Alan Leduc's
Palmetto Ramble 2002
Ride Report

The Palmetto Ramble 2003 was an 11 hour long distance competitive rally which was held March 1, 2003. Home base was in Columbia, South Carolina. The rally organizers posted a list of bonus locations in South Carolina and the surrounding states the week before the event. Each bonus location or task was assigned point values. The participants were required to develop a ride that hopefully would allow them to collect as many bonus points as possible in the eleven hours from 6:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. A 550 mile limit was imposed with a 50 point per mile penalty for each mile over. Riders were time barred after 5:30 p.m. and would be scored as did not finish (DNF). Riders arriving after 5:00 p.m. but before 5:30 p.m. were assessed a 100 point penalty for each minute they were late.

Bonus Locations

Route Development

Now a veteran of a few rallies, my method was to plot all of the points in both Microsoft Streets and Trips and Garmin's Mapsource. This takes a lot of time, but I seem to be able to plan better with S&T and of course need the Mapsource for the GPS. Dang, why won't they make these things compatible? I got this done but was knee deep in planning for the MTF 50CC/100CCC, which was scheduled for the following week, so I really didn't have much time for planning. I plotted out a rough route which took me north with a little taste of the mountains. I decided to just go with the route and not worry about being competitive.

My original plan was to meet  Bob Moore (DragRacerBob of the MTF) in Lexington on Friday. However, weather was not cooperating so I decided that I would leave on Thursday early afternoon and try to avoid the forecasted snow on Friday. It looked like this was going to be a blessing in disguise. I hoped to get to Knoxville in the early evening Thursday and have time to work on  my route so more. I attempted to call home on my cell at Knoxville and my phone was not working. I had a similar problem the last time I was out of my calling area and was told that I would have to call when I had the problem, not when I got home. I spent the next five hours on the phone with Cingular Wireless. I tried to work on my route but just could not focus. So I was stuck at this point with my quickie route.

Even for a quick route, this seemed to be a lot of points, but you never know. The problem was Streets and Trips summarized the route as 461.4 miles and 13 hours:31 minutes. This simply looked too aggressive, so I was going to have to have some escape plans and just live with how it turned out. It should also be noted that I would have to work in another State Park to get the extra 750 point bonus.

Location Points 1 Riverside Inn 0 2 Gaston - Odometer check (mandatory) 500 3 Cross Anchor Lil Cricket Market 776 4 Sandy Springs - Volunteer Fire Department 648 5 Cold Point - Crenshaws Fishing Supplies 774 6 Lake Greenwood - Amoco 734 7 Greenwood - receipt 653 8 Greenville - Confederate Armory Plaque (Main and 123) 974 9 Paris Mt. - Travelers Rest (hwy 25 to Altamont Rd.) 1527 10 Jones Gap State Park 11 Caesars Head - receipt 1363 12 Landrum - city limit signs 1255 13 Gaffney - Cowpens National Battlefield (SC110 and SC11) 771 14 Gaffney - Macedonia Vol Fire Dept #1 1028 15 Blacksburg - Bridge at the Stateline on Hwy 198  946 16 Grover, NC - Castle on SC side. 973 17 Blacksburg - Bridge at the Stateline on Hwy 198  946 18 Blacksburg - Bridge way out in the middle of nowhere 997 19 York County County Line 700 20 Lockhart - Hydroelectric Project 606 21 Leeds - Woods Ferry 928 SC Lottery ticket - bring back an unscratched SC lottery ticket 500 State Park #1 - bring back 1 State Park stamp 250 State Park #2 - bring back a 2nd State Park stamp 500 State Park #3 - bring back a 3rd State Park stamp 750 Call back the rally organization between 11:00 AM and 12:00 PM 500 Declare your route before the rally 1000 Bring a 6 pack for dinner Friday (at check-in)  500 Bring a 6 pack for dinner Saturday (5:00 PM to 5:50 PM)) 500 Surprise bonus 1500 Total 23099

I decided to get up early on Friday and to ride part of my planned route on the way to Columbia. Was this cheating? Maybe. Did others do it. Likely. Did it help? Yes. Why did I do it? Riding in the winter gives you a lot of bad habits. You work so hard at taking curves straight up, that I felt I needed some time in the twisties. Secondly, I wanted to get an idea of how aggressively I had planned and to get an idea of how to plan my escape routes. Wow, did I need that practice in the twisties. Glad I did that. Plus who can resist and extra opportunity to ride to Caesar's Head. And yes, I needed get to the hotel and work out some bail out plans.

