Yesterday morning it was 33 degrees here in Daytona, but the I-95 corridor up in the northeast was gettin' pounded with over a foot of snow. Poor people - I feel for the folks drivin' to Bike Week. At least it was super sunny here, though it was chilly. Boots and Pup drove me down to Crank 'n Chrome to pick up the Dixie Glide and I figured this was probably a good day to go check out Beach Street, Main Street and areas south. I detest ridin' there, especially during Bike Week, but figured I owed it to our audience to check it out and give my impressions.
There were lotsa bikes parked along the east and west sides of Beach Street ....
.... and I squeezed the DixieGlide in a slot as someone else was pullin' out. You can pay $5 to park off the street a couple of places but then you have a long walk to the vendor and display area.
If you're a little patient, someone will pull out and you can pull in to the now vacant parking spot. I took off the leather, put it in the saddle bag and walked down the street towards Daytona Harley. They've leased the lot across the street this year and there were probably twenty of thirty vendors along the riverfront. I checked out the Chamber's Official Welcome Center, picked up some reading material and moseyed into the vendor area.I detest goin' to this part of Daytona during Bike Week for a couple of reasons: traffic, posers and wannabees, and the absolutely ridiculous rip off prices. I've written about it in the past, but here's the pictures from yesterday. First up when you walked in the vendor area:
$5 for a cup of coffee. Then walk a little ways towards the end and you could pick up a souvenir from Jesse James ...
... or go across the street and get a whole pizza for $25 (And you saved $7!) or get a 12 oz. can of Coke for $3 (a 12 pack in the 7-11 was $2.99) or a bottled water for $3 ($5.50 for a case of 24 in Wal Mart) ...
... or a Bike Week special waffle for $8 (Waffle House All American Meal is $6.95 and ya get a waffle, two eggs, hash browns, toast, sausage or bacon - you get the point) ...
... and you can wash your waffle down with an ice cold beer ...
... or, if you prefer non-alcoholic beer, Root Beer was on special, too:
Man-oh-man. And folks think I'm cynical and too hard when I write about the rip off prices in the Main Street - Beach Street area. Jeez. I'm all for capitalism, but I also ain't stupid. You might sell 100 beers at $4 a pop or you could sell 1,000 at $3 a pop. Can't they do the math? Wal Mart has. Okay, enuff on that.
I loaded back up and figured this would be the only day I'd ride Main Street so I headed east over the Main Street Bridge and traffic wasn't too bad. Of course, as soon as I got over the bridge the first thing I see is ...
... yep, cynical me. There were quite a few folks out and about doin' the Main Street crawl. 
and the traffic comin' from the East, off of Hwy A1A was a totally different story than the way I was heading ...
Well, enough of this, I thought. Normally I'd stop, walk the length of Main Street, both ways, take some pictures along the way and report on what I saw. The hell with that. Maybe Wednesday when everyone's out at Samsula at the Coleslaw Rasslin'.
I hung a right at A1A to head south to the Dunlawton Bridge in Port Orange and made a brief stop at the only toplees bar in Daytona:
They're an advertiser and I wanted to see how things were goin'. I talked with Noble, the day manager and he told they'd been slammed. "Thanks for gettin' the word out about us, man!" he exclaimed. "I can't tell you the number of folks that have been her cuz of the Bike Week Guide. It's worked great."
Well, thanks. But the place is okay for bikers - no cover charge and $3 longnecks. And half nekkid girls. Yep, you read that right. Their beer prices are cheaper than Main Street just three miles north and you're in a strip club. How 'bout that. Oh, and about my comment about the ONLY topless bar in Daytona Beach area? It's true. All the other places that advertise as "Gentleman's Club" are bikini bars. New rules, laws and regulations from Daytona Beach and Volusia County have done away with topless or nude clubs. Biggin's is in Daytona Beach Shores and is grandfathered in.
