Wurzburg, Germany 1989, We had some Serious Fun!

It was 1989, the year I bought my first Harley. I was stationed in Geibelstadt, Germany on an old WWII airfield that was used by the Germans to test the Me262 jet fighter. They flooded the runway to help hide the place, but the British noticed the fake cows hadn't moved in a day or so in their spy pics and found the place. The village and surrounding area was liberated from the SS and the US took over the place for the Army Air Corp and then eventually as a helicopter airfield. We were even still using a lot of the old buildings built by the nazis. It's closed down now, but Geibelstadt and Wurzburg was a GREAT placed to be stationed. Hell, I got my first couple of tattoos and my Sporty while I was there so it couldn't be all bad. These pics are from before I got hooked up with the Stray Dogs MC, when I was just another independent Biker looking for a good time.

The first time I ever sat on my very own Harley Davidson. It was a 1989 883 Hugger XL. I loved this bike and put MANY miles on it. It was even stolen and returned to me. slid into a tree and repaired, basically we went through a lot.  I wish I still had it.

So new it still had the stock mufflers on it! This picture was taken at a rest area on my way to Holland for a party I was invited to. A few weeks before this I was riding around Wurzburg and saw a couple on a BMW bobber stopped looking at a map. I stopped to see if they needed help and it turns out they were from Holland and were looking for a campground on their way to Paris. I helped them out, we partied that night and a little while later I get an invitation in the mail to come to their farmhouse for their big Biker party. THAT was a great weekend. I rode up by myself since no one else could get a 4 day pass to go with me and I was the only American there. Talk about getting treated like a celebrity. . Buy me a couple of beers sometime and I'll tell you the stories.

The night before the party we put our bikes in the rear/party area of their farm house. That's Peter's BMW in the foreground. As you can see I over packed even back then. I hate needing something and not having it.

Another picture following Tattoo, Earl is in the lead and I'm sure we were heading to a bar somewhere.

We used to party and hang out at the Fortress Marienberg in Wurzburg a lot. Especially at night after the bars closed. We would park here in the courtyard and then go sit on the castle walls and drink beer or try to get cozy with whatever honey decided to ride up and party with us. The Polizei were pretty cool about it, they always told us to just make sure we cleaned up our mess. I'm sure it's not like that anymore.

The same shot as the last pic from farther away. Check out that Citroen 2CV. Those cars were so ugly they were cool.

This is a view of the castle from across the river. I would hate to have had to assault it back in the medieval days. We would sit up on those walls and talk, drink beer, snuggle on our sweeties, whatever was right at the time. Damn, I miss that place, it had a really cool vibe about it.  I didn't take this one I got it from Sundar Palaniappanand his webpage through google.

This is Tattoo and Karin having a beer at the Rock Palast (Rock Palace) bar. Karin owned a small bar in Wurzburg, but she had a thing for Tat so every once in a while we could get her out to the bigger bars with us. The Rock Palast was a great Heavy Metal bar, the walls were painted like stone castle walls, there was a 3 foot wall around the dance floor to sit on and hang out. they even had the back half of an old Cadillac to sit on a drink your beer. The bouncers and bartenders really appreciated it when us real Bikers actually showed up. They got tired of the posers in t-shirts talking about the bikes they used to have or were going to get. The stories from this place will cost you some more beer and it might take a while.

The wall of a church in downtown Wurzburg. I always thought it was cool to see the old stonework on these buildings and how they used the death iconography. The winged skull has been around for many centuries, it's not just a biker thang.

The front of the same church. Can you imagine a Southern Baptist church with a robed skeleton guarding over the door like this?

That's enough for now. I hope you like traveling down memory lane with me like this. I really enjoyed my three years in Germany. I put over 25K miles on the bike and got to see a lot of cool places. I wish I had taken all the pics I should have, but back then you had to use film and it cost money to buy it and develop the pictures. I needed the money more for beer and gas, I did manage to get some good shots though.
Later....