Monday, June 13, 2011

Days of ZAMM

I'm not alone on the ride this year!

It is now official. I am asking that the folks that want to make a difference for military families direct contributions to Not Alone. Not Alone provides programs, resources and services to warriors and families impacted by combat stress and PTSD through a confidential and anonymous community. Their vision aligns with my original fund raising idea and after a couple of conversations and many emails with their Executive Director, Mike Jones, and a look at their financials I am proud to recommend them to each of you.

My goal is to raise a dollar a mile for these folks, which means about $7500 total. If more comes in that is OK as well! You can make a difference by clicking on the NotAlone logo which will take you to a special contribution form that will add to the ZAMM2011 ride total. Any amount is acceptable but I have some special days that I'd like to offer to individuals or groups of friends.

These special days are the runs described in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance that I will start riding on or about July 3rd starting at the author's former home in St. Paul. I will be reading the book along with each days travel and I invite you do so too. See the link under 'good reading' on the left for the full text of the book, check it out of the library or buy a used copy on-line. I am sure to make comments about the book along the way, and take pictures where they took pictures to see how the landscape has changed since their trip in 1968, the same year my bike was manufactured.

I am also looking forward to meeting some of the readers of this blog and the Not Alone families who live along the route and in some bigger cities along the way. If you would like to meet up with me please leave a comment on this page or email to zamm2011@gmail.com. I hope that some of these will work out.

These are the mileage figures for each of the ZAMM days:

Day 1: St. Paul, MN to Oakes, ND 324 miles
Day 2: Oakes, ND to Lemmon, SD 258 miles
Day 3: Lemmon, SD to Miles City, MT 191 miles
Day 4: Miles City, MT to Laurel, MT 191 miles
Day 5: Laurel, MT to Gardiner, MT 165 miles
Day 6: Gardiner, MT to Bozeman, MT 85 miles
Day 7: Bozeman, MT to Lolo Pass, ID 255 miles
Day 8: Lolo Pass ID to Brownlee Campground, OR 281 miles
Day 9: Brownlee Campground, OR to Prineville, OR 319 miles
Day 10: Prineville, OR to Grants pass, OR 228 miles
Day 11: Grants Pass, OR to Redwood Valley, CA 321 miles
Day 12: Redwood Valley, CA to San Francisco, CA 177 miles

I may or may not stick to this exact daily ride schedule, but you will be able to follow along on this blog.
Let me know if you pick up one of these days and I'll try and mark them off the list.

I'm ready for the ride! Please join me on-line or in person.

Lesson Learned: When recovering a 40 year old seat, one might not be able to reuse the tiny rusty screws, but I managed to do so by rethreading them.
It worked. Those are 3mm x 0.50 screws.

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