DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- They arrived. They cruised. They amused. They drank. They danced. They hooked up. They left.
In three short days -- leather-clad biker bad boys and babes thrilled us with the rumble of Harleys, the sleekness of choppers and the whining of Ninjas -- with two objectives in mind -- to see and be seen -- to make their presence felt in and around Daytona Beach.
And that they did. There was the snake charmer. The scantily clad tub gals with sotball-sized boobs. There was even a gender-bender freeakazoid on a custom chopper seem to revel in others gasping "WTF?"
And Main Street in Daytona made a comeback from last year's dismal showing, though Bruce Rossmeyer's Destination Daytona in Ormond appears to be the new ground zero for bikers.
It seems some things never change when it comes to the phony stats of 125,000 bikers or more, as suggested by the print media that is the Daytona Beach News-Journal without attribution.
To the casual observer -- perhaps there was slighrly less than half that total in and around Daytona Beach, Ormond Beach, Palm Coast, Port Orange, New Smyrna Beach, DeLand and Edgewater.
Headline Surfer® believes there were 65,000 bikers for the three-day rally, based on informal surveys with the cops on the street, revelers and checking in with hoteliers, some og whem were filled, though most had rooms available through the weekend.
Attendance was up from last year's Fall motorcycle rally when there were an estimated 40,000 bikers.