brick1
Well-known member
2011 Rendez-vous Rally
Riders gathered at the Auberge Harris in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, on Friday September 9th for the fifth annual Rendez-vous 12-hour motorcycle rally. This is a unique rally in that it sometimes involves multiple border crossings within the 11 ½ hour riding time period. This year riders from the U.S. and Canada came to participate in a rally with a “Trains, Planes, and Automobiles” theme. Of the 41 riders signed up, only Bungie backed out at the last second and was a DNS; too bad, because he missed the best riding of the season and a great time.(I know you had to work, but come on, get your priorities right!)
Because my FJR was in L.A., I rode the 1150RT, without fuel cell.
brick1 at the Friday night riders meeting
Rallymaster Kevin Craft makes a point
Kevin gets the last laugh at Perry Karsten's 'special' flag
Following the mandatory riders’ meeting on Friday night, riders went back to their rooms to contemplate the possible routes. I’ve done enough of these to know to look for a route that is about 600 miles long, with no more than twenty stops involved.
My original plan was a nice route through the Adirondacks (magenta), picking up two big-point anchor bonuses along the way and a bunch of smaller ones.
Mileage was real good at 550 miles, but there were barely 38,000 points to the route. So I extended the miles a bit to 613 and got a few more points, but still nothing great (grey route).
Kevin also included a route through Quebec that didn’t involve a border crossing (green), but the best one could do points wise was in the 30’s. This was not a winning route.
Looking at where the points where it was obvious a better route would include New Hampshire and Vermont.
So I came up with this:
It included two border crossings, about 616 miles, a lot of interstate, but some two-lane roads through Vermont and New Hampshire between 9 AM and 11 AM. Most importantly points were bigger, approaching 50,000 with some of the Wildcard bonuses Kevin had thrown at us (sealed driver’s license, fuel receipt, photo of a ‘woody’ wagon, rest bonus, and a few others).
After the 5 AM riders meeting bikes lined up for the start.
brick1 at the 5 am meeting
Kevin Craft doing his choirboy imitation
At 5:30 AM riders left the parking lot and headed in different directions through Quebec, Ontario, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.
photo courtesy of June Entman
My first stop was in Vermont at a small airport (green bonus) where I had to answer a question about services offered by the company (2345 pts). I rode by the blue coloured bonus at the top of the image, as it was only worth 199 points.
My next stops should have been 39 and 56 but I must have entered Gorham (23) into the GPS and headed straight there instead along Hwy 2 through Lancaster. That was a mistake, especially when you hate riding Hwy 2 in a rally as much as I do. That was valuable interstate I passed up. Net loss 3252 pts.
I took a photo of train #5546.
From Gorham, the scenery was spectacular as I passed Mt Washington. Everybody and his brother was out pedalling the hills up from Jackson to Mt. Washington, lots of young men pedalling with their hands. What a workout! Made my job seem a lot easier.
From Gorham I headed south to a group of bonuses north of Conway:
The first was worth 318 pts:
Across the street I stopped for fuel, then continued on to the largest bonus of the three. This photo was worth 3245 pts.
The last of the three was just down the road. It involved answering a question about hours that train whistles were not allowed to blow.
From this point I had to head south to Conway then motor west along the Kangamus Highway. Up to this point I had managed to avoid roads that had been washed out by the severe rains in the weeks before the rally. After hitting a parade in North Conway, and finding a detour around town, I made my way up the Kangamus. Things proceeded beautifully until the midway point where the road was closed. I turned around and returned to Rte 16. Total loss: 3640 pts and a half-hour of time.
This was my GPS track up the Kangamus highway. I wasn’t the only rider to get caught doing this road. And no, there was not a sign warning us that it was impossible to get to Lincoln.
I doubled back and headed to the largest bonus on my route in Manchester. This is my GPS track.
The Manchester bonus, a photo of a caboose donated by France after WWII, was worth 14,080 pts.
Theres a caboose in there...hiding.
This was the most southerly point and it was time to head north. There were two bonuses in Lebanon within spitting distance of each other. That was the next stop.
For 4940 pts I took a photo of the three unit train.
Then moved back out the road and took a photo of this sign for 848 pts.
