What's the craziest thing you've avoided?

I can't think of anything that does. I was thinking more along the line of live critters. Sorry for the lack of clarity.

 

I actually forgot about this one, but one of my psycho ex-girlfriends jumped out in from of me as I tried to leave her house once after an arguement...she later keyed my truck, turns out I shouldn't have swerved to miss her after all :tongue:

 

....over the years a few weird/scary incidents....probably the scariest was when i had a 83 kawi ltd and i was running late to work...it was really foggy,and i got stuck behind an old pickup truck.....i was just about to pass him(cause i was late)remember?...i had just gassed it when i noticed the trucks stop lights had lit up....i looked up past the truck,and saw a huge moose lumbering out of the woods in the haze of the fog..across the road...right about when i would have been passing the truck.....i decided that i would be late that day....then there was the time.......................

 

Six horses running straight @ me @ 3am in the morning taking up both lanes. There was a horse auction the following morning @ a corral I ride past every day, a group of them got out. For one reason or another I wasn't in my normal frame of mind & was riding slow to begin with. I couldn't see them right away but saw a bunch of shadows swaying back & forth just out of range of my headlight, so I slowed way down. I figured I was seeing things & just tired from working a 18 hr shift, much to my suprise 4 adult horse & two colts ran right around me. I just continued not fully realizing what had just happened for about another 10 miles. Also realizing I very well could have been dead if I was cruising @ my normal pace; kind of humbling. This was two years ago, the porcupine was just a couple of months ago so that was fresher in the memory.

 

Came round a corner on a single track backroad and coming towards me taking up threequaters of the road was a large pickup truck. The other quater of road was occupied by the donkey being led by the guy driving the truck.

 

I was following a beer truck on a two lane wide interstate bridge when a hand dolly bounced off the truck and landed in the lane infront of me. I went for the other lane but it started rolling that way too. I was braking and swerving and it was rolling and bouncing but I was lucky and went around it.

 

Just today

Just this morning there were about 10 or 12 Emus on the road. one big one, had to be 5 or 6 feet tall - with a blue colour on his neck, and 9 or 10 smaller ones, about waist height. Theyre a big ostrich like bird

I spotted them in plenty of time, so no dramas.

 

I dont think it's homocide if the person is trying to commit suicide. :wink:

I was riding home one morning after work in the rain and the truck in front of me starts to slow down as we were coming up to a sweeping right hander that also has a side road the ends at the begining of the curve, making it look like a 'Y'. I start to slow down too cause I want to be careful at this intersection and this truck just stops. I am like 'oh crap' and trying not to lock up the front as I am having to adjust pressure on the rear becuase it keeps locking up. I start to move toward the right and just miss hitting him by like 2 feet. If he had been 10 feet back from wher he stopped I'd a been in the grass to avoid him. The bugger about it was he didn't use his turn signal. DOH!

 

This isn't strange, but scary. Two weeks after I got my VFR I was riding on the freeway. I knew my exit was about to come up and I was about to change lanes to get over to it when the traffic suddenly slowed. Right in the f*&%n middle of the road was a whole tread from a semi tire curled up. I was very gald I didn't change lanes right then, 'cause that would've messed me up pretty bad. I don't think the fall would've killed me, just the cars running me over afterwards. I was scared to ride on the freeway for a few days after that, but now I just make sure I look up the center before changing lanes!

 

This is the weirdest for me - I'm headed down US 301 in central Florida (6 lane divided) and an open top dump truck (idiot driver) passes me hauling a$$ and pea-gravel, the gravel flying out the backend of the truck. For about 10 seconds (felt like an eternity) I am riding in a hailstorm of b-b-sized pea gravel bouncing along the pavement with me at the same speed up to head height. Braking is a bad idea, pea gravel being mostly round and smooth; accelerating is going to keep me in the storm; so I haul out to starboard and look for a turnout. It's a good thing for me I wasn't packing!

 

I have had my share of close calls. One event that happened a few years ago on Pleasent Valley road near Vacaville Ca comes to mind as a little bizzare. I was riding my girl friends R6 with her on the back doing about 60. I was passing a orchard when a damn 35lb peacock decided to make a dash across the the road directly in front of my path. All I could do to avoid a dead-on impact was to swere hard and duck since the bird was at the same level as my handel-bars. Pow!! and there was feathers everywhere. I manage to pull over to the side to see how my girl friend was doing. She was remarkably being cool about this even with a talon sticking out of her pant leg.

There was several residences in the area and I am feeling bad that I probally just killed someones pet bird. One of the people lives in the area saw the whole thing and told me not to worry about the bird. Another person who saw the event was driving in the oppsite direction stop to see I was alright.

Now this is where it gets weird.

The witness that was driving and after he saw I was alright, went running down to the bird and started ripping feathers off it. Just when that was happening, one of the other local residents (a woman in her 50's) came out and started yelling at person who was pulling out feathers. This joker that was pulling out the feathers asked "Is this your bird?" The woman replied no but I know who the bird belongs to. He now told her to shut up and then ignore the womans yelling.

