The Big Ride (also The Long Post)

The week has been hot and humid, almost tropical, oh yes Canada is a cold snowy place, but here in Southern Ontario it can get like Mombasa in the summer, humidity you can cut with a knife, it’s all those lakes. Toronto is after all more or less on the same latitude as Venice.  Then on Friday evening we had a storm that made me wonder if I really should have built a boat and put all the animals in, two by two, instead of a deck in the back yard. Saturday the weather couldn't make up its mind, but Sunday (Sept 7) played ball. Glorious blue skies, cooled down considerably and a little on the windy side, but as near to perfect biking weather as can be requisitioned. I know that the real way is to use a road atlas, but Google maps is just sooo much easier and I want to get going sooner rather than later. There are a few roads a want to ride, Highway 518, 60 and 127. I plan the ride, scribble it down on a piece of paper and rub my hands together like DR. Evil, this is going to be a BIG RIDE, 700 Km in one day…Muh hah hah!

I leave the silent house, nobody stirs, even the chubby Dachshunds slumber on. I can feel that although the sun is up there is a chill in the air and with 700 Km ahead of me, I won’t be travelling slowly. I don the suit, the naff florescent green suit, ok you know the drill. Highway 9, west to Highway 27 North to Barrie. The 27 is an old favorite even though it is as straight as a die it passes through some very pretty farmlands, rolling hills all the way. There are a few lovely little villages like Bondhead, ‘Home to Sir William Osler, Father of Modern Medicine’. Well at least so says the sign, I’m not sure that modern medicine can be said to have a single ‘father’, but I am not going to argue with the village elders. Then there is Cookstown, this is a favorite spot. There used to be a great little restaurant that my wife, Helena, and I often rode to, The LOL Café, for breakfast, fabulous eggs benedict and espresso, a few weeks back we did a breakfast run and lo, the LOL Café was gone, all boarded up. Apparently the owner and chef closed up due to ill health and then while she was looking to sell the place, someone mounted the sidewalk and drove a car through the restaurant with fatal consequences. Nothing is certain in this life.  

There is another reason why we like Cookstown, there is a little cabinet maker there called Frank that is extraordinarily talented and does not charge the Earth. His lovely South African significant other has a shop the sells his stuff and her craft jewelry, upmarket, well-made and of original design. I would tell you all about them, but I still want a few more pieces at a reasonable price… go find your own guy!

Frank restored this little book case and then made an exact replica for us 

Highway 27 takes me to Highway 400 just before I hit downtown Barrie, northbound to Parry Sound. Usually the 400 is a nightmare of assholes in dirty great pick-up trucks with steel gonads hanging from trailer hitches, and it seems to me some of the guys that dive these vehicles have an ambition to actually kill a motorcyclist. But today it is relatively empty and nary a faux testicle to be seen. Pass the Duckworth Street exit and nod to my Alma Mater, Georgian College Motorcycle Training Program. Okay it was just a weekend course, but to anyone that wants to learn to ride a motorcycle, this is a very good place to start. Granted the $450 plus tax price tag seems a lot, but it is actually worth every single cent, I learned a lot, had fun and crashed their bike, not mine, twice. Check it out if you have a Facebook account, (is there actually anyone that doesn’t?). https://www.facebook.com/GeorgianCollegeMotorcycle

I wonder if he may be compensating for something? 

I have so far not had the need to travel the 400 beyond Barrie. Several times I’ve driven up to North Bay on Lake Nipissing on Highway 11, the 400 held a few terrors for me, unfounded as it turned out. The pavement is in excellent condition for most of the way, brand new black top, smooth as eggs, still sticky, just a few miles of grooved pavement, resurfacing work in progress. I’ve said before that motorway riding is not my favorite, but this was not bad at all, of course Sunday morning going north is probably the best time to ride this particular stretch. The topography is rolling hills and the farmlands quickly give way to forest. It’s obvious why when you ride through cuttings through the hills, I am already in the Canadian Shield. Precambrian Igneous rock with barely a dusting of topsoil. The Canadian Shield forms a giant ring around Hudson Bay, about as large as half of Canada. No one could farm here, well not crops anyway, I don’t know how the trees do it, but they manage to penetrate the rock with their roots and flourish as the enormous Canadian forests, further north its barren tundra… pissing cold most of the year. The scenery is gorgeous, but zips passed at 130 Km/h and Highway 400 deposits me in Parry Sound before 11.00 am, 200 km in the wink of an eye.

