July 15 - Sunday - Oswego NY to Starksboro VT - 292 miles

I was exhausted last night and after catching up with Herb, Sandy and Tracy, I wobbled off to bed. The fan in the window was perfect for some white noise and also cooled things down a bit. I have been noticing how dry everything is back east here. Brown lawns, brown golf courses, and it sounds like they have had really hot weather, more record breaking stuff.
Good nights sleep and leisurely coffee, then around 9:00 I headed out, my last day of the trip. The Weather report was clouds north of me and south of me so looks like I'll take the tried and true way back home I have been driving for 30 some odd years. Deb was working today until 4 so I had plenty of time to get home, so somewhere after Mexico NY I decided to take a different route and told Google girl to get me to Lake Placid NY, way upstate.
I gotta say, I have not been this way before. She took me over hill and dale, through little towns I had never seen, some run down, but most their own little oasis's. The roads are in pretty nice shape way up here and the "note to self" is, this might be a good area for some day trips later this summer.
I stopped for gas (my last fill up) somewhere near Star Lake (never been there) and the guys inside were all locals having a good conversation about the new "Hangover Medicine" they were selling. We all decided to stop speculating on it's effectiveness and go get hammered and try it tomorrow morning. Fun guys..

As I came into the "Olympics" area of Tupper lake, Lake Placid, etc, the crowds got bigger, but not too bad. It was a beautiful day (fire the weather guy) and everyone was enjoying the Sunday afternoon (by then). Google girl shot me off into some side roads again (been to Lake Placid but never this way) and I ended up in Keene NY and then over the hill to the Champlain Bridge. It's always awesome to cross that bridge back into the arms of the mother state. Especially on a beautiful day like today. This calls for a Goodies Snack Bar stop to get the official "Creemee" (soft ice cream for you foreigners, and the only flavor that SHOULD be sold in the state is Maple. Usually you opt for a small and get plenty, but the woman in front of me had a baby sized that was the size of you fist, so I officially sealed the return home with a baby maple creemee at Goodies.
Autopilot from here, awesome ride in the dappled sunlight the last few miles up our dirt road. Deb was there with a couple cold ones in the fridge, and my old Dog Zorro was still with us (he is a 16 year old lab).
Life is good up here on the hill tonight!!

Odometer = 30231 - 29939 = 292 miles today
30231 - 18289 = 11,942 miles total trip

July 14 - Saturday - Buffalo NY to Oswego NY - 180 miles

Good sleep last night and and had a long chat with three students from Toronto returning from Virginia. Sunny and clear sky this morning, but I am supposed to get rain in the afternoon. I punch up Baldwinsville NY on the maps app and she talked me through the outskirts of Buffalo and back into farmland. A lot of nice quiet side roads.
Somehow Google girl sent me all ove, not complaining 'case they were nice roads, but instead of the 3 hrs she said it would be, it took 5 hours to get to Baldwinsville, but it turned out ok, because I get there just when Hannah started her break. She took me to the B'ville Diner which is awesome. Open 24 hours, this place is an institution. I bought a shirt since all mine were on strike and it's a cool shirt.

After some lunch I went back to catch the Corning show which is to real professional glass blowers making this intricate pitcher. Big ovens (electric diesel generators) at 2100 degF on a hot day must wear these folks out.
I met lots of great folks working and volunteering on the Lois McClure, Hannah's boat, where she cooks, and runs the 60hp zodiac, pushing the McClure around, and I met the awesome folks working for Corning on the glass barge. They all seem to get along real well and it sounds like they have fun in these little canal towns. A summer to remember for many.