During the pre-ride, I decided to eliminate Jones Gap State Park. It looked like a short diversion but ended up being close to a 1/2 hour and that was to the gate. I was told at Caesar's Head that they would not have a ranger on duty, so that meant documentation hassles. Scratch one State Park. This meant I now needed to find two other State Parks close to my route in order to get the the 1250 points for the second and third State Parks.

When I got to the hotel, I called Cingular again as my cell phone still was not working. I played with the route a bit but just couldn't think analytically while jumping on and off with the Cingular customer service rep. Maybe because now 6 hours of talking to Cingular, I still didn't have service and was getting the same dumb response. My temperature was rising. The only thing that I discovered was that Mapsource was routing me from Greenwood (Stop 7) to Greenville (Stop 8), up route 25 instead of returning back to the interstate. The new mileage was 451.1 and the new time was 13 hours:32 minutes. This saved about 10 miles but cost an extra 1 minute. But it looked like a good way to go, so I decided to go for it. 

Without Jones Gap State Park and assuming that I wouldn't be able to get the other two State Parks. I was down to 21849 points. And was still 2 hours:32 minutes over. I looked at reversing the route, but counter-clockwise seemed to provide the best opportunity for escapes, so I decided to stick with a CCW route.

What about escapes? 

• If I bailed at the Macedonia Fire Department (Stop 14) and moved Cross Anchor (Stop 3) and Sandy Springs (Stop 4) to the end I would be at 413.2 miles and 10 hours:28 minutes. That was definitely a workable route and would result in 16699 points. Not a winner, but at least I would be able to ride to Caesar's Head and back.
• If I dropped York County (Stop 18), Lockhart (Stop 19), and Leeds (Stop 20), the route would be 471.3 miles and take 12 hours: 9 minutes. This seemed like a feasible route and would result in 19615 points. I could make a call at Macedonia (Stop 14).
• If I dropped Blacksburg (Stop 15), Grover (Stop 16), and Blacksburg (Stop 17) the route would be 426.5 miles and would take 12 hours:28 minutes. This route would result in a total of 18933 points. It seemed that the best choice would be to use one of the two above strategies.

Pre-ride Pizza Party

At the pre-ride dinner I was able to greet some old friends and meet some new ones. I had some pictures but it looks like somewhere in the saving process, I destroyed them. So much for those memories. Anytime you make a list you are likely to forget some but among those that I had met at other rallies were Wally Nichols, Jim Bain, Brad Ingram, Jerry McCumby, and Duke Dunsford. Among the Motorcycle Tourer's Forum Charter and Gold Members were Andy Simons, Neil Dolson, Bob Moore, and Don Kime. I also meet Richard Matthews who would be participating in the MTF 50CC the next week. He had come to the Palmetto all the way from Oklahoma, was returning home, and then back to Florida the next week. Wow. 

Bob Moore was setting across from me at the pre-ride pizza party and was discussing his route. Every time he mentioned a bonus spot, I would say, "I'm going there." I finally ask if he would consider riding with me as a team. It sounded like we had the same route anyway. We had to commit to a team that night, so Bob informed Andy Simons that we were considering running as a team and we met in my room to compare our routes. The best I remember, our routes were the same except that Bob only had part of the stops that formed the cross at I-26 (Stops 3-7 on my route) and Bob had included Batesville and Saluda. Bob had already decided to drop Batesville due to a timing issue with the bonus. So it didn't take much to convince him to drop Saluda and add the extra bonuses at the cross.

Bob and I had ridden together quite a few miles before the rally, so I knew riding would not be an issue but I wasn't sure about stopping. However, I had already decided that I was just doing this for fun and figured it would be even more fun sharing the ride with a friend. Besides, it was worth an extra 250 points. We told Andy that we were riding as a team and it was official.

