A few weekends ago the 'rents and I packed up the BigRig and headed to Wisconsin to investigate a few Honda Passport scooters Debbie found on Craigslist. It was just the trip I needed to get out of Chicago, and have some good old fun. We even got to hang out with Aunt Taffy!

Upon arriving in Madison we went directly to meet the first Craigslister. Aaaaand.... purchased. Two complete bikes, one parts bike. check and check.

Stop number two was heading out of Madison at someones house. Peeking out of the back shed was a gleaming Yellow Passport! It's just what we were looking for. A little steep on the price, but Debs worked her magic aaaaand... purchased. One Yellow Passport with less than 300 original miles!

Dinner was at the Tornado Club in downtown Madison. The food was great at this"supper club" style spot, and the drinks were extra great. Lets just say we had a good time. :)

The next morning we unpacked our bikes that we had brought along, and went for a nice little ride through the countryside. Our destination was to see this Lustron home that is out in the middle of nowhere! Its an all metal prefab home built in the late 40's. Pretty strange but interesting to see.

So, it turns out, picking is actually pretty fun!! Hope to do some more soon.

Ana who? Exactly my reaction. Anamosa is a small town in Iowa that is home to something very important to my dad and a few of his friends: the National Motorcycle Museum. As some of you may know, one of my dad's hobbies is restoring and collecting antique motorcycles. Recently, he and his friend/business partner, Justin have formed CJ Vintage, taking one step closer to their shared goal of making this hobby into a career. While they are staying plenty busy fixing others' motorcycles AND reproducing parts and pieces that are no longer on the market, CJ Vintage has introduced an "Investment Bike" to the to-do list. Similar to how one might find investors to restore a car, they found 10-12 people to invest in this bike, pitching to restore and auction it off in one year.

Anyways, the purpose of the daytrip was to take measurements and document the completed and extremely rare Thor, which is at the National Motorcycle Museum. The group was comprised of about half of the investors, and all 10 of us piled into the Big Rig (my parents' huge RV/truck/garage vehicle).

Our first stop on the trip was in Savannah, Illinois. This small town seemed to be focused around the motorcycle realm with a few tiny bars showing off one person's impressive antique (and otherwise) motorcycle collection. There were also a number of really good antique stores. We had lunch at the Iron Horse Social Club, then it was back on the road to Anamosa!

The museum is located in a "bigbox" building, and it is FULL of really interested bikes and paraphernalia. The bike we were after was located in the very back, and we all helped to photograph and document every INCH of the bike. Craig was SO nervous that we were moving and touching the bike too much...he was nervous that it would fall over, or that we would get kicked out. hilarious.

We had such a great time! I will keep you up to date on the Thor... it has quite a ways to go!

MORE PHOTOS HERE --->