Headed to Sandy and Herb's for the night, ducking rain clouds and pulled in about 5:30. Tracy and Sandy and Herb were there so got caught up and then felt pretty exhausted, off to bed. Tomorrow I go home!!
Odometer = 29939 - 29759 - 180 miles
29939 - 18289 = 11650 this trip

July 13 - Friday - Saginaw MI to Buffalo NY - 373 miles

It was raining when I woke up around 5:30. I have a brandy new front tire and awesome rain gear so no biggie. I am exhausted and it's time to get home.
I forgot to spray the chain last night so I'll stop somewhere today when the chain is warm, spray it and take a break. The chain lube I am using is great. I have about 13K on this X-ring (DID) chain and had have only adjusted it once (half turn on the adjuster screw). It is made by DuPont and is a waxy teflon mix with a volatile. You spray it on, wait half an hour and then ride. I always do it last thing so it has time to penetrate the rollers. No dirty on the chain either.

My ATT Canada cell plan has expired so I downloaded the map for Ontario ironically through my cell connection because the motel wifi was not playing nice with my phone. I realized I do not have any maps (you remember those paper things) so have trusted my phone the whole trip.

Coffee, yogurt and toast, pack the bike, and off.
I picked up a new rattle sound yesterday which i hear on bumpy roads. I thight it was the caribeners I use to secure the Giant Loop bag to the bike with but it turns out, my front disc brake pads are rattling. Good chance I am almost out of brake pad (gee you think, after 30K miles), but they work fine and there is no metal scraping (yet). It will last 3 more days. I checked them pretty close tonight and they look ok, just rattling.

I told Google girl the route and away we go. Google maps has given me some interesting routes and today's was great. She immediately got me onto nn-crowded back streets, little tour of Saginaw, then out into the countryside where I picked up crops again (wheat, hay, corn, and something else). Yesterday I say signs for rhubarb all over so that may be a big crop. Ontario is covered with huge greenhouses, wind turbines and solar trackers. They are making good investments for the long term.
 Stopped for coffee in Algonac, and realized I was right on the Canadian border. Forgot to buy cheap US gas so ended up buying half a tank mid-Ontario. I was pleasantly surprised when Google girl dropped in the parking lot of a tiny ferry dock. These small ferries I think are run by one of the native American tribes. It could fit 9 cars on it and we had 3 cars, me and a truck pulling a small camper. Nice ride and by the way, the rain stopped before I headed out this morning, so no rain gear. One random angry little cloud dumped on me at a road construction site, but only for 2 minutes. I dried out over the next hour or so. The flag guy and I looked at each other and laughed. Temps were in the 70's to mid 80's so no big deal.

Google girl did a great job sending me down lots of sleepy roads today so I got the real deal tour of Ontario. Lots of big flat fields and crops, not many big towns which surprised me. And I started seeing motorcycles, more and more as the day wore on. Turns out every Friday the 13th, in the summer, there is ahuge bike gathering in ths part of Ontario. All kinds. It's a big deal. Not just Harleys, but every kind of motorcycle you can imagine. I chatted up a Harley bad ass looking guy and his girlfriend and they said it was 10K or more bikes every time they do this. Something nice about a bad-ass Harley guy and his tabooed girlfriend wishing me a safe trip.
And the Google girl got  moody on me. She does this thing where she just doesn't say anything and next thing you know, you are in the middle of a corn field, you look at the map and she says, "Oh yea, you are in the middle of a corn field". Not sure if she just takes a powder, or is angry or what, but she did it 2 or 3 times today. The second time I was riding along on this nice road, all by myself and I look over to my left and there is the lake, and I thought, nice, I though Lake Erie would have been on my right, and then I look at the compass ball and it says I am going west, and I stop and look at the map and I'm going the wrong way. Where did she go??
On that occasion a nice couple stopped to see if I needed help and I explained and they laughed and asked if I wanted some cold water. This is what I mean about random acts of kindness.
The closer I got to Buffalo, the busier the roads got and the more and more bikes I shared the road with. The border crossing is always confusing road wise because they seem to always weave you around town before they put you on the bridge, bu Google girl suddenly got cheery and guided me right through the back streets and onto the bridge and even gave me a perky "Welcome to the United States of America".