Already in the Canadian Shield 

Parry Sound is quite a decent town with a nice little waterfront, and as a bonus I get to see Lake Huron again. The exit from Highway 400 to Parry Sound bore a sign for a Starbucks and my desire for a good double shot Americano is high. Sadly either I am blind or it has closed down, so I settle for the inevitable Tim Horton’s and console myself with a bagel and cream cheese, the 90% okay espresso and a pee in a nice clean washroom. The charms of Parry Sound can’t keep me for long, Highway 518 awaits. Fill up gas and backtrack a few Km on the 400 to get the 518, one of Ontario’s legendary bike rides and one of the main reason why I am here.

Waterfront Parry Sound 

They did not lie, it really is a terrific road to ride, also much of it newly resurfaced, smooth black and sticky, with a hard shoulder and curvy as Marilyn Monroe. Very little traffic and I can get up a decent speed, that is until I can’t, the curves become way too tight to tackle in a grand careless way. They require some serious concentration and many can’t be taken faster than 50 Km/h, unless you have a desire to collect on your personal accident policy. No doubt my childhood friend, Martin, would do much better on his Honda Fireblade, but the Boulevard is built more for comfort than speed and agility. I pass a bunch of lakes, Haines Lake, McNutt Lake (sounds like the dish that McDonalds serves in Madrid after a bull fight), Martin Lake, Sugar Lake, Diamond Lake, Bear Lake and Doe Lake. Miles of rolling hills, forest and lakes, I’ve said it before, this is beautiful country and there is just so much of it. AND guess what? No billboards, this road is devoid of the damn things. The forest is showing a lot more red than last week, when fall comes, it comes fast… sigh L. Maybe I’ll have to invest in a Ski-Doo.  

Scene from 518

I know why I ride, and as I lean into the corners, pushing the limits of my courage, it’s reinforced. When you ride a motorcycle you find yourself living in the best place there is to live, the present. Yesterday does not matter because it contributes nothing to the moment, except for your experience and that is buried deep in your being and needs no thought at all. Tomorrow means even less because it may not even come, actually if my next corner is as ropey as the last, it stands a damn good chance of not arriving, for me at any rate. I wonder why I struggle so much to live like this always, I think of the 13 billion odd years that the cosmos existed before I came along and the many billions of years it will continue to exist after I have gone… I have no belief whatsoever in an afterlife. Are all the regrets that wake me up at night worth a moment’s lost sleep? Are all the fears I harbor for the future equally as futile? I will pass from this world and so will all the people I know, as will our species and eventually all life on this planet. All the stuff that I worry myself sick about, striving to do the best job I can do, worrying about professional reputation, mortgages, bathroom renovations, educating children, are really not that bloody vital. I’m not a nihilist by any means, there is meaning to life, but that meaning is rather personal, and requires personal effort to discover it, riding is part of my journey to discover that meaning. I know for sure, without asking him, that the reason why Martin rides his Fireblade at 250 Km/h is connected to living in the present … Chautauqua for the day. The 518 ends at Highway 11, I head south to Huntsville.

Highway 60, just before Huntsville proper is the road to Ottawa and maintained in a manner appropriate to a road that leads to Rome. You wouldn’t want our fearless leaders to encounter any potholes on the way, now would we? I do, however, encounter the Muskoka Ironman. Not a comic book dude, but real life athletes that shame me and Bob (Bob is the guy that lives under my shirt and ruins my figure). I have tremendous admiration for the people that can do this. In a way I was once, reluctantly, a sort of Ironman, way back as an army conscript, perhaps an Aluminum Foil Man. I like to be reasonably fit and I can still run 4 Km in 30 minutes, not great I know, but it is something. However this extreme stuff doesn't quite grab me, I admire from a distance. Helena, did the Tough Mudder last year, and for a fleeting crazy moment I thought of joining her – but then sanity reasserted itself.  Actually if I look at the folks doing the Ironman, there are at least as many women as men. Perhaps it should be the Ironperson completion, not as snappy, but more accurate and possibly more pc. I guess if you are a woman doing the Ironman you don’t need or give a damn about pc, you are it, period.     

