eemcclure

Days 41 – 49 Five Days in Montreal and the Final Leg Home

RIP Leonard Cohen – A Favored Son of Montreal

The trip nearing an the end on day 41, I rode from North Bay, Ontario into Montreal, Quebec. It would be here that I would spend 5 days, four of them with my stepson Jason, exploring this beautiful, vibrant city. What a great time we had.

Jason arrived on a Friday afternoon and on that first evening we found that we could drive his car to a local metro station with free parking and catch the train. Actually, the “train” is and electrically powered, multi-car transport that travels primarily on raised platform rails. The stations that server the metro and the trains themselves were immaculate and they served nearly every section of the city.

Jason and I Riding the Train into the City

The first day we caught the metro into the city and walked all over for a total of 9 miles or so. And in that time we covered only a small section of the city. The city is vibrant and clean with a healthy scattering of greenspaces and parks. Newly constructed high rises shared the cityscape with buildings nearly 400 years old. Like Toronto, Montreal is a multicultural city that while primarily French speaking, is home to people from all over the world.

On Saturday we spent a good bit of time in the Montreal Museum of Fine Art and again walked a good bit of the city. That evening, determined to find some live music, we stumbled into a free concert: SOUL FEST Montreal. Though it started out slow, the main act did not disappoint! Dawn Tyler Watson along with a backing band and a side show of dancers framed in front of a stunning old cathedral keep the crowd on its feet. Definitely the highlight of the trip!

The final day explored more of the city and took a tour of the Montreal Botanical Gardens. That evening we said our goodbye’s over a final dinner and beers, hoping that we still have a number of cities we will still get to explore together.

On Tuesday, day 45 I head to Bangor, Maine. Main is beautiful, rural, quaint and very green.

Having crossed the US border in Maine I can feel the pull to make it home, but I want to spend one day traveling the main coast before beeline home. What I found is this – the road along the coast of Maine shares absolutely no resemblance to the Pacific Coast Highway! I was a real fight to actually the the coastline. I am sure had I done more research and planned my route out in advance I would have had better luck. But then this was my final leg home and I was really looking forward to seeing family and sleeping in my own bed. So the Maine coast can wait for another day.

After the Maine trek I spent the night in Rochester, New Hampshire. The next day I made it to Allentown, PA – through difficult traffic. The next day home to Willis, Virginia. Home at last!

Though I still really enjoy riding, especially on winding mountain roads, this will likely be my last cross-country adventure. All the the hotel points I had built up from working out of town for so long helped make this one possible, but unless you are willing to camp out a lot (which I am not) and eat on the cheap (which I did not), this is an expensive pastime. Besides, as far as just pure “riding” and beautiful rural settings, I have never found anything that quite compares to the mountains of southwest Virginia, Western North Carolina, West Virginia and Tennessee and those are in my back yard! I do want to spend some time in the exploring the west, but that is a longer trip for Thais, Cosmo and I and if the motorcycle is involved it will travel in the back of my truck while towing our travel trailer.

So, all’s well that ends well! Thanks for sharing the adventure.

Postscript – I do have a lot of GoPro video still to process from the trip but I am permanently retiring this blog and will post everything else on Facebook.

Day 40 – North Bay, Ontario

A Pleasant End to a Good Day on the Road

It’s been six days and and quite a few miles since my last post – 1,286 miles to be exact.

Day 35, 36, 37 – Grand Forks, North Dakota to Winnipeg, Manitoba. Not a particularly long ride, but interesting. Winnipeg is a pretty good size town so I assumed the highway would be pretty up to date from Grand Forks. Not so much. Actually, whether it is Google’s preference or just there is no other choice, Google routed me through a number of unpaved roads on this route. Good thing I have an adventure bike, I don’t think Marshall’s RT would have been to accommodating here. This part of Manitoba is very rural and absolutely covered in crops of one type or another. The crops that really caught my eye were the expansive fields of what I believe to be rapeseed which is used to make canola oil. They were is bright yellow-green and the fields went on for miles and miles.

I ended up staying two days in Winnipeg. Not a lot to report there. It struck me as a pretty much working class town. It may have had it’s own charm but I wasn’t there long enough to discover it. I did get some time to give my bike a much deserved wash down and attend to the obligatory chain maintenance.

