The road crew is literally at sea, visiting the 10th Annual High Seas Rally. We got some photos back from their travels to the Blues, Bikes and Barbeque Rally and Thunder Beach. Here are some shots of the RIVCO booth at those rallies, and sights seen. Also included is a pic of the 1 1/2 lb. sandwich Jordan ate at one of our local restaurants.Thanks to John for providing all the photos. (1 is BBB, 2 & 3 are Thunder Beach, and 4 is clearly the sandwich, but missing the 1 1/2 lb. pile of french fries!)

It's pretty hectic at the RIVCO factory. Bodies are flying around the shop floor, assembling products and packing things up for customers, and machining aluminum like crazy. And a big dose of the High Seas Cruise Rally just adds to the excitement.

The High Seas rally is an annual event (this is the 10th) and comes together for a great cause, kidney dialysis research. The rally takes place on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship, with up to 3000 bikers, and is truly a great way to socialize, party and meet the biker community at the end of the rally and riding season. A few select vendors get to make the trip too, and RIVCO has been making the trip for several years now. New products are shown, there are lots of free prizes and events, and some amazing parties, not to mention traveling in complete luxury to western Caribbean destinations like Grand Cayman and Cozumel. It's casual dress, so no pressure and the bikers can ride directly to Port Canaveral, Florida where the ship is docked. This year the rally takes place from October 28 to November 4.

Locally, since the weather has been warmer during the days, we are still getting riders at the factory, checking out the latest products. It's very gratifying that we get so many people from Wisconsin, Illinois and even Michigan taking the time to enjoy the ride to Burlington. If we could entice some of the hardy souls from Indiana and Iowa, that would be great too. The factory and outlet is open from 7:00am to 4:00.

Last week, our traveling outlet store/semi made the trip to the Thunder Beach Rally in Panama Beach, Florida. There are quite a few Florida rallies during the course of the hard core riding season here in the States, and one of the interesting things about them is how many people attend who aren't Florida residents. Bikers come from the surrounding states, Louisiana, Alabama and Texas but many come down from the east coast, and a surprising number of Canadian riders make the journey. Thunder Beach, which is a spring and fall event, has always been good to us, but the comment that came back about last week from John, our purchasing manager who attended the rally was "Maybe a bigger crowd than the spring show." Late season rallies just seem to be getting more and more popular, which makes a lot of sense. If you've got ten or twenty thousand or more invested in your bike and you love riding, then stretching the season and the roads just is too good to pass up.

So this week, starting today, the RIVCO semi-trailer is parked at the amazing Biketoberfest in sunny Daytona, Florida. The Fest goes from 10/18-10/21, and our people and accessories have a nice spot at Riverfront Park on Beach Street. If you want to see some innovative billet products, hang out with our road crew and visit the hot spots in Daytona with a bunch of free-spirited fellow bikers, well come on down.

This week the big blue semi is at the Thunder Beach Rally in Panama City Florida. This has always been a great time and show for RIVCO, and so even though the biking season may be winding down a bit here in Wisconsin (though today a well-bundled guy on a Honda Valkyrie passed me like I was glued in place) it is still really going at this time of year in our southern and southwestern states. Our owner decided to bring a big crew if you visit the Rally, you'll see the truck parked in front of the Shoppes at Edgewater, and be able to visit with Rich, John, Justin and Chick. There will be some new products for hard baggers and Harley baggers specifically, and everyone at the booth is friendly, so check them out!

In the shop, the assembly group is preparing additional displays for the Biker Budz, and the smell and heat of welded steel is warming the back end of the building. A potential additional stove wood source has been located courtesy of Alice and new signs for the front of building are ready at Signs & Lines in Waukesha. It's a fine tuned machine here, and we have more rallies coming up quickly.