I decended the bridge into a small sea of waiting cars at immigration. I turned the bike off and it felt good to just push it along. There was a continuous din of Harley engines running and one of the Harley guys dropped his bike and almost knocked me over. Not a scratch on the Kawasaki, but it scratched his pretty red bike up quite a bit. Boy was he embarrassed.
The customs guy was real friendly and quick. He asked me about my motorcycle clothes, if I got hot, etc). I think he was enjoying the break us bikers give these guys and the toll booth guys.
So Google girl twisted me through some seedy parts of Buffalo where a couple kids ran up to me at a stop light saying "wheely, wheely", yea right. Another guy offered to buy my bike. Then Rt 5 out of town, and right to the door of the motel.
Turned out to be a great Brew Pub next door so a couple pints and a burger, the bed. Up at 3am and writing this before it leaks out.
This is my last nigh in motels and my last dinner out. Tomorrow I'll stay with Debs dad and the next night I'll be sleeping in my own bed, if those brake pads stay put..



Odometer = 29759 - 29386 = 373
29759 - 18289 = 11470 total trip

July 12 - Thursday - Sault Ste Marie ON to Saginaw MI - 282 miles

 I slept exactly -1/2 hrs last night. So up at 3am and checked the weather map, and, crap, again, a storm coming in over Lake Superior. Payback for 203 weeks of prefect weather. The beauty, usually, of being on a motorcycle, and I guess the thrill is beating storms. The I huffed the saddlebag (Giant loop) down at 3:30 and the front desk guy seemed surprised, but I told him I wasn't checking out until the sun came up at 6am. So made some coffee  (still have a little "camp coffee" left, much better than whatever sheep droppings they put in those motel coffee machine packets (yeck- magic word for the day). A couple leisurely hours of drinking coffee, checking maps and checking radar, oh yea, washing out socks. I have to cross the Mackinaw Bridge today which I have heard is a bitch on a motorcycle because it is steel grate for 5 miles over water (don't look down, trust me). A couple YouTube videos show it paved in one lane so maybe my almost bald front tire (13K on a Kenda K761) will be ok. Gotta find a bike shop to get a new tire or tires. I actually found a shop in Bay City that also is a Kawasaki dealer so they may be able to put one on.
I finally rolled at about 5:45, just before the sun came up. Google girl ran me around in circles at the boarder crossing, same thing happened when Jeff and i came through a few weeks back. Bad signage. the Canadians want you to stay!

Over the bridge and customs guy mumbled the usual stuff in his early morning only one cup way and I said no to everything he asked, whatever it was, and on my way.
Paid money to someone for a bridge and then a long stretch of kidney punching road (yes our crumbling infrastructure) with no traffic but a minimum 55mph speed limit (weird) until I got to the Mackinaw Bridge. It was sprinkling just enough to not put my rain stuff on, but just enough to make me nervous about a wet steel grate 5 mile bridge with a bald front tire. And no breakdown lane on the bridge to put rain stuff on, thus getting soaked, getting moldy and hypothermia and dying (see how us worries plan). So at the toll lineup (short), I decide to duck into the police barracks next door and put all the rain stuff on. I was waiting for the Michigan Mounties to see my tire and complain, but they just waved. So it did rin a bit on the bridge as I left the toll booth and YouTube was right about the paved lane, but YoutTube did not include the construction going on (in the paved lane) a mile in, nor did it show the "Merge Left" sign forcing me into the dreaded steel grate. Wet steel grate with bald front tire turned out to be ok, The 1" crack between the grate sections was a bit trickier, key is do not panic. So a mile of relief followed by 3 miles of death grip on the handlebars, followed by a mile of cool down.

