Well, I got the new girl all legal and stuff today. Apparantly riding without a license plate or having any kind of vehicle registration is illegal in Washington. Huh, who new?   I thought if I had the MSO and Bill of Sale I could ride it to the DOL, but I've been informed this is not the case.

Either way, she's all taxed, fee'd, titled and registered now so I'm no longer a law breaker - at least for now.

Went for a short ride through the valley, wow! what a different ride from both the Paul Smart and the K12. I think I'm going to like this bike.   It's a bit twitchy in that it wants to jump ahead of you at the slightest bump in the road. It feels like the throttle it pretty sensitive. I've got a Gadget Guy mount in the mail as I'm quite sure I'll need to get the radar detector hooked up pronto before I have to let Johnny Law compliment me on what a nice bike I have .

Here’s a couple of pics by the Snoqualmie River off of Lake Crescent Rd.

Well in addition to switching major jobs, I have sold my trustworthy and always reliable BMW K1200RS. The bike was just not a good commuter for me and with my touring being scaled back the bike was simply not be being used to its potential. So off it went, and surprisingly (to me) it sold in less than week. This is great, I guess, but now I need to figure out what the right bike is for me to use daily, and potentially year round. My Paul Smart bike is a hell of a lot of fun but is not a good every day ride and absolutely not a year round bike in the pacific northwest.

I really love Ducati’s. The BMW’s are uber-reliable machines, and if I could afford a 3rd bike to address the mid range I was looking for I would have kept it for the odd long day ride or multi day rides I’ll do a couple of times a year. But I wanted something closer to the road, if that makes any sense at all. Something that is fun to ride commuting to work daily and still has enough beefcake to handle being loaded up for a few days. Something I can take on the twisties if I take the long way home or we decide for an early morning ride to Mt. St Helens or a 3 pass blast to Leavenworth.  I’d also like something Michelle can get on once in a while if we want to take a short ride into the city for breakfast or dinner.

So I started scanning ebay, craigslist and cycletrader for Ducati’s to see what currently floating around the market. Before I bought the BMW I went back and forth between it and the Ducati ST3. I really liked the Ducati, but the BMW beat it in every way for long distance two up riding. Now that long distance two up riding is no longer a requirement, the ST3 is back on the top of my list. The only problem being that Ducati has stopped manufacturing them.  Finding a late model candidate with low miles at a reasonable price was going to a be a challenge. Finding a black one would be even harder – or so I thought. 

Last week I came across an unusual listing for a NEW 2006 black ST3s ABS in Salem, OR.  NEW?  So I called down and it turns out the bike was left over from a dealer on the east coast that had gone out of business. The Salem dealer bought it and was now selling it as a NEW bike, not a demo, not used – but brand new with a full Ducati warrantee. The bike had 35 miles on it! What a find.  The dealer and I came to an arrangement on a fair price for both of us and the bike is now mine!!!  I drove down to Salem this morning, paid cash for the bike and trailered it home. I’ll register it tomorrow and my next new Ducati is a done deal.  I’m a happy boy :-)