I filled up the gas tank for the last time. It was after noon hour and I qualified for a fuel bonus...that is, until I went over 3.9 gallons. I should know to read Kevin’s bonus sheets before putting in fuel, scratch the 500+ points off the scorecard.
From Lebanon, I continued the diagonal northward push to the border. I bypassed the green bonus (1200+ pts)on the image because it was off the highway, and not worth the points of the next two.
My next stop was in Barre, VT, at the Hope cemetery, located not too far off the interstate. There were two bonuses here, a granite marker in the shape of a car,
And a marker carved into a biplane.
From Barre, I headed north west towards Burlington, VT, bypassing the green marker in Waterbury. I should have stopped there because it was just off the highway. Time was getting tight though, so any stop was going to cost points at the end. The Kangamus episode was costing me here.
There were instead two blue covered bonuses in Swanton that I would try to pick up.
One required the answer to a question, the other a photo of the long term parking sign at the small airport.
After the two bonuses in Swanton it was time to cross the border. I arrived and joined a slow moving line of cars. I could see some riders ahead of me; everybody was in a rush to get across. Had I brought my Nexus card I would have been through in minutes, but I left it at home and spend a good twenty minutes to a half hour in line. It meant I would be late, but I pushed to the finish, arriving sixteen minutes late. I didn’t have time to pick up the little bonus along the way to the finish.
At the scoring table there were no points lost due to carelessness, but I did miss the free points for the fuel bonus for not reading the fine print within the bonus listing. The late arrival cost me over 700 points, leaving me with 41,375 points good enough for 9th place. That’s the challenge of a 12-hour rally – there is no room for error. There were two mistakes that ended up costing me several thousand points, and some time. You can get away with that in a longer rally, as there are opportunities to make up the difference along the way, but not in twelve hour event.
Here’s the bottom line: this was the nicest riding of the season, sunny and dry and just a bit of crispness in the air to keep it comfortable. It was a load of fun. Big turnout. Great people. Beautiful scenery. A wonderful way to kill a weekend.
Hope to see even more people out next year.
Peter Delean
North Bay, ON
Thanks to Perry Karsten for the Friday and Saturday morning photos.
Riders gathered at the Auberge Harris in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, on Friday September 9th for the fifth annual Rendez-vous 12-hour motorcycle rally. This is a unique rally in that it sometimes involves multiple border crossings within the 11 ½ hour riding time period. This year riders from the U.S. and Canada came to participate in a rally with a “Trains, Planes, and Automobiles” theme. Of the 41 riders signed up, only Bungie backed out at the last second and was a DNS; too bad, because he missed the best riding of the season and a great time.(I know you had to work, but come on, get your priorities right!)
Because my FJR was in L.A., I rode the 1150RT, without fuel cell.
brick1 at the Friday night riders meeting
Rallymaster Kevin Craft makes a point
Kevin gets the last laugh at Perry Karsten's 'special' flag
Following the mandatory riders’ meeting on Friday night, riders went back to their rooms to contemplate the possible routes. I’ve done enough of these to know to look for a route that is about 600 miles long, with no more than twenty stops involved.
My original plan was a nice route through the Adirondacks (magenta), picking up two big-point anchor bonuses along the way and a bunch of smaller ones.
Mileage was real good at 550 miles, but there were barely 38,000 points to the route. So I extended the miles a bit to 613 and got a few more points, but still nothing great (grey route).
Kevin also included a route through Quebec that didn’t involve a border crossing (green), but the best one could do points wise was in the 30’s. This was not a winning route.
Looking at where the points where it was obvious a better route would include New Hampshire and Vermont.
So I came up with this:
It included two border crossings, about 616 miles, a lot of interstate, but some two-lane roads through Vermont and New Hampshire between 9 AM and 11 AM. Most importantly points were bigger, approaching 50,000 with some of the Wildcard bonuses Kevin had thrown at us (sealed driver’s license, fuel receipt, photo of a ‘woody’ wagon, rest bonus, and a few others).
After the 5 AM riders meeting bikes lined up for the start.
brick1 at the 5 am meeting
Kevin Craft doing his choirboy imitation
At 5:30 AM riders left the parking lot and headed in different directions through Quebec, Ontario, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.
photo courtesy of June Entman
My first stop was in Vermont at a small airport (green bonus) where I had to answer a question about services offered by the company (2345 pts). I rode by the blue coloured bonus at the top of the image, as it was only worth 199 points.
