The Road to Vermont started early. Very early on Saturday morning I heard a crack. The crack raced across the sky and turned into a slow, rumbling boom. Now that I was awake I could hear that there was a deluge happening. I could hear the waves, the rain pounding into the lake. Normally, this would have been the most pleasant thing to listen to, and even to wake up to. I love thunderstorms! I love listening to thunderstorms on a lake! But the thought of going out in the rain, of riding home amidst a thunderstorm, those thoughts kept me awake, and made me pull the thin blanket around me.
Finally I dosed, and then, BANG! another clap of thunder. Its ok though, it will stop before breakfast, its still dark, and it can't rain this hard for that long.
Wrong.
When the wakeup bell rang, I felt as though I hadn't even fallen asleep. It was still pouring. We showered and dressed, I moped, and Seth energetically packed everything up and put it on the couch. "No point in actually putting these on the motorcycles till after breakfast," he said. I agreed completely! 100%! No need to test the waterproof claims of the motorcycle bags until absolutely necessary! After all, my books are in there. I've never heard of anyone packing books on a motorcycle adventure, but that didn't stop me.
We made it to breakfast, and ordered. I ate particularly slowly, hoping that the rain would let up, just a little bit, if we waited a few extra minutes. I even ordered an entire second meal!
It didn't. But at least I stayed long enough to say bye to Lindsay before we left.
Bob felt really bad for us. He didn't even want to drive home in this rain, and he had a windshield, a roof, and a heater (and a defroster)! Rick came in and remarked on the misery of the day, and how horrible the weather was for driving home. I must have accidentally sent a searing glare in his direction, because he turned to me in sudden realization and said "Oh NO! You guys are on the motorcycles!" No one really knew what to say...there was nothing they could do to improve the situation, no aid they could offer. We had gotten ourselves into this situation and we were going to have to get ourselves out!
Reluctantly, we made our final farewells and left the dining room. !!!!! What! Then the rain let up! By the time we got to the cabin it was a mere drizzle! A misting, really! We quickly (and enthusiastically) packed up the motorcycles, got our gear on and headed out. As soon as we got to the beginning of the driveway, it started to pour again. It was ok though, once we were on the motorcycles, it didn't really matter much whether it was raining or not. We followed Bob's Avalanche down the driveway, turned right after them, and followed them for a few miles down the road. I was starting to think the rain was even rather pleasant. The sound of the rain on my helmet was like the sound of the rain hitting a roof in an attic room. "As long as this doesn't put me to sleep," I thought "I could really get used to this!"
By the time we got to the first stop sign, every inch of me was soaking wet. Water was dripping off of my helmet and running down my back (inside the supremely helpful waterproof coat.) I didn't realize how wet I actually was until I tried to stop at the stop sign: my jeans clung to my legs and my shoes squished as they hit the gound.
It was raining so hard. So hard! I was kind of enjoying being wet until Seth turned suddenly and I couldn't brake in time to turn with him. I was fine while we were going, but I was not very happy when we had to stop.
Finally, by the time we got to Owen Sound (about an hour away) it stopped raining and the sun started poking through the clouds. We knew that we were only outrunning the clouds though, and were never sure how far ahead of them we were getting. The day was pretty uneventful. Somewhere that felt like it should have been the middle of Ontario, but in reality was probably closer to Evergreen than to New York state, Seth's route took us on a lot of dirt roads. The dirt clung to our wet motorcycles and clothes, and we got REALLY dirty. (It kind of reminded me of Africa, we got so dirty.) The trip seemed to be going more quickly, since I recognized some of the roads we were on. Finally we stopped for gas and decided to eat our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, ginger snap cookie and water bottles which the Evergreen staff had so kindly packed for us. Seth had kept them in one of the waterproof bags, and they weren't even soggy!! It was amazing. Here are the bikes, and Seth, at lunch. I probably should have had him take my picture too, but I was anxious to get on with it and get to the bloody hotel, so I could lay down for good. 'Til morning at least.
I had started to clean off my headlight when Seth said something like "Wait!! Don't you want to take a picture and document our dirtiness??" Does anyone ever wonder why I love him so? I sure don't. We're like peas and carrots.
