International Motorcycle Show

Its that time of year to revise your motorcycle dream list. All the bikes from all the makers will be under one roof in San Mateo next weekend – Nov. 20 to 22.for the Cycle World International Motorcycle Show.

Here’s a discount code special from me to you: go to www.motorcycleshows.com and use the code COB for $3 off entry.

I’ll be speaking on Who Women Riders are Today. Of course there’ll be my pictures for the slide show and I’ve been gathering my facts to open eyes, pop  eyes and show ‘em that we’re real, we’re here, and we’re kicking butts.

I’ll be on in the Hub 11:30 – 12:00 on Sat. and 1 – 1:30 on Sunday.

Sue Slate and Gin Shea, founders of the Women’s Motorcycling Foundations and Dirty Dozen fame will be running the Women’s Center. Find the great new gear that is finally seems to be available to fit women.

Lois On The Loose – a book to crack me up.

 

book review of Lois on the Loose by Lois Prcye

 

I don’t love travel books.  Much as I love to travel, I find reading about others travels a tepid drink of backwash. Of course I readily hold forth on my own travel adventures, which you’ll just have to trust are perfectly woolly tales of danger and enlightenment. But I’m taking my hat off to Lois Pryce and her book Lois on the Loose and I’m waving it enthusiastically in the air.

The one word I’d say in any number of way is: FUNNY!  I snicked, snorted and giggled my way through the book.  The language alone is comically British and I always have a titter when some one says “Crikey!”.

But that’s only half of what carried me through the book chronicaling Lois on her trip from Alaska to the tip of South America upon a tiny 250 motorcycle. What kept me turning the pages was her own focus on the road itself, the drive to keep moving. An obsession to keep on keeping on.

She doesn’t dwell on what she ate at a great hole in the wall restaurant, or how charming the locals at the market, or the political or cultural aspects of the counties she passed through.  The most detailed she gets is at the border crossings and they seem to sum up her experiences ranging from somewhat criminal to charming.

The best bits of the story seem to be the worst bits of the road. I try to keep that in mind when traveling “this will make a great story” as its always more fun than hearing about sunshine and stellar views. Lois suffers so many brutal conditions and stretches of misery that I was left happy to just be an armchair reader.

Oh and the might of the pen. It was a juicy read to hear the antics of her miserable travel companion who would say things like “How do you idiots get anything done in this place? God I’m so fucking sick of useless fucking Peru”. Wouldn’t it be cathartic if you could detail someone’s bad behavior and have lots of people read about it?

Well I won’t be a plot spoiler, just get your own copy and enjoy. I just ordered her next book “Red Tape and White Knuckles” where she one-ups herself and crosses Africa on another wee bike.

Suburban book club takes on Chicks on Bikes

Wine, dessert and Chicks On Bikes

Those who know about book clubs know that too often the book doesn’t get entirely read. So I really thought Chicks on Bikes would be a perfect book. Heck, you can just look at the pictures like kids read National Geographic. Then you turn up drink some wine, nibble a little dessert and a have a gab with the girl friends.

Chicks on Bikes is an accessable book for anyone to jump into and enjoy, but its not just fluff with photos. It got a powerful message of what it means to follow your passion, how women jump into a man’s world and make it their own, how people assess risk… and lots of juicy topics for any book club.

The Moraga Moms book club is here in an affluent suburb of San Francisco – they do not ride motorcycles. They are not interested in ever riding motorcycles. But I’m terribly pleased to report that they loved reading Chicks on Bikes.

In their own words, here’s what they said:

“I just picked up the book to look flip through the pictures and I got caught up and read it straight through.”

“I would probably never have gone out and read this book because I have no interest in motorcycles. But I found that the women were more like me than they were different. I know at one point I cried.”

“I was astounded by the power of the women.”

“Maybe its a great book for us because we’re hitting middle age and harbour some fantasy of doing something wild!”

” I keep looking at the pictures and I see something new every time.”

Well that’s it for me tooting my horn with a blush. But I’m psyched to get my book into the hands of more book club and share the inspiration and spirit of Chicks on Bikes.

So I’m going to offer a Book Club Special:

• I’ll send a box of 6 books or more with 20% discount and free shipping to your book club. ($20/book) or add $3 each to ship direct to each person.
• I’ll sign each book.
• I’ll call in during your meeting for an personal chat with your group.

And when you’re done reading it, how fun is it to put a book on your coffee table with a big vaginally suggestive image on it. Use it a rorschach test of visual literacy!

email me directly: Christina@cshook.com
And check out the website: www.ChicksOnBikes.US

Dirtbag Challenge

I’m so glad I got my tired butt over the bridge after a day of photographing kids, babies and families. You’ve no idea how exhausting that can be. But the magical light crossing the Bay Bridge seemed to promise something wonderful awaiting.