Day 38 Winnipeg, Manitoba to Thunder Bay, Ontario – Where most of the western US states like Nevada, Utah and Arizona seem to have little in the way of lakes and rivers, Ontario has them in abundance. Plus, Ontario share a lot of shoreline with Lake Superior and Lake Huron. Like the Pacific west coast, where there are large bodies of water, there is plenty of fog and cooler temperatures. All the lakes and rivers seems very clear so it was a pleasant ride. I am again struck as I was in the US Midwestern and western states of just how sparsely populated the majority of North America is. For example The US population density is 97 person/sq. mi. and Canada is only 11 persons/sq. mi.. Contrast that with India at 1,256 and China with 386. You just really have to travel this country to drive home just how much open land we have. Hit rain coming into Thunder Bay, but it could have been worse.

Ohh, yeah, watch out for Moose

Day 39 – Thunder Bay to Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario – Again this ride was pretty much all along the coast of Lake Superior so cooler temperatures and heavy fog over the water. A pretty ride, again very sparsely populated, lots of provincial parks. Absolutely no rain on this ride, which was really nice!

Day 40 – Sault Ste. Marie to North Bay, Ontario – A mostly unremarkable day. Scenery was relatively bland compared to the previous days. But, thankfully, with a couple of 400 mile plus days that preceded it, this ride was fairly short at 270 miles. The early day afforded me this time to catch up on my posts. A couple of cold Stella’s on draft made for a perfect ending before turning in.

Tomorrow it is off to Montreal, Quebec which just got hammered by the remnants of Hurricane Beryl. Hoping things will have cleared up by then. Looking forward to spending a few days exploring the town with my stepson Jason who will me me there on Friday.

Onward!

Day 34 – Williston, North Dakota

On Wednesday, July 3, I set out from Kalispell, Montana for Havre, Montana, traveling through a lesser – though no less beautiful – chain of the Rockies. Hit rain for the first few hours of the ride, but light to moderate. This ride stuck mostly to mountain passes with the peaks rising up on either side of the road. The highest elevation though the Rockies was just over 5,000 feet. The sun joined me as I made my way out of the Rockies and on to the beginning of the prairie (or plains) that make up the more easterly portion of Montana.

The Mountains open to Prairie as the Sun Breaks through the Clouds

After an evening at the Quality Inn in Havre – quality is a bit of an oxymoron in this case – I head out across the plains to cross into North Dakota, finally landing in Williston. the plains alternate between being relatively flat, and hilly, but all covered in grass or crops of one type or another. A different environment from the mountains, but beautiful in its own way. The ride went pretty smoothly up until the last 60 miles or so.

The View – 60 miles out from Williston, North Dakota

Stopping to take this picture, and hour out from my destination and heading straight into the dark abyss I knew this was not going to be fun. I was right. About 10 miles into that mess I hit a driving rain along with lightning striking uncomfortably close. I stopped to don rain gear so getting wet really wasn’t the problem. It is visibility. Motorcycle helmets will tend to fog up in this type of weather so you need to crack the face shield to get good air flow. Even then visibility is greatly reduced by water beading. And, since the face shield is now open at the bottom, driving rain strikes your lips and chin like tiny little needles, which you have to ignore because you need to maintain intense concentration to maintain speed with diminished visibility. Well, this IS an adventure, right, and adventures often present challenges. I did make it into Williston safe and sound.

Tomorrow I am off to Grand Forks, North Dakota, my staging point for rolling into to Winnipeg, Manitoba the following day.

One last item, I just realized that I posted a video I compiled of the ride Marshall and I made in the mountains outside of Bolder on Facebook, but never included it in my blog. So, if you aren’t on Facebook, you wouldn’t see it. So I am reposting here. Make sure and maximize the video for the best experience.

Until the next post ……….

Makeup Post – Day 32 – Kalispell, Montana

A LONG time since my last post which covered our time in Ventura, CA and the trip to the Sequoia National Forest. After Sequoia we had a one day stay in Santa Maria, CA before camping out in San Francisco for a couple of days. My sister Kathy was kind enough to play tour guide and drove us all through San Francisco, Marin County and the Sonoma/Napa Valley wine region.