My next stops should have been 39 and 56 but I must have entered Gorham (23) into the GPS and headed straight there instead along Hwy 2 through Lancaster. That was a mistake, especially when you hate riding Hwy 2 in a rally as much as I do. That was valuable interstate I passed up. Net loss 3252 pts.
I took a photo of train #5546.
From Gorham, the scenery was spectacular as I passed Mt Washington. Everybody and his brother was out pedalling the hills up from Jackson to Mt. Washington, lots of young men pedalling with their hands. What a workout! Made my job seem a lot easier.
From Gorham I headed south to a group of bonuses north of Conway:
The first was worth 318 pts:
Across the street I stopped for fuel, then continued on to the largest bonus of the three. This photo was worth 3245 pts.
The last of the three was just down the road. It involved answering a question about hours that train whistles were not allowed to blow.
From this point I had to head south to Conway then motor west along the Kangamus Highway. Up to this point I had managed to avoid roads that had been washed out by the severe rains in the weeks before the rally. After hitting a parade in North Conway, and finding a detour around town, I made my way up the Kangamus. Things proceeded beautifully until the midway point where the road was closed. I turned around and returned to Rte 16. Total loss: 3640 pts and a half-hour of time.
This was my GPS track up the Kangamus highway. I wasn’t the only rider to get caught doing this road. And no, there was not a sign warning us that it was impossible to get to Lincoln.
I doubled back and headed to the largest bonus on my route in Manchester. This is my GPS track.
The Manchester bonus, a photo of a caboose donated by France after WWII, was worth 14,080 pts.
Theres a caboose in there...hiding.
This was the most southerly point and it was time to head north. There were two bonuses in Lebanon within spitting distance of each other. That was the next stop.
For 4940 pts I took a photo of the three unit train.
Then moved back out the road and took a photo of this sign for 848 pts.
I filled up the gas tank for the last time. It was after noon hour and I qualified for a fuel bonus...that is, until I went over 3.9 gallons. I should know to read Kevin’s bonus sheets before putting in fuel, scratch the 500+ points off the scorecard.
From Lebanon, I continued the diagonal northward push to the border. I bypassed the green bonus (1200+ pts)on the image because it was off the highway, and not worth the points of the next two.
My next stop was in Barre, VT, at the Hope cemetery, located not too far off the interstate. There were two bonuses here, a granite marker in the shape of a car,
And a marker carved into a biplane.
From Barre, I headed north west towards Burlington, VT, bypassing the green marker in Waterbury. I should have stopped there because it was just off the highway. Time was getting tight though, so any stop was going to cost points at the end. The Kangamus episode was costing me here.
There were instead two blue covered bonuses in Swanton that I would try to pick up.
One required the answer to a question, the other a photo of the long term parking sign at the small airport.
After the two bonuses in Swanton it was time to cross the border. I arrived and joined a slow moving line of cars. I could see some riders ahead of me; everybody was in a rush to get across. Had I brought my Nexus card I would have been through in minutes, but I left it at home and spend a good twenty minutes to a half hour in line. It meant I would be late, but I pushed to the finish, arriving sixteen minutes late. I didn’t have time to pick up the little bonus along the way to the finish.
At the scoring table there were no points lost due to carelessness, but I did miss the free points for the fuel bonus for not reading the fine print within the bonus listing. The late arrival cost me over 700 points, leaving me with 41,375 points good enough for 9th place. That’s the challenge of a 12-hour rally – there is no room for error. There were two mistakes that ended up costing me several thousand points, and some time. You can get away with that in a longer rally, as there are opportunities to make up the difference along the way, but not in twelve hour event.
Here’s the bottom line: this was the nicest riding of the season, sunny and dry and just a bit of crispness in the air to keep it comfortable. It was a load of fun. Big turnout. Great people. Beautiful scenery. A wonderful way to kill a weekend.
Hope to see even more people out next year.
Peter Delean
North Bay, ON
Thanks to Perry Karsten for the Friday and Saturday morning photos.
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