Motorcycle Journeys Trip Logs

Category: Trip Reporting

Reports from the road

  • Am I having a flashback?

    Up at 5:00 AM to be on the road before 6:oo to avoid Friday morning rush hour and once again I backed out of the garage, turned the motorcycle on, no headlight.The same thing that happened when I left for Vermont last month.

    Back in the garage to tear all the carefully packed gear off so I can get the seat off to check fuses and the headlight fuse was blown. Three fuses later I’m running out of 7.5 fuses and need to find out what’s causing the problem. I pulled my much liked HID bulb and replaced it with the old PIAA and the fuse doesn’t blow when I turn the motorcycle on.

    Repack the motorcycle, throw the HID in the top case in hopes I can figure out the problem while on the road and hit rush hour traffic at 7:00 AM. Once on the frontage road I see I-35 is at a stand still so I take surface streets to cut through old town Lewisville and get on 121 heading northeast to find very light traffic. Head north on 75 and all the traffic flow is headed into town so I have smooth sailing.

    I had decided to wear the Aerstich since I would need my Gerbing heated pant and jacket liner in the cooler temperatures up north so I left the mesh at home. By 10:30 I’m regretting that decision when I have to stop and unzip everything I can to try to get some air flow to combat the 90+ degree temperatures. Have I mentioned how tired I am of the heat???

    I had decided to try the shorts and sleeveless top that I wore comfortably under the mesh in high temperatures and promptly found my exposed skin stuck to the lining of the suit when I started sweating. I hate the way the Aerostich lining feels, but too late to do anything about it now. And yes, I have read the warning in my Aerostich that you’re supposed to wear long sleeves and long pants under the Aerostich, but the folks who make this suit are in cold Duluth, Minnesota not overheated Texas.

    I follow US 69 uneventfully north through Oklahoma and then I-44 into Missouri. I stopped at the Missouri welcome center and the wonderful lady at the desk fixed me up with maps, directions on how to avoid St. Louis traffic, and coupon books for motels in Illinois where I hoped to stop that night.

    I have a very sensitive sense of smell and frequently smell things burning when I’m on the road. I repeatedly was getting that smell and had stopped and checked there was nothing resting on the engine or muffler and burning. It didn’t occur to me until later to check the HEADLIGHT. The PIAA bulb had vibrated loose, turned slightly sideways and melted the plastic around the bulb mount. Great.

    I reseated the bulb, once again making sure the lock ring was firmly attached, and discovered I could see the back of the bulb while riding and started checking it periodically to make sure it wasn’t loose again. Meanwhile I’m imagining how expense the back of the headlight will be if I have to replace it…

    I continued my rush hour trend that I seem to follow on my solo trips and hit St. Louis at 5:30 PM Friday night. Fortunately the suggested route quickly got me out of congestion and into Illinois.

    It’s funny how fast you can go from sweaty and soggy to cold and shivering. Within minutes the sun disappeared behind clouds, the temperature dropped into the upper 60’s and I had to stop and zip up. I was still cold but hoped I’d be stopping soon.

    I missed my planned stopped in Vandalia, IL and ended up going on to Effingham where I had been told there would be a lot of motels. Unfortunately that had me arriving after dark with my miserably poor PIAA bulb. I was really missing my HID.

    The only really pretty thing I saw all day was while crossing bridge over the Mississippi — I looked down and there was mist hanging over the still water and it was a beautiful, serene scene. Just not a scene I could get a picture of.

    750 miles today and 550 tomorrow for me to get to my errand north of Detroit. Rain is forecast for the entire day. I can’t tell you how excited I am about that forecast.

    I talked to Jean-Francois hoping he was close enough I could blow off my errand (and the rainy ride) and meet him instead, but he was in Arizona and hour from the Colorado border. He’d had problems with his motocycle and had lost time on repairs.

    So I guess it’s the rain tomorrow.

  • Ride home Quebec to Dallas day 3 – 652 miles

    Union City, TN to home Friday, August 13

    It seemed kind of funny I would be riding the worst day of the entire trip on Friday the 13th. Haven’t you heard that Friday the 13th is supposed to be good luck for left handed people? I got through the last day without being so frightened I was shaking, but spent most of the day somewhat alarmed due to the heat.

    I was again on the road before first light (5:45) and was into Arkansas by 8:00 and through Little Rock by 10:00. That still left me five hours to get home and it was already insufferably hot.

    This was the most brutal day I have ever spent on a motorcycle. When I started the day at 5:45 I was able to ride until a needed fuel. For the rest of the day I had to stop about every 90 minutes to re-wet my cooling vest and get more cold water. Stopping that often was delaying me so I would hit Dallas during Friday afternoon traffic, but I didn’t have any choice.