Crossing the Border from Nevada into California

Approaching Sequoia National Park

Touring in Kathy’s Convertible

Crossing the Golden Gate Bridge

Marshall and Kathy with the Pesky Fog Covering the Bridge

Finally the Bridge Comes into View

Wine Tasting in Full Swing

Once we left San Francisco we headed up the Pacific Coast, from California to Oregon and finally Washington State. The coast was socked in for a good part of the ride.

California Coast on our departure from San Francisco

California Coast

Crossing into Oregon

Oregon Coast Starts out Foggy

and Foggy

But Finally Clears Up

Our final Pacific Coast destination is Seattle where after 6,000 miles on the road both of our motorcycles are due for service. After calling ahead BMW Motorcycles of Seattle agreed to take both of our bikes in for service. After we dropped them off on Friday morning we headed down to the Pike Place Market on the Seattle water front. The market was founded in 1907 and is one of the oldest and largest continuously operating public markets in the US. A few pictures below:

However our trip to the market was short lived. Within an hour of our arrival at the market Marshall received a call from the service department at the BMW dealer. His bike had serious engine damage which, at least initially, looked like it could have ended Marshall’s leg of the trip. So we rushed back to the dealer to discuss possible solutions. Given the gravity of the damage Marshall was extremely lucky on two counts. First, the dealer was able to locates the parts necessary to replace the damage and also, incredibly, agreed to work through the weekend to repair his bike. Additionally, Marshall had purchased an after market warranty on his bike which was still in force and it paid the majority of the repairs.

However, the shock of running into such a serious issue on the trip along with the mounting expenses of over a month on the road was taking its toll. At this point Marshall was thinking of planning an earlier exit (we were both feeling the money crunch) but we had different plans on an exit strategy. I still wanted to go a more northerly route through Idaho and Montana and eventually tour Canada as well. He wanted to bee-line to Mount Rushmore and head straight home from there. So, in the end we both made it to Spokane, Washington and went our separate ways the next morning, wishing each other a safe journey on and now individual paths.

So today, which is now day 32 I rode from Spokane through Idaho to Kalispell, Montana, home to Glacier National Park.

Entering Glacier National Park

The plan from here is to take a northerly route through Montana and North Dakota then track north and spend a few days in Winnipeg, Manitoba. From there I will trace an as yet undetermined route that will deliver me to Montreal, Quebec, Canada where I plan to meet up with my world-traveling stepson Jason. He and I spent few days in Toronto a few years back when I was on a project in Buffalo – we had a blast. We are both looking forward to this new adventure.

Onward …..

Day 19 – Chillin’ in Ventura, CA

There have been a number of days since my last post and we have covered a lot of ground in that time. From Boulder, CO we traveled west across the Rockies to Grand Junction, CO, then to Salina, UT, from Salina to Ely, NV, from Ely to Bishop, CA, from Bishop, CA to Bakersfield, CA which was out jump-off point for the Sequoia National Park and finally to Ventura, CA where will take a break for a couple of days before heading up the Pacific Coast Highway. Each of those rides had their own beauty and charm. The Rockies were amazing, stunning vistas and snow covered peaks. Interstate 70 is like no interstate I have ever traveled. Long tight curves, rapid changes in altitude and a complete onslaught of visual panoramas mile after mile. Utah with its buttes and mesas, warm red and brown colors, Nevada with its golden brown hills.

One reason for my recent lack of posts is the deluge of videos we have amassed on this trip coupled with my inexperience with editing this media. Tonight I finally got around to creating one montage of stills from our trip through the Sequoia National Forrest. I am also posting a video taken at the concert we attended in Boulder. That concert was the initial driver of our mad pace to make Boulder in 10 days. Though Marshall was probably not as excited about the concert as I was, we both had a good time. The group, My Son the Hurricane, is out of Ontario, Canada and tours all over North America and Europe. The group is akin to a marriage between the B52’s, a rap group and a high school marching band but their most distinct feature is their incredible energy. The venue really helped make the night. The concert was hosted by the Roots Music Project (https://www.rootsmusicproject.org/) which is a Boulder based nonprofit that provides a fully equipped venue for lots of bands and musicians. It is a small, intimate environment that helped drive the connection between the band and the audience. What a great night!

I have a lot of other content from our trips from Santa Fe to Canon City, Co and Canon City to Boulder that needs attention before I can post. But, eventually, I will get there. Until then, checkout the two YouTube videos below. I found that YouTube is the best method of hosting video content on this site.

