Girlie Motorcycle Blog

Some people are perfectly content to live their lives in the same town, in the same city. My great aunt lived on the same street her whole life. 75+ years on the same block! I on the other hand am plagued with a nagging wanderlust. I want to be moving all the time. This often presents a problem because I can’t just pick up and leave any time I want to. Perhaps those are the very things that keep small moments away on the bike feeling special. The dangling carrot is always so delicious.

Away

Living on an island, as I do means I’m always crossing the water to get away. Be it just for the day or for a week – when my wheels roll across a bridge I know I will be going to a place that I am not from. There is something exciting about that for me.

6 Bridge Photos from my Travels:

Piermont, NH	New River Gorge, WV	Grand Isle, VT
PCH, CA	San Francisco, CA	Missouri River, SD

Just came home today from a few days on the road in the car with my daughter. We stopped off at Clark’s Trading Post in North Woodstock, NH.

Inside the grounds, they’ve built a replica of a garage that was apparently on Main street called Avery’s. Inside there were a few old Indians on display as well as a 1927 Ace and a 1926 Henderson in the Firehouse.

How do these old bikes get lost in the shuffle and turn up so many years later?

I woke up to overcast skies. My motorcycle sat alone in the hotel parking lot near Killington, Vermont. Its a familiar lot that is so often filled with the smiles, bikes and happy faces of my riding friends. Today it was me all alone. I was going to go ride the Mount Washington Auto Road. That would be one more tick off of my life’s To-Do List.

I turned on the Ipod and shoved off at about 6:30 am.

Vermont seems to be a rolling succession of picturesque little towns and villages that proudly line their main street with American flags on every telephone pole. It really harkens to a seemingly long forgotten piece of innocent America.

Between these small towns is a weathered yet charming string of farms and rural homesteads. I quietly wonder how people are so lucky to have the strength to choose a life that appears to be so much less cluttered on the surface. I don’t want to know the reality of what their lives are like, i want my dream.

Meandering east, I cross into New Hampshire.

Sometimes you know you’re walking this world on your own, don’t you?

According to Roadside America, Warren, NH is the only town that apparently has a Redstone Rocket on display. Goshalmighty, if that isn’t reason enough to stop for visit, I don’t know what is!

Fog on the Kanc.
I set the ole self-timer on the camera and also took a pic of myself standing there. But being the buffoon I am, I somehow managed to capture myself doing what appears to be ‘The Robot’ in my raingear. Perhaps if I’m feeling masochistic later I will post it up.

Here it is. My moment of glory!

This is as far as I made it up the Auto Road.

The very nice lady at the tollbooth sheepishly walked over and said, ‘I’m sorry, honey. We’re closed to bikers today.’ It took about 20 seconds for what she was saying to register in my brain. Apparently after Laconia Bike Week, the dirt road had become degraded and unsafe to bikes and was being repaired.

So… I visited Mount Washington from across the street over a turkey sandwich. Typical.

There it is, up in the clouds. So close, yet so far.

I called Kenny and gave him the lowdown on my aborted summit attempt. He kind of chuckled and said, ‘Of Course.’ As i stood there looking at the mountain, the weather began to roll and tumble.

Maximus: ‘At my signal, unleash hell!’
And it did. The rain dogged me all day from this point on. This was the last pic I took trying to escape the onslaught.

There were so many spots I rolled past and said, ‘I’ll snap a pic on the way back.’ It proved to be foolish on my part. The thunder and lightning kept me moving. Lesson learned…maybe.

Moments in time are fleeting. Stop and smell the roses.

Sunday May 11 – Saturday May 17, 2003
Crudmop Kenny, Maharajah Myko & Me

The Route:

We head off for the 7am Port Jeff ferry on what looks to be a super great day. Its about an hour from PJ to the other side of the sound, landing in Bridgeport CT. Our intention for this day is to make the full push from Bridgeport to Kenny’s parents place in Maine. It’s totally doable in a single day, no problem.