After lunch the trip draaaaagged oooon and oooon and oooooooooon. I thought we would neeeeeever get to Brockville, where our hotel reservation was. I kept seeing signs to familiar towns and thinking "Oh! I remember that! That was early in the day last time! Before lunch even! Fantastic!" I think the problem was not so much that these places were really that far away from each other, but that I was just so exhausted that every second felt like a minute, and every minute like an hour. So, obviously it felt like it took MUCH longer to get anywhere! I noticed a lot of Red-Winged Blackbirds in Canada. On the sides of all the roads, before the nicely groomed fields and just in the long grass. They'd fly away as we drove by. I got tired of the Red-Winged Blackbird. I was ready for a new species.
Finally, Seth asked if I would rather take the highway back to Brockville, which would be shorter but I would have to deal with higher speeds, or go the way we came. I picked the highway. At some point I had said something stupid and naive about wanting to avoid the highway at all costs, because Canadians drive like crazy on the 401 across Ontario. Anyway, I picked the highway and we were at the hotel in 20 minutes.
We arrived at the hotel 5 minutes after their restaurant had closed for the evening. We asked the guy at the front desk and he mentioned lots of awesome sounding restaurants where we could go. "Can we walk?" I kept asking? "Hmm, I wouldln't walk. You should drive." He kept saying.
If we hadn't finally coaxed the name of a pizza place that delivered to the hotel, I would not have eaten dinner. I was not getting back on the motorcycle.
Showered, fed, and off the motorcycle, out of wet clothes and finally warm dry and comfortable, I thought I would fall asleep immediately! But then we discovered that "Driving Miss Daisy" was on tv, and I couldn't fall asleep til it was over.
In the morning, I dallied through breakfast again, even though it was a perfectly sunny morning. Once we were done though, I was ready to go and get the rest of the trip over with. The adirondacks were next, and they were the fun part! I couldn't wait to see the serene mountain lake again.
When we reached the border, I was nervous again. Not nervous for me, I was pretty sure I was not going to have any problems. I was nervous about what Seth might do this time. I even considered going before him, just to make sure they weren't already annoyed when it was my turn. I didn't though. I stopped dutifully at the stop sign and let him go ahead. I don't know what they asked him, but when I got up to the guy, he was chuckling, and said "So how do you know this guy?" with a nod in Seth's direction. Perplexed, I stated, "he's my boyfriend."
"Yea," he said, "and you live in Vermont? How'd you get to Vermont?"
"He is going to grad school there." I said, quite honestly.
"That bike looks a little big for you." he said, as I tried to get off. "Are you going to fall over?"
"Maybe!" I said.
"Why did you get such a big bike?"
"Well, It is fine when we're riding, we don't usually do a lot of stopping and standing. We've been trying different things though to make it shorter. We lowered the triple clamps in the front and got the seat cut down. We need to get a new shock in the back, or smaller wheels...."
"But you haven't yet?" he said.
"No."
(?? What a jerk! ??)
"Yea, have fun, don't fall over." he said, and that was the end of my border patrol interview.
I got up to Seth, and he said "Was that guy a prick to you too?"
Apparently when he asked Seth how he got to Vermont, Seth's response was "I drove??"
We got lost in western New York. Apparently Seth was planning on "having fun" on the way home and taking some winding dirt roads instead of the main, direct road. It didn't work out very well and I became increasingly annoyed each time I had to pull a U-turn in the middle of a road. Eventually we made it back to the Adirondacks and it was peaceful again. We stopped for lunch in Saranac Lake, and stopped to take pictures of the Ski Jumps in Lake Placid.
This isn't the greatest angle, but from on the road you can see how towering they are!
At the ferry there was a tremendous line of cars again. It took an hour or so to cross, but we got to stand on the ferry instead of sitting on the bikes, so that was good. Once we got into Vermont, there were Chickadees flying out of the roadside bushes instead of Red Winged Blackbirds. They made me smile, and I felt instantly at home. The mountains were familiar. The manure smell hanging in the air smelled like hay instead of like insipid waste. The Green Mountains are soo pretty! I smiled from the time we got into Vermont until the time we got home. It was by far the best part of the entire ride.
