Events & Discoveries

3) Never drive at night in Iowa. ("There are no drivers in Iowa willing to dim their headlights.")

4) Be careful at railroad crossings in Ohio. They are bumpier there than anywhere else.

5) Beware of large rocks, oil slicks and chuck holes, any one of which can throw you.

6) Wear a crash helmet.

7) Heed the "reduce speed" signs around small towns in the East. They may herald a cobblestone street, which is poison to a fast-traveling scooter.

8) Stay off turnpikes in fog and at night. A huge truck—with the driver so high and you so low—could run right over you without the driver's ever seeing you. (Toll collectors and highway patrolmen may ban a motor scooter from a turnpike anyway, unwilling to believe that it can hold the pace.)

9) Stay overnight in a comfortable place. Don't plan to sleep out along the highway. You need a comfortable bed to get the kinks out.

Yet, apparently, the kinks were not too severe. The day after he got back home, Young said he'd be willing to do it again some time—"if I could just take a little more time."

It seems odd that Young put up with the nuisance of combing insects out of his beard in the interest of economy, but this is the case, and it works out this way: motor scooters are strongly affected by the wind, so most of the time Young drove without the scooter's plastic windscreen in order to lessen wind resistance. This arrangement permitted the bombardment of grasshoppers, gnats and dragon flies, but it also allowed him to get 100 miles to the gallon.

SONGS FOR A BEAR