So I didn't quite win.
I didn't do bad either, wound up placing 5th in the amature class, 12th overall out of a 28 man field. Also with my "detention" at the state jail I walked away with a case of oil. Overall a damn good time at a damn good event.
Started out with a 6am wake up at my parents house, everything was ready all I had to do was to load up the bike with my GPS and tank bag and get going. I already had 1000 points for submitting a photo of my bike through facebook, so I was at this point effectively tied for first. The ride 50 miles north to the rally headquarters was uneventful except for a check engine light that kept coming on (there is something screwy with my tach, I think it is getting moisture inside it causing the engine code), I ignored it and made it to the headquarters with plenty of time to get gas before they opened doors for the morning. The theme for this rally was right (or wright) and wrong, basically most of the locations had a link to constitutional rights, jails (wong) police (right), wright brothers, Frank Loyd Wright, that kind of stuff.
Check in was easy and again uneventful breakfast was served and was complementary. I'm not a donut person, but managed to get an egg mcmuffin. Rally packets were handed out, rules were explained, questions were asked and answered and wild card bonuses were thrown into the mix. I had my route already planned with 14 locations to hit worth a total of 14,000 points. Plus I would have 1:30 left to pick up 3 other locations that were (round trip) 40 miles or 1 more higher value location (round trip) 25 miles away from the finish. The wildcard bonus's were 3 photos of 'no right on red', 3 photos of 'wrong way' signs, and 3 photos of a police officer holding the rally flag, each of those were worth 1000 points, but if you could get the cop to turn on his lights they were worth 3000 points. There was also a way to substitute one type of bonus with something similar that you found during the day.
Start was at 9am and again it was an orderly start with no complications, each group of 5 riders was let go every 2 minutes. I started in the third wave. I had to be back by 5:06pm, but I had fully planned and made all my time calculations for a 5pm return.
The first 3 locations were close, all within 3 miles of each other in Trenton.
Grave marker for David Brearly (NJ supreme court justice)
Trenton Capitol Dome
A house surrounded by a prison
Then I headed down near Dave's house to a frank Loyd Wright house. This was nice because I got to shave some of my calculated time off on the highway at speed. I wound up in the wrong parking lot and may or may not have rode down a sidewalk to get to the next parking lot to take this photo.
Caught this state police barracks from the CVS next door and used their bathroom at the same time. This is also when I started looking for a porn magazine for my substitution of a freedom of the press bonus. I never found it and was surprised how hard it was to find a playboy or a hustler.
The next bonus cost me some time, just about half an hour.I learned the hard way that the prison police don't like photos of their facility being taken, even though I didn't actually take a photo of their facility, just the sign out front. I wasn't arrested, only detained, but did spend a solid 10 minutes sitting in the back seat of their car. I notified the rally master and after I took the next photo bonus got the text that said not to take pictures of the prisons.
The next location was also a prison, the requirement was a sign and the water tower, needless to say I was in and out in under 30 seconds. The rally flag was already out of my tank bag before I came to a stop.
At this point due to the fact I spent a but load of time at the one jail I made the decision to cut out one of my planned bonus's, easy enough to decide since cape may was a little out of the way, I just deleted that point from my rout plan in the garmin and headed toward atlantic city for a shot of a bail bonds store.
Then it was a straight shot north on the garden state parkway. I had two bonus's right next to each other and a planned gas stop at the same time. This is also where I got my first no right turn (I hadn't actually seen a no right turn on red sign so I started taking pics of no turn on red signs) and wrong way signs.
Coming off the Parkway I saw a wrong way sign in the rearview mirror and a no turn on red sign 30 feet apart (2 for 1 deal!).
The next police barracks and the law office building were only a few miles apart, and I took a photo of an army recruiting station that I used as a substitute for a tank
I shot north on the parkway again and got off near seaside to head inland to get this photo of the church (actually the dome and the sign). Coming off the parkway I saw a wrong way sign in my mirror, grabbed that, then 50 feet away I see a different one and shot that one too.