    I stopped looking at the thermometer when it read 110. I simply didn’t want to know. I was having to ride with my knees fanned out to minimize the burning from the engine heat. The heat from the pavement and motorcycle was so extreme my feet hurt. I have good touring boots — it was just that hot.

    It’s the first time on the motorcycle that I was having to fight getting light headed from heat. Soaking the vest in a bag full of ice water, filling a bandana with ice and tying it around my neck to cool the blood flowing to my head, pouring ice water all over the mesh jacket and pants, filling my water reservoir with ice to cool me on the inside. None of this was enough to combat the excessive heat. Maybe it wouldn’t have been such a big deal if I was doing less mileage each day, but when I’m doing 600-700 mile days I feel I really need to take care of myself in order to safely ride.

    Up until the last day I had found it more comfortable to ride with my visor cracked open a little to let fresh air flow through. The last day the blast of heat hurt, so I rode home with the visor closed except when I was drinking water (I have a 55 oz. Camelbak on top of my tank bag).

    This may be silly but I feel the last miles are perhaps the most dangerous of the trip. I’m at my most tired for the trip, I’m back in familiar territory and may let my guard down, so I am the most careful and the most vigilant as I approach home. Add the fatigue from the heat and Friday afternoon traffic to the mix and I was really being careful.

    I was able to cut across Dallas with only minor slow downs and safely pulled into the garage and put the side stand down. Does anyone else feel that intense satisfaction and gratitude when returning from a very long journey and safely returning home? I feel it each time both me and the motorcycle are back safely in the garage.

    As for heat damage — once again the top of my boots blistered both legs and the inside of my right leg is moderately cooked from the heat coming off the engine. I stayed hydrated, so the rest of my body did okay. As far as the motorcycle — I am surprised the tires didn’t melt right off the wheels, but I guess she’s tougher than I am.  I pulled off the tank bag when I got home and it was so hot it hurt to hold it and I didn’t want to bring it into the house that hot so it’s out on the work bench cooling off.

    Me? I’m in the house cooling off. I may not leave for a while…

  • Ride home Quebec to Dallas day 2 – 694 miles

    Conneaut, OH to Union City, TN Thursday, August 12

    It was only 73 degrees when I walked out to the motorcycle, but the humidity made it feel a lot warmer. Back into the heat so I was on the road shortly before sunrise. I hit Cleveland at 7:30 but took a route that went well outside of rush hour traffic. It was uncomfortably hot by 11:00 AM but I got through Columbus, Cincinatti, and Louisville and picked up the Western Kentucky Parkway to cut across Kentucky.

    The parkway is a great road with little traffic but the thermometer on the motorcycle was reading 104 degrees. Around 2:00 some clouds appeared and I was initially grateful to have them. Around 3:00 I looked up ahead at suddenly very dark, threatening skies. Within a mile I was in heavy, gusting rain that was throwing the motorcycle all around the road and made it nearly impossible to see. I couldn’t believe the sheets of rain being pounded across the road in front of me.

    The visibility was so bad I didn’t feel pulling over to the side of the road was an option and there were no overpasses to hide under. I bailed out on the first available exit and was having trouble seeing the road since I still had sunglasses on and it had gotten very dark. Once again I realized I was so scared that I was shaking from head to toe. That’s two days in a row… I kept telling the weather “Be nice! Just let me get to a gas station.”

    It wasn’t pretty but I pulled into the first gas station I saw and got under cover. People at the station were telling me they had gotten off the road because they didn’t think they could see while driving their cars and they couldn’t believe how bad the storm was. No kidding?

    I took my time fueling up.  It looked worse. I parked the bike and decided to wait it out in the Subway attached to the gas station.

    It took about an hour to let up and I returned to the parkway in light rain watching storms to both the north and south. I connected with Purchase Parkway that headed south into another storm. Since I didn’t enjoy the first storm all that much I actually got the motorcycle parked and into a convenience store before the second storm hit. As the rain started to slow the people at the store warned me the deer would be out in numbers since the temperature had cooled due to the rain. I only had about 40 miles to get to my planned stop in Union City, TN so got back on the road, and fueled up before stopping for the day by 8:00 PM.

    I had a busy evening trying to get everything spread out to dry… The first storm had blown up so quick I hadn’t gotten my rain liner on and had gotten soaked to the skin. For the record — hard rain hurts through a mesh jacket.