Make sure and maximize the videos for the best viewing experience!

The video of our trip to Sequoia National Park: https://youtu.be/brrN7oaR4K4

The video of the My Son the Hurricane concert on June 10,2024 in Boulder, CO: https://youtu.be/9ZyRAfUXRpo

Days 9, 10, 11 – Santa Fe, Canon City, Boulder

Roaring through the peaks,
Wind whispers secrets, unseen,
Roads to Boulder gleam

Well, it was inevitable given the pace that we were attempting that sooner or later I would fall behind on the daily posts. We experienced the most spectacular rides yet through the Rockies as we made our way from Santa Fe to Canon City on Sunday and from Canon City to Boulder on Monday. Rough Thunderstorms towards the later half of our ride into Canon City but all in all the scenery was spectacular. Still working on editing GoPro videos for these trips. On Monday we finally got to see the concert that drove our timeline at the start of the trip and it was over the top energy-wise. Will include videos of that once I get caught up. Actually, after getting back late from the concert Monday night, we chilled here in Boulder today. We did get a nice little mountain ride in around Boulder. More details and videos on these trips soon I hope.

Last minute research on Zion National park (wait times, forced to use shuttles within the park) turned us away from our original plans to go there. We are re-routing to get started on the southern end of the Pacific Coast Highway now. The first leg will be to make it to Grand Junction, CO by tomorrow evening.

Until then ………

Day 8 – Roswell, NM to Santa Fe, NM

A good day today. Since we had a fairly short 191 miles to reach Santa Fe we spent a short time at the Roswell UFO museum, mostly because my daughter-in-law Rachel is more or less obsessed with UFOs and I could pick up a few Roswell related gifts for she and Kayden.

The ride today started off much like yesterday, hot, open land with some scrub vegetation but once we got within about 60 or so miles of Santa Fe things really started looking up; hills, a lot of sage brush, some trees and as we got even closer a beautiful view of the mountains. It also began to cool off. Halfway through the ride we start at a small to refuel and get a drink. It seems that almost every time we stop people will comment on the bikes, ask where we are headed and often share stories about their bikes or rides. Today Marshall and I were talking with a young, maybe early to mid thirties couple. They were living in a large travel trailer, he was a carpenter and travels from project to project. He shared what he thought was the best road in Nevada to travel on a motorcycle so we may have to try that route out. Another man driving a budget rental truck struck up a conversation. He was traveling with his wife back to Nashville. He had been out west staying with is son and granddaughter for a while.

Food review alert – After stowing our gear and cleaning up Marshall and I headed out to dinner. We again struck foodie gold at the The Ranch House. Incredible food and service and at an unexpectedly reasonable price. Marshall had Salmon Tacos with Remoulade, Pico, Green Chile Slaw and I had a half rack of Baby Back Ribs with Green Chile BBQ Sause, BBQ Baked Beans and Corn Bread. Hope we can keep this streak up, finding all this great food.

Tomorrow we are off to Canon City, Colorado and will be riding in a valley between to sections of the southern-most Rocky Mountains. Really looking forward to that.

Until then ….

Day 7 – Amarillo, TX to Roswell, NM

Today was an easier ride than yesterday, around 213 miles. But – still very hot. Marshall snapped a shot of his dash display when we stopped for gas. I actually saw 107 on mine for quite a while.

We started out the day at the Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo. It’s hard to know what to say about this. I mean you hear or read about this attraction and you think, well, we are going to be in Amarillo, we should see this. But really, somebody buried 10 old cars in the dirt at an angle and lets anyone who will pay $7.50 for a can of spray paint whatever they like on the cars. We didn’t paint any cars. There we cars parked all along the street leading up to the ranch so I am sure they get a lot of visitors. In the end, you would not have the urge to do this twice. We moved on.

After the Cadillac Ranch we head off to Roswell. As we stopped for gas along the way a young kid, maybe 16 drives up on a Kawasaki Ninja sport bike and walks over to the bikes, saying how much he likes them and can he take a Snap Chat video. The kid and the video below. Ha Ha. Nice kid.

