Shipped the bike!

It’s a wonder that the bike got on the truck at all…I overslept. Well, it was the AM/PM alarm clock issue. I had my alarm set for 5:30, so I could get on the 6:45am ferry, but my clock thought it was PM, not AM! YIKES! Thank goodness Charlie woke me up at 5:35am and said, “Hey are you going on the first boat today?” I believe I muttered something like I have my alarm set, when he announced that it was already 5:35!

Thank goodness the bike was all packed and ready to go, so I made it to the ferry terminal with plenty of time to spare and got on the boat. My instructions from the shipping company, Federal Motorcycle Transport, were that the truck would be at the designated pick up location between 8am and 12pm. I was told the driver would call one hour before the pickup time. I had selected the parking lot in front of TJ Maxx on High Street in Ellsworth. There’s plenty of room on the side of the building and if I had to wait a couple hours, there’s a McDonald’s in that parking lot area and of course TJ Maxx to kill some time.

I got the one hour notice call while I was still on the ferry. The truck would be at the TJ Maxx at 8:45am. I would arrive just after 8am, so that would give me time to photograph the bike in great detail in case there was any damage when the bike came off the truck in Oregon.

The truck, and its two shippers, Terry and Batto, arrived right on schedule. We moved to the back of the parking lot and got to work. First, they had to offload some stuff to be able to load my bike. There were two other bikes already inside the truck, which made me feel confident that they were indeed motorcycle haulers. They quickly loaded my bike and strapped it down. Terry asked me why I was shipping the bike across the country. He inquired, “Are you selling it?” I explained my TEAL on WHEELS trip to him and by the time we were ready to part ways, he gave me $10 towards my trip. Nice guy…they were both nice guys!

So, I walked away and watched the truck pull out with my bike destined for Coos Bay, Oregon.