June 3, 2007

Just a day of riding.

The Boy Scout campsite last night was a pretty good choice. It was quiet. I wrote my log on the stairway to the bathroom which was bug free and warm. It really got cold last night. It must have been in the mid to upper 40’s. When we hit the road at around 8:00 the temperature on the bank sign said 50 degrees. There was an overcast sky so it stayed at around 50 until just before second breakfast after about 30 miles. With the 5 to 10 MPH head winds and our riding speed of around 10 to 15 MPH the wind chills made it feel quite cold, the coldest so far on the trip. Just before we stopped for breakfast the sun came out and it was mostly in the low to upper 60’s for the rest of the day with bright sunny skies. Wind directions shifted from out of the east in the AM to out of the south in the afternoon. In the morning it was headwinds, in the early afternoon it was tail to cross winds and in the afternoon through quitting time it was headwinds out of the south. Both Denny and I are getting wind burns on our faces , at least the parts of our faces that are exposed.

Antique Water Tower in Frenchville

I was pretty sluggish this morning until after second breakfast. I got a full eight hours sleep last night so I attribute it to too much sleep. I seem to do better with six to seven hours sleep.

Saint Johns River

US 1 from Fort Kent to Madawaska is the worst section of road on the trip. Where there weren’t holes or cracks in the road there were cold patch bumps. Although there wasn’t much traffic it didn’t make any difference because there were few sweet spots on the road or shoulders. That with the headwinds makes for slow going. Just before Madawaska there was a pretty good down hill with no shoulders. The road was torn up on the sides as well. As we were going down a line of traffic came behind us so I moved over to the right. I thought the bike was going to fall apart from the bumps and holes even though I slowed down considerably. Denny didn’t go as far to the right and was greeted with a blast of a horn. I got really hot and yelled “fix the roads if you want us to ride on the sides”. That is the first time that I have lost it in a long time. I guess it was a combination of feeling sluggish, the head winds, and the roads. But still, there is no excuse for that.

Just planted.

After entering Madawaska the roads became much better and were fine for the rest of the day. Also, Denny and I each got the “Hungry Man’s Special” so I felt much better from an energy standpoint.

Getting a fill up.

The scenery is nice, but nothing spectacular like the past few days. One thing we noticed is that there a lot of ATV’s. They are everywhere. In the afternoon we stopped for a snack break at a gas station. Three out of four of the vehicles that stopped for gas were ATV’s. I mentioned to one guy that in Minnesota everyone has a boat and a snowmobile and that it looks like in northern Maine everyone has an ATV and a snowmobile. His reply in that Maine kind of way: “It’s beginning to seem that way.” When I asked him what kind of mileage ATV’s get, he said: “I don’t really know. . . never checked.. . . but I’d bet it’s a lot less than you’re getting.” I told him that we calculate our miles per gallon of Gaitoraide, to which he replied: “Well, that’s going up too.” I always like hearing the dry wit of those from Maine.

In case you didn't believe me.

Overall today was a good day from a riding standpoint.