White/Green Mountain ride 2009

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I guess from riding on Long Island for so long Ive never encountered roads like that. Just let me know if more dirt roads are in the next trip and ill bring along a dirt bike....lol....

 
Fred has already given me a route hint for next year. RT2 through Grand Isle! I might have to ask FJRed for some help with it. You up for it Ed?

Tom

 
Very proud of FJR your crew. Well setup, good folks and great roads. I want to see more pictures.

Just went and checked out Dave's ride report. Great pic's.

 
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Photo post assist for Mike:

Mike arrives at his ride goal, the Canadian border:

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Riding partner George, titled Knight Rider:

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OK, I've got some pics for yah's. They aren't all that great as Joann was using her little point'n shoot camera. Now that she's used to taking pictures during the rides (she just started on our vacation last month) I have to get her to use my (bigger) Kodak Z812. Even that is pretty compact. You guys (and gals) swinging the big DSLRs with tele lenses around on the bikes have my admiration. :blink:

Without further ado...

We didn't get any pictures of the bike drop. But that has been pretty well documented by others. In any case, I'll pick it up after the "restart"...

Somewhere along Rte 10

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Then it was Micheal's favorite, Pinnacle Rd and Orfordville Rd past the town of Hardscrabble, NH. If you didn't know there was a town there, you'd have never guessed it.

Oh yeah Mikey, it was definitely intentional. I'll make sure to include a little dirt on all of my future rides just for you, bud. ;)

Did I mention that some of the covered bridges are on dirt roads? :eek:

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Back on the tarmac on Rt 25A...

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First stop in the little village of Warren, NH...

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Eric was wondering if a 1st gen FJR is really faster than a redstone missle...

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As the heat built up through the day, unfortunately so did the haziness...

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We did hit a little traffic congestion in Lincoln, certainly to be expected on a summer weekend. But it sure is a pretty little town surrounded by some good size hills.

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Riding the Kancamagus Scenic Highway... It's famous for a reason.

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Check out the sky. Do you think we got lucky with the weather?

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Rest stop at the Top of the Kanc, just after "the hairpin". When we first got off the bikes, Michael was absolutely giddy. "That was awesome. That's the best road I've ever ridden on!!" His enthusiasm is highly contagious. Eric and his friend on the Gixxer took off back from where we had just come so they could ride through the hairpin again with a little more gusto.

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Did I mention hazy? View from the top on Saturday

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Same view back in February '08

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Back out on the road, down the east side of the Kanc and then up and over Bear Notch Rd to Bartlett

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The Swift River (no kidding, that's its name) that runs along much of the east side of the Kanc.

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And on up Rte 302 through Crawford Notch

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Past the old and regal Mount Washington Hotel into Bretton Woods for lunch.

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The camera was forgotten for a while during lunch stop in favor of chowing down. After lunch we zipped down into the town of Twin Mountain and jumped on Rte 3 headed south, where we were able to pick up the pace a little with some better opportunities to pass the slower traffic. Rte 3 joins I93 at the base of Cannon Mountain. The best skiing in New Hampshire, IMO...

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The trail directly underneath the tramway cables is called "Bodie's Run". It is one steep and rocky mother...

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At this point, I93 is a divided 2 lane through Franconia Notch.

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Profile Lake

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And then suddenly as you round a turn, up in the cliffs above, on the back side of Cannon Mt., there it... isn't. Well it used to be. The famous "Old Man of the Mountain", depicted on every recent piece of tourist propaganda put out by the state of NH, including being (still) featured on our license plates.

The "Old Man" was a group of several individual cliff prominences that when viewed from the side gave the profile of the Old Man. The ledges had been naturally eroding for eons, and some locals had been working on holding it in place with pitons and wires for the past few decades, until finally the Face fell off the mountain.

It used to be in the scraggly section to the far right of the cliffs in this picture, just under the highest peak point.