We warned Don Kime that you needed to get up early as you left in the order that your bike was lined up. Don was doing this with all paper maps and this was his first rally. 

I made one final call to Cingular and they discovered that they had turned my roaming off (actually they discovered that the night before).  But now after 7 hours on the phone they discovered that they had not turned it back on last evening and that was why I still couldn't make calls. Flip a switch and I was back in business. One of my favorite sayings is "When you are dumb you suffer." In this case, they were dumb and I suffered by loosing 7 hours.

Just as I was wrapping up the call with Cingular on the hotel phone, I was placing a test call to my wife on the celluar phone, and then there was a knock on the door. I told my wife that I would call her back, terminated the call with Cingular, and answered the door. It was a person that was wanting to clear an old issue. This was not a good time and I really was not interested in resolving an issue that we disagreed upon on principle. Not the most pleasant conversation and now I was stressed and running out of time. I had only gotten about 4 hours sleep the night before because of Cingular and it looked like this night wouldn't be any  better.  I called my wife, explained why it had taken so long to get back to her, and then headed out to get gas, which I should have done in the afternoon.

I decided that I would not do anymore work with the route since Bob and I were now a team. But I did make index cards with each stop. I would use these to write down the answers to the bonus questions instead of writing them directly on the bonus sheets. I figured if it rained, this would protect the bonus sheets. I included a target time on each index card. I determined the target time by ducting the time overage proportionally for each stop. This should give us an idea as to whether or not we were going to have to escape. I also downloaded the route to the GPS.

Looks like only about 3 hours sleep. Better make them good ones.

The Ride

We got up early the next morning and Don, Bob, and I were only had 5 or 6 bikes ahead of us. As I was attaching the electronics and taking an pre-ride assessment , I noticed that my credit card was missing. Back to the room. Nope. Checked all my pockets and all my luggage. I just used it last night for gas. Could it have fell out of my pocket while I was checking the tires? I walk across the way to the gas station. No Luck. $*#% what a way to start a ride. Good thing I  brought plenty of cash.

I had missed the riders meeting but Bob informed me that the surprise bonus was that we had to buy a duck and have it duct taped to our bike upon our return. I told him that there was a gift shop at Caesar's Head and that hopefully we could find something there.

Bob decided that I should lead. I usually prefer to ride drag but when the riders were released at 6:00 a.m., off I went. Made the OD check at Gaston with no problems (last year a rider turned the wrong direction out of the parking lot). However, upon leaving the OD checkpoint, I missed the turn to the interstate. Oops. First U-turn. I bet Bob is thinking he should be on his own about now. I was having a heck of a time reading my GPS. It was much later in the day that I discovered that I had mounted the GPS on my camera mount instead of its normal position. If you wear bifocals, you understand why I was having trouble reading the GPS.

We headed  up I-26 to our next stop Cross Anchor (Stop 3). What brand is served by the diesel p ump? Crown. We were out at 7:29, 5 minutes ahead of our target time.

Next stop Sandy Springs (Stop 4). How many bay doors to the fire house? 4. I blew by the stop and had to make another U-turn. I'm sure Bob was thinking, what a ditz. Time out 7:39, 14 minutes ahead of our target time.

Stop 5, was Crenshaw's Fishing Supply at Cold Point. What is on the roof? The roof was covered with animal skulls. Time out 7:55. We were now 22 minutes ahead of our target time. I was feeling pretty good. There were no tricks at any of the bonuses so it was taking far less than the 10 minutes allotted time for the stops.

Stop 6 was the Lake Greenwood Amoco. What kind of food is served here? Subway. Time out was 8:06 which was 21 minutes ahead of schedule. 