An Ironperson 

Highway 60 takes me through Algonquin Park. It’s odd that I have lived only a couple of hundred Km’s south of this world famous park (I actually knew about Algonquin Park years ago when I had no intention of moving to Canada), yet so far have not managed to visit. I excuse this on the grounds of fear of mosquitos and black fly in the summer and the fall always seems too wet and cool. Lousy excuse I know. I used to hike a fair amount many years ago, South Africa has some good trails and Algonquin has a few very interesting looking options that I really should try, of course that would mean leaving the Boulevard in the garage for a few days… mmm I’ll have to think on that one. Talking of hiking in North America, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods, where he hikes a fair stretch of the Appalachian Trail (he managed about 1300 km), is a really fascinating read. One of my favorite books.  

There is a reasonable distance on Highway 60 before you reach the park, nice stretch, albeit a little too billboarded, but one in particular made me giggle. It’s advertising a ‘Couples Resort’, so far so good… but the logo is picture of a statue of a couple in flagrante delicto or as close to it as you could legally have on a billboard. We humans certainly are an odd bunch.

Okay so we know why you are booked in here... 

Crossing into the park itself the billboards thankfully disappear. I was a little surprised to see that the speed limit did not change and neither did the lack of observance to it. I’m disappointed, I’d hoped to be able to toodle through the park at about sixty, but as I have said before you need to keep up with the traffic speed when on a motorcycle unless you want to get ridden over. Seeing the park zip past at 90 to 110 km/h is not exactly visiting, but what I see is tantalizingly wonderful, black fly or no black fly, I just must come back here and do some hiking, maybe rekindle my lost interest in birding. I get to see a little bit at normal speed when I stop for lunch at the Lake of Two Rivers Grocery and Camp Store, hamburger (what else) and chips, It’s not bad, reminds me of the fare served at the Kruger National Park rest camps from my youth, only there the hamburgers were buffalo or elephant, I strongly hope this one isn't bear.

More red now

Highway 60 exists the Park through a set of impressive, but apparently functionless portals, and the road signs revert back to normal, in the park they are yellow on a brown background. I take the 127 south bound, homeward bound, but still a long way to go and I have to admit that I am not as fresh as I would like to be. I start to realize that 700 Km might be just be a little bit of a stretch. A thousand km is known as a ‘blister butt’ ride, and this is somewhat short of that, but still quite tough. There is a vast difference between driving 1000 km in an air-conditioned car on a motorway, and doing that same distance on a bike through twists and turns. Of course it’s a lot more fun on the bike, but it is more taxing. Anyway highway 127 ends at Maynooth, and a very fine ride it was, made me think of the U2 song, ‘All I Want is You’ and the line ‘You say you'll give me a highway with no one on it’. Long stretches with no traffic except for me… marvelous.

From Maynooth its highway 62 and now I pick up the cottage traffic, lots of boats being towed home, another sign of the end of summer. Looking at the map as I write this I see that the route I should have taken is Peterson Road (County Road 10), it looks like a good road to ride, at least on the map. But perhaps I was too tired anyway, but I make a mental note to include this for a future adventure. Short break at Bancroft to stretch the legs and consume a Red Bull, then turn onto Highway 28 heading for Burleigh Falls. Initially highway 28 heads in a westerly direction, it is almost 5 o’clock, and the big flaw in my ride planning suddenly becomes apparent. The sun is already low in the sky and I have still got more than 200 Km to go and most of it is going to be travelling west, damn, not good. Riding with the sun shining directly in your eyes is very uncomfortable and dangerous. If you come out of a stretch where the sun has been behind a hill, say, and it’s a bit dark, and then have the sun in your eyes again suddenly, you can lose visibility completely for several seconds. It’s very nasty and unless you plan your rides properly to avoid this it’s a feature of riding in the autumn. Of course no one wants to plan every ride, sometimes it’s more fun just to choose a direction and ride to see where the road takes you.

Highway 28 does take me south for a reasonable distance with The Kawartha Highlands Park on my right. I’m riding parallel to the 507 that I wrote about previously, just on the other side of the park. It’s a good ride, but not in the same league. From Burleigh Falls, it’s nearly all west on County road 36 and eventually County road 8. Beaverton then home through Durham County

I make it home by 7.30 watery of eye and sore of ass. The two chubby eunuchs greet me as if I have been away for months, with a fanfare of barks and tails wagging so fiercely they can barely keep their back paws on the ground. It was an excellent day, but good to be home.    