Magical light on the Bay Bridge.

mesmerizingly lovely Bay Bridge

Golden San Francisco

I was all geeked up upon arriving at the wrap up to the The Dirtbag Challenge 2009. The awards were just about to be given.

The rules are simple:
No Harely’s
1 month to build it
Cannot spend more than $1000
Must be able to complete the ride to Marin Headlands and back.

Seems I was plumb overwhelmed by the excitement of my buddies winning the “Peoples Choice Award” because I did not focus my camera at all. Oops.

blurry but happy - Kerri, Tegan, Jen and Kathy win Peoples Choice.

I got myself together for a few pics of their hot little Darling Dirtbag bike.

Jennifer Bromme

Tegan appears

Kerri appears

The tank really makes it.

And the hot red seat.

And then the light was just about gone so I just got one other hottie showing off her bike with builder boyfriend (someone tell me who this is, I lost their info).

Winner for Cleverest Chopper

The beer was gone, the builders and riders exhausted, and just a trace of light left. But the burnout and fireworks progressed. I was entranced with the noise, smoke and exuberence of it all. It well worth the hearing loss.

BBBBBBBBurnout!

This had been going on all afternoon, as you can see from the marks.

Loud and happy. The tires about gone.

I’m bummed I missed most of the day, but I can’t wait for Paulo Ascension’s film he’s working on about the Dirtbag Challenge. He filmed it in true dirtbag style – beer in hand.

La Ducati Day

La Ducati in La Honda, I just figured out the irony!

For the last weekend in Northern Cali before the rains come – I thought there would be more avid bikers out. Did a little fog keep the riders from one of the best know Bay Area rides down past Alices on Skyline?

These little girls could kick your bum bum.

Do not mess with the pink car girls!

Those who came reaped the fun. From my Chicks On Bikes book table, I could see the somewhat absurd but highly skilled slow motion races. The “Noise Contest” took place within earbreak distance from me.

Sandra Bernt comes in 3rd for best sounding bike.

Chicks on Bikes SF ride/party – how did it go?

It was kind of like a wedding day. Lots of planning, a hundred details, a thousand communications, and one big day. Also like a bride I smiled my face off and saw lots of old friends.

Here are some of the girls in the book before the ride.

Jenny Lefferts, Goth Girl, Jennifer Bromme, Alex Elchinoff and me

It was a magnificent day in San Francisco when we met at Ocean Beach. There were dozens of fun filled events in the city that day – the Love Festival, the Folsom Street Fair… But us girls were there to ride.

Here’s Pinky arriving with her most stylish sport bikin’ crowd. See the sunshine, the cliffs, the mob of cars looking for a place to park…

We’d filled the no-parking red zone with bikes, but Jenny charmed the police who smiled happily and left us all to park as we liked. Do girls get away with more?

I was a bride who had to take her own photographs. So I missed a lot and was often caught up IN the moment not the distance that it takes to be photographing. Rob Stokstad from City Bike covered the day much better, click here.

With that disclaimer, here’s a few pics from the parking lot.

Sunset Red with her helmet count of how often she's been stung by bees.

My new Ducati friend Rain Hayes

Alex was the racer girl in the book with her bike in the bedroom. More tatoos 10 years later.

SFMC Paige and President Tegan

And then the ride was on! It was the best ride through SF I’ve even had. The roads seemed to part before us like the red sea. GOTH girl and Alex were Moses and SFMC the loyal disciples who blocked traffic better than Jesus Christ.

Perhaps Jesus loves chicks on bikes because it really just went so smooth and fast. We broke laws, set off car alarms and dusted several cops along the way.

I managed to grab a few shots while riding which is tricky with the throttle hand.

Broadway St.

Embarcadero and Bay Bridge

Goth and Alex in front of the ballpark.

Almost there, we can smell the beer. When a Muni bus stopped we uniformly broke rank, swarmed past the bus and bee lined the last block to the party at Benders.

hanging in front of Benders

SFMC tell me they love to block traffic. Thank you!

The bike I most wanted to own. Holly came up from Santa Cruz on 3 tiny tanks of gas.

Into the bar where I drank one extreme margarita that fueled me for a couple hours of book signing. I hope I didn’t write anything too stupid in anyone’s book. I stole this shot from Bob's site. Thanks Bob.

performance art moment by my freind Barbera Lou McDowell. In case you didn't get it.

