Billy did it. He accomplished so much! He rode to all 50 states, including that tough run with Trace up to Prudhoe Bay on KLRs. He had a wife and son, and left many life lessons for his son in the BWOM videos. He had great friends. Billy also touched so many of us who never got the chance to meet him. Thanks, Kev, for honoring his memory with this series. You done good. You done real good.
About a year and a half ago, my younger brother passed away unexpectedly, to young at age 56. He was sort of a super-handyman, originally a plumber, but as time went on, he learned how to build, fix, or replace just about anything, whether it was in a home, a Burger King, or a chain of private schools. I'd been planning a trip (BWOM, of course) from our home in Southern California to Jasper, AB, Canada. I decided to dedicate the ride to him, and my wife & I took off on our bikes, with some unusual cargo. I had about 15 wooden stakes in one bag, and another was filled with all sorts of plumbing & electrical stuff, odd tools, etc. Somewhere in each state & province, at a hidden but scenic location, I would write a special note to him on a stake, and attach a part or tool to it, then hammer it into the ground. So there are now some very odd places that someone may find an electrical outlet, hose spigot, light switch, or whatnot. The idea seemed really silly at first, but everyone agreed that he'd think it was pretty cool. Anyway, this series brought back those memories, although you guy did a much better job of recording it (I do have photos and a few very short videos), and I know that Billy would think it's very cool. Seriously, great job! Thanks for doing this - I can't imagine how much time it must have taken, but I know that it was worth it for both of you. We all miss Billy!
Jim Stoneman thanks a lot for the story. It was really moving and exactly the type of thing I was trying to capture with this. I would like to see some of the pics. If you would like to email me the story and pics, I think it would be cool for the website. Thanks again. I’m sure he appreciated it too.
Thank you for the comment. We really enjoyed doing it, though the editing, and things were alot of work (thanks to Scott for the music work) we wouldnt have done it any other way. Really really glad that you liked it and that it was thought worthy of the time.
Well done Kev. Well done. Thank you for that closure and the history of old vids. So great to see and hear Tracy's voice again too. I'm planning a cross country ride this summer (my third) and will be thinking of you all when I cover some of that same ground. Be well.
Thanks for vloging the final ride Kev. I always looked forward to BWOM in the winter to get my fix. Ohio winters suck ya know!.. Oh and to Tracy, if you're reading this.... What happened to the Aero-Stench? I noticed you're not suited up the same as usual? LOL
624metv good deal. I’ll get back with you shortly. It may be this weekend because of work but I’ll get back to you for sure. Thanks for being willing to head out and get one.
Hey man, sorry for the lack of any news for quite a while. I have to go back through everything. Had a few life changes, all positive, but demanded quite a bit of time. I will be getting back in and doing an update. I believe 4 of the five were found, with the last one not being where I left it. I will do an update soon with regards to all this. To top it off, the hard drive that I kept everything on is shot. I need to get someone to try to pull everything off of it. But, all those excuses being used up in this one comment, I will get back to it shortly and get things going. I still have BWOM 10 to plug in, edit, etc, if the hard drive comes back up. And I know that I should have backed it up, but sheesh, what am I, a brain surgeon???
billmaa Yes, things would be much easier if life didn’t keep getting in the way! 😁. Having worked with computers my entire career, I am fairly paranoid about backups. I have two Synology NAS units each with RAID. Fortunately, they are fairly easy to set up so no brain surgery required. I actually did have one of the drives fail and recovery was completely painless. Power down, replace bad drive (under warranty thankfully), power back up and the NAS automatically copies the data from the good drive back to the bad one to maintain the redundancy. It is ironic that none of my computers has lost a hard drive, but the backup system had a drive failure. Go figure! I am glad they were all found. I was thinking if one was still unrecovered, I might have some time this year to go searching. Being retired is nice.
Robert Timmons I scoured his bwom computer and found the start of the book but really it amounted to “it was a ...” and that, sadly, was as far as it got. After building a website and doing a movie, who knows, maybe I’ll write his book also.
Billy did it. He accomplished so much! He rode to all 50 states, including that tough run with Trace up to Prudhoe Bay on KLRs. He had a wife and son, and left many life lessons for his son in the BWOM videos. He had great friends. Billy also touched so many of us who never got the chance to meet him. Thanks, Kev, for honoring his memory with this series. You done good. You done real good.
Carl Pop thanks so much. I agree with all of your sentiments about him and really appreciate the kk d words.