The 'Highlands' Ride

Since Lake Huron I’ve done a few decent rides and may still write about some of them, around Lake Simcoe, along the north shore of Lake Ontario to Sandbanks, Kawartha Lake District, Trans-Canadian Highway to the ski resort town of Rigour in Quebec and a few others. Notice the prevalence of the word ‘lake’ in the preceding sentence. This is definitely the land of lakes, take a look at Canada on Google Maps and you’ll see that the Great Lakes are just a small part of that equation, there seems to be almost as much lake as land (okay, I am exaggerating, according to Wikipedia, water and land is about 1:10, but you get my point). All this water makes for some really gorgeous rides, because where there is water there is life, nonetheless I am building up to a good desert ride, maybe next year, Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada. For now, it’s forests and lakes in Ontario.

This past Sunday, Sunday before Labour Day, I did a ride that is definitely worthy of a mention. I’ll call it the Highlands Ride. It’s Highlands in name only, for what passes for Highlands in Southern Ontario are no more than rolling hills, laugh lines, not even wrinkles on the topography. This is pretty damn flat country. Of course Canada does have mountains, the Rockies are something to be seen, but they are two to three time zones away from here… maybe next year (I’m starting to sound like I’m Jewish.)

The Kawartha and Muskoka County Highlands remind me of my first visit to Montreal. The taxi driver that brought me into the city from the airport was terribly proud of his city, with good cause it’s a great city, but he kept on saying that he particularly loves the mountain. ‘Mountain’? What bloody mountain, I strained my neck looking for the damn mountain out of the car window. I discovered later that Montreal is named for the mountain, effectively the city is called ‘Mount Royal’, translated into English, but there isn’t a mountain at all, it’s barely a hill, a pimple of a mound. I told him, that I too hale from a city that has a mountain, the mountain is called Table Mountain and the City is Cape Town, and the residents are so proud of the mountain that you would swear they built it themselves.

Now that's a city with a mountain... just saying...

Anyway, this is all interesting, but not important. I leave home at about 9.00 am, after a good breakfast, having overslept by an hour. Still the neighborhood is dead quiet and I am hoping the roads will be too. It is overcast, but warm and humid and no need for the lining inside my mesh jacket or a rain suit. I head out along an old favourite route, Green Lane, becomes Herald Road, winds though forest and farmlands then becomes Sanford Road, now Durham County Road 11. It is devoid of traffic so I coast along at 8o Km/h and enjoy the view without any assholes tailgating me in an anxious attempt to get there quicker. I get stopped at a level crossing and get to see a very long CN freight train take a long, long time to pass, I didn’t count trucks, but there are many, nice little cheap thrill. I’m heading for the town of Lindsay via Little Britain…very little, two dozen houses and a few shops. I stop and buy a couple of cans of Red Bull at a small, but well stocked grocer. Then onwards and upwards. It’s a pleasant road to ride, getting a bit busier, but still pretty good with some nice bends. One of the bends has a bit of gravel and I feel the back wheel slipping for a heart-stopping millisecond, but then it gets a grip and all is well, I’ll have to watch for that when I hit the Kawartha Highlands.  I bypass Lindsay, crossing the tail end of Lake Scugog and take Highway 36 to Bobcaygeon.

 Miles of freight train... awesome

Teeny Weeny Britain  

This is a pretty decent road, some good bends, still relatively empty of traffic and the pavement is in good condition. The scenery is switching from mostly farmlands to more forest. I’m settling nicely into the ride and the Boulevard is running sweetly, traffic speed is 110-120, the 80 limit is definitely observed only in the breach. On a road like this an 80 Km/h limit is silly, it is not observed, nor enforced so why have it? I don’t know if there is an attempt at moron psychology here, such as if the limit is 80 people will go 110, if it is 110, people will go 130. Anyway, if you did travel at the speed limit on a bike you would get the bejesus tailgated out of you and get home a nervous wreck, if you managed to get home at all.  

I am seeing a lot of road kill today, I guess the little critters are all out and about, trying to make hay while the sun still shines and getting ready for winter. Road kill makes me feel sad. I know this isn’t a big ecological deal, like whale hunting or global climate change or over fished oceans, but it symbolizes, at least for me, the reckless way we go about things. All these pathetic bodies lying next to the road, or worse ground to paste on the pavement. It seems to be mostly raccoons, skunks and squirrels, I guess there would also be foxes, coyotes and some domestic animals in the mix. I did spot a few small deer when I rode around Lake Huron. Somehow the raccoons are the saddest, they look like forlorn old tramps, slightly overweight and dressed in baggy clothes lying dead next to the road while we roar past in big shiny motor cars or fancy motorcycles and don’t give a shit for the simple little lives that lay snuffed out on the shoulder of the highway. We are even offended by the smell of rotting corpses or the stuff that skunks squirt to defend themselves, not that there is any defense that they could mount against us. I know that there is not much we can do to prevent this carnage, short of banning night travel on these roads and that’s not going to happen. Still it makes me sad and a little more convinced that humans are the worst thing to have happened to the biosphere in its 4.5 billion years history. The extinction of our species is probably the only hope the rest of life on this planet has, assuming we don’t take it all down with us when we go.

