Readers digest ride report for the Green & Whites, or, how I forgot how much fun it was to ride in an all day rain.
I pulled out of Sudbury and headed for my brothers down near Barrie on Thursday. I had to wait until after 1pm for the rain, which was heavy, to stop. Spent the evening there visiting and having an excellent BBQ chicken dinner. Up at 6am Friday to meet Rob for 9am at his home. Pulled in there at 9:10am to find Rob sitting on his porch in full gear. Met his daughter Mitchy who is a hardened FJR world traveller having attended NAFO in Golden with Dad. I also met Rob's pit bull who refused to have a leak and instead spent most of the time dangling by her jaws 6 feet off the ground from a piece of tire. After seeing the condition of the piece of tire and the steel belts having been chewed through, I'd recommend not 'stopping by' Robs place unannounced!
Rob and I hit the road and after a stop at the local Ford dealer (Ford? Really?!) and ogling a pair of mint 67 Shelby Mustangs race cars, we headed for Cornhole.. er, I mean Cornwall due east on the 401. The 401 is always boring as hell, but you can really make some tracks on it. Or at least, after sitting for half an hour because of a lane closure. Rob blew through Customs, me, I had the guy who decided I needed to have a bad day. I didn't let it happen but he was gunning for it. The guy who processed Rob through customs came over to ask me if I was travelling with him (pointing at Rob). "Oh WTF did he do now?!".
"Ya"
"Do you have an Iron Butt plate too?"
Hum.. how to answer, I did my SS1600 but it hasn't been certified yet...
"No"
My border gaurd.. "I thought you said you weren't in a bike gang"
Ya, I'm in band with a gang.. and you gotta catch me if you want me to hang....
Anyway, Off through the reserve and passed a huge wind farm in Update NY:
We took a little brake near Rouse's Point at the top of Lake Champlain where Rob checked into the Iron Butt Motel:
Down I89 racing the daylight:
We checked into the Fireside Inn about 9pm. Odd, bikes in the parking lot, but not a soul to be found. We needed some food so we hit up the micro-brewery across the parking lot. Naturally we rode there (all of about 250 feet!). Where we met the gang coming home from drinking their dinner. Inside, we found Geezer, TooFast and a few others. Ordered up a steak and a started with a 'Ice Rock Canadian". Good combo.
Back at the hotel we found a bunch of people annoying the other hotel guests by drinking and talking really loudly in the court yard. Oddly enough, MEM was the ring leader. Go figure.
The next morning after a great breakfast spread put out by the Fireside folks, we met out in the parking lot to find FredW giving instructions for the days ride. Wasn't long winded and ended with "Have fun!". Wise man that Fred.
I'll skip the part where my GPS shit the bed.
We weren't on the road 30 minutes when we all converted our bikes into Dual Sports. Geez Fred! If I want to ride gravel roads I'll just ride here!
First stop for the day was at the Missle (sorry, don't remember the name of the town). If you see one of these airborne, your having a bad f'n day!
Where as usual, a fight nearly broke out over a tire discussion:
From there, up the Kangamangus (sp?) Highway. Good Ride:
Great view from the scenic lookout up there:
Kazoo kept following me and did everything I did:
I got her back though by posting this pic on the forum and calling her Kazoo.
From there we headed through Crawfords Notch:
close to Mount Washington part of the group stopped for lunch at the ski resort. We stopped at a converted train station called Fabyan's where we watched TooFast LITERALLY inhale a cola float. No pic of that, but I've never seen anybody want to inhale and cough at the same time before.
Rob and I took off ahead of the pack and rode for most of the afternoon then cut the bottom part of the loop and headed down I91 for a quick nap. Hey, riding on nearly bald tires is nerve wracking and tiring!
After thinking the evening dinner was IN the hotel and finding nobody in the restaurant, we ran back to the room, and in amazing feat of sluething via internet, we determined the dinner was at Jesse's in Hanover. Where the hell is that? Google to the rescue! ya, we were half an hour late, but we didn't miss dinner. As a consolation, I got a lap dance from MEM. No pics, but it did happen.
Back at the hotel we annoyed the other guests by drinking in the Courtyard to well after midnight.
The next morning it was raining heavily, so everybody decided to bug out because the forecast was for even heavier rain for Monday. No Mount Washington this trip. Rob and I hit the road after saying our goodbyes at exactly 10am. We stopped a few times because it had that lazy-sunday-and it raining-so I want to snooze- on the couch type vibe to it. We eventually hit our stride after stopping for lunch on the reserve and topping up the tanks in Canadian funny money at par - SCORE!
Rob and I parted way just west of Cornwall, I headed north toward Ottawa thinking it was supped to rain tomorrow as well. Might as well just ride all the way home. Made some tracks and stopped for a coffee near Prescott "I need high test" as I still had about another 5 hours of riding ahead of me. Everything was going to great until just 75 miles from home a bat attacked me. I saw it, perfectly clear for exactly 1 hundred billionth of a second before it left bat innards up my windshield. Yewww....
About an hour later I was passing 2 cars in a passing lane in full dark on low beams. No high beams, no Hella's. Something BIG is dead and in the middle of my lane. ****. I just punched the bars as hard as I could. Thank you FJR for being such a maneuverable bike. I clipped, what I think was a hoof. So I'm assuming it was a deer but I can't say for sure. I know the car behind me wasn't as lucky as I saw the headlights go sideways then up and the down, then pull over. The car behind them pulled over with them. That was CLOSE.
Anyway, rolled into the driveway at 10:10pm, grabbed some food, checked in here and conked out.
Final tally off the GPS:
Thanks Fred. Maybe we'll see you guys for the Covered Bridges/Colour Tour on the way home from NAFO!