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It's hard to get a sense of the scale of things from pictures like this. These cliffs are a favorite climbing area for people with an addiction to adrenaline. There are probably several climbers on the cliffs in this picture, but it takes a while scanning with binoculars to find them. What looks like small rocks at the base are actually huge car sized bolder chunks that calved off the face of the cliffs.

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We probably should have stopped, but just rolled on through. It was cooler while on the move...

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Clark's Trading Post in Woodstock. The big draw here used to be their trained black bears. Don't know if they still do that anymore. Haven't stopped here since the kids were little.

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We then encountered Skooter Granny on RT 175. She was a bad-*** granny and didn't want that murdercycle gang passing her, so she hugged the centerline at her skooter's top speed, about 25mph. We were past her in a blink after the first curve.

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Bagged a covered bridge, Blair Bridge, just before getting into Plymouth.

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From Plymouth it was a cruise along the Baker river and down the lower part of RT 118 that has been repaved and allowed us to pick up the pace again. Somehow the camera got put away there... :rolleyes: Then we hooked up with Rte 4 for a while through some of the old Shaker towns along Mascoma Lake.

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Finally, and none too soon, we jumped on Interstate 89 for a quick cool-down blast back to the hotel.

to be continued in the Green Mountains.

 
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After arriving back to the hotel on Saturday, I relaxed for a while in this contraption before supper.

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Oh, man. Was that good? You betcha! :yahoo:

All (or at least most) of the folks that got King sized rooms had one of these things in it.

It does a credible job of deep tissue massage in your back, once you learn all the controls.

I really wonder how much they get for one'a those things?

Then I looked out my window and noticed something a bit strange going on out in the parking lot.

What's that? Those Long Island fellas were out there taking glamour photos of each other posing on their bikes?

Hmmm.... :unsure: :rolleyes: :unsure:

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We found out later, at dinner, that George has scheduled his seat to be customized at Russell in the next month, so was taking the opportunity to capture the required photos for the build.

Dinner was at the Seven Barrel Brewery.

Great beer. Strange waiter. Good food.

Except you should apparently stay away from the Shepherd's pie. Mike and George both tried it and said it was dreck.

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Day 2 begins.

We head into Vermont.

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The roads in Vermont are to die for. The Sunday morning traffic? Meh, not so much.

It was tough keeping up any sort of a pace at times. Like the ride down in Manchester in the parade behind the fire truck. Too bad. That would have been a nice road to cover at a decent speed.

That's when it's time to take in the scenery and the greenery...

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Stopped at Zoey's Deli in Manchester to stock up on grub for lunching later. Their sandwiches were HUGE!. We definitely could have split one just fine. Apparently, those who had been here before were in the know and did just that. Instead we carried home a half from each of our big sandwiches.

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The best lookin', bass boat bluest bike:

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Stocked up, we head back out on the road. Through "malfunction junction" and on up Rte 30 to Vermont's Lake country...

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We stopped and ate at the State Park at Lake St Catherine. We did have to pay a day use fee ($3 per person), but it was worth it (to me anyway) to have a shady cool spot to sit down and enjoy lunch and each others company for an hour or so. And it wasn't too awful crowded.

Before we headed back out, a real glamor shot of Mikey.

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Yeah it was very hot and humid, so a few of the group decided to risk removing some gear in order to keep from passing out. After seeing Ron's rashed up knees Saturday morning Joann and I opted to tough it out. It wasn't bad so long as we were moving.

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Oh geeze, Alan. I guess we were on the same trip. :rolleyes:

At least Joann saw the sunflower field.

I must have been zoned out... :blink:

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By now you should have picked up on the underlying theme of these pictures:

Vert-mont. (French for GREEN mountain)

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In Brandon the group split up with Ed leading George, Mike and Barry up Rte 7 to ride Rt 17 (the App Gap) and to points north. Our group of 6 continued along to a very pretty, and thankfully cool, water fall at a road side wayside on Rt 100 in Granville.

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Art (roadrunner), Tom (snikr) and Joann (Mrs W) taking in the falls.

