Bucephalus outwits the Cisco Kid; wrapping it up and packing it in

The Silk Road Adventure -- this is the second last "blog" entry from Dan Moore's road trip, in which we learn that Bucephalus will not be euthanized. The bikes are now on their way back to the States. Hurry and read this one before it disappears into that aggravating *.PDF archive.

The problems with Bucephalus (my motorcycle, named after Alexander the Great’s horse) intensified two days before the end of the riding part of our trip. It had been running well for more than two weeks with the automobile fuel pump. But on the way to Pingliang it stopped running. Fortunately, Dennis, one of our group who is an electrical engineer at Cisco (the Cisco Kid), developed a way to jump the fuel pump directly off the battery, so that the fuel pump would run regardless of an electrical fault somewhere else. It worked for one hour, and then on a steep hill, it stopped running even though the fuel pump was getting fuel. This time we had no answers, and it looked like we would have to call the chase vehicle to carry Bucephalus the rest of the way. There were steep cliffs all around, and there was a discussion of euthanasia, but I would have no part of it – Bucephalus and I are bonded.