Stop 7 required a receipt in Greenwood. We had decided since we needed a receipt as documentation that we would get gas at this stop even though it was only about 145 miles into the ride. Our time out was 8:15. We were now 40 minutes ahead of our target. I mentioned to Bob that while we had seen several riders at Stops 3, 4, 5 and 6 no body seemed to continue on to this stop. They must have been looking at routing similar to Streets and Trips which recommended a back tracking route and figured that it was not worth the points. Bob said, maybe they know something we don't. I said, that may be but then again maybe we know something they don't. I saw our buddy Don Kime ride by while we were at the gas station. Bob missed him but I told him that Don had just passed. Hard to tell with the full face helmet,  but I'm guessing Don had a smile on his face.

Just after turning the corner 72 on to 25, I remembered that I had forgotten to get my receipt. Remember that I had lost my credit card and my routine was screwed up. I paid for my gas but did not get the receipt. I pulled to the side and told Bob what had happened. I spotted a Burger King. Bob waited in the lot as I went inside. I ask the clerk to ring up a cup of coffee and give me a receipt but that I did not want the coffee. This from a guy wearing a helmet. She complied but I'm sure wondered what the hell was going on.

US 25 was a good 4 lane road with few stop lights. This seemed like a good decision. My Garmin Street Pilot Colormap does not have autorouting and as often happens, all I had was a straight line from Stop 7 to Stop 8. Darn, I hate it when that happens. Why couldn't there at least be a warning when you download the route. $&#%. As we approached Greenville and I realized that this was a pretty good sized city, I told Bob that he should lead. We got off track somehow, so I went into the seek and find mode by zooming in and honing in onto a GPS dot. We eventually found our way the Confederate Armory Plaque (Stop 8)which was right downtown. Who donated the land? Vardry McBee. Time out 9:32. Our little mistake and the traffic in having to go through Greenville cost us some time. We were now back to being only 21 minutes ahead of schedule.

Our next stop would prove to be one of the most special bonuses of the day. Every rally should have some bonuses that are just a bear. Who ever found this one deserves the rallybastard of the day award. We were headed to Paris Mountain - Travelers Rest (Stop 9)in search of a radio tower. Where does a tower get the best transmission? At the top of the mountain of course. My GPS again gave me a direct route but I was in the lead. I missed the road but it looked like we could just take a right at the next road and would be ok. Wrong. Roads in SC do not often go straight. After 5 miles of twisting and winding a some pretty slow speeds a U-turn was once again due. Bob lead us out. Damn he was pushing me on those curves. What a rider. We find the road which was accessed from a frontage road and up the hill we went. The higher we go the foggier it got. Pretty soon I could only see Bob's taillights when he hit the brakes. There were no guardrails and no shoulder. If you got wide or short in a curve, you were in trouble. We get to the top of the hill where the tower should be but there is no sign of it. Another U-turn. This one wasn't easy as the road was narrow and steep. Bob spots an access road. Hmmmm. Up he goes and and I'm right after him. This was about a 30% grade for about 20 feet and then a 260 degree cutback at the same grade. I wouldn't be surprised if somebody dropped their bike on that one. What is the FCC/FAA Registration Number? 1005297 It ends up that this was the number,  but it was the one that everybody wrote down, so the rally team accepted it. I kidded Andy about the fog. I told him when it got to the point that I couldn't see Bob's taillights due to the fog, I just followed my GPS. When it said turn, I turned. LOL Time out was 10:09. Our little adventure had cost us. We were now only 10 minutes ahead of schedule.

Our next stop, since we decided to skip Jones Gap State Park,  was Caesar's Head. (Stop 11) Bob was in the lead. I was glad as he is a much better technical rider than I am and the ride to Caesar's Head is basically twisties up and then the same twisties back down. Bob was cooking. My highway boards were dragging and I was trying to kick them to the up position but they obviously needed some lubrication as they were not cooperating. I was getting behind. Finally, I got the highway boards up and all I was dragging was my boot -- big feet. What a bonus Caesar's Head turned  out to be: 1363 points + 250 point State Park Bonus + we were able to buy our duck for the 1500 point surprise bonus. The rangers had them stacked up at the counter, so we didn't even have to shop. Wow, 3113 points at one stop! I taped my duck onto my luggage rack. He (now named Drag after my riding partner DragRacer Bob), felt right at home with my other birds: Jake, Jr. a pink flamingo given to me by my friend Patrick Jacobson aka Flamingo Jake; Stuff, a bluebird that represents my wife, a user of Super Blue Stuff; and Little Stuff who represents my grandson Bailey who had to have a bird. Time out was10:46. Bob pulling me up the mountain through the twisties had allowed up to make up for some of our mistakes and we were now 24 minutes ahead of our target time.