Just after the bridge you turn left (so I can follow the shore on the eastern side) but Google girl wanted me to go back over the bridge, so ignore Google girl and just follow Rt 23. Sheboygan (I love that name, makes me want to bowl or throw curling stones) is first up and i stopped for gas, just to say I filled up in Sheboygan. Not a lot of happy people there getting gas or waiting to pay for coffee, weird.
Found a McDonald's for a nice cup of senior coffee, and back down Rt 23. At 9:30 I called the Kawasaki shop and the woman in service said she had 4 machine torn apart and the tire guy was on vacation so "Go Fish". She sounded a little miffed that I was trying to get a drive by tire change and had no suggestions about where else to go. So I found what turned out to be the Honda shop a 1/4 mile from her shop that said hey had a front tire that size but no back one and just stop by and they would fix me up (wow). I said I'd be there in a few hours.
This eastern side of Michigan is ok, not great. A lot of private lots so the public can't really see the Lake (Huron), but every now and again a public spot where you can use the lake. At one point there was a nice bike path all along the lake shore for probably 10-20 miles or so. But not too exciting lake shore.

I turned inland to pick up some time and again, nothing spectacular. I got to bay City and drove write by the Kawasaki shop with the tire guy on vacation and 1/4 mile later the Honda shop appear. The guy behind the parts counter was not the friendliest, but he was efficient. He checked the tires they had, checked my bike to make sure i wasn't fibbing about the tire size, rode my bike out back and an hour later it was out front with a shiny new Dunlop D404F in stead of the Picasso looking cup-city Kenda tire with 13K miles on it (it served admirably these last weeks). The rear Kenda still has plenty of rubber so it will make it home. $80 for the tire and $80 to put it on. So now it can rain all it wants and I'll be able to stop in an emergency.
After the shop I got a coffee and then decided to crash at the motel another 1/2 hour down the road in Saganaw. Google girl go weird again so I turned her off and back on again and she got me there. She gets icked off if i don't do things her way and then just doen't talk to me ("fine, go figure it out yourself you jerk").
Budget but friendly and clean motel. Took a two hour nap (more than i slept last night) then walk down th road for a beer and a Caesar salad ( with anchovies, yumm), then back to the ranch. Nice feeling having a new tire.
Odometer = 29386 - 29,104 = 282 miles today
29,386 - 18,289 = 11,097 so far this trip.

July 11 - Weds - Thunder Bay ON to Sault Ste Marie - 437 miles

Slept all night so felling caught up. The hotel was crappy looking on the outside, but the inside rooms (mine anyway) was actually clean, well maintained, fresh towels. So I can appear to be roughing it, but so soft inside..
Today's job was to get to Sault St. Marie, which is a ways, but if I just stick to it and plod along at 55mph (90kph), then it actually goes isn't bad.

I was inside my head most of the day but Rt 17 over Lake Superior is really pretty with lots of pin trees (or Spruce or Fir or ??) and a lot of lakes with little rock islands in the middle, kinda like Maine. Deceiving few towns and I almost ran out of gas near the end because i was off in a daydream and missed a couple gas stops, and my odometer is kilometers so who knows how far I'v been. But he reserve light was blinking away..
The motel office was closed this morning and the room did not have a key, but rather a combo lock (Rm 15, combo = 7805 if you are ever in Thunder Bay and need a room..), so I just left. Complementary coffee was not an option. So up the street to a coffe shop with lots of work truck out front (those are the best). The place was packed and the old farts club meeting was in full swing with about 8 guys solving the mornings problems in soft chairs in front of a fake roaring fire. I didn't bother them (like I usually do), but I did spend an hour talking to a 72 year old guy driving a diesel (1992 or 7) Smart Car. He grew up on the Gaspe' and "worked in the bush" all his life, first with horses and then driving truck. He and his sons now work in Thunder Bay in the only remaining pulp mill. Good stories but I had to cut him off politely when he told me it was 8 hours to SSM. Another guy was waiting to talk to me who had a nice old 1000 Honda 4 cylinder, but I cut him short as well when we got into all the gear on my bike. I like Canadians, good people.

