Return-Path: From: east@big.att.com Date: Fri, 30 Jun 95 17:44:15 EDT Reply-To: east@big.att.com Sender: east@big.att.com Original-From: holbrook@world.std.com (Mark D Holbrook) To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: Markie's Homeward Bound Adventures (long) X-Comment: East Coast Motorcyclists Mailing List If you see this twice, sorry. I posted it to both the nedod and east lists. Preface: It is 450 miles from my house to the RCR the most direct way.... Day 1 (Sunday) The folks who rode down with me to the RCR deserted me for the ride back ("Heck, I'm not going to ride with HIM again!"), so I left Camp West Mar by my onesies (not IN my onesies), with bald tires and full of good advice from Howard, Dave, et al about how to get to south Jersey ("It's over there, stupid.") Right off the bat, I turned the wrong way on Brown Road, but soon realized this first of many errors, turned around and reached the outskirts of Thurmont just as the heavens opened up. After doing the rubber suit dance (couldn't have put it on BEFORE it rained, could I?) and sweating profusely, I followed numbered routes generally eastward across Maryland until I crossed I-83, then headed northeast toward the Norman Wood Bridge in Pennsylvania to cross the Susquehanna. The bald tires were fine on the dry roads on Saturday, but a pain in the wet Sunday. Other than that, things went well until I tried to follow a local road and ended up in some place called Fawn Grove rather than at the bridge. Trying a bunch of other local roads compounded the error. The first one turned out to be five miles of loose rock and it was followed by at least ten more miles of backtracking on bumpy little weiner roads before I found the river and finally, the bridge. The dam for a hydroelectric plant near the bridge forms Lake Alfred and its associated Recreational Area, including a practically empty Susquehanna just below the dam where you can prance about on rocks in the middle of the river and wait for the siren to tell you the power plant folks are about to try to drown you with a water release. An interesting place, worth stopping at if you're in the area. From the bridge, I had the good sense to stay on numbered roads until the congestion of the Philadelphia suburbs made trying to stay on back roads pointless. Since this part of Pennsylvania is pretty flat, riding entertainment was limited to occasionally sliding on the line of horse doots occupying the right-hand tire track of seemingly all of the roads in the Amish country around Lancaster. Eventually, I broke down and jumped onto the Interstate and joined the flow of traffic around Philadelphia, across the Delaware (I had forgotten how big those bridges are) and into the beautiful Camden area. Jeez, I'm glad I don't live there anymore. Ugly, flat, and congested. Bleah. Hot, too; being gun-shy, I still had my rain gear on when I stopped. I found my friend's townhouse in Cherry Hill, chatted for a couple of hours over the constant interruptions of his two snotty kids, and headed north toward my father-in-law's home north of Princeton via north Philadelphia and the big roads again. Once I got back into New Jersey, I got off I-95 and wandered up some of the wonderful back roads in the rural central part of the state that I remembered from when I lived there. Unfortunately, that was 14 years ago and my memories of where all those roads go was imperfect. This was to have its effect the next day. Anyway, I made it to his house by suppertime and was warmly welcomed by my wife and children who were there visiting after a week of goofing off at the Jersey shore. Distance covered: about 250 miles. Day 2 (Monday) I was really looking forward to cruising north through the pretty and relatively empty parts of New Jersey, even though it was warm and humid and misty, so after a huge unhealthy breakfast, I headed out, thinking I knew where I was going, but taking enough wrong turns that after a while, I just pulled out my compass and followed anything that headed north. This worked just fine (even though a couple of the roads were dirt) until I got way outside my familiarity range near a place called Budd Lake. Here, every road I tried eventually turned back south, whether they started out going north, east or west. I tried them all. On one of them, a gaggle of Canada geese attacked me as I rounded a 15 mph turn that they clearly thought was their turf, but I managed to miss them and honked back. I shot at least an hour getting to know this area a whole lot better than I really wanted to and eventually had to admit defeat and head back south to hop onto a main road and get out of the mess. Taking some of the roads we had used going down to the RCR, I ended up back in Pine Grove, New York, onion capitol of the world. There are more onions and onion fields in Orange County than you can imagine and the whole county is covered with the really black dirt they like to grow in. From there, I headed toward the Bear Mountain bridge over the Hudson, sort of following Dave Lawrence's Spring Fling up-route rather than the route we had taken down, and I recommend his over mine. I had a yummy lunch of Hot and Spicy Shrimp at the hole-in-the-wall Chinese joint in Warwick. While I was adjusting my chain near there, I thought I heard cannon fire in the