Hit by a Prius. Still riding and laughing, scooter girl Laura.

Pat Mazerra made her way down from the Folsom Street Fair.

Finally I sneak out back with my friend Sydney the only hip suburban housewife MILF one from my alter ego life in Orinda who came.

And what happened on September 27th 2009.
If you haven’t already bought your book and you’ve read this far. Go immediately to Chicks On Bikes website and order it.

Not Any Given Sunday – its my big hometown book party/ride for Chicks on Bikes

For those of you who’ve harbored a dream for years and years to publish your book and haven’t actually finished it – listen up. Its kind of scary. Now there it bound on paper for all to see. Or worse, not to see. My own mom didn’t even bother to look through my website. Ouch.

I waver between thinking I have the best thing between 2 covers that transcends all genre and is a brilliant statement on the gender roles of women in the world of male dominated fun and the photographic successor to great documentary photography such as Doreathea Lange’s images of dust bowl refugees; or that I’ve fallen sadly short and … and… well hell I’m not going to write my own bad review but you can imagine what insecurities lie there.

Actually its gone pretty well, and its had very kindly reviewers. One of my fav’s is a fun magazine I’ve just discovered RumBum.com . I love the grass roots satisfaction of review from bloggers like these:
www.yourbikelife.com
www.couragecommunity.com
www.demenshea.com
My favorite blogger is Rippen Kitten and here’s what she has to say: www.rippinkitten.com
You can read a whole except from the book here:
www.bikerchicknews.com

So here I am with a garage of books and some heartfelt good words from friends and the motorcycle community. I have grand visions of success and accolades and a second edition after they all sell out during the holiday sales rush.

Yet I’m perversely reluctant to give it over to mainstream distributors. Shouldn’t my goal be to have this in every suburban strip mall Barnes and Noble in America? Nope, I want to sign and add little notes on a postcard to each person who buys a book. So I’m going to get a bigger mechanism, one might way a web, a WWW to find those people.

A happy daunting moment when my garage fills with books.

Oh yes, that’s what I wanted to tell you book dreamers in the beginning of this blog entry – getting it published is just the first breath of life for your book. If its to have a life of its own, you need to keep up the mouth to mouth breathing.

I’m hoping to whack the chest of Chicks On Bikes and keep breathing until it gets up on its own sexy biker chick legs and walks right into the living rooms of those who love my photographs, are fascinated by the imagery from a rich culture and understand the universal stories of women who have found their own way and lived with passion.

I have finished a long standing project that has haunted me while I have nurtured loved and nearly but never quite abandoned in the 10 years it took. It is deeply gratifying.

My 9 year old daughter Ella is entirely impressed with me. Now that’s a bonus. I want to be the kind of mom whose grown and successful kids name me as a role model and inspiration. What higher aspiration could a mom have? Infact I feel like some emotional after-school-special just saying it. I don’t think they have after-school-specials anymore. Fine.

I’m just saying I’m proud to have a book of my own creation (and Jeffrey’s) and finished it, and jumped through the many spinning hoops to get it published, promoted, packaged and sold. That promote/sell part is my current overwhelming task.

Sunday is the hometown parade. I’m calling San Francisco my hometown because that’s where my heart is. I get to ride down the street with dozens, maybe 100, women bikers. This is going to be so damn fun. We should do this every year. We should do it in every city in America. Chicks on Bikes are so much FUN, and you will feel the POWER.

So here’s the details if there’s any single reader who hasn’t got them here at the 9th hour:

My book Chicks on Bikes is finally out! Its a lifestyle coffee table book of real women bikers. See http://www.ChicksOnBikes.US

Come celebrate women riders. San Francisco must the the epicenter of women bikers, so lets show what we’ve got!

The ride is at 12:30 and the book party is at 3pm. Dudes on bikes are welcome to come support us.Be sure to sign up for my newsletter for more cool biker chick news:

http://www.chicksonbikes.us

The party after at Benders is sure to be a rocking scene, so even you non bikers, come on down.

Chicks On Bikes – 100 Women Ride
San Francisco
Sunday Sept. 27
12:30- Be at Ocean Beach on the Great Highway where Fulton ends ? ready to ride.
Map of the ride route.

3:00 Chicks on Bikes Book Party
Benders Bar
806 South Van Ness @19th
Free BBQ, Liz Fabuliz on the turn table, 2 pool tables, and me smiling and signing your book. 21+

It still makes me cry – 9/11 memorial ride

This is Erich Bay who kissed his wife Lorraine as she went off to work on September 11th.