Rt 11 took me a good ways until Rt 17 took over and then I realized I was up against another long stretch of Indian Reservation, but very scenic and good road with lots of passing lanes (good for us slow pokes).
So ride, ride, ride, then ride more, then gass, then ride ride ride, then, "crap reserve tank" then slight panic, then plan to get the orange duct tape out and write "Gas" on my motorcycle jacket and look sad, but then a sign for gas in 15 km.
This gas stop was a place that, yes sold gas, but it sold everything under the sun that could pass as Indian some how. And I think the hired half the college kids in the province to work there for the summer and thos kids were having a blast.
I pulled up to the pump and there were three university (don't say colleg, it means something else), and the the kid explained he was supposed to fill the tank for you, but bikers could fill their own. He was a chemical engineering student with a minor in Computer Science. I wanted to tell him to savor this summer because when he gets my age, these will be the good memories. Fun stop with all the "college" kids in the grocery store, gift shop, gas station.

So Google girl dumped me after the first construction detour (typical) so I drove around and then started her up again and got to the motel, which is sort of seedy and it is attached to a Greyhound bus station. But a great, busy restaurant next door with coconut cream pie and beer on tap.
odometer = 29,104 - 18,289 = 10,815 so far this trip.

July 10 - Tuesday - Grand Forks ND to Thunder Bay ON - 463 miles

No sleep last night so I got up at 4:30 and checked the radar. Holy mackerel, where did that storm come from! I usually stay on top of the weather forecast but this was right on top of me to the west and south. I was planning to go south east today to Duluth MN, nit it was going to be a wet mess. The only way out was to go north east toward Thunder Bay ON and over the lake.
I had already started to rain as I packed the bike and so I did the full suit thing, grabbed a cu of coffee just as they opened at 6:00 (yuck), and promised myself a better cup later on.
First stop was Thief River Falls to see a company called Digikey who Dave and I have been buying parts from for probably 40 years. They used to have these little ads in magazines for electronics part and now they are huge. I was expecting something flashy, but was pleased at how they spent their money on customers, not buildings. Thief River Falls is actually a pretty small town and I saw a billboard for Digikey Careers coming into town. I asked a guy going in if they gave tours and he said he thought they used to and might still by special appointment so I'll skip that, and I have a long way to go today.
I did not appreciate how much nothing there was going to be today. This corner of Minnesota, and Ontario are vast swampy affairs. But there are also some pretty spectacular lakes up here. I bumbled along all day at about 55 mph (90kph) and as soon as I got to Thief River Falls the rain had stopped and I had beat the storm. And the temps were perfect with 70-85 all day, probably because it was still a bit cloudy for the first 2/3 of the day.

You need to plan your gas up here and I bought my first tank (1/2 tank, no chances) on a reservation. It had no octane marked on the pump so I asked an old indian man filling his truck up what octane this was. He said he didn't know but his truck runs fine, and so did my Kawasaki. It looked the right color.
The reservation got lonelier and lonelier as the morning went on with no cars to speak of. Kinda creepy being out here by yourself. I got a tent and sleeping bag and water so not to worry.
International Falls came up and what a nice, pretty big, modern, tidy town this is kinda all by itself up here. This is the town you hear about reporting the coldest temp in the US. A guy told me the Smokey Bear in the park was adorned with a fur hat in the winter.

The Canadian border crossing was easy and since nobody was there, the border guy wanted to know all about my trip, so we chatted until another car came. There is a job for me! He said there was only one gas stop between International Falls and Thunder Bay and it was 160km away so I stopped there. The bike has and easy changeover to metric, but metric takes a bit to get used to.

Long haul to Thunder Bay with beautiful sunny skies (good call Miller). I hit another time zone change and realized I did not have a place to stay in Thunder Bay. Not enough internet to get a webpage to load so I texted Deb and she got me a room (thanks sweetie). Good thing she did because all the motels were full. When I got to the Nites Inn, the guy behind the counter said he was full and was trying to find me a room in another motel (sweet!). He did and it was only a block away. He gave me $20 for the screwup. Wow, these Canadians!!
A couple phone calls and bed.

