I'd Forgotten How Much I Loved Riding the Bulldog 150 ...

I went ahead and re-plated it until the Lifan KP Mini is back in the shape I prefer -- still having intermittent down-shift problems and it seems silly to keep messing with the clutch cable when the cover that cable's attached to will be coming off for a gasket replacement, etc. in the next few days.

Yesterday, I rode it over to the new house (assuming nothing goes wrong with the deal) and back just because. That's about three miles of "country highway," a left turn, and 1/2 or 3/4 of a mile down a narrow, paved road that's basically a "tunnel through thick trees" before the turnoff onto the cow path that the new house is on.

Speed limit, 30 mph. It seems like a bad idea to publicly confess that I exceeded the legal speed limit even a little, but let's just say that part of the ride was great fun.

On the way back, I definitely adhered to the posted speed limit. That was probably a good thing: A deer materialized out of the trees maybe 50 feet in front of me and plodded, completely unconcerned, across the road. It didn't even notice me until it was nearly across, then just gave me a dirty look before disappearing back into the jungle. If I'd been doing 50mph instead of 30mph, this tale might have taken a negative turn.

Anyway, I like the control that a manual transmission offers. I also like that the Mini bottoms out at about 75 miles per gallon, while that's the Bulldog's top mileage. But "twist and go, no gears to worry about" is also lots of fun.