On that cheerful note, I turn off the 36 onto County Road 507, north to Gooderham. This is one of the roads I came here to ride. Believe me when I say that riding this road makes one glad that we are not yet extinct, it is right up there with girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes and brown paper packages tied up with string. The road skirts the Kawartha Highlands Provincial Park just to the right and twists and turns constantly, left and right around hills and lakes, pristine forest nearly all the way. Apart from a few patches, the road surface is in good condition. I stop on a small patch of hard shoulder and take some pictures, when I take off again I get stuck behind a Ford Focus, but not for long. On a rare straight stretch I turn the throttle and the Boulevard responds like an eager racehorse, it takes some effort to slow it down to 90 for the next twist, the floorboards scrape the pavement and I see some sparks out of the corner of my eye...nice. I don’t encounter any more traffic until Gooderham where the 507 ends, what a ride... what a ride. I contemplate turning around and going back, but conclude that may be a little childish, like going up and down escalators. Anyway I am hungry and getting a little saddle sore.

I'm with you on that one

Some great twisties on the 507

I stop at a ‘family’ restaurant on the outskirts of Gooderham, such as a tiny village can be thought to have outskirts. The waitress tells me that there is a rush on and they have more guests than they are geared up for, but if I am prepared to wait awhile I’ll eventually get fed. I’m a little disappointed, but grateful that she told me, I would be really annoyed if I have to wait an hour for my food. I drink one of the Red Bulls I’d bought in Little Britain, it takes the edge off my hunger and the break is enough to refresh my ass from the mounting saddle sore.

I follow the 503 north, it’s almost as good as the 507, the twisties are not as frequent or as tight, but it is still a wonderful ride, and the scenery is out of this world. Forests and little marshy wet lands, ponds and small lakes covered in water lilies, ferns and wild flowers. Really this is an absolutely gorgeous part of the world. There are ominous little signs of things to come, here and there the leaves are turning red. Now I don’t pretend to know why some trees of the same species turn red before others, but it seems to me that there is a basic randomness underlying the universe, an unpredictability within the predictability. We know that the leaves will turn red, but don’t know when a particular tree, or leaf for that matter will do so. I do know that pretty soon this forest will be a riot of colour for a short while, and then the riding season will come to an end and I’ll be an ordinary bloke again. Not a biker, just another joker cursing the snow, or sitting on the commuter train or driving a Dodge Caravan, looking old, grey, bald and sad.

Ominous signs of things to came...leaves turning red here and there

The 503 ends at Tory Hill in a T-junction with the Provincial Road 118. This is definitely a bikes’ road, excellent condition with paved shoulders and lots and lots of twists and turns. Hills, forests and lakes. I revel and ride, I’m alive. Its cottage country, but not time for the cottage people to be heading back to the city, so the road is not busy.  I see a wild turkey, the first since arriving in North America, I suppose it could just be an escaped domestic turkey, it’s pecking away next to the road, neck like an old man’s… well never mind, hope it doesn’t join the road kill brigade. I have one beef, those goddamn billboards again. Really, don’t tell me that they bring in enough revenue to make even the tiniest dent in the provincial coffers, yet the aesthetics of this beautiful forest is sacrificed for a few dollars by the ugly mug of some or other real estate pusher with an insincere smile.

I arrive in Haliburton, now I really am starving and the Haliburton Family Restaurant is a welcoming sight. On the décor front, this establishment does not make it in the top 100, maybe not in the top 100 000, but that is not a problem. The middle aged waitress is friendly, service is fast and the hamburger is one of the best, I’ve had in a long while. And then there are the chips… now I have always said that outside of Great Britain the best chips to be had are served by the café just inside the top entrance of Kirtstenbosch Botanical Gardens in Cape Town. These are on a par, golden colour, crisp on the outside and soft inside, about 1/3 inch thick and between 4 and six inches long and no traces of peel, and no smell of old oil. Absolutely fucking divine. Of course the coffee is bloody dreadful, but hey, I deal … total bill, including diet Pepsi, $13.00.    

Ain't she sweet?

