Modern Vespa

We took off in the car early last Friday morning on a nearly 900 mile drive from the Black Hills to Tulsa, Oklahoma, so my wife, 'Trixie', could run in the Route 66 Marathon on Sunday (today).

A few hours out of Tulsa yesterday, I had Trixie, on the off chance that there might be a Vespa dealership in the area we were going to, do a Google search, and lo and behold, there was such a mythical Unicorn (to us) right there in Tulsa, so we immediately set the GPS coordinates directly to it.

Needless to say (but of course,I will anyway) I was giddy with anticipation.

I began shaking like a Ketchikan Chihuahua when, as a prudent precaution, Trixie spread a protective layer of newspapers beneath me on the floor of the Subaru, then set the coordinates to the dealership into the GPS, and pushed the 'Go To' button.

Fifteen minutes later, we were arriving at The Route 66 Mother Road Motorsports Piaggio/Vespa/Aprilia/Moto-Guzzi dealership in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Y'all City folk may not fully appreciate the lonely isolation we relatively backcountry Vespa owners have to deal with, which in my case at least, means that the nearest servicing Vespa dealership is 400 miles 'that-a-way', so to visualize the situation that I found myself as I approached Tulsa, recall the scene in the Wizard Of Oz as Dorothy (me?) and her buddies were frolicking across the vast poppy fields towards a gleaming Emerald City looming in the hazy distance ahead..though without the doping part of course, just a natural 'high' will do for this tale.

The shop had a couple dozen Vespa scooters of various modelage, a bunch of Moto-Guzzi machines, and assorted Aprilia bikes. They said that they would also have Ducati in the near future.

Lots of rolling Italian things in the joint, and a coffee shop, can't forget that.

Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of Vespa swag there, which is kinda what I wanted, so I ended up leaving empty-handed, but for the moment, just seeing an actual, honest-toGod, real-life Vespa dealership in person was good enough for now, and I was finally satisfied that, indeed, there actually ARE Vespa dealerships scattered about the country (US), although rather willy-nilly I must say.

They seemed like very nice folks, and put up with my ever-spouting biker-geezer BS with patience and a smile.

Some images of the extraordinary happening are certainly in order...

Great writeup and had me laughing this morning, thank you!

I (and my wife) can relate to finding Vespa dealers as that is always on my radar in our travels as well as seeing a Vespa in the wild!

I suppose that I should also mention here someplace that 'Trixie' did start her 41'st 26.2 mile marathon this morning, and is somewhere around the 17 mile point as I type this. We'll start heading back home as soon as I can pour her back into the car at the end of the run early this afternoon.

After visiting the Piaggio dealership yesterday afternoon, we definitely found some other rather interesting things in Tulsa...