The rest of the ride to Roswell divides into two parts; Amarillo to Clovis and Clovis to Roswell. The word “godforsaken” comes to mind to describe Amarillo to Clovis. Flat, very dusty with little vegetation and where there is something other than dirt and nothingness, small stores, large cattle processing concerns and railroad tracks. It is hard to imagine that people actually live and work in that environment. I don’t mean that in the way of criticism of the people that live there, just the awe of what living there must like.

Clovis to Roswell is even more devoid of people and buildings. However, there is a sort of scrubby vegetation that seems to save it from the nothingness of the first portion of the ride..

In both cases it is very windy with nothing to block it. It seems to be a constant fight to keep the bike in line.

We arrive in Roswell without incident, have a quick meal at an Appleby’s and rest up for tomorrow. We will hit the UFO museum in Roswell in the morning then it’s a short 192 mile ride to Santa Fe afterwards.

Day 6 – Clarksville, AR to Amarillo, TX

Winds howl, tires grip tight,
treacherous heat fills endless roads,
Amarillo nears

Today’s ride to Amarillo was around 500 miles, with temperatures reaching as high as 104 degrees F and Marshall plagued by intense cramps. As we approached Amarillo we were racing a severe thunderstorm to see which of us made it to Amarillo first, us or the thunderstorm. We won, sort of. We did stop to don rain gear once it became apparent that it was likely that we might not beat the storm. This caused its own issues given the 104 degree temp mated with riding gear the is good at repelling rain but performs miserably and passing air over your body. So the end result, Marshall and I one for beating the Storm, and the storm one for nearly giving us heat exhaustion. But we did make it, so all is well.

It dawned on me, reading over my trip posts to date that – a. The reader might be getting the impression that the rides may sound more tedious that fun and b. I spend an inordinate amount of time talking about food.

Speaking to a. – Marshall and I are enjoying the trip, but it is not without its hardships. It is supposed to be an adventure and adventures often have difficult times mixed with the good. We accept that. Also, this first part of the trip has been more about getting to a specific destination by a specific date and that has made achieving the end goal (reaching Bolder by June 10) take precedence over smelling the roses. After today’s ride things get less hectic and more geared to having a good time. So expect that future posts will begin to brighten up!

About b. – I am pretty sure I am not angling for a food channel sponsorship (although I certainly wouldn’t turn that down <smile>), it’s just we have been fortunate to have incredibly good dining luck on this trip and, well, it would be a shame not to mention such a positive component of the adventure. But it is not my intention to make food reviews a major component of the blog.

Well, and easy ride tomorrow to Roswell, New Mexico where we will revel in the pure schlock we expect to encounter.

Until then ………

Day 5 – The Ozark Route

Today, based in our landing spot of Clarksville, AR, we set out on a 279 mile tour of the Ozarks. I copied this route from one an avid writer who had posted the route on the net. Lingering night time rain caused us to push out our desired early start until after 9AM. But, once on the road we didn’t experience any additional rain.

We both needed gas and hoped to find some along our route. That proved difficult. And, not only were there few gas stations along our route, the one we did not sell 93 octane gas which our bike require. So – we compromised. The station we found fairly early on only sold 87 octane gas but we were able to purchase a bottle of octane booster to up (by how much we had no idea). But it did keep us from running out and neither of us could detect engine knocking so we survived. The little store we bought the gas and booster is shown below. Oark – not Ozark – Arkansas.

Ozark bonus shot – A rusted out Chevy Vega station wagon on a pole!

The ride itself was, well, okay. We have gotten used to all the great mountain roads we have in Virginia, Western North Carolina, West Virginia and Tennessee. There were plenty of curvy – if not particularly well maintained – roads but the tallest peak is just over 2,500 feet and overlooks and vistas we all but non existent. Also we seem to miss a couple of the treats we expecting to see, like Americas oldest functioning general store and the motorcycle tree (a tree with motorcycles hanging from it). But, all in all, a decent ride

I did take a good bit of video with my GoPro during the ride, but it needs to be edited and that takes more time than I have left tonight. Will compile videos in a later post. We did cross an interesting single lane bridge, pictured below.

And, yet one more time, dinner turned out to be the highlight of the day. Back to the Crosswinds Restaurant in Clarksville. Food below. Marshall got chicken breasts grilled with bacon, with sauteed squash and cabbage and I went with the chopped steak smothered in onions, peppers and mushrooms along with the cabbage and squash.

Tomorrow it’s off to Amarillo ……