Motorcycle ride to Memphis, Part V - Thyatira - Shreveport Motorcycle Travel

Mary Baker, In the rain

Ric Baker

Motorcycle ride to Memphis, Part I - Shreveport, West Monroe, and Jackson

Motorcycle ride to Memphis, Part II - Jackson

Motorcycle ride to Memphis, Part III - the Natchez Trace

PREFACE: As you can see, this article starts with Part IV. If you have not read Parts I - IV, please do not proceed (although each article can stand on its own). Go back to the other installments by clicking on the links below the picture, and catch up on the story. If you do, you’ll read about our trip from Shreveport, Louisiana to Columbus, Mississippi; the journey is half the fun.

Part IV - Thyatira

It had been a long day, and it was beginning to rain, so we got on our bikes, and turned back the way we had come, across the Mississippi/Alabama state line and quickly found shelter under the eaves of the gas station pumps at the corner store, and avoided the relentless pelting of raindrops. John and Ric both parked in the open and ran inside to shelter, leaving their bikes to Mother Nature. When the rain stopped 5 minutes later, my seat was dry, but theirs was not. They wasted a few minutes using paper towels and a shop rag to try and dry off the seats, but, nonetheless, they were going to sit on a wet seat.

When we turned on to Wolfe Road, the road that The Broken Spoke Bar and Deli was located, we filed in line behind a couple of other motorcycles. The dusk was upon us, and before we made it the 6 miles to the bar, the darkness had enveloped us. We pulled up into the, YES, gravel driveway, where we met a fellow biker who had just dismounted. We spoke to him a few minutes before going inside. The Broken Spoke seemed like a nice place, but we only stayed fifteen minutes because we had to get home if we were going to ride to the Tennessee State Line in the morning.

In the morning, I awoke to the smell of Maxwell House tantalizing me. Ric's roommate, Rusty, had left for work earlier, and thoughtfully had made coffee for us. Showers behind us, clean clothes on us, and coffee in us, we were ready for whatever the day had to offer. I tied on my pink bandanna, and headed outside to prepare my bike for the ride. Ahead of the guys, I was finished, and for some unknown reason began to clean John's bike. I guess I owed him, since he did wash Lacey for me once.

It's an exhilarating feeling to know that you have the whole day ahead of you, and exciting to wonder what events might unfold; these are all things you can contemplate while rolling away the miles on your motorcycle. We wasted no time getting to the fuel pumps and shortly found ourselves on Hwy 45 North, following Ric towards Tupelo. Less than an hour into the trip, I noticed an exit for Elvis' birthplace, and thought Ric would stop, but he went on by, cruising into a Sonic instead. I mentioned that I would like to see it, and he said we'd stop on the return trip.

Back on the road, we traveled, lost in our own thoughts until the sky began to turn black in front of us, and we could see lightning in the distance and hear the roar of thunder. Off to the right, though, it looked clear, and I pulled up beside Ric, motioning him to turn to the right and try to ride out the storm. It was not an option this time to stop and put on the rain gear, since we didn't bother to bring any. I can honestly say Ric wanted to, but both John and I shook our heads and said "I laugh in the face of rain." Famous last words. No sooner had we made the right turn than the temperature dropped and the rain came down in torrents. We topped a hill that revealed a sharp curve and found ourselves traveling a little too fast on newly oil slicked roads. Ric was in the lead and made the turn, and upon cresting a hill, had no time to see the situation he was in, and no time to warn us. Thankfully, he was able to straighten out the curve and slow down. Still, he passed the shelter of a country store to his right, and had to turn around and come back. Following him, I realized too late that I was going into a curve too fast with an SUV pulled off the side of the road, precariously close to my turn radius, and no opportunity to brake safely or straighten out the turn. I did the only thing I could -- held my breath, released the clutch and breaks, tightened up on the grips and leaned into the curve. I felt as if the world was in slow motion, my heart was pounding in my chest, my thoughts were racing through my head, and I broke out in a cold sweat. I wanted to close my eyes in the face of the danger, but knew I couldn't. I held on to Lacey for dear life, fearing that I was going to go down at any second. I just hoped that I would not hit the SUV. I visualized the skid and the impact before regaining control. Skill or experience, luck, fate, or God; something or someone had a hand in taking me safely through the curve, narrowly avoiding an accident. The Gremlins were not powerful enough this time, and John in the rear, was able to see our struggles up ahead, and had time to slow down. We pulled into the wet, mushy, gravel driveway of the little store in Thyatira, Mississippi, and I dismounted knees knocking and shivering from the cold and the near collision.

Take yourself back in time. Imagine a small town in Nowhere, Mississippi. Google it and you'll find longitude and latitude coordinates. With a little more searching, you'll learn that Thyatira High School is defunct, and Thyatira School, (Black) in existence in 1878, is also defunct. Click on "jobs in Thyatira" and your result will be "No recent job posts available in Thyatira, MS." Don't bother to look up population or census statistics, because they're not available. Some things can not be found on the Internet. Some things still have to be learned through experiences. Imagine you just survived a near miss crash on your bike, and found yourself in this little town at this little store with the rain coming down around you. Look around. There's an old gas pump that you're not sure still works; thankfully, you don't need gas. We had the time (waiting out a rain storm), to learn a little about the town and to talk to what I think was probably the entire population of about six.

Come back soon for more of the adventure!

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