Our first first stretch across Connecticut should only be about an hour or so up RT 8. As it turns out, it was smooth, sunshiny sailing all the way up 8. As we were rolling along, we see an unmarked cop car on the other side of the hiway, ticketing someone. We drop the pace slightly and press on. Not 5 minutes passes and in my mirrors I see a set of headlights gaining on us in a hurry. We get buzzed by the same unmarked car going well over 100. He heads off out of sight. My spider senses tingling, I KNOW he is going to be waiting for us. He was. Luckily we were shielded by an 18 wheeler as we passed him on the right hand shoulder on a sweeping turn. Sneaky. I snickered to myself in my helmet and thought, score 1 for us.

Mass. gave us a nice treat called damn, i forget now, shit. It snaked along next to a small river. Ess turns on new feeling pavement, shaded by trees and framed sweetly with the flowing water. It set my smile firmly in place.

We boogie on through Massachusetts and into Vermont, the sun shining, the air feeling fantastic. We happened through this town. We all wanted to stay for a while to see what it had to [cough] offer for fun [/cough]

Village. Um..ok. I didn’t see any cannibals or pots boiling with dancing villagers, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t there.

We arrive in Vermont in no time at all. Its funny when you look at a map and see a twisty road and get all excited about it, you forget about road surfaces. In my mind, a 2 lane major roadway on the map that rolls through the mountains always has a smooth finish. Enter Vermont Route 100. Frost heave city. Bumps galore. Oh well. My spirit is still high. The Ohlins on my bike rules

Lunch break at Dot’s in VT. Myko gets caught off guard.

The guys are jealous of my expert packing skills. I have a weeks worth of stuff creatively stowed in my tank bag. I bought pre-packed cotton Ts, socks and underwear. They packed vertically very small and neatly. A single pair of jeans & sneakers and toiletries. I was able to just throw out the undies as I wore them and discarded anything I didn’t need as I used it. I ended up coming home with less than I left with. We stayed at a place that we were able to do laundry in so it worked out great.

I had never seen a moose in person. While we ate at Dot’s the waitress, who gave me a flower as it was Mother’s Day, had mentioned Moose being out and about. In my naiveté I thought that it would be super cool to see one while we were out. I later found out, I really didn’t want to see one while I was riding. They’re frickin’ HUGE when they cross the road in front of you. As a NY Metro person who’d never seen one before, I had no idea what they were about.

Somewhere in Anytown USA in Vermont. I don’t know where off hand. As we sat here, the rain started. We pull out our rainsuits and press on. Hoping that it will subside. After about an hour, it does. A rainsuit is such a great thing. Little did we know, this rain was just the beginning.

You can’t really tell by the photo, but the lean angle for my bike on its sidestand was severe enough that I had to have one of the fellas move it to a more level ground so that I could lean it up off of the stand. :-/ What a chick. I feel dumb even typing that. LOL. Someplace in Vermont.

Ahoy Matey! Captain Crudmop says we be a hearty lot. Lincoln, New Hampshire after we pass through the Kancamagus Hiway. Steady rain. Temps dropping steadily. After Kenny’s rain suit disintegrated over the Kanc, I share my rainsuit with him. He’s got perfs in his pants. Pouring rain, 40 degree temps and holes in your pants don’t work very well.

We could have never imagined the weather we would experience as we pulled away from that gas station where the Captain joked jovially. We went on to spend the next 200 miles in soaking rain, fog, frogs and 40 degree temperatures all the way. Shivering, aching, plagued by darkness. Its so bizarre to me to think that there are places that do not have streetlights. There were none to be had from New Hampshire and across our route to Maine. A layer of fog clung quietly to the ground. The rain tap, tap, tapping steadily for hours on my helmet.

Me & Myko, warming up by the fire outside of the house.

The moon over the lake at Kenny’s. A rare break in the clouds for this trip.

Off to Bar Harbor.. or maybe not. When we set off for Bar Harbor, the skies just look sorta, cloudy but not really threatening. Of course, that means rain. We stop off in Freedom, Maine. This mom & pop gas station provides us with some shelter. I get some coffee to warm up and wait out the rain. I opt for the French Vanilla, in which the French was crossed out on the dispenser and replaces with ‘Freedom’. Freedom Vanilla coffee.

Acadia National Park

click for a biggie

Cadillac Mountain near Bar Harbor