Loren "Grits" Schreiber
Loren "Grits" SchreiberSo a few us theatre technicians are sitting around in this bar in Minneapolis after the 2003 USITT Conference. Bill Sapsis, Greg Williams, Moe Conn, Michael Banvard, Cris Dopher, me and maybe a couple others when Greg suggests getting a group together to ride motorcycles across the country to the next year's USITT Conference in Long Beach California. Now at the time I didn't even own a motorcycle, not to mention I lived only a hundred miles or so from Long Beach--Not much of a cross-country ride. Still, it sounded like a cool thing to do, if I could only figure out how. So I got to thinking . . . I could borrow my little brother's 1980 Yamaha 850 Special parked in a garage in Oakland, California, ride it down to San Diego and then out to Baton Rouge, Louisiana over Christmas--fly back home, and then fly out again to ride with the rest of the pack as they passed through Baton Rouge on their way to Long Beach in March. A little convoluted, perhaps, but possible. Well, about the time I had that figured out, Bill Sapsis says,"Why don't we make it a charity ride?" And, as they say, the rest is history. Now in our 4th year, the Long Reach Long Riders have raised many thousands of dollars for ESTA's "Behind the Scenes" and Broadway Cares/Equity Fight AIDS.
By the way, that's my new bike "Flambo." It's a slightly customized 2006 Harley Davidson Superglide.
That first Long Beach Long Riders ride in 2004 was pretty cool. When I showed up at the hotel in Baton Rouge on that raggedy old Yamaha, Cris looked it over cooly and wondered out loud if it could make the journey. Well it did, and it was one of the few bikes that had no troubles at all during the ride. Here's me and the Special at the Alamo.
We really didn't intend to make the ride and annual thing, but the interest was there, so we continued. However, our destination was no longer Long Beach, California, but Rapid City, Nebraska. Obviously we needed a name change. I suggested "Butt Seriously, Folks!". For some reason that idea was shot down and we went with my second suggestion: "The Long Reach Long Riders".
On the first day of the second Long Reach Long Riders charity ride in the summer of 2005, the old Yamahopper simply would not start, no matter how hard I kicked it. (Turns out that was a good thing, because later I discovered that the gas tank had drained its entire contents into the oil sump.) So I hastily transfered my gear to my wife's 1997 Honda Magna 750 and headed out for Rapid city, South Dakota--the destination of the second ride. I met Wayne "Razz" Rasmussen in Las Vegas and together we hit the road through some of the prettiest country on earth. We met up with the others riding in from the east at Hayes, KS and continued on as a group as far as Scottsbluff, NE. At that point my wife called to tell me our dog Cheyenne had died. Disheartened, and no longer interested in continuing on, I rode the 1259 miles home in one 23 hour stretch.
Here's Razz and I at Zion--that pretty country I mentioned.
~Matchless in Africa~ |
*Buds on Bikes* |
*Motorc. Misc.*
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