distance. Perhaps it was (West Point?) but a third of the way through Harriman State Park, the skies opened and down came a deluge that forced me off the road. A gaggle of adolescents at the group camping area enjoyed watching the ultra-cool biker dude once again look very uncool doing the frantic rubber suit dance. I gingerly (remember: bald tires) wandered the rest of the way through the park and up the Palisades Parkway to the bridge and spent five minutes getting money out from under all the gear at the toll booth. By then the rain had stopped and it was a pleasant ride up 9D, 301, etc. to the vicinity of where AAA put the compass rose on their southern New York map, obliterating all indications of what roads are available there, so once again I took off on a compass bearing and got lost. A half hour later I "found" route 22, stopped to take off the rain suit and headed into Connecticut. But, the skies got darker and darker and somewhere near Kent, they let loose again. This time I was smart and as soon as it started, I turned around and flew off in the direction I had come, running away from the rain. When I stopped a couple of miles away, I had given myself enough time to get the rain gear on while it and I were still dry. What a concept. The route I followed back east through Connecticut (in the rain, very gingerly again) generally paralleled the route we had taken down, but was a bit south of it. Route 140 is a much better alternate to route 190 from the Connecticut River to Stafford. The rain stopped, but the bike was beginning to handle as though the roads were still wet, i.e. a little squirrelly. A gas stop in Monson, Mass. confirmed my worst fears, namely that the rear tire was down to the cords. Sure enough, a few miles down the road just north of Palmer, it went flat. At 8:00 p.m. As I paddled back toward Palmer cursing all the extraneous miles I had ridden the past two days (more than would have been enough to get me home from Palmer), what to my wondering eyes should appear but Al's Cycle Shop, a Kawasaki dealer no less, only a mile away. I pushed the bike to the side of the shop and banged on the door of the house in front, hoping "Al" lived there and would open up. Well, Al Lavoilette is getting on in years and was basically immobile with a bad hip right then, so his wife Shirley came out and let me put my bike in the shop's garage. We rummaged through their stock of tires but couldn't find any in my size, so I was stuck until at least the next day. Being that I had all my gear with me, I camped out behind the shop with her permission rather than walk a long way to a motel. After a yummy dinner at the local McDonalds that I managed to keep down (hey, it was the only restaurant within walking distance), I went to sleep serenaded by the roar of trucks cruising the Mass Pike two hundred feet away. This day's total: about 320 miles. Day 3 (Tuesday) The next morning I hit Mickey D's for breakfast right as they opened at 6:00 a.m. (even with ear plugs, the Pike got me up at 5:30) and sat for two hours drinking post-lawsuit lukewarm coffee (and reading James Clavell's _King_Rat_ which made my particular circumstances feel absolutely painless) until Al opened up. He phoned his supplier in Springfield and yup, they had a tire. Shirley drove over there and got it, their son put it on and I was out of there by 9:30. $150 "suggested retail list" went on my VISA, but I'm not complaining a bit. Besides, the running chat with Al was worth it all by itself. Al started his shop in 1954. He and Shirley and their children and friends have been involved in motorcycling ever since and he'll be happy to bend your ear about it, in a quiet, sardonic way, and you'll love every minute of picture and trophy showing and stories about flat-tracking, hill-climbing, motocrossing, touring, and general tomfoolery (e.g. he won "Best Lights" at Americade for his 1300 Voyager). He's sold all kinds of bikes in the past, but now sells Kawasakis and restores and sells old Triumphs. His shop is larger than it looks and old bikes of various marques fill the nooks and crannies and the second floor and the trailers out back. Great guy, neat place. I was home by noon (it was only about 90 miles (main or back roads) away), having wandered along the obscure road that follows the east side of the Quabbin Reservoir and having gotten lost (for the last time) somewhere between Hardwick and Barre. But I didn't care - it was a gorgeous dry day and I knew a shower and a cold beer were waiting. One last incident: I was following a pickup truck down route 2A in Westminster. Its driver put his left turn signal on and moved toward the left to turn onto the obvious street. He started his turn, I drifted to the right to pass by, he decided right then that what he really wanted to do was to turn *right* into a gas station, and did so. No looking, left turn signal still blinking. I did the first stoppie I've ever done on the big Ninja in 50,000 miles, bald front tire, luggage and all. I pulled into the gas station and yelled a whole bunch of things at him that are unpostable to a family-oriented mail-list like this. So I rode 660 miles when I could have slabbed it for 450. That's nearly a 50 per cent premium. Do I care? What do you think? Mark (Holbrook@world.std.com) "Back Roads. Period."