I had a note on my Caesar's Head card to remind me that there was a bonus for calling back to rally headquarters between 11:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. After we cleared the bottom of the hill and were out of the twisties, I pushed the speed dial button on my cell phone. Hello. Hi, this is Alan Leduc and his team mate Bob Moore reporting in. Where are you at? Somewhere between Caesar's Head and Landrum. Sounding somewhat confused, where? I repeated, somewhere between Caesar's Head and Landrum. Did you say you had somebody with you? Yes, Bob Moore my teammate. Where is he at? About 50 feet in front of me. Huh? I have my cell phone hooked into my intercom system. We're on the move. Ok, got you down. Those were pretty easy points and cost us no time.

We passed through Landrum (Stop 12) and missed the sign coming into town. We stopped and asked a some passer-bys what Landrum's claim to fame was. Huh? We each went into separate stores and ask where the sign was identifying Landrum's claim to fame. Seems nobody knows. I then remembered that this was part of the route that I had pre-ridden on the way down to Columbia. I remembered that there was another sign on the other side of town. We stopped across the street from the sign and I walked over to get the information. What is Landrum's claim to fame? Home of the first chapter of the National Beta Club. We were out at 11:37 and 22 minutes ahead of our target time. Things were looking pretty good even though we had taken time to chat with the good folks of Landrum.

I told Bob, that I had gotten lost here on my pre-ride and suggested that he continue in the lead to our next stop which would be Cowpens National Battlefield (Stop 13). Somehow I had gotten back in the lead. I was running radar and part of this leg was on Interstate 26. As we enter Chesnee, we see a couple of other bikes. We ended up passing them, but all arrived at Cowpens about the same time. It was Wally Nichols and Rick Miller (at the end we found out that they were riding as a team and would take second place). Wally said, "You guys are riding too fast." Maybe. Probably. We're we? I never felt uncomfortable. What was the total number of British Forces? 1050. Time out was 12:04 which put us 34 minutes ahead of schedule. Alright, we picked up some more time. Looks like we have a shot a making the planned route. Never would have thought that. I have a note that we need to get gas 32 miles later after the Castle (Stop 16).

It was just a short trip to the Macedonia Volunteer Fire Department How many bay doors? Hmmm, haven't we had that question before? This time the answer was 5. Time out 12:14 and we were now 39 minutes ahead of our target time. I had a note on my card that Blackburg, the area we were about to enter was know for its speed traps. I reminded Bob and took the lead since I had the radar detector.

We were looking for the "Bridge at the State Line" (Stop 15). On the way Bob pointed to his gas tank. My light had come on as well. We were now on the interstate and I didn't want to make an extra stop until we got off the interstate. I have to admit I was sweating it a bit. We stopped as soon as we got off the Interstate. Bob heads to the restroom as soon as he got his gas. I promptly followed. This had been our first potty break of the day. Both of us grab some snacks and were quickly off. Bob said, "I already know the answer." I had that bonus last year. Of course we traveled to the bridge anyway. Checked the sign and sure enough, "First sign off bridge on the South Carolina side was Cherokee County. Time out was 12:40. Even with the gas stop, we are still 36 minutes ahead of target. 

Just across the interstate was the Castle at Grover, North Carolina (Stop 16). There was quite a crowd of riders at this stop so Bob and I pulled across the street. What is on each side of the main door? Armored Knight. We were out at 12:51 and were now back to 39 minutes ahead of schedule. Maybe I am imagining this, but I seem to remember Bob about getting wacked by a car as we pulled out. 