I didn't want to get involved in this silly argument and started to look over the bike for any damage from the impact. My girl-friend continued listening on to the argument and then got involved because of a statement that the woman had said about motorcyclist riding. I told my girl friend to leave it alone and lets just leave. (If it was that simple)

By now the guy that was yanking out feathers had quite a bit of feathers yanked out and was getting fed up with this woman that would not stop yelling at him or my girlfriend. He grab all feathers that he could carry walk across the road to where the woman was and threw the feathers at the woman. After throwing the feathers, he said there you go, now you have some feathers too. She started screaming at the guy and the guy started laughing. SHe picked up as much feathers and started throwing it back at the man who was still laughing. (Please try to understand there is a 10 knot wind) Feathers started going out in the road with traffic still moving on.

It wasn't one minute from the time the man threw feathers at the woman when a CHP came down the road and almost hit another peacock. The CHP saw all the peacock feathers scatter everywhere and ask who is responsible for the feathers in the road? The woman yelled out "it was those two!" while pointing at the man who pulled out the feathers and me.

Ah shit! What is this womans problem? The woman would not shut up making all sorts of statements that I was driving too fast and being reckless.
Fortunately for me, the gentleman that first ask me if I was alright talked to the CHP officer and explained everything. The CHP told me to leave and not to worry about the peacock since he almost hit one too. Both the man and the woman that threw feathers given tickets for littering which comes with a $1000 dollar minumum fine.

Okay, I guess you would of had to been there to seen this just how funny this was.

 

LOL --- sounds like a slapstick comedy. Sorry I missed it and glad the bike, you and the girl friend are OK. :caked:

 

Since I didn't avoid it, does this still count?

Happened on my second trip to the Dragon...

After a few runs, the wife decided to stay at the resort & I wanted to get one more run in so I pulled out of the parking lot. The last thing I saw at the resort was a red 5th gen pulling out behind me. I took off up the hill with the red VFR in chase. We were having a blast, since save for color, our bikes were probably indentical. On one of the many, many curves, I noticed something moving on the side of the road, turns out it was a female turkey. It took off & proceeded to fly directly into my helmet. I almost crashed. I made it to the overlook and the guy on the red VFR said all he saw was brake lights and feathers. We were laughing so hard we could barely stand. The guy on the red VFR says he believes the turkey survived since he saw it run off the road. All the people at the overlook had their jaws on the ground as I pulled feathers out of my helmet & collar. No one could believe I didn't go down, no that I think about it, I can't believe it either. Like an ass, I left the camera with my Wife. I made it back to the resort safely & my neck & shoulders were sore for a week.

KC-10 FE out...
lane:

 

Reminds me of the time i ran into a flock of sparrows at about 140km per hour. This was in 88 on my old vfr700. Wiped out about 6 or 7. One hit me in the helmet, which made a clunk and knocked my head back. Several on the fairing, one in the radiator. Feathers blood and shit on me and the bike. No damage thankfully.

 

Too many to list here. in detail.

1. State trooper dealing with a trucker, Bud and I came zooming up the TPK since our exit was in another mile. We pulled out to pass a truck in the slow lane (WFO) and saw the statie, who had the trucker pulled over He looks up Sees us points at us and goes back to writint the trucker a ticket. Luckily We missed a nice chat.

2. Same bud and I are zooming up in the mountains... Ok little background here the general rule of thumb is we can take any turn at 2x the posted speed. My buddy goes WFO, and passes a Water truck that I get stuck behind, as soon as oncoming traffic passes I go WFO to catch him. I'm quickly reeling him in when all of a sudden I see him slam on his brakes. I slam on mine. Both our skid marks start in the same place (reaction time and all.) I see what is up here is a turn marked 25 that the meant really 5. (90deg downhill outside turn with the road counter cambered to the direction of the turn.) Luckily there is this nice scenic overlook. My bud skids into it and in slow motion goes over the berm at the end and off the mountain. I skid into it on his heels and manage to stop at the dead top of the berm.

I get my bike pushed back and run down the hill My friend is not hurt apprently that pine forest int he mountains had about 4 foot of pine needles on it. he fell about 10 ft and and then slid. damage to the bike (None) damage to him sprained shoulder and broken face shield.

3. Driving into Canada on my Hog a Wild pheasant flies across the road and hits me square in the chest. this normally would have taken me completely of the bike save for the fact that my wife was riding pillion and behind her was all of the luggage. turkey knocked me into her and she got pushed into the luggage and we all stayed on.

Thats about he wildest stuff that has happened... but a bit off topic I guess because I really didn't avoid them.

 

Birds!

everyone should have the opportunity to strafe a flock of birds. It makes for great stories over beers!:caked:

 

Years ago I was riding in Owensboro, KY, when I rounded a corner to face a tank coming down the street. The Guard was moving it for some festival or fair I guess. Not OMG freaky, but definitely something I didn't expect to see that day!

BTW, it's good to see all the stories here that include "my helmet", it makes the results easier to take. I know many states (like my Indiana) don't have lid laws, but most of the replies here include birds, road junk, terra firma or unplanned get offs. Helmets do more than help during a crash.

There, I'm off my soap box. NEXT!

 

NZ is my territory. I've had a similar experience with a bull, except we had a stand-off at 30 paces. The rule is ... them with balls bigger than your crash helmet have right of way !