06 Far East Ride - Day 7 - VA to CT

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This is the seventh part of a series about the ride I took on my 2005 883 Low Harley Sportster ‘Effie’ from Kansas City to Novia Scotia and back. This was part of my vacation from 4 to 20 AUG 2006

THUR 10AUG06

This morning the weather radar shows that if I were in DC I wouldn’t be wet yet, but the rain is tracking my path of travel and its far enough ahead of me that I will be in the rain probably most of the day. I treat myself, on days I know I am going to be wearing the rainsuit all day, those days I wear sweat pants instead of jeans. I only brought 3 pants with me, one pair of blue jeans, one pair of sweats and one pair of shorts (for the hotel in the evening). This is the second day I am wearing the sweat pants. And it did rain all day. Woke up and it was raining. Packed and it was raining. Pulled out from under the roof to sit and get the GPS set for the day.. and it was raining. The days goal is to get to the MA/RI HOG rally in MA. I headed for Harpers Ferry. As WV, VA, MD signs are all right in there and I knew where they were and how to get to them. It rained or drizzled the whole time in VA today. As I pulled into Harpers Ferry I remembered this same stop last year. What a difference having the right gear makes. My new rainsuit is annoying at times. A small annoyance is the Velcro on the legs comes undone in the wind when traveling on the highway. That would be okay, as I haven’t had a problem with rain coming up the leg, but the major issue is the pants are too long so they come down around the back of my heel. When I get off the bike I am walking on the back of the legs, or I have to hold the pant legs up while I walk…really annoying. The suit is plenty big, as I wanted to be able to wear 2 coats under the jacket. The raincoat will be a valuable part of my cold weather gear also. Anyway I spent basically the whole day in the rain suit. Every time I thought it would be safe to take the jacket off, I would have it back on in less than 30 minutes. I was lucky though every time I needed to take a picture, it wasn’t raining. I brought a back up camera encase my new HP quits on me. Last year the old HP I was using quit 3 days before I did on my attempt to make it to Maine, this time the old HP is the back up camera. My newer one is protected in the pelican box that I have mounted to my handlebars. That was an idea I had after my camera crapped out last year. I need a waterproof housing like they use in diving, but a pelican case will be close enough for awhile. Camera housings cost $200-300.

This time as I am walking up the visitors center at Harpers Ferry my feet are dry, I am in good spirits and I am not expecting anything to be here. Last year, the water level in my boots rose and fell with my foot steps (I replaced those boots a week later), I was soaked and physically drained from 3 days of riding in the rain with no end forecasted for the near future (thanks Katrina) then the pisser was when I found that harpers ferry national park doesn’t have Harpers Ferry. You board a bus that shuttles you to a shopping area that doesn’t have any parking. Why does the federal government run a shuttle service for the local businesses? Any way this time I remembered to bring my passport book, so I stopped for a stamp. With my parks pass, the stop didn’t cost me anything. Last year I paid the $5 to park. There were 3 passport stamps at Harpers Ferry, but no Harpers Ferry -- our tax dollars at work. I was wanting the passport stamps because I am toying with the idea of doing the Master Traveler through the Iron Butt Association. You have a year to complete it, so I figured anything I do now I could count if I decide to try for it. For the Master Traveler its something like 50 park stamps from at least 25 states. The 50 stamps aren’t going to be that hard but the 25 states will be challenging. I sat on the bike in the parking lot, while it was sprinkling just like last year and contemplated the value of the right gear. Gear can make or break a trip.

As I am going around Baltimore, I remember last year and how the GPS routed me directly through the heart of it. I didn’t have maps with me to choose another route. So this time I had entered a waypoint on the outer beltway so I would be routed around the city instead. Baltimore is an IBE city (#18). Then Delaware. Next is NJ, I missed the exit for the beltway route I had routed for Newark and ended up going down to the airport and back out, I was halfway to the beltway waypoint when I realized that was probably wasting time heading for it now. So I removed that waypoint from the route to head directly to Hackensack (IBE #59) and Haverstraw (IBE #79). In NJ they don’t have self serve gas. The stations on the tollways I was on were extremely slow. I pulled out of one, figured I would die of fumes before I ever got gas in the tank, the second one wasn’t much better. Are these guys state employees?? The local private stations were much faster at taking care of me. And not none of the guys even acted like they wanted to debate who was going to fill my tank. But they did turn the pump on, select the grade and take the money. I had three fills ups in NJ. After NJ came CT.

It was after dark by the time I pulled over for the night I am just under 200 miles short of the rally. Its amazing how much slower it is to move around here. A Days Inn in Danbury CT ($62 for the night). There was another biker and his wife that pulled in right after me. Our bikes shared a well lit parking spot that night. He had the saddlebags that use a zipper to attach the to the bike. He showed me where one of the zippers had failed and the bag sat on the pipes and just melted/burned. The 2 of them didn’t notice it until a cage driver pointed it out to them.

Although the day was wet, it was a contructive day. I travelled 7 states getting 6 ABC points and 3 IBE cities.

The First Journal in this Series is: 06 Far East Ride - Day 1 - MO
The Route Map for the trip is located in the last Journal: 06 Far East Ride - Day 17 - HOME

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Photos

IBE #18 Baltimore, MD
This is the Baltimore city line, I had crossed the Baltimore county line a few miles before.