We were now in search of another bridge, the Blackburg bridge in the middle of nowhere (Stop 17). This was in the middle of nowhere. After another necessary U-turn, I head down the road to the bridge. This was "Trailer Trash Holler". Hmmm, wonder how the rallybastards ever found this spot? Relatives maybe? LOL As I am approaching the bridge two pot bellied pigs cross the road. Not wanting to be tagged with the nickname Hawgkiller for the rest of my life, I managed to maneuver around them. There was some other wild life in the vicinity: dogs and guineas chickens. The bridge is a one lane wooden bridge. We stop short of the bridge and read the sign. Not wanting to hang around the hood very long, I pulled on out and stopped after exiting "Trailer Trash Holler" to record our answer. What is the weight capacity in pounds? Well the bridge had a capacity of 3 ton per axle / 5 ton gross. Oh a trick question. Will the rallybastards be pricks and discount any score given in tons? They should. That is part of the game. Correct answer is 6000 pounds per axle / 10000 pounds gross. Time out 1:06 and we are now 44 minutes ahead of schedule with only three more stops.

Yet another bridge. The theme of the rally was water. We would soon find out that Mother Nature intended to make sure that she kept up her end of the deal. Bob once again says, I know that bridge. It was dedicated to "Salem Irene". He had that stop the previous year as well. Sure enough when we get to the bridge over Broad River on highway 211 (Stop 18), we see the sign. Great memory, Bob. Time out 1:27 and we are now a whopping 53 minutes ahead of target.

We are now off to the Lockhart Hydroelectric Project. Andy had posted a pic of this on the web site. Bob had stopped here on the way down to Columbia and knew right where the sign was. I'm thinking I remember seeing Wally and Rick here again. What is the project number listed on the plaque? 2626. Only one stop to go and we are out at 1:44 which is just two minutes short of an hour ahead of target time. Wow. We should complete our planned route for sure. So much for the bail out plans. We have ridden one hell of a ride.

Our last stop at Leeds was woods ferry. I had hit this stop on the way to Columbia. I thought I was lost as the GPS was just a straight line and the road seemed to go on for ever in the wrong direction. There had been a lot of wind and I warned Bob to expect a lot of debris in the road. We eventually hit a gravel road. OK, road is a bit of an exaggeration. Oh crap. I missed the turn. Ouch a U-turn on a narrow gravel path in the rain. That was fun. We get to the river and who do we see? Wally and Rick. They get their information and are soon out of there. But we also meet our friend Neil Dolson (Dylein) of the MTF. We are done with our planned route. It is about 2:15 p.m. and we are still about an hour ahead of schedule. Neil is wanting chat, but I am thinking that we have a chance to be competitive. I have my laptop in the trunk and I'm yelling to Bob. Punch Ft. Lawn in your GPS. How far is that? I think Bob said about 45 minutes. We were about 1 hour and 45 minutes from Columbia which would put us in at about 4:00 p.m. an hour early. That is a lot of time to leave on the table. It looked like we could make Ft. Lawn and still only be about the same distance away and we would have interstate instead of back roads. Neil said be sure to stop for food, that is worth extra points. I said, "Heck with food, it looks like we should be able to pick up Great Falls and Heath Springs as well. I felt bad as I thought I was rude to Neil. I hope he understood. My competitive instincts kicked on on that "leisurely ride" that I had planned on having.

It was still pouring rain. On the way to Fort Lawn, I notice a sign to a State Park. I mark it in my GPS. We get to Fort Lawn and it is pouring. Bob has it in his GPS but missed it and can't seem to find it. We make a U-turn and soon are pulling into the parking lot. I told Bob, let's stop and see how long it will take to get food. We could use the time to check some things out on the lap top. A rider is setting at the counter having a nice leisurely meal. He comments, this is his second meal there that day. I ask what is the fastest meal we can get. The waitress responds soup. I told Bob, I guess your having soup. The waitress then said, we could also do BBQ. Bob orders a BBQ and I changed my order as well. I still have my helmet on. I have the laptop on the counter and am punching in information. It looks like we should be able to make Great Falls in addition to getting the food bonus here at Fort Lawn . We woof down the BBQ, get the receipt, record the answer to the question and are off.

