Time to get to California and start the ride, and meet George posthumously.
I’d spent a lot of time planning the Postie bike ride to Alaska and actually left on the ride but had to cancel after two days, so this ride had minimal planning.
When I got back to Phoenix trying to figure out what happened to the Postie bike and the timeline to get parts made me decide to do this ride last minute, I’d planned on doing this next year. Honda parts were a week out so why not ride this early on its 120th anniversary?
Sure why not I tell myself, I’ll leave in the morning (this was Monday, the whole ride has been completed BTW)
I load up the new to me T7 with my luggage, look down, and realize the tires on the bike only had a few millimeters of tread on them. Not having ever used the Pirelli Scorpion, I had no idea if this was enough tread to get me to SF/NY and back to PHX, I didn’t even check the Pirelli website I just got on the phone to MotoZ and ordered some of there GPS tires, that I know will last 10,000 miles
Is this enough tread for???? ⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️ not worth the risk.
I figure not a big deal, MotoZ tires coming from CA they’ll be here the next day, Tuesday, I’ll fit them straight away and head out Wednesday.
Late Monday I get a message, both GPS tires weren’t in stock in CA so we’ve sent them both from Idaho, they’ll be to you Thursday.
As there was no timeline on this ride what did a few days matter? Thursday rolls around, UPS drops the delivery off around 1 pm and I fit them that afternoon in the garage, they’d been in the back of his truck all morning so nice and pliable.
I actually had a harder time getting the Pirelli off than the MotoZ tires on, about 15 minutes for each and I was ready for a Friday Morning departure towards San Francisco.
During the few days I’d been waiting I’d been downloading vintage location photos to make this story a little more visually pleasing, George had a camera with him and took a few photos, not many, I’ll share them but I tried to find additional photos in the same areas he’d traveled taken around 1903 so I could see what he saw.
I left Phoenix early Friday morning and headed to California
Went past the old Gas Island shoe spot in Rice
Tried to find the earliest photo I could of the place, before the shoes, and this is the best I could do
I ended up in the Coyote Lake Campground about 90 miles south of San Francisco
The delay on the tires actually worked to my advantage for the whole trip, I’d now be in and out of San Francisco on a Saturday, with WAY LESS traffic. I know the city pretty well, so getting around is easy.
I stopped to get a couple of shots of the Golden Gate, it has nothing to do with the story…
…but George was from San Francisco and it seems like the Golden Gate Bridge has been there for a long time, but it didn’t actually get completed until 34 years after his ride (it took 4/5 years to build), so as a middle-aged man, he may have been on the bridge on opening day May 27, 1937, along with 200,000 other people.
George Wyman died on 15th November 1959, I felt I had to go and find him, find his burial spot so with the information below I left downtown and headed to Mountain View Cemetary, how difficult could it be?
I got there and had to be signed in at the gate by security, they pointed me in the general direction of the Mausoleum but knew nothing more, not his exact location even though I had his exact location, I left security a little confused.
I found the Mausoleum went inside and then understood, this is what I saw, thousands, maybe tens of thousands of plaques, but not a single number to be found, and no one around to ask.
I walked to the exit and met an older lady, she told me her grandfather was in there somewhere. She’s been here originally dozens of times and eventually someone drew her a map of how to find him, “there’s a person in the office one day a week that can do that for you” she tells me…I can’t wait a week, how was I going to find George?
I walk outside back to my bike, and a little John Deer 4-wheeler is driving past, a groundskeeper I suspect, I flag him down.
“Obviously you work here, is there a way you could help me find someone?”
– “Sure, but I’d need the plot numbers”
I look at him, his name was Chris, a badge on his chest, long hair in a ponytail a long beard, and probably in his 50s
“do you ride a motorcycle?” (I might have been guilty of profiling 
)
– “I used to years ago!”
“I’m looking for a man called George Wyman you might have heard of him, I have his burial plot details”
– “That name sounds familiar, was he something to do with Harley Davidson?”
“he was the first man to ride a motorcycle across the USA before Harley even built their first motorcycle”, and I show him the plot numbers.
“come with me, I know exactly where he is, when I’m not a grounds keeper I’m a paw-bearer and I put the ashes in their final place, I know this place like the back of my hand, been doing it for 7 years!”
He walks me down a few corridors, up some stairs, down some more corridors, then starts counting, 155, 156, 157, “down here,” then he stops and points. “There he is, George and his wife Nellie. I’ll leave you with your thoughts.”
This is the closest I’ll get to shaking Georges’s hand.
I head outside and Chris is waiting for me with the historical director of the cemetery, he had no idea who George Wyman was but was fascinated.
I told him about Georges’s ride and my upcoming ride. He wanted to know more, a lot more, telling me it was so sad that so many famous people are here, but they are all but forgotten.
This is Georges’s final resting place, quite idyllic.
I head back to central San Francisco and the starting point, 120 years after George
continued…
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rtwPaul 