Flight 93 left Newark NJ but never made to San Francisco; so Erich and several other family members of those who died on that hijacked light finished it in their memory. They rode motorcycles from the Newark Airport to SFO airport in an emotional cross country journey.

They were welcomed and escorted by many across america. But ultimately motorcycling is a solo journey with much time to reflect. He said the support and wishes of those across america brought him some comfort.

Erich was kind and smiling, but I started crying. The tragedy of it all comes pouring back. Their grief is shared by me in a way that no other tragedy evokes. I feel they suffered what was intended for us all to feel. I feel it, and I remember.

My spirits too rose when a distant roar broke into a full cacophony as hundreds of bikes filled Broadway street. Bikers from all over the bay area had joined to come and give support.

Here’s the ride leader, Nick from Hercules.

Urban Moto Magazine sponsored the SF event that evening. This is Leslie Kaye the groovy biker chick editor and publisher Danny Molina.

You know where my heart really is – chicks on bikes. I met the fantastic club – Curve Unit – that I’d heard of for years. They are total CHICKS ON BIKES – all caps baby. They had better show up for the Chicks on Bikes ride on the 27th.

A little plug for their biggest event of the year coming right up too – a bbq fund raiser for Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation. Family fun, music, raffle… Check out their site www.curveunit.com

I believe a key to life is showing up for it. Thank you to the motorcycle community for being the kind of people who do what you believe in. Thank you for showing up.

To wrap up this post: a piece of memorial fence they brought from Shanksville, Pennsylvania where the plane crashed.

Curses on the printer, cheers for a new party date – 100 Women Ride

Oh the trials of publishing, everyone warned me. Ok my printer is in China and despite my very best efforts at good communication, its a bit like ordering Chinese food on a busy Saturday night over the phone. But honestly they’re good people, honest, good quality and the best price by far. DIYA publising if you want to know. Now back to my bitching…

I had to reschedule the date for the Chicks on Bikes ride and party after. It is now set for Sept. 27th. The ride starts at 12:30 and ends at Benders Bar in the mission at 3pm. I’m now calling it the Chicks On Bikes 100 Women Ride. Surely we can get 100 women on bikes out there. Its a deep and powerful feeling revving engines with big pack of girls. Its truly a Hear Me Roar feeling.

Dudes on bikes welcome.

Here’s the details:
Chicks On Bikes – 100 women ride.
San Francisco
Sunday Sept. 27
12:30 Be at Ocean Beach on the Great Highway where Fulton ends – ready to ride.

3:00 Chicks on Bikes Book Party
Benders Bar
806 South Van Ness @19th
Free BBQ, great drinks, 2 pool tables, hip music and me smiling and signing your book. 21+

I just hung a show of my work there that will be up all month. Stop on by and check it out.

And have a bloody mary there if you’re ready for lunch. Just so you know, its not mine.

The who’s who of who rocked Christina’s world at Women and Motorcycling Conference.

I’m going to start my list with Lois on the Loose – If you love a mad funny adventure story and you don’t know yet know her click immediately on this link and get Loise on Loose, or Red Tape and White Knuckles. Her latest journey from London to the tip of Africa will give humility to most all of us who like to tell tales of challenging roads.

Here we are Lois and her fan, moi.

Andrea Sears appeared somehow everywhere to me. I’d photographed her years ago for Chicks On Bikes and she’s now the President of the Siren’s NYC chapter.

Now - 2009

Then - 2007

I’ve always had an admiration of the Motor Maids. They seem to be real ladies in the best sense of the word. They are the oldest women’s motorycling club and they’ve been around over 65 years in their classic royal blue piping uniforms. They’re dedicated, classy and welcoming to all.

Jessica Prokup and Cam from the Motorcycle Industry Council have all the numbers to prove women are a thriving force in motorcycling so the industry best sit up and start catering to us!

Late one night I was riding my KTM home through the maze of condos at Keystone when I came upon a man on foot who shouted me down. Turns out he’s Skip Harrinson author of the book All Who Wander Are Not Lost.

He was infact slightly lost and wandering. I rode him back to his motorcycle and he popped up at my table the next day.

I was stuck at my table a lot selling books. But that was the fun part too. A parade of women bikers to watch and talk to. I love to people watch as any good photographer must. Here’s a couple of snaps of women at my booth I just liked their look.

Wrapping up here with a true inspiration. Because motorcycles spell freedom to many of us.

Carlana Stone lost the use of both her legs in an car accident years ago. She now rides a trike and needs no help to get rolling down the road and embracing life.

She’s got spirit and grace that I hope to capture a snip of in photos. I’ll blog again with her full story and lots more pix.