said "Sure my uncle used to have a Harley something or other I would sure like a ride mister”.

“How far you going?” I asked.

“I have to get to Medford, my dad's real bad sick and I just gotta git there.” She was not dressed for bike travel she had on a pink prom dress and flat-heeled shoes.

As I popped open the trunk and dug out the spare helmet and plugged in the intercom. I said, " I have to go right through there, I will drop you off.”

"Oh thanks Mister shore am glad y'all came along."

I offered her a shirt to put over here shoulders to keep the sun off. She said " I ain't been getting near enough sun lately an it don't bother me none so I guess I won't take it.”

I got on the bike and steadied it up and told her to get on. The big pink skirt was just flying in the breeze as she mounted. The cars going by on I-5 were honking their horns. She reached down between her legs grabbed the back of the dress and pulled and twisted and the skirt seemed like a pink pair of shorts with a tail off to one side. Them women no all about how to do that stuff.

I remember thinking I had already fitted the helmet to her head and showed her how to use the intercom. I put on some tunes and we began the ride.

You all know how a hot day gets better on a bike. Not this time over 110 it just gets hotter and the nice breeze we love so much just becomes a terrible burden. But, having a pretty girl in the saddle behind me and feeling her body lean against my back was nice, very nice in fact.

I tried hard to keep Memnoth (the golden dragon) down under 70 but I and the bike and lady wanted cool air and it was 100 miles away. I had a full tank of gas the road was mine. I-5 from Sacramento to Redding California is a long almost straight boring ride.

I put ole’ Willie on the tape deck and let the speedometer drift. 80 85 we are talking a brand new section of interstate. Julie kept her head in line with mine as we leaned into the few turns there were and didn’t try to counterbalance us, as some of my female passengers had done in the past. Heck sometimes if she were not chattering at me in the earphone I would have hardly know she was there.

I asked her how it came about that she was hitching in such a nice dress. She said "My daddy bought me this dress and I was wearing it home, when my darn car broke down. They guy back at the gas station said he could not get something or other for three or four days and daddy's sick and I just told him I will be back for the car but I gotta hitch me a ride up to see him. I sure hope we make it in time ok"

This changed my feeling of a casual ride, to a little more urgent purposeful ride. Like I "need" any excuse to twist that throttle, I still did not let it drift up into the triple digits but we did now and then get close to ninety.

Ahhhhhhh the cool air at last. No not mountain air just foothills but just about 20 miles above Redding I pulled into a rest stop and got off the bike for a smoke and a stretch and all the usual things you do there. By now Julie was an old friend. You ever meet anyone like that, sort of an instant old friend. I have just met a few but most are still old friends.

We were just at the 400-foot elevation marker and she still would not take a shirt or anything. I looked at the skin on her shoulder and it did not seem to be reddened up too badly so maybe she knew what she was doing. I gave her some sun block 15 (I cant leave the house without it) and we hit the road again.

Every hundred feet in altitude brought us down a few degrees in temp. The rest area was under a hundred and it just got better from there, Now we were on the older section of the interstate, two lanes going in each direction separated by as much as five miles at times. Other times just coming right alongside.

The hill climbing began in earnest with the twisting and turning of the mountain roads it was just great we came over the hill and hit the smoke. It was like a thick fog, but without the mass cooling affect.

Until now I was only listing to Julie and the tunes now I switched on the CB and put the music in a background mode. Julie was shocked and laughing at the truckers as we passed them and would comment on the pretty bike with a beautiful girl and some old fuzzy faced biker. Often they noticed the antenna and tried to engage in conversation I would say a word or two to them but soon be out of range so mostly just said hi and what's the road report like.

"Wall there ain't no smoky bears out but that dern Forrest fire bout 70 miles off the hi way is blowing all this smoke at us. Makes sorter funny driving don't cha know"

I'd thank them and ride on.

My idiot light came on and said it was time to think about fuel and the next station was only 40 miles ahead the turnoff said Weed/Yreka but I just wanted the service station it had cooled down nicely now close to 76 degrees according to my on board computer.

I was getting 29 miles per gallon and had 22.5 miles to go before empty. This was as I pulled up to the pump and filled her up. The service station attendant asked me if I wanted him to wash the window or check the oil. (Remember those days?) I told him don't touch the window or the oil and I would let him breath the rest of the day (grinning he was not offended) but said if that smoke did not go away he might not want to breath all that much.

The last few miles Julie had seemed to vanish from the back of the bike she was so much a part of it. I could just hear her snoring in my headset. Not the first or last one to sleep on the back of my bike on a long run. As we pulled into the station Julie woke up and ran inside. When I came back to the bike she was back and ready to go, with her helmet on when I was ready for her to load up and plug in.