Best chips this side of Blighty

Highlands of Haliburton 

I’m following the 118 towards Bracebridge, planning to take Provincial highway 11 south just before I’d actually reach Bracebridge, I’ll do Muskoka properly some other time, maybe when the leaves are in full fall colour. The sky has darkened and it is getting cool, almost certainly I will get rained on. I stop on the hard shoulder and don the suit, the rain suit, the naff florescent green outfit that I have grown to rely on to keep me warm and dry. Twenty minutes later the clouds have broken up, blue skies and sunshine, sweat trickles down my back despite the wind from 100km an hour riding. This is not the first time this has happened after I get the rain gear on, that suit possesses some really powerful magic. I decide to stop and take it off before getting on Highway 11, it’s a busy double carriageway and I’d rather not be distracted by overheating.    

Scenes from the 118

Highway 11 isn’t a great road for biking, at least not my style of biking. I am not keen on fighting with the cottage traffic, getting cut-off and tailgated even when exceeding the speed limit by 35 Km/h, but I hang in there until Severn Bridge, then exist to travel down through Rama, home to at least a few of the Chippewas nation, and of course home to the more famous ***CASINO RAMA***. There are several smoke shops along the way, some claiming to be the original Rama smoke shop, but I decide to stop at one that sells moccasins and serves espresso in addition to the tobacco products. I’m after the espresso not the tobacco stuff, I gave that bad addiction up a decade ago and not keen on taking it up again. I get a take-out as the place is definitely not smoke free. The cigars, tobacco and cigarettes are proudly displayed where everywhere else in Canada these products are discretely kept behind plain un-labeled cupboard door, like condoms in the pharmacies of my distant youth.  

   

The shop that sells moccasins is a non-smoking area, but the moccasins are not locally made by any means, factory made, it would not surprise me if these are of Chinese manufacture. The moccasins are also just a small part of what is for sale, the rest is the usual tourist junk, tiny maple leaf shaped bottles of maple syrup, T-shirts, caps, stuffed toys shaped like moose and so on. As far as I can tell not a Chippewas in sight, even the barista that served the coffee is blonde. Anyway, the espresso is good, and I don’t regret leaving Highway 11 behind.

Rama Road ends in a T junction with County Road 12. I follow it south, with Lake Simcoe to the west, to Beaverton. This is familiar territory for me, the stuff of evening rides when they day’s work is done. Its four o’clock and I’ll be home before five, in time to take the two funny, fat little dachshunds for a walk with Helena – and thank the gods, tomorrow is Labour Day and I'll be doing anything but.

Closing the Loop

I guess I owe the four faithful followers of this blog an apology, the final posting for this trip, has been delayed for several weeks. My bad, but annoying things, like having to work for a living, have taken up too much of my time. The few hours left to me I have had to choose between writing blogs about biking and actually biking, I presume I can be forgiven for choosing the latter. Nonetheless I feel compelled to close the loop on writing about the trip around Lake Huron, just as I felt compelled to properly close the loop around the lake. I am one of those guys that sometimes struggle to finish a job, but who insist upon doing so anyway, it’s a blessing and a curse.    

It is strange but there is a difference between the way the Americans make use of the lake and the way the Canadians do. It’s like the Canadian attitude is ‘this is the land of lakes, so no need to treat this one special’, maybe so. Lakeshore Road turns out to be a bit of a misnomer as it keeps a frustrating discrete distance from the lake. It’s a great road to ride, but I want to see a bit more of Lake Huron. Eventually I turn off and do a loop on Outer Road, as far as I know this has nothing to do with taking folks out of closets, I don’t actually see the Lake, but get rather close. As compensation I get to see a few other rather delightful wetlands. The loop takes me back to Lakeshore road, which is also County road 21. I follow it northwards, sadly only catching a glimpse of the lake on very rare occasions. Still I am riding well, comfortable with man and machine as one. After a time I realize that man is getting hungry and machine needs some gas.

Nice little wetland

I spot the inevitable Tim Horton’s and stop. Which brings me to a short Chautauqua – my love/hate relationship with this Canadian institution. The great thing about Tim Horton’s coffee shops is predictability, the crappy thing about Tim Horton’s coffee shops is predictability. In any given town or even tiny village in Canada you will find a Tim Horton’s…almost guaranteed, where you will get a 90% acceptable coffee or espresso and something to eat that is reasonably healthy and 90 % tasty (you can also get unhealthy, like donuts or honey crullers, but that is your choice) and everything is incredibly cheap. The washrooms are