"Why do we ever even leave?" I thought to myself.
As soon as we pulled into our driveway it started to rain.
Finally I dosed, and then, BANG! another clap of thunder. Its ok though, it will stop before breakfast, its still dark, and it can't rain this hard for that long.
Wrong.
When the wakeup bell rang, I felt as though I hadn't even fallen asleep. It was still pouring. We showered and dressed, I moped, and Seth energetically packed everything up and put it on the couch. "No point in actually putting these on the motorcycles till after breakfast," he said. I agreed completely! 100%! No need to test the waterproof claims of the motorcycle bags until absolutely necessary! After all, my books are in there. I've never heard of anyone packing books on a motorcycle adventure, but that didn't stop me.
We made it to breakfast, and ordered. I ate particularly slowly, hoping that the rain would let up, just a little bit, if we waited a few extra minutes. I even ordered an entire second meal!
It didn't. But at least I stayed long enough to say bye to Lindsay before we left.
Bob felt really bad for us. He didn't even want to drive home in this rain, and he had a windshield, a roof, and a heater (and a defroster)! Rick came in and remarked on the misery of the day, and how horrible the weather was for driving home. I must have accidentally sent a searing glare in his direction, because he turned to me in sudden realization and said "Oh NO! You guys are on the motorcycles!" No one really knew what to say...there was nothing they could do to improve the situation, no aid they could offer. We had gotten ourselves into this situation and we were going to have to get ourselves out!
Reluctantly, we made our final farewells and left the dining room. !!!!! What! Then the rain let up! By the time we got to the cabin it was a mere drizzle! A misting, really! We quickly (and enthusiastically) packed up the motorcycles, got our gear on and headed out. As soon as we got to the beginning of the driveway, it started to pour again. It was ok though, once we were on the motorcycles, it didn't really matter much whether it was raining or not. We followed Bob's Avalanche down the driveway, turned right after them, and followed them for a few miles down the road. I was starting to think the rain was even rather pleasant. The sound of the rain on my helmet was like the sound of the rain hitting a roof in an attic room. "As long as this doesn't put me to sleep," I thought "I could really get used to this!"
By the time we got to the first stop sign, every inch of me was soaking wet. Water was dripping off of my helmet and running down my back (inside the supremely helpful waterproof coat.) I didn't realize how wet I actually was until I tried to stop at the stop sign: my jeans clung to my legs and my shoes squished as they hit the gound.
It was raining so hard. So hard! I was kind of enjoying being wet until Seth turned suddenly and I couldn't brake in time to turn with him. I was fine while we were going, but I was not very happy when we had to stop.
Finally, by the time we got to Owen Sound (about an hour away) it stopped raining and the sun started poking through the clouds. We knew that we were only outrunning the clouds though, and were never sure how far ahead of them we were getting. The day was pretty uneventful. Somewhere that felt like it should have been the middle of Ontario, but in reality was probably closer to Evergreen than to New York state, Seth's route took us on a lot of dirt roads. The dirt clung to our wet motorcycles and clothes, and we got REALLY dirty. (It kind of reminded me of Africa, we got so dirty.) The trip seemed to be going more quickly, since I recognized some of the roads we were on. Finally we stopped for gas and decided to eat our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, ginger snap cookie and water bottles which the Evergreen staff had so kindly packed for us. Seth had kept them in one of the waterproof bags, and they weren't even soggy!! It was amazing. Here are the bikes, and Seth, at lunch. I probably should have had him take my picture too, but I was anxious to get on with it and get to the bloody hotel, so I could lay down for good. 'Til morning at least.
I had started to clean off my headlight when Seth said something like "Wait!! Don't you want to take a picture and document our dirtiness??" Does anyone ever wonder why I love him so? I sure don't. We're like peas and carrots.