About a year and a half ago, my younger brother passed away unexpectedly, to young at age 56. He was sort of a super-handyman, originally a plumber, but as time went on, he learned how to build, fix, or replace just about anything, whether it was in a home, a Burger King, or a chain of private schools. I'd been planning a trip (BWOM, of course) from our home in Southern California to Jasper, AB, Canada. I decided to dedicate the ride to him, and my wife & I took off on our bikes, with some unusual cargo. I had about 15 wooden stakes in one bag, and another was filled with all sorts of plumbing & electrical stuff, odd tools, etc. Somewhere in each state & province, at a hidden but scenic location, I would write a special note to him on a stake, and attach a part or tool to it, then hammer it into the ground. So there are now some very odd places that someone may find an electrical outlet, hose spigot, light switch, or whatnot. The idea seemed really silly at first, but everyone agreed that he'd think it was pretty cool. Anyway, this series brought back those memories, although you guy did a much better job of recording it (I do have photos and a few very short videos), and I know that Billy would think it's very cool. Seriously, great job!
Thanks for doing this - I can't imagine how much time it must have taken, but I know that it was worth it for both of you. We all miss Billy!
Jim Stoneman thanks a lot for the story. It was really moving and exactly the type of thing I was trying to capture with this. I would like to see some of the pics. If you would like to email me the story and pics, I think it would be cool for the website. Thanks again. I’m sure he appreciated it too.
I got my treasure tin and will treasure it, pun intended. It was so worth the ride. Thanks Kevin!
Got mine too.
Tracey and Kevin thank you both so much for your effort in making "these are the good times" again. This is a great series of videos.
Thank you for the comment. We really enjoyed doing it, though the editing, and things were alot of work (thanks to Scott for the music work) we wouldnt have done it any other way. Really really glad that you liked it and that it was thought worthy of the time.
Great job Kevin and Tracey! Billy would be happy, guys!
Dammit no Canada .... Thanks for doing the trip .... I'm sure u guys made him proud .
Well done Kev. Well done. Thank you for that closure and the history of old vids. So great to see and hear Tracy's voice again too. I'm planning a cross country ride this summer (my third) and will be thinking of you all when I cover some of that same ground. Be well.
Michael Kallelis thank you very much!!!
Thanks for vloging the final ride Kev. I always looked forward to BWOM in the winter to get my fix. Ohio winters suck ya know!.. Oh and to Tracy, if you're reading this.... What happened to the Aero-Stench? I noticed you're not suited up the same as usual? LOL
Miss him. Thanks for making these.
Look forward to seeing how people find the BWOM treasure. Nice work guys. A great tribute series.
fingarz oh man, me too. It will be fun to see how it goes. I am getting updates that I throw on the website occasionally. Thanks again.
Love the idea of the hunt for treasure and the billmaa montage . Cheers.
Just Tex thanks. I thought it fit with billmaas skull and crossbones moniker, and harkened back to the motoscavy. (Which was my idea btw)!!!! 😉
Kev Tracy thank you for doing this.
Thanks for watching it. It was something we both felt strongly about.
Looking forward to seeing some videos - hopefully people film their adventures.
Mark Gunnison that’s what I’m hoping for too. I’ll plug all of it on the website if I get them.
Hey guys I recorded my tin recovery. Nothing like Billy's or Kevin's videos but you can see the treasure.
i just drove by the one in Minnesota in early January. Great idea. Sounds fun. I"m in. Sent you an email.
624metv good deal. I’ll get back with you shortly. It may be this weekend because of work but I’ll get back to you for sure. Thanks for being willing to head out and get one.
Have a gopro will document it.
Were all five found? I only see two marked as found on the web site. #2 and #5 as I recall.
Hey man, sorry for the lack of any news for quite a while. I have to go back through everything. Had a few life changes, all positive, but demanded quite a bit of time. I will be getting back in and doing an update. I believe 4 of the five were found, with the last one not being where I left it. I will do an update soon with regards to all this. To top it off, the hard drive that I kept everything on is shot. I need to get someone to try to pull everything off of it. But, all those excuses being used up in this one comment, I will get back to it shortly and get things going. I still have BWOM 10 to plug in, edit, etc, if the hard drive comes back up. And I know that I should have backed it up, but sheesh, what am I, a brain surgeon???
billmaa Yes, things would be much easier if life didn’t keep getting in the way! 😁. Having worked with computers my entire career, I am fairly paranoid about backups. I have two Synology NAS units each with RAID. Fortunately, they are fairly easy to set up so no brain surgery required. I actually did have one of the drives fail and recovery was completely painless. Power down, replace bad drive (under warranty thankfully), power back up and the NAS automatically copies the data from the good drive back to the bad one to maintain the redundancy. It is ironic that none of my computers has lost a hard drive, but the backup system had a drive failure. Go figure!
I am glad they were all found. I was thinking if one was still unrecovered, I might have some time this year to go searching. Being retired is nice.
Might of missed it but did you ever find his book he was working on?
Robert Timmons I scoured his bwom computer and found the start of the book but really it amounted to “it was a ...” and that, sadly, was as far as it got. After building a website and doing a movie, who knows, maybe I’ll write his book also.
So great to see a Billmaa video notification again... Like old times and missed. Good job.