OOPS! Didn't Quite Fit Through There ............
Went for a ride this afternoon. Felt like taking a couple of pictures of the local covered bridges and there's probably 7-8 of them in a 50 mile radius of where I live. Seems like a good reason to go for a ride, eh?

That's what I thought too.


This is the Lovett Bridge over Graham Creek. Kinda cool. Not real impressive, except for the fact that it's still standing.








I consulted the Gazetteer and headed off cross country to try and find my way to the next place.

You do have a Gazetteer right? If the answer is no, get one. Best thing for finding your way when not on highways and major roads. No really, go get one NOW! If you only have one map reference for your state these things are great.

Worked my way via the back roads to this place next. Nice looking bridge here. This was the first time I'd gone to this one. The Otter Creek Bridge.


You can tell from the picture here that the approach is pretty steep.








That steep part? That's where the whole title of this post "Ooops, Didn't quite fit through there" comes from.

When I pulled up to this place I got about 1/2 way in and up that grade and realized "This is gonna be a bitch to get out of".

No problem right? Uh, that would be wrong.

Look at the space between those posts and then look at the width of that bike. Close isn't it? There is enough room. I measured it.

What I didn't count on was losing traction and sliding into the post on the right and then bouncing into the post on the left.

Shit. Broke BOTH of the saddlebag mounts. Yeah, not one but BOTH of 'em. I did try to roll backwards to get out of there at first, but I damn near dropped it. so I tried the forward route. Classic case of "Shoulda' paid more attention when I was coming in at first.

Duh. Oh well. The bags are basically ok. I'll have to repair the locks that hold them on the, now broken, mounts. Fortunately, I had a shitload of Bungee cords and a cargo net in the bags. I strapped the bags onto the back of the bike and headed home.

I'll have to go to a few of the other bridges at a later date and get pictures I guess. Good news? I didn't drop the bike. I was at this bridge for a good 1/2 hour and never had a single car go by. Yeah, it's out there. If I'd have dropped her rollin' backwards, I might still be there waiting for help getting her up from the ground.

Here's a picture from the window in the Bridge. There's a bigass Leatherback Turtle in that picture down in the lower left corner, but you can't really see it in the picture.

Here's a picture from the "Non- Crash" end.

Well, It could have been worse. I'll have to start lookin' for new mounts on Ebay or at the The Concours Owners Group I guess. New ones are out of the question. Totally outrageous price from the Kawasaki dealer.