"How much further to Medford she asked me..

“Just about an hour and a half more the attendant says maybe just a bit more because of the smoke ahead.”

"Oh! Red I shore hope we make it on time.”

I had noticed a little accent in her speech earlier but had not mentioned it. I said " You sound just like my cousin Little Rich, out there in Virginia, he's been there so long he sounds like a native.”

She smiled. "My daddy's whole family live right by some big ole' Navy base out that way I ain't been there since I was a little kid but I know I sorter sound like it. Chesapeake is where they all live!"

"Are they gonna let all the ole' trees just go to waste in the fire?"

"No!" I replied, “You’ve seen some of the big rigs headed back down the hill with backend logs on them. They get them to a staging mill and saw away the black stuff and are left sometimes with lots of good lumber. They pay the state a fee and plant ten trees for every single one they haul out of here. It don't seem to make it right but it helps.”

The sun was going down' and it was cool enough for a jacket I put on one and gave her a Pendleton shirt to wear. I told her no more sleepyhead on the back and I would need her to keep me wide-awake and aware of anything going on around us.

I was going to put on some speed and would try to cut the time down some on the last leg of the journey. I really went nuts speeding every single place I could but still taking the proper line for curves and such. There are some lovely big sweeping curves, gentle climbs and steep hard pulls in this area.

In an hour, we began to see signs announcing the distance to Medford as 30 mi. then 20mi. and then 10, just as I topped a last small hill and started down the other side all the dash lights flickered and died. The computer quit and the engine died. I grabbed the clutch, kicked her down to neutral quick and coasted down the hill off the side of the road to a small mom & pop, all night market with a gas pump.

You just can’t believe how surprised I was! I had started with under a thousand miles on the odometer. I bought a Honda in the first place because I am no mechanic, these things have a great rep and I was wondering now if it was true. I put the bike on the center stand as asked Julie to go in and get us a soda pop.

I don't know now why I did it, but I popped off all the side covers very carefully placing them in the trunk or on the seat. After 20 minutes I was still confused and headed into the little market.

There was a small line at the counter I grabbed a soft drink from the cooler and looked around for Julie. No sign of her. There were no restrooms inside the market they were outside. I waited and asked the ole' man behind the counter if he had seen a pretty blond lady in a pink dress come in, in the last half hour?

This was an older man in his mid sixties I would guess but still ramrod strait. He looked back at me over his half glasses with those bright blue commanding officers kind of eye's "Go ahead and drink your pop young man I believe I can help you in a few moments.”

He spoke into what looked like a cross between a walkie-talkie and a telephone, "Mother can you bring the big book out here? She has done it again.”

Puzzled by the statement and the sad reply that she would be right out with it. I drank down the soda and in fact went back for another the place had calmed down to very quiet. The old man’s wife handed her husband a big thick album, which he laid up on the counter, and opened to an old yellowed newspaper clipping, glued to the album’s page. He then turned the album so I could read the headline "Local girl killed on way to father’s sick bed.”

The story went on to tell of a young girl on her way to see her dad just like Julie had told me. But Her car broke down just outside of Sacramento near the spot where the Airport was to be built. Someone had picked her up and after doing the usual brutal things had killed her. She was left on the side of the road near the turnoff where my bike had quit running.

After the printed story I thumbed through the hand written pages of stories of other men who had picked her up and came into the store for help. The old man asked me to write my story up for the book. I promised him I would and what I have just shared with you is a copy of what I put into his ledger book.

Julie had often came into the store from a car and many times from a big rig even once from a movie stars Greyhound bus conversion. I was the first from a motorcycle. Pop said, "Every single guy who has come into the store has been a nice strait clean fella, the kind who would never think of taking any advantage of a pretty young girl like her. Every single one of them came in like you worried for the girl for her own sake and not due to any bad idea's they had about her.”

The old man continued, “I have a theory that the one's who don't come to the store just don't make it this far. We have had a number of single car wrecks on this mountain mostly on this side of the peak. Quite a few within a few miles of where your bike quit on you. It's just my guess! But I think you passed the test. A couple who did not, have mentioned Julie to the Ambulance drivers, but none ever made it all the way to the hospital. Julie never did either.”

I started to call a shop to come get my bike when Pop said "Oh there ain't a thing wrong with that bike go fire it up!” He walked me out and stood there while it fired back up. I put the parts back on I had removed. Got pops recommend on a Motel close by and Headed on.

So if your ever in the Valley headed North from the Sacramento area, and see a young lady with her thumb in the air. Stop and give her a lift. She is an interesting passenger, and nice as she can be, just be sure YOU can pass the test.

"Hey mister can I get a ride with you? My dads real sick, and I sure could use the ride"

Back to The Biker eNews Archives