$5 for a cup of coffee. Then walk a little ways towards the end and you could pick up a souvenir from Jesse James ...
... or go across the street and get a whole pizza for $25 (And you saved $7!) or get a 12 oz. can of Coke for $3 (a 12 pack in the 7-11 was $2.99) or a bottled water for $3 ($5.50 for a case of 24 in Wal Mart) ...
... or a Bike Week special waffle for $8 (Waffle House All American Meal is $6.95 and ya get a waffle, two eggs, hash browns, toast, sausage or bacon - you get the point) ...
... and you can wash your waffle down with an ice cold beer ...
... or, if you prefer non-alcoholic beer, Root Beer was on special, too:
Man-oh-man. And folks think I'm cynical and too hard when I write about the rip off prices in the Main Street - Beach Street area. Jeez. I'm all for capitalism, but I also ain't stupid. You might sell 100 beers at $4 a pop or you could sell 1,000 at $3 a pop. Can't they do the math? Wal Mart has. Okay, enuff on that.I loaded back up and figured this would be the only day I'd ride Main Street so I headed east over the Main Street Bridge and traffic wasn't too bad. Of course, as soon as I got over the bridge the first thing I see is ...
... yep, cynical me. There were quite a few folks out and about doin' the Main Street crawl. 
and the traffic comin' from the East, off of Hwy A1A was a totally different story than the way I was heading ...
Well, enough of this, I thought. Normally I'd stop, walk the length of Main Street, both ways, take some pictures along the way and report on what I saw. The hell with that. Maybe Wednesday when everyone's out at Samsula at the Coleslaw Rasslin'.I hung a right at A1A to head south to the Dunlawton Bridge in Port Orange and made a brief stop at the only toplees bar in Daytona:
They're an advertiser and I wanted to see how things were goin'. I talked with Noble, the day manager and he told they'd been slammed. "Thanks for gettin' the word out about us, man!" he exclaimed. "I can't tell you the number of folks that have been her cuz of the Bike Week Guide. It's worked great."Well, thanks. But the place is okay for bikers - no cover charge and $3 longnecks. And half nekkid girls. Yep, you read that right. Their beer prices are cheaper than Main Street just three miles north and you're in a strip club. How 'bout that. Oh, and about my comment about the ONLY topless bar in Daytona Beach area? It's true. All the other places that advertise as "Gentleman's Club" are bikini bars. New rules, laws and regulations from Daytona Beach and Volusia County have done away with topless or nude clubs. Biggin's is in Daytona Beach Shores and is grandfathered in.
I donned the leather again and headed south on A1A. It was still chilly, around 4 o'clock by this time and probably 55 or so. Folks had on full leathers for the crusin' ...
But if you weren't ridin', perhaps the sun was warm enough for some of our snow bird friends. I reckon ya gotta go back with a little tan or sunburn to show your friends you've been to sunny Florida, right? I saw these guys hangin' out in front of their hotel on A1A
... but I was ridin' and it was certainly chilly. As I topped the Dunlawton Avenue causeway I snapped a picture lookin' North towards Main Street and thought to myself, "Man, it even looks cold and stark from here ..."
Once over the causeway I turned right - north - on US Hwy 1. Figured I'd run up to Miller's and the Limpnickie vending areas. It seemed to me there were a lot fewer vendors than normal, and there was plenty of parking available at this normally very crowded venue.
I wandered around checkin' out some of the awesome "next generation" bike builders here. They build some crazy stuff, that's for sure, but they all pride themselves on making the builds ridable and 'built for the working man.'
The sun was gettin' lower and lower and I knew when it dropped that temps were gonna sink like the Titantic so I loaded up and headed north on Ridgewood Avenue (US Hwy 1) from South Daytona towards the "New" Main Street - US 1 in Ormond Beach. Only stop I made on the way was at Tropical Tattoo to smoke a cigaret and shoot the breeze with Marcus a little bit. I didn't get to talk with any of the artists this go-'round cuz every chair was filled with folks gettin' some new ink or an old piece touched up. It was SRO only and it was good to see the parking lot filled with motorcycles.
