I have been in the market for a used Brush Hog for our farm. I found the perfect machine listed on Craigslist, but it was located in southeastern Ohio about 115 miles south of my house. I called the guy and told him I wanted to come take a look at it, and I was looking for an excuse to take my new Harley fo a long ride.
He said I was welcome to come, but warned me "I live on top of a big hill and the last mile up my drive is kind of treacherous" Now most people when they heard the word treacherous would have said thanks, but no thanks. No, not me, I said, I'll be there in a couple hours. Yesterday was a little chilly, but it was a fantastic day, perfect for my maiden voyage. The bike rode like a dream and everything was going perfect. I even got to stop at my favorite restaurant (waffle house) and have breakfast. So I get to this guys drive and holy s#%t there it was and "treacherous" was an understatement. It was large gravel, twisty, washed out, ruddy, straight up in places, muddy in other places, dropped off 3' to 5' on both sides with a creek on one side. Just a freakin mess, the worst mile of a road that I have encountered in my 50 years of riding motorcycles. I don't know what I was thinking, I guess I just felt invincible sitting on that Ultra Classic. After about 5 seconds of thought I took off like I knew what I was doing. Somehow I made it up to the top, I mean just made it, and almost threw up I was so shook up. The guy came out and said "that was the first time I ever seen anybody come up here on a motorcycle". So I looked at the brush hog, gave him a check, and said I would come and get it next week. But the whole time I was thinking, how in the h#ll am I going to get down off this mountain in one piece. After talking to the guy for an hour I said "well, I guess they won't be paving that road anytime soon, so I better give it a try". He said" when you get to the bottom honk a couple times so I know you're ok. I said ok,but it is going to be awhile. I thought I am going crash my new bike for sure. There is no way I am going to keep this 900 pound hog under control going down rutted gravel this steep. I went slow and literally ducked walked that thing almost the entire mile. At least three spots it was so steep, I had to just let her go and hope for the best. I somehow managed to maintain control. When I got to the bottom, I honked a couple times, I got off the bike and almost puked, and I was shaking like a Harley. I thanked God and headed home. My bike is the new Ultra Low with ABS and I am only 5'-7" on a good day. That bike handled better than any bike I have ever owned. (And I rode BMW's for years) If I thought I could do that again, it would make a great commercial for HD. I kept thinking, why didn't I just park the bike and walk the last mile. What a day and what a happy ending.

 

Glad you made it but now you have to drive on that crappy driveway again when you pick up that Brush Hog. Shoulda taken the farm truck in the first place.

 

..... that would'a sukt

 

Holy efn Christ..no way no way would I have done that...You coulda called him from his driveway for him to pick up you or bring down the brush hog and park you're bike, no? Anyway kudos

 

I feel your pain. Once, I got trapped taking a downhill twisty road to a winery that suddenly went from payment to large-chunk deep gravel with about 1/2 mile to go. Every second on a "road" like that feels like an hour, and you're completely wiped out from stress when you finally make it.

Glad you and the bike made it without injury. Definitely a tip of the cap to you my friend!

 

I did that once on my night train and barely made it out in one piece. At one point my bike was nearly sideways sliding down the gravel hill. My *** was puckered so tight I made a suction pop when I got off the bike at the end. Never again.

 

Glad you made it without dumping the bike. I probably would have though. It was kind of funny to read about your experience as I had something similar yesterday. It was overcast and gloomy but really green due to all the rain this season. 7 of us decided to go for a ride on South Carolina back roads to check out a biker bar we hadn't explored yet. So we are doing around 55-60 on a 50mph road and suddenly I see a red (not the usual orange) warning sign with speed limit posted as 25 mph and with warning text as "Loose stone". Well that was an understatement to say the least. All of us kind of woke up to see that sign pop up out of nowhere and REALLY loose stone on the road under the tires. Talk about the "pucker power"! One VRod guy went off road but managed to come back without laying it down. I went into a road groove with a bunch of loose gravel like stone and almost lost control. Still don't know how I didn't drop the bike. At the end everyone made it safe but you could see the sweat on faces on a day with temperature in low 50s.

 

In '92 I bought a new Heritage Softail Classic (livid black) and I went down to TN to visit some relatives.
Well, ya know how those southern folks are about building houses on hills.


My cousin's house isn't really too far up the hill but their driveway was/is a mixture of dirt and gravel and not very well graded.


I made it up the driveway without incident but as I was going back down (probably too cautiously) one of the ruts gave way and my front wheel slipped and I had to put my right foot down to keep the bike from going down farther than the muffler and saddlebag guard, so no harm, no foul!


Interestingly, I sold that bike to that cousin two years later and he still has it!

 

glad you made it!

 

You have to include pic. Lol!