New England Roadtrip 2004

My friend Chuck (Texas Chuck for those who have followed our adventures) and I started planning a Four Corners Tour a couple years ago.  As time progressed, the plan morphed into a simple trip to the New England states for a little riding.  As it turned out weatherwise, we would not have been able to make the Southeastern leg of the Four Corners anyway.  As it was we were forced to hole up one day in Lake George/Lake Luzerne, New York to wait out the tail end of Frances as it passed into New England.  We had two other days with some rain but not enough to be a concern.  My route, in red on the lower map, was from San Antonio, Texas to Farmington, Maine.  Chuck's varied only in that he rode to Sikeston, MO from Wichita Falls, TX to meet me.  I had ridden to Chicago for business the week before and we arranged to meet in Sikeston on the 4th of September.  The purple route was my return trip from Farmington, ME to San Antonio, TX.  Chuck split off in Ardmore, OK for a 100 mile leg into Wichita Falls while I had about 400 from there to San Antonio via I 35. For the most part we avoided Interstate Highways on the way out and used them almost exclusively on the return.  There is no substitute for the 'slab' when the desire is to make time (I returned from Farmington, ME to San Antonio, TX in four days, averaging about 600 miles a day.) The exception on the return was a secondary run from Joplin, MO to Ardmore, OK to avoid many miles of toll roads.  Chuck paid them on the way out and we swore we would not pay again on the way back.  We did have to pay 'bridge' tolls to get to Niagra Falls throught Buffalo and into and out of Canada, about $2.00 each. Our bikes were an '04 FJR1300, mine, and an '03 ST1300, Chuck's.  They were set up very similar with Givi top boxes, Rick Mayer seats, Garmin GPS (mine a V and his a III+.)  We used HJC Chatterbox FRS radios, bar mounted, for communication.  He fed a CD player through a preamp for riding music and I ran an IPOD through the Chatterbox for mine.  This was the first time I'd ridden with music and I found it a great boon on the 'slab.'  The HJC FRS set ups worked fine for us, even allowing communication at warp speeds, something our old Chatterbox two channel rigs did not.

1.  Our first scheduled stop was the AMA Heritage Museum in Pickerington, OH.  We hit there on Sunday, September 5th after a great ride across Kentucky on routes 62, Kentucky and 41, Ohio.  We used the Interstates a little to make some time but tried to stay off for the most part.  We did take the slab from Columbus to the New York State Line (saw two people with an SUV and a canoe in the median on I 90...canoe must have come loose....either that or they were making an unusual portage.)  The AMA offices and the Heritage Museum are located in a beautiful park-like setting about 30 miles from Columbus.  Covered motorcycle parking is provided with .25 lockers to store your stuff while you tour the museum.  We were not all that interested in the 'main show' which was the history of HD from the early days to the present.  There were six unique bikes though that really caught our attention: board track Harley's from the 20s, each perfectly restored to better than new, and all six owned by and on loan from a gentleman in Teseque, New Mexico.  The BSA racing exhibit was very nice as were the other nostalgia bikes on the lower level.  We spent about an hour and a half at the Museum before heading out.  I would have like to have visited Bill Wood, AMA magazine editor and an old Colorado 500 riding partner but it being the Labor Day weekend, he was out of the office, spending time with relatives.

2.  Our next stop was Niagra Falls, NY.  We made it there on day two of the trip, staying just on the east side of Buffalo.  We arrived at the Falls on the morning of the 7th at about 7:30 am to find everything closed.  This worked to our advantage financially though with free parking and admission (through a little used service entrance....)  We took a bunch of photos, marveled at the force of the water, etc., then headed out for breakfast and a day of riding secondary (and thirddary) roads across NY.  It was on this leg that we met a NY State Trooper...71 in a 55...But he was in a good mood and our record still stands: four stops for speeding while riding together, no pay tickets yet!  As we were leaving Niagra Falls, we fell in with three Goldwings pulling trailers accompanied by an SUV pulling what appeared to be a motorcycle camper trailer.  We would see them off and on for the next several days, finally getting to talk to them on the 'Kanc' in New Hampshire.  We thought they were from CA but actually LA.  They were on a two week trip with Maine as their destination too.  The SUV was there because the owner's 1800 'Wing had a cracked frame.

3.   Our destination: the upper three New England States of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.  We made it to Lake Luzerne, NY the evening of the 7th and got a room at the Woodside Motel.  This would be 'home' for the next two days, one of riding the Adirondacks and one of watching it rain while we planned our next few days.  We met up with Tom Hawkins on Friday morning the 10th in Rutland, VT.  Tom had taken the day off so that he could show us some great VT roads on his '04 FJR.  The roads were great but one of our most serious rains kinda ruined the run over the Appalachian Gap on 17.  'Turn the page' for photos of all these places!

A sidebar to our trip:  On the second saturday of our trip, Chuck and I entered New Hampshire to find flags flying at half mast.  We had lost track of time and the date and failed to realize until that evening that it was September 11, the third aniversary of the Twin Towers attack.  As it turned out, it was also the day a good friend of mine and a great friend to the Motorcycle World, especially the BMW fraternity, Rob Lentini, passed away from cancer.  I think he's watching over us now from a better place.

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