Mission Accomplished!

Woohoo! After 5 days and 1800 miles, the Legacy Run is over. We are no longer rookies! You can bet we'll back next year.

We rolled from Gallup this morning at 5:30 local time, and arrived at Legion Post 4 in Tempe at about 1:00. Along the way we traveled an absolutely beautiful road through the Salt Fork Canyon. You have to see it to believe it.

Temps started out in the low fifties, and stayed fairly cool until around Globe, AZ. It was funny watching everyone shed leather jackets and chaps (yours truly included) while moving up in the gas line every 15-30 seconds.

From there things steadily got hotter, until we arrived in Tempe at 108 degrees. (How do these people survive here?) We had a lot people that turned out to watch and wave in Globe, and we got a great welcome from the post in Tempe. We had one minor incident where a rider clipped a vehicle at a stop light and went down, but was able to ride her bike on into Tempe.

At the lunch hosted by Post 4, more donations were turned in, bringing our total so far to over $242,000, and tomorrow we should add a significant amount again.

Tomorrow we will participate in a parade from Post 4 to the Legion Convention, with lots of media and press coverage. We hope to have as many riders as possible to maximize the impact of the Legacy Run.




Damn, it's early...and dark. Dave Schoonover from Hutch tells us at the briefing to watch out for deer and elk. Fortunately, we didn't see any.







I know this is a bad picture, but it shows the snake of taillights stretching out for 2 miles in the dark.










Heading south in Hwy 77.









Also on 77, in the Sitegreaves National Forest.







Leaving our gas stop in Globe AZ. We knew we would have police escort out of Globe, but five minutes before leaving the cops told us they wanted us to take up two lanes and ride 4 abreast. We haven't done that at all in the previous 1,700 miles, but we pulled it off. Looked pretty cool too.






Pulling into the Legion Post 4 in Tempe.








Socko presenting Commander Conatser with another donation from Kansas.






Here is the Legacy Run Staff, who put the ride together, did all the planning, and gave up riding to make sure it all ran smooth. These folks are awesome.





The Ride Captains. They encouraged, pushed and prodded us until we worked like one big well oiled machine.



Next year the national convention is in Louisville, so we're not sure what form the run will take, whether a loop or something else. Stay tuned.