Launching a New Riding Adventure

Let's see how far we go.

The 4th fill up of the day. Thank goodness for American Freedom Energy!

 Wednesday, June 29th.

In 2010 I took a 7 week tour of the American West on my motorcycle. It was the trip of a lifetime in so many ways. The landscapes were gorgeous, the roads were amazing for riding, the National Parks were incredible and the hiking was challenging. I really didn’t want it to end, but that was just the starting leg of a full year of traveling. I had to get home to get ready for the rest of it. (All the details of that year are included in the left column of the blog under Western US Motorcycle Trip and the four tabs above that: South American, Africa, The Middle East and Asia.)

I have always wanted to return to the ‘cowboy’ country of the US and do it on the bike again, but I got distracted by many other destinations, and then everything was on hold for two years due to the pandemic.

So, I made myself two promises for this summer: 1) to visit the Maritime Provinces of Canada, which I just did, and 2) ride west again before I turn 70 and the bike and I are too old. I am riding the same beautiful Yamaha VStar that I did in 2010.

After some planning of things to see and ways to go, and booking three must see destinations that I missed last time (because I didn’t pre-book), I woke up this morning all ready to go. Except it was raining. Not an auspicious start. So, I hung around at home until noon when it finally abated. I saddled up and rode out of Toronto along the 401 West. This is the trucker’s highway, and I rode through canyons of 18 wheelers for 5 hours to the Windsor to Detroit border crossing. On route I saw two separate incidents of trucks on fire. About 30 minutes outside of Windsor I passed dozens of windmills. I was amazed again by their gigantic size and confounded by how they were planted in the farmer’s fields… Entry into the US was easy and I rode out on I75 south to 475 West and then 69 South to Fort Wayne Indiana. I rode for a total of 8 hours, 662 kms and four gas fill ups. Not a great day of riding,  but a necessary day in order to get where I want to go. Tomorrow will be more of the same.