CHAPTER X ONLINE NEWSLETTER

Welcome to GWRRA Chapter X - SW Washington. Our Chapter was Chartered in June 2007. We invite and encourage you to attend our monthly breakfast meeting or check out one of our many events throughout the month. Our motto is "if it isn't fun, we don't want to do it". GWRRA offers friends for fun, safety and knowledge. We have an outstanding Rider Educator that can help to expand your motorcycle safety, tech nights to help expand your knowledge on motorcycle maintenance and many events throughout the month to allow you to meet new people and hopefully make some new friends.

We started this Chapter to bring together the many motorcycle riders of the SW Washington area. You don't have to ride a Goldwing to be a part of our group. We welcome all riders of motorcycles.

Our Chapter helps out local charities in the SW Washington area throughout the year. During the Holidays this last December we donated new toys and canned food to Share House in Vancouver. We want to bring a positive and informative view of motorcyclists to this area.

We hope that you will stop in and visit with us. Be sure to bring your smile as we know you will have a good time.

Until we meet, ride safe.

Michael & Terry Frerichs
Chapter Director WA-X

Hello fellow riders, here is my story of getting into the GWRRA. Way back in 88 when I got my first wing, it's a 79 and yes I still have it. I was brought into GWRRA by a member by a coffee buddy. After joining the group I got to put a couple hundred thousand miles on that wing. I was asked to run the chapter store and got to know the whole chapter and had fun doing that job, but it's a tough job. I moved to the northwest in 96, and rode the clutch off the 79. Since then I purchased the 89 we have had now a couple years.

Since we've started this chapter Mike asked me to be part of the ride coordinator team and 50/50. Then a few months ago I was honored by being asked to be Individual of the year. Now that you know some about my GWRRA background we can get up to date. Tony and I are asking for your help to set up rides we will all enjoy. We would like to set up a parking lot ride as the weather starts to get nice (we hope soon) as we all can be a little rusty from the cold damp weather. Then there will be more rides following our meetings to some wonderful ice cream places through out the northwest. We’ve been trying to brainstorm to come up with some fun and unusual, okay let’s just say different rides. If you have a place to ride let myself or Tony know. Also let us know how far you like to ride.

There are several other chapters that would love for us to ride up and visit which will be on part of our ride activities. During my time in the Arizona chapter we made it a point to travel to the farthest chapter, in the state, and work our way home as much as we could. I would like to be one of those chapters who shows up with more than a couple people for visits. The past couple months a few of us has visited the chapters up the I-5 corridor, and have had fun in doing so. Let’s get more visitors out there to meet other chapters….it’s a lot of fun.

I really got to see and know Arizona by hopping on the old 79 and twisting the throttle for the day trips mostly, but also had those weekend trips where we loaded the camping gear and found those neat little spots off the beaten path. I would like to get to know Washington like that having the bike to travel to those little out of the way places for the best burgers & fries or that post card photo. So if anyone wants to get out and get lost with the bikes let me know…oh yes I have home programmed into the GPS to get back to do that work stuff so can’t get too lost…DARN IT!!!!

Thanks
Jerry

A WORD FROM YOUR CHAPTER COUPLE

We are having a ball at Chapter X as Chapter Couple and because of that fun, we got busy with it and are also the Membership Enhancement Coordinators for Washington District.

We returned to the world of motorcycles in 2005 after a 25+ year hiatus. Actually, we had kids and put our love for bikes on hold... After they grew up and left home a friend bought a touring bike and got us back into biking.

We have a 1995 ACE Shadow 1100 and soon discovered that bike wasn’t too comfy for long adventures, so we added a 1992 Gold Wing Trike and as they say, the rest is history.

Back on track… about 'RA… We joined GWRRA in early 2006 and became chapter couple in Oregon later in the year. We relocated to Chapter X with the formation of the new chapter in June 2007 and proudly serve as Chapter Couple. We’ve had so much fun greeting people at meetings, making new friends, attending events, participating in parking lot practices and most of all attending Wing Ding last summer. We learned so much about the chapter couple program and met so many nice people from all over the country.

We both “pilot” the ride – Carmen participated in a Team Oregon class last year and came away with new respect for these guys who ride us around!!! How can they plan their escape route, be aware of all the situations, have some of us yakking away in the headsets and the radio playing besides… After taking the class and learning all the things to be aware of and then adding in worrying about falling over (twice in class), she would rather be Trixie Triker and Ieave two wheels to those who are better equipped!

We look forward to this year’s riding adventures and already have scheduled a trip to Lynden to the Washington District Rally and a trip to Powell, Wyoming for the Region Rally! We look forward to representing our chapter and our district as we make new friends and promote GWRRA and the Chapter Couple Program!