  • Ride home Quebec to Dallas day 1 – 610 miles

    Magog, Quebec to Conneaut, OH Wednesday, August 11

    Between motorcycle repairs and pricey lodging I felt it was time to get home and stop spending money. I was dreading the ride back into the heat and just wanted to get it over with so I left Quebec with the goal of reaching home in three days. I left Magog at 5:40 AM (first light) in heavy fog. I love fog because of it’s beauty, but this fog was so dense I could barely see the road and I almost didn’t see the entrance ramp to Autoroute 10 to head toward Montreal.

    I had decided to go west through Quebec to cut across the southeast corner of Ontario and cross the border into New York. My 5:40 departure took me through pockets of heavy fog and had me crossing the Jacques Cartier bridge into Montreal at 7:30 right in the middle of morning rush hour.

    The route I had chosen took me down Ontario 401 to cross the Thousand Islands bridge to the US. My excitement for seeing the St. Lawrence again was quickly wiped out when I came around a curve on the road that started out across the river to see an enormous bridge that had a steel grid deck. I had crossed a couple small bridges the previous summer with this slippery surface and hated it — I never would have knowingly chosen this huge bridge that arched up 800 feet above the water and was completely steel grid, but there was no turning around at a border crossing.

    I ascended the bridge and was so scared I realized I was shaking from head to toe – so counterproductive to good control of the motorcycle, but at that point I was having to remind myself to breathe. I topped the rise of the bridge to see construction ahead on the steel grid and a stop light that was red. I did not want to stop on that surface — I just wanted off it. I slowed down and to my great relief that light turned green just as I approached and I didn’t have to stop the motorcycle until I had my feet on wonderful, predictable pavement.

    Thousand Islands area St. Lawrence River

    Getting that scared wears me out (which I didn’t need) and it took me a while to stop shaking. The most disappointing part was  missing what was probably a spectacular view of the St. Lawrence because my eyes were glued to the steel grating. I still got to see the parts of the river since NY 12 is a great route that follows it in an area where there are islands everywhere.

    NY 12 took me to I-81 which connected to the New York Thruway I-90 and I started repeating the route I had taken north in reverse. It was only 5:00 when I got to my planned stop in Conneaut, OH for the night, but it had been such a good place with a great restaurant I decided to call it a day and get on the road early the next morning since I knew I had experienced my last day of pleasant temperatures while riding. It had been 78 degrees when I crossed the border from Canada, but it was 90 degrees in Conneaut. It was going to be hot and humid all day the next day.

  • Magog, QC

    My pictures from Magog: http://motorcycle-journeys.com/current/photos/magog/index.html

    I was really taken with the Eastern Township area of Quebec last summer and since I wasn’t ready to return to the Texas heat I decided to go north and explore the town of Magog and the area around it.

    Bleu Lavande

    Magog is on the northern tip of the long narrow lake Memphremagog that extends from Vermont up into Quebec. The majority of the lake is in Quebec. It’s surrounded by green rolling hills and mountains. What I didn’t know until I stopped at the information center after crossing the border was that I would be arriving on the last day of the La Traversee Internationale du Lac Memphremagog — a 32 kilometer swimming event held annually in Magog. The people working at the information center thought there were no rooms available in the entire town of Magog. I called the motel I wished to stay out (a short walk from downtown and the lake) and could not believe my good luck that they had just had a room cancellation.

    When I arrived in town the traffic was backed up, the sidewalks were packed with people and in a town of 24,000 it took me 30 minutes to get to my motel. After I unpacked the motorcycle and got cleaned up I walked to a nearby restaurant and found it also packed with people since it was across the street from the park where the event was being hosted.

    The next day I left Magog to ride south along the edge of the lake and visit Bleu Lavande a lavendar farm in Fitch Bay. The lavendar was no longer in bloom since it had peaked around July 10 — a day the farm had a record breaking 9,125 visitors. After visiting the lavender farm I continued my ride along the Chemin des Cantons to see small villages around the area.

    The next morning I was out exploring the town at sunrise and saw the Aquilo 36 that offered tours of Memphremagog on the catamaran. I went out on the 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM tour and had a great time. The captain of the boat and the man helping crew both spoke excellent English and filled me in on area history.

    I got back to the motel and shortly after ran outside to help pull down umbrellas and secure lawn chairs as a storm with very high winds hit the area. Want to guess how happy I was that I hadn’t done the afternoon tour on the catamaran?

    I spent three days in Magog and figured it was time to get the ride back to Texas over with. I rode out of Magog on August 11 at first light with a temperature of 59 degrees and very heavy fog.