shinysideup A long, strange trip
By Ron Davis #111820 AS RIDERS,
WE
all probably attach special meaning to the phrase, “The journey is the desti- nation,” but some- times our destinations can
change the way we feel about our journeys. This was true in my case on a little jaunt I took last July. The day started out pleasantly
enough with my loading up and jumping on my bike for what I thought would be a pleasant, relaxed cruise up to north central Wisconsin for a radio program recording session and then on to the U.P. for a story I was working on. The weatherman (and my wife) had warned of high winds, but as I swung onto the inter- state for the dead straight run north, there was only a light breeze, and the robin’s egg sky was punctuated by puffy white clouds—no problem. However, by the time I hit a tower-
ing bridge over the Wisconsin River outside Wausau, I was being slammed by powerful crosswinds cannonading out of the southwest, broken only by buffeting blasts from passing semis. I was never so thankful to see my exit, which would lead me into the city and the recording studio. My work there took longer than expected, and rather than ramping back onto the superslab, I decided to continue through the city and try tracing a sparsely traffic-ed two lane northwest which, if I was lucky, would keep much of the wind quartering at my back. Once I navigated my way through
the city, I found myself meandering through farm fields and forests, but the wind grew even fiercer—not a constant blow, but rather sudden
12 BMW OWNERS NEWS February 2016
blasts that I judged were hitting at least 40 or 50 miles per hour. Given the direction of the wind, turning around would have been even worse than continuing, so I settled in for a wrestling match with the handlebars. There’s not a lot a motorcyclist can do in a situation like this; certainly you have to slow down for every blast of wind, lean into it, keep your grip loose, and flare out your knee on the windward side to stabilize the bike, but at times my only option was to close the throttle and pull over, then cau- tiously ease back up to speed. There was practically no traffic as far as a little town called Gleason, but soon after that, cars started piling up behind me, annoyed I’m sure by my erratic maneuvering and my seesawing speeds. Running on empty (in more ways than one), I stopped in after another 40 miles for a sandwich and gas, then resolutely set out again. Oh yeah, it then started to rain. It occurred to me that there’s a lot
to be said for traveling by
automobile. Doubling back on a county trunk when I
reached Michigan, I finally made it to a rutted gravel road snaking up to a home situated on a high ridge overlooking Lac Vieux Desert, a huge saucer-shaped lake which is the source of the Wisconsin River. I was greeted by Val Immel, the subject of my interview, and his dachshund Fruede at the door. I have known Val for years and in that
time had heard intriguing snippets of sto- ries about his family’s immigration to America, which had led this interview. Val’s a big guy who speaks with a booming German/Russian accent, and coupled with his ruddy, well-worn complexion and a thick Stalin-esque mustache, it’s no wonder he’s known to the locals as “The Mad Rus- sian.” Stressed from the ride, I was Jone- sing for a beer or one of Val’s legendary vodka martinis (chilled Stoly), but as we had discussed on the phone, my main pur- pose for the visit was to hear the whole
story of his family’s history, and Val imme- diately said, “First we talk, then we have a drink.” His story started with the Russian Revo-
lution, when both his parents’ families were arrested and sent to Siberia since they had been landowners in Immelsdorf, Ukraine. With some string-pulling by a Communist relative, they were eventually allowed to return to their homes to become farm workers, but only a few years later, with the onset of WWII, Val’s father, Edu- ard, was drafted into the Russian army. Captured by the Germans, Eduard chose joining the Wehrmacht’s ranks over prison (or worse), but then, in the final year of the war, his unit surrendered to the English and he was interred in a POW camp for the duration. Meanwhile, soon after her hus- band had been drafted, Val’s mother Anas- tasia, five year old Val, and his baby sister were rounded up by the Germans under the suspicion they were Jewish (they weren’t), herded into a boxcar and shipped off to a work camp. “One of my first memo- ries is of bodies being taken out of the box- car every morning,” Val said. In 1945, Val’s father was freed, and his
mother and their children had been liber- ated from the work camp by the Ameri- cans. With a tip on where Val and his mother had been relocated, his father wan- dered the streets at night, crying out “Anas- tasia! Anastasia!” Miraculously, they were reunited; Val remembers his mother was in tears, overwhelmed with joy—she had not heard from Eduard in five years. Val’s tale continued with story of the fam-
ily’s long journey to America. After wind- ing their way through endless paperwork and interviews in an effort to immigrate to practically any country that would accept them, they were off on a 10 day sea voyage to New York City, where they were told they had a sponsor in Goodman, Wisconsin. Val said, “We had no idea where Wisconsin was, let alone Goodman, but they put us on
the club
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