Bob pulls to the side of the road, it is pouring rain and he can't seem to read his GPS. I said lets forget Great Falls which is 432 points and go back and get the State Park that I marked on my GPS. That is worth 500 points. We get to the mark and make the turn. The waitress had said the park was only a few miles off the main highway. A few miles turned out to be 9 according to the sign. That would be about 30 minutes plus the time to get to the visitors center. That would really cut it close. We decided to forgo the State Park and just try to pick up Winnsboro worth 245 points.

Bob leads as he has the GPS with autorouting and I do not have Winnsboro in my GPS. We get there and get the telephone number for the Railroad Museum. Bob is still having trouble reading his GPS, presumably because of the rain. I can see mine fine as I have adjusted the bifocals and I'm thinking that I guess that eliminates the Street Pilot V. I told Bob, if we get to the street to the hotel and have more than 15 minutes to spare, we should go for the 58 point Columbia bonus. We have plenty of time so decide to go for it. It is nowhere to be found. I go into a gun shop and ask about the plaque. The guy says, " What's up with that? There were a couple of guys on BMW's asking about it yesterday." I tell him we are doing a scavenger hunt and he tells me in his best South Carolina slang where the plaque is located. Huh? He repeats. Something about right in front of that little plaza. Darn I should have studied South Carolina English. I have no idea what that guy just said. It was a gun shop, I didn't want to add the third time.

We looked a bit and gave up. We pulled in with about 8 minutes to spare. Like I told Bob, at Fort Lawn, "I have no idea how well we will finish, but we rode one hell of a ride."

Bob goes to his room to get his score sheet together. I unload my stuff into my room and start to enter my points. We both get 22424 points. Friends are asking our score and they seem pretty impressed. Bob asks if they said anything to me? I said know, he said the guy that his score indicated that it was a good one.

The End Result

The Palmetto Ramble 2003 is history

A good time was had by all. The weather was not yet perfect, but much better than last year's. The morning started cool and dry; towards noon a light rain started to fall down in Columbia. By that time all participants were spread throughout the State and beyond. Some had more luck than others.

Of the 43 participants that started 41 managed to finish before 5:30. There were two time barred and a few didn't manage to make it to the start for one reason or another.

Bob Moore (Louisville, KY) and Alan Leduc (New Castle, IN) were crowned co-winners of the 2003 Palmetto Ramble, with Bob also winning the "rookie of the year" award.

Wow, a ride where I thought I would not be competitive. A ride with a friend instead of my normal lone riding. That was enough. Winning? I would have never dreamed of that. It was nice but seemed almost secondary now. Thanks, Bob for sharing this experience with me.

Here is Bob Moore's Report

By the scheduled time of the Friday evening rider's meeting and handing out the Rally books, the motel parking lot had filled with motorcycles. The Riverside Inn once again played host to the event. At the riders meeting, Alan Leduc and I were discussing our routes and noting the similarities when Alan suggested the possibility of teaming up and running the route together, so we decided to look into this after the riders meeting was completed.
Our planned routes were nearly identical, I had a couple of bonus locations in the southwest part of the route that Alan didn't have and he had a couple of locations in the northeast that I didn't have. So on with the riders meeting and the discussion of the bonus locations, where it was discovered that one of my southwest locations required a signature from a motorcycle shop employee at a local shop, which meant that I would have to be there during their business hours. Well, three's the first problem with my route, as this was to be my 2nd stop and would put me there before they opened. If I decide to skip this stop, it then makes my 3rd stop too far for just the points that it would offer alone (without the points of the 2nd stop). Alan's route is quickly looking better. No other problems were discovered, so we finished up the pizza and enjoyed the time to talk with the other Ramblers before everybody headed back to their rooms for the last attempts at checking and editing their routes. Alan and I went back to my room and compared notes and it didn't take me long to take him up on his offer to ride as a team. Our last decision of the evening was to get up early and get our bikes near the front of the line to get away quickly and not be behind 50 other bikes.