From Tropical Tattoo I headed to our home for Bike Week - the Deadwood Saloon. It was pretty crowded but I pulled around back and got a parkin' spot with no problem.
Across the street at the IHS was a totally different story, though (below). As I related on Friday or Saturday's post, traffic and parking is a bitch on the west side of Hwy 1 (and the food and drink prices are higher, too!). I'll take the east side and hangout with bikers and pretty ladies instead of sittin' in friggin' traffic.
As the sun was startin' to disappear I heard a big whoopin' and hollerin' on the front porch of Deadwood Saloon. Seems it was Bob's birthday - he's from Indiana - and Lindsey, one of the gorgeous barmaids at Deadwood was treatin' him to a semi-world famous body shot ...
I can think of worse ways to chase down the shot ...
Well I thought that was a pretty good way to end the day so after another pass through, I pulled on the leather, the gloves and the toboggan and rode home. Five or six hours of chilly ridin', but it gave me a good feel for everything that was happenin'.
But if you weren't ridin', perhaps the sun was warm enough for some of our snow bird friends. I reckon ya gotta go back with a little tan or sunburn to show your friends you've been to sunny Florida, right? I saw these guys hangin' out in front of their hotel on A1A
... but I was ridin' and it was certainly chilly. As I topped the Dunlawton Avenue causeway I snapped a picture lookin' North towards Main Street and thought to myself, "Man, it even looks cold and stark from here ..."
Once over the causeway I turned right - north - on US Hwy 1. Figured I'd run up to Miller's and the Limpnickie vending areas. It seemed to me there were a lot fewer vendors than normal, and there was plenty of parking available at this normally very crowded venue.
I wandered around checkin' out some of the awesome "next generation" bike builders here. They build some crazy stuff, that's for sure, but they all pride themselves on making the builds ridable and 'built for the working man.'
The sun was gettin' lower and lower and I knew when it dropped that temps were gonna sink like the Titantic so I loaded up and headed north on Ridgewood Avenue (US Hwy 1) from South Daytona towards the "New" Main Street - US 1 in Ormond Beach. Only stop I made on the way was at Tropical Tattoo to smoke a cigaret and shoot the breeze with Marcus a little bit. I didn't get to talk with any of the artists this go-'round cuz every chair was filled with folks gettin' some new ink or an old piece touched up. It was SRO only and it was good to see the parking lot filled with motorcycles.From Tropical Tattoo I headed to our home for Bike Week - the Deadwood Saloon. It was pretty crowded but I pulled around back and got a parkin' spot with no problem.
Across the street at the IHS was a totally different story, though (below). As I related on Friday or Saturday's post, traffic and parking is a bitch on the west side of Hwy 1 (and the food and drink prices are higher, too!). I'll take the east side and hangout with bikers and pretty ladies instead of sittin' in friggin' traffic.
As the sun was startin' to disappear I heard a big whoopin' and hollerin' on the front porch of Deadwood Saloon. Seems it was Bob's birthday - he's from Indiana - and Lindsey, one of the gorgeous barmaids at Deadwood was treatin' him to a semi-world famous body shot ...
I can think of worse ways to chase down the shot ...
Well I thought that was a pretty good way to end the day so after another pass through, I pulled on the leather, the gloves and the toboggan and rode home. Five or six hours of chilly ridin', but it gave me a good feel for everything that was happenin'.Today we're doin' our free poker run from Deadwood Saloon to the White Eagle to Trader Jack's and back. Highs are only supposed to hit sixty so I better bundle up again. I'll let y'all know how the New Main Street to Swampland to Oceanside Ridin' to Cattle Country and wooded by-ways ride goes. About a hundred miles and four traffic lights - sounds like a good one to me.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment