ABATE of Kansas 31st Annual National Labor Day Rally

1) Friends - Every year I meet more and more people and make lots of new friends, who you can always count on to be there year after year. It’s sort of like a family reunion except without crazy Aunt Marge and her lumpy potato salad. Many of the people we party with at this rally live out of town, so this is the only time we get to see them.

2) Weather - The weather at Lake Perry over Labor Day is traditionally wet; however, this year, the weather was perfect and the only precipitation was a light rain Saturday night, which made for great sleeping in the tent.

3) Boobies - More chicks = More boobies! Nuff said!

As usual, we got a late start taking off from Kansas City on Friday, September 1, so by the time Stripe, Terry and I pulled up to the registration tent at the rally entrance it was already dark. After signing a release waiver and getting our wrist bands we rode into the campground looking for our friends, Boog and Lexie from St. Joseph, Missouri, who I’d camped with the previous year. If you’ve been to this rally before, I’m sure you know Boog and Lexie. They are the really cute couple who ride around camp every year completely nekked! Last year they even recruited Lexie’s sister, Tristen to ride on back, which added to the fun and debauchery Ahhh…now you know who I’m talking about!

We rode to the campsite where we stayed last year, poked around in the dark for a while, and when we couldn’t find anyone or get a hold of them on the cell phone, we decided to camp with some of our other good friends, John and Carol Diaz, Tattoo and Rachel, J.O., Ike and the rest of the crew. John and Carol were even nice enough to haul my big-ass tent and air mattress to the lake in their truck this year. Thanks again, guys!

We pointed the headlights of our bikes to a somewhat flat area next to the other tents and set up camp. After a couple drinks at camp we walked down to check out the action on stage and in the vendor area, which is the hub of late night shenanigans. Hard Likker, Firebox and Final Drive were the lineup for Friday night, and as usual, the beer tent was alive with scores of topless women and camera-toting guys pretending to be professional photographers. After a couple more drinks we grabbed a bite to eat and headed back to camp for the night.

We were moving a little slow Saturday morning, and by the time we dragged ourselves out of the tent, Stripe had already visited the CMA tent for a cup of coffee and was ready to cover the field events. God bless him! This year’s field events included a tire toss, slow ride, balloon toss, wienie bite, barrel race, keg roll, tire drags and other fun biker games. Our good friends, Tony and Alan Stiles, Jack and Annette and the rest of the gang were camped out right across the street from the field events so we visited with them while watching the action. That’s when Tony showed me one of his new tattoos, which, believe it or not, was our Cycle Connections logo! How cool it that? Tony is now the undisputed number one Cycle Connections fan!

While the field events were taking place Boog and Lexie made a pass through the area—nekked of course, which took the focus off the events for just a while. Then, when you didn’t think it could get any crazier, some guys in a truck pulled up with stripper pole attached to the trailer they were pulling. Needless to say, there were plenty of scantily clad girls ready to try a little pole dancing. Some of them seemed to be a little too good at it, which makes you wonder what they do for a living. Things that make you go Hummm???

After the pole dancing had subsided, and since it looked like Stripe had everything covered at the field events, we decided to take a quick ride out to Topeka Harley-Davidson. We got a pretty late start so we weren’t sure if we’d get there before they closed and as it turned out, we were right. They were locking the doors just as we pulled into the parking lot. Since we were already in Topeka we decided to drop by the Kick Start Saloon for a couple of beers before heading back to the rally. On the ride back, we came across a somewhat unusual sight. Apparently, a rather small SUV was pulling a rather large boat, and as they were coming down the hill the boat trailer started fishtailing and ended up spinning the SUV around in the opposite direction and the boat came off the trailer and was lying across the road. The police had the road blocked off trying to figure out how to get the boat back on the trailer and were kind enough to let us ride through the ditch to get around the mess rather than making us backtrack several miles and take an alternate route.

Once we got back to camp, our buddies from Omaha rode up pulling their custom painted coffin trailer, which they do every year, and before they could even stop, Terry and Annette had climbed in and were ready for a ride around the rally grounds. Although I didn’t ride along this time, knowing Terry and Annette, I’m sure all the rally-goers were treated to a great T&A show.

Saturday night’s entertainment included music by Buffalo Alice, Silver Bullet and Backlash as well as the annual titty show. After another late night at the beer tent watching Terry, Annette and lots of other girls dance and put on a show; we stumbled back to camp and crashed hard.

Sunday morning…at least I think it was still morning…we rolled out of the tent and made our way down to the bike show, which was set up in the same area as the previous day’s field events. There were lots of beautiful bikes, many of which we recognized from previous bike shows in and around the KC area. After the judges made their final decisions, trophies were presented to the top two bikes in each class. Kenneth King, a.k.a.”Big King,” from Carrolton, Missouri took Best in Show with his 1963 Panhead, and his bike received even more attention when Rachael, our February 2006 cover model posed on his bike for an impromptu photo shoot.

That evening, The Breeze, Canned Heat and Shawn Ward took the stage and of course, there was another titty show. You would think things would calm down a bit since it was Sunday night, but think again. Monday was Labor Day so it was business as usual at the beer tent. Ya just gotta love three-day weekends! After listening to the bands for a while we headed down the well-worn path back to camp.

On Monday morning we got up, took down our tents, packed up the bikes and headed home. Rack up another wonderful weekend with great friends, good times and incredible weather! Until next year!

Story by Mike Schweder

Photos by Mike Schweder, Stripe & David Stracke