This year's 2nd edition of the Palmetto Ramble had promises of better weather. Although not as predicted, the weather was a big improvement from last year. The temperature at the start time was 37 degrees and DRY. Saturday, 6AM and the rallymaster, Coop, releases the first group of riders which included Alan & myself being the 3rd & 4th riders out. The first stop is the mandatory odometer check, where we complete the stop and are the first pair of bikes away. We only get about 1/4 mile when we figure out that in our haste, we already missed our first turn. No problem, we'll just do a u-turn, the first of many u-turns that we'll make throughout the day.
The next 7 bonus locations go pretty smoothly until we try to find the TV station antenna at Paris Mountain - Traveler's Rest. We probably spent 20 minutes just trying to find the right road, which turned out to be a tight winding mountain road, covered in fog so thick that you couldn't see more than 100 feet in places. After winding around and up for several minutes, I missed the turn-off to get to the steeper tighter road to access the tower. Now we have to do another u-turn on an off-camber, narrow road in the fog, only hoping that nobody else is coming. The turn-off is now at a bad angle from this direction and difficult to maneuver, but we both made it okay. Several minutes later we are back down to better roads and better visibility. On to Caesar's Head State Park, which proves to be our best Bonus location of the day. We picked up the location bonus, the State Park stamp bonus and the duck bonus all at this stop. The duck bonus was the "Surprise Bonus" that was revealed to us at the riders meeting. Each rider would get 1500 extra points for crossing the finish line with a duck, duct taped to their bike.
This is just about the 1/2 way point in our planned route and according to Alan's calculations, we are about 1 hour ahead of schedule; things are looking good!

From there, we head east for the next 7 locations which all went pretty well. One of these was the "Bridge in the Middle of Nowhere" which included some "Deliverance" type surroundings, including shacks, rebel flags, the old wooden bridge and a variety of animals in the road, pot-bellied pigs, turkeys, chickens, dogs, and this was all within 100 feet ! !

Still on route and still ahead of schedule arriving at Woods Ferry in what has now turned into a steady rain and on what was a mostly gravel road that now is partly mud, Alan gets out his laptop and starts searching for additional stops that are reachable within the time and mileage that we have left. After a little research, it looks like we can get to Fort Lawn and pick up the double bonus at the Wagon Wheel Restaurant. So out of the Woods Ferry area we go, zipping right along until I encounter a large dog that wants the same part of the road that I do. Finally, after some hard braking in the rain, (thank you ABS) the dog finally decided that he would move off the road; whew, thanks for the rush ! ! !

We made it to Fort Lawn and drove right past the Wagon Wheel Restaurant without seeing it, so once again, we are practicing our u-turns and find it about 1/4 mile back, right where it was supposed to be. We pulled up, parked, and went in to get the receipt for a meal that had to be consumed in the restaurant. We sat at the counter, eating, and again, Alan had his laptop out looking into possible locations that we may have time to pick-up on this last leg of our route. We decided that we had time to go to Great Falls, so off we go, and once again, I started off in the wrong direction. We stop in the middle turn lane and after a little discussion, we scrap Great Falls and head for a State Park bonus. Alan had noticed a State Park sign just a few miles back, so we decided that we would head that direction. We made the turn at the sign and then there was a sign that read "State Park - 9 miles". At this point, we don't have extra time for an 18 mile loop, so now the plan is to go to Winnsboro & get the bonus points at the Railroad Museum. With the Winnsboro stop complete, we now have 26 miles to go and 45 minutes to do it We are nearing the finish and still have 15 minutes, so off to find one last bonus location we go. It's only 2 miles from the finish, but after circling the area and asking some locals, we are unable to locate this stop, so we head for home.
Feeling good that we had run our route as planned and even found time to get in an extra bonus location, we arrived back at the finish line with 8 minutes to spare after covering 530 of the allowed 550 miles. As it turned out, our route was good; good enough to win the event ! ! I struggled all afternoon, trying to read my GPS, thinking it was because of the rain. Later, to my surprise, I found that Garmin hadn't made provisions to correct problem with mis-placed contact lens. I found one of mine stuck up under my eyelid ! !

Thanks to everybody involved with putting on The Palmetto Ramble, it was a well-organized and well-run event.

Alan, thanks again for allowing me to share the road with you.

Bob Moore, Co-winner & Rookie of the Year