After lunch the trip draaaaagged oooon and oooon and oooooooooon. I thought we would neeeeeever get to Brockville, where our hotel reservation was. I kept seeing signs to familiar towns and thinking "Oh! I remember that! That was early in the day last time! Before lunch even! Fantastic!" I think the problem was not so much that these places were really that far away from each other, but that I was just so exhausted that every second felt like a minute, and every minute like an hour. So, obviously it felt like it took MUCH longer to get anywhere! I noticed a lot of Red-Winged Blackbirds in Canada. On the sides of all the roads, before the nicely groomed fields and just in the long grass. They'd fly away as we drove by. I got tired of the Red-Winged Blackbird. I was ready for a new species.
Finally, Seth asked if I would rather take the highway back to Brockville, which would be shorter but I would have to deal with higher speeds, or go the way we came. I picked the highway. At some point I had said something stupid and naive about wanting to avoid the highway at all costs, because Canadians drive like crazy on the 401 across Ontario. Anyway, I picked the highway and we were at the hotel in 20 minutes.
We arrived at the hotel 5 minutes after their restaurant had closed for the evening. We asked the guy at the front desk and he mentioned lots of awesome sounding restaurants where we could go. "Can we walk?" I kept asking? "Hmm, I wouldln't walk. You should drive." He kept saying.
If we hadn't finally coaxed the name of a pizza place that delivered to the hotel, I would not have eaten dinner. I was not getting back on the motorcycle.
Showered, fed, and off the motorcycle, out of wet clothes and finally warm dry and comfortable, I thought I would fall asleep immediately! But then we discovered that "Driving Miss Daisy" was on tv, and I couldn't fall asleep til it was over.
In the morning, I dallied through breakfast again, even though it was a perfectly sunny morning. Once we were done though, I was ready to go and get the rest of the trip over with. The adirondacks were next, and they were the fun part! I couldn't wait to see the serene mountain lake again.
When we reached the border, I was nervous again. Not nervous for me, I was pretty sure I was not going to have any problems. I was nervous about what Seth might do this time. I even considered going before him, just to make sure they weren't already annoyed when it was my turn. I didn't though. I stopped dutifully at the stop sign and let him go ahead. I don't know what they asked him, but when I got up to the guy, he was chuckling, and said "So how do you know this guy?" with a nod in Seth's direction. Perplexed, I stated, "he's my boyfriend."
"Yea," he said, "and you live in Vermont? How'd you get to Vermont?"
"He is going to grad school there." I said, quite honestly.
"That bike looks a little big for you." he said, as I tried to get off. "Are you going to fall over?"
"Maybe!" I said.
"Why did you get such a big bike?"
"Well, It is fine when we're riding, we don't usually do a lot of stopping and standing. We've been trying different things though to make it shorter. We lowered the triple clamps in the front and got the seat cut down. We need to get a new shock in the back, or smaller wheels...."
"But you haven't yet?" he said.
"No."
(?? What a jerk! ??)
"Yea, have fun, don't fall over." he said, and that was the end of my border patrol interview.
I got up to Seth, and he said "Was that guy a prick to you too?"
Apparently when he asked Seth how he got to Vermont, Seth's response was "I drove??"
We got lost in western New York. Apparently Seth was planning on "having fun" on the way home and taking some winding dirt roads instead of the main, direct road. It didn't work out very well and I became increasingly annoyed each time I had to pull a U-turn in the middle of a road. Eventually we made it back to the Adirondacks and it was peaceful again. We stopped for lunch in Saranac Lake, and stopped to take pictures of the Ski Jumps in Lake Placid.
This isn't the greatest angle, but from on the road you can see how towering they are!
At the ferry there was a tremendous line of cars again. It took an hour or so to cross, but we got to stand on the ferry instead of sitting on the bikes, so that was good. Once we got into Vermont, there were Chickadees flying out of the roadside bushes instead of Red Winged Blackbirds. They made me smile, and I felt instantly at home. The mountains were familiar. The manure smell hanging in the air smelled like hay instead of like insipid waste. The Green Mountains are soo pretty! I smiled from the time we got into Vermont until the time we got home. It was by far the best part of the entire ride.
"Why do we ever even leave?" I thought to myself.
As soon as we pulled into our driveway it started to rain.
The ride sounds alternately terrible and wonderful. (P.S. I like your header!)
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