I guess Tom was seeing how things look sideways...

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Brook that went under the path's bridge. Kinda wanted to jump into that sucker...

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It was so pleasant standing in the shade, in cool mist at the base of the falls for a while. It was hard to get back on the bikes to continue on. But we did...

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Before you knew it we were back down to White River Junction, and across the CT river into New Hampshire and West Lebanon. The Sunday night stayers pealed off for the Fireside. Dave and Ann and Joann and I buzzed down I89 to Sutton, and jumped onto Rte 114 for a brisk ride to Goffstown. The Sunday evening traffic wasn't too bad, so we were able to maintain a good pace through the smooth sweepers on 114. We made the ride in about an hour and a half, which is about what it takes if you stay on the interstate the whole way. But we avoided the lake goer traffic (I93 gets jammed up through Manchester ever Sunday going south), had a fun ride and saved a buck on tolls!!

All in all Joann and I had a great time, with a great bunch of folks. I wouldn't have changed a thing. See you all again real soon.

 
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OK, Here's my contribution to the picture pile we've got going here...

Gearing up on Saturday Morning

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Just sitting around in the street waiting for an ambulance to show up. (some people will do anything to get attention)

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Taking a break in the shade.

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My way cool bike.

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The gang at dinner Saturday evening.

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and at lunch on Sunday.

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Michael, George, & Barry when I left them in Stowe on Sunday evening.

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Click Here to view all of the pictures I took on the ride.

I definitely had a great time this past weekend. Can't wait for next year...

 
Green Mountains Ride picture bomb. I've tried to cull out most pictures that are similar to the ones already posted. There may be 2-3 pixs from our ride to Lebanon or on our way home.

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Ya, sure, just climb right on the back.

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Awesome Zoey’s for lunch.

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For Mike, a road we took on our way home:

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NH cow, milking these will make a man out of your boy. Yes, it is a Mrs. Moo, baby moo is just out of the picture.

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OK, I've got some pics for yah's. They aren't all that great as Joann was using her little point'n shoot camera...I have to get her to use my (bigger) Kodak Z812...You guys (and gals) swinging the big DSLRs with tele lenses around on the bikes have my admiration...
We do shoot those DSLR tanks when stopped, but on the road the main work horse is a pocket camera Canon A720IS

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Very nice pix, Alan and Helen!

Helen's ability to frame a subject while on the roll is quite phenomenal.

I recognize County Bridge in Greenfield, is the other one Edgell Bridge in Lyme?

 
...is the other one Edgell Bridge in Lyme?...
Bingo! Just a short bit past the dirt section of River Rd. which parallels Rt. 10. River Rd is a very pretty ride! If a ride were to pass by this road it would be worth the detour. Road condition ranges from B- to C- with roughly 4-5 miles of DIRT; marked 30 mph. This road would earn the Mike Abhors Award for the dirt. I would rate the dirt road an A-, it was in real good condition, better'n some of the paved parts.

 
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All, I'm so pleased you got all the shots of the barns and countryside. This is what I was really hoping to see and remember, and to share with my wife. The architecture and countryside was really fantastic. Loved all that. Great pics!

 
It's been (yet another) rainy day today so here are the last of the pixs I'm gonna post from our ride.

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It was really getting too late in the day to shoot the waterfall, everything was either black or excessively bright.

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I sure wish I made that ride. Family events got in the way. I know a lot of those roads and I've enjoyed the heck out of a few of them. Let me say that next years ride will be very high on my list of priorities. Great photos and write ups. Thanks!

 
Well... since you asked: Next year how about heading up RT 2 through the Champlain islands? I've never been there and was a bit envious of Taz, Mikey and Zip.
I'm thinking Hurricane Mountain Rd and a piece of western Maine for the NH day next year.

I came across this link on another forum and thought it might help with next years ride or even give anyone who lives in the area some good rides to do on their own. .... https://www.newenglandriders.org/Great%20Ro...Information.htm

 
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