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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:20 pm: | 
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One of the new friends I made (thanks to the lack of a language barrier) is Scott. Born in the US, Scott was in the Army in Germany and married a German woman. When he retired from the Army he decided to settle in Germany. Scott came over for Homecoming last year and I just spoke with him about 2 hours ago about our plans for this year - Me going over to Germany for the MSM and him coming over for Homecoming this year. He has a Blast at his parents house in Minneapolis that he rode from Minneapolis to Milwaukee in 4 hours for last years Homecoming) and an XB9S racebike in Germany along with this S1 (My ride for this years MSM - thank God it has the twin tail on it! - as Scott is one of the planners for this years event and he won't have any time to ride it).
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:24 pm: |
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As I mentioned the weather was topsy turvy over the whole weekend.
Sunny one minute:
To not so sunny, and rainy the next:
During this downpour the only place better to be stranded was the beer tent, but the next best place was where I was stuck - the Hillbilly Motors tent.
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:26 pm: |
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:30 pm: |
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Just as I was thinking about all the Buell's present and what models I hadn't seen - OK, no Blast!, but nearly everything else since H-D became involved with Buell, I found it quite interesting that there was not a single S2 at the MSM. Then I walked back to our Mercedes Hotel and what did I see? The lone S2 at the MSM.
Amazingly parked oh so close to the Mercedes Hotel and Frank's X1:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:36 pm: |
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Frank's favorite portion of the MSM is the Show n Shine. He took 2nd in his class at the event. Here are some pictures of the Show n Shine bikes.
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:40 pm: |
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More Show n Shine pics:
My favorite:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:43 pm: |
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:45 pm: |
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 06:48 pm: |
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To finish off the Show n Shine:
The Bird of Paradise:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:05 pm: |
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Some cool T-shirts from the MSM:
My personal favorite:
One from Scott's group:
To those of you from Detroit, and anyone else who's interested, here's a link:
to the Goldie's Bikes n Babes Bar shirt
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:11 pm: |
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When it comes to a lot of things the Germans are really on top of it. One of these things is drinking - which is near and dear to my heart as well. One of the best gifts I was given was the item in the following picture. Talk about hands-free drinking - well kinda. At least you can use your camera without having to hold your bottle of beer at the same time.
What the 'hard Buell riders' drink at the MSM:
The packet is similar to kool aid. You empty the packet in your mouth, swish it around a bit and then take the shot.
This is a typical reaction to this drink (yes, this and the other alcohol was beginning to set in):
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:20 pm: |
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Some faces to put with the names.
This is Scott. He will be at this years Homecoming again, so if you see him stop him and say hi.
This is Werner. He's the Blake of the XBorg. Without him, the MSM would probably not exist.
As the night wound down a German band - Halber Liter (Half Liter) - who, in addition to their own German songs, covers a lot of American classic rock songs, played well into the night.
It was interesting to hear what a band that's native language is German thinks the lyrics to good old English language classic rock songs are. For the most part they were spot on, but some of the lyrics were a little off. Not terrible, just made it that much more interesting.
All in all the BORG MSM was:
But there was still MUCH more left to my adventure...
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:29 pm: |
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On the way back to Kassel from Haltern am See
we stopped at the monument Herkules (Hercules in English). I had been there previously, but I thought it would be good to see it again. Unfortunately the statue was under renovation so my pictures don't do the statue justice.
But the rest of the grounds are truly amazing:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:31 pm: |
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More from Herkules:
The people in the pictures should give some indication of scale/size:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:45 pm: |
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Since the statue was under renovation, these official pictures should show the truly fascinating thing that the monument Herkules is:
Along with some 'specs':
And history:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:49 pm: |
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After we returned to Kassel we had to collect the bike owned by a friend of Frank that was on display at a Kassel Car and Bike Day show. Amazingly the Buell content for my weekend was not over yet:
This cool little Aprilia was also on display:
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| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:52 pm: |
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As the name of the show was Kassel Car and Bike Day, there were some cars there too:
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| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 07:57 pm: |
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Including this BMW Isetta (competition for the Messerschmidt shown earlier from MeilenWerk):
An pair of interesting bicycles:
And this turbo (original) Mini Cooper:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 08:05 pm: |
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After we dropped off the motorcycle we picked up in Kassel at Frank's friends' place we were headed back to Frank's place and met up with another friend of Frank's riding a KTM:
Then it was time for me to start heading toward the Marilyn Manson concert in Glauchau (near Zwickau on the map):
So, once again it was:
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 08:30 pm: |
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The ticket was for the entire Woodstage Festival
But my only intention was to see Marilyn Manson
Thankfully I arrived just in time to get a Doener Kebab and a beer before Marilyn Manson went on and played until it was time for me to head back to Berlin.
The Gruendelpark Glauchau was quite an interesting (and kinda small) venue to see such a show. It's a shame the pictures don't open to larger pictures on the website. Quite an interesting place.
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 08:36 pm: |
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After the show it was the last time for
YES, even after dark! From the area of Chemnitz to Berlin
Arriving in Berlin at about 2:30-3:00 in the morning and checking back into my hotel for a few hours of rest before my early morning flight.
I overslept missing my wake up call (go figure) but still made it to the airport in time to fly back to the US, with all my all the treasures from my trip.
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1313
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 08:41 pm: |
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And this, FINALLY, concludes my (what I thought to be a once in a lifetime) trip to the BORG Mid Summer Meeting. Now that I know that I will be going back for the 2008 MSM, I am wondering what I will post from this years adventure (and how long it will take). Needless to say the timing will be pretty tight as I will have to ride my new XB12XT to my parents house in East Troy, fly from Milwaukee to Berlin for work and the MSM, and fly back into Milwaukee if I am to be in East Troy for the Homecoming festivities. That's the plan as of now.
It sounds like this years adventure will even top last years,
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Court
| | Posted on Sunday, March 23, 2008 - 10:54 pm: |
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SPECTACULAR ! ! |
Oldog
| | Posted on Monday, March 24, 2008 - 09:58 am: |
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Thanks for sharing this Brankin
I am at a loss for the correct descriptive |