Odometer = 28,667

July 9 - Monday - Williston ND to Grand Forks ND - 361 miles

I panicked a bit this morning when I check the weather radar but the rain was south of here and the 100+ temps were down in South Dakota, just what my weather forecasting app said a few days back. Another beautiful day today. Started at 68 degrees and ended at 84 degrees and maybe got into the upper 80's somewhere along the way.
I pretty much covered the whole state today (I think) and it is not as flat and lonely as many have implied. Granted there is a lot of oil & gas activity, mostly near Williston, but there is also a lot more crops being grown than I expected. Lots of untouched grasslands, but wheat and corn and no sign of irrigation equipment helping them out. Maybe it varies from year to year.
I followed Rt 2 all the way today, sort of 2 lane 4 lane, in that there are 4 lanes but it is not limited access and not many chain places because most of the towns are small historic towns, probably from when the trains came through. I did see a lot of trains and I spent an hour next to one this afternoon going the same speed until it finally wandered off to the north. Not coal, although I did see some coal cars today, but some kind of other stuff with a closed top car and hoppers underneath.

Outside of Williston I saw a couple small private planes landing in a small field, but then I saw a helicopter, but not a spray rig or anything, but what looked like a Huey from the Vietnam era. ThThere is an air base nearby so probably something pretty darn important. Weekly rations of coconut cream pie?, annual clean underwear supply?, ??
Good rubbernecking today with lots of lakes and ponds with what looked like ducks, flew like ducks, but smaller than ducks all over. Some crops mixed with open grass land and towns every 50 miles or so with a gas station.
I got to Minot mid-day and stopped for the usual coffee. The motel coffee was pretty bad this morning so I was looking for old reliable McDonald's coffee.

A couple guys motioned me over to join them and one of them had a helmet so I joined them hoping to get some background on the area. Turns out, these two are old friends in their 70's (looked younger than that, motorcycles have that effect on us old guys), and they owned and worked together for decades in a local motorcycle shop and were now retired. I was the young one, but I tried to keep up with all the old motorcycles that I remembered either having or my older brothers having, or hoping to have way back when. Don had a Triumph 1200 twin (new one), but it looked a lot like my old Triumph Bonneville. They invited me to stop by Don's shop at home so I followed him and Bob came along a little after. Don gave me the nickel tour of Minot with public spaces (Teddy Roosevelt Park, walking paths, water park for the kids (of all ages)). Nice tidy community tucked back here away from Rt 2.
He has an awesome motorcycle shop at his home with a lift, all the supplies you need, a boring bar (for boring out cylinders), sand blaster, and somewhere out back he mentioned a paint oven for powder coat painting. I'm ready to retire and build a shop!! Don't forget the mini-fridge (did not see a coffee pot, but I'll have one of those). He has a thing for Hodaka's and there seems to be a lot of Hodaka folks out there who keep in touch and still restore the old bikes. And these guys are both still married!! Sign me up.
Nothing sweeter than two old friends who obviously still enjoy each others company and can still get together and ride their bikes. I think Bob is looking at the X300 in his future. And Bob pointed out that their nicknames from their youth was "Teen Angel"(Don) and "Old Poop" (Bob).
Thanks you two for a very enjoyable afternoon and your wonderful hospitailty!

Back on the road and the plan was to cut down on Rt 52 and then back up through a small lake region, but i added up the time and decided to stick to Rt 2 to get to Grand Forks at a reasonable hour.
I did stop at the geographical center of North America (who knew), and then on into Grand Forks (200 miles from Minot). Grand Forks is also a tidy good sized town. You have to get down into these towns off the road to discover how nice they are.
So all in all a very pleasant day with good weather, some new friends, and a couple more weeks left to get home. Let's hope the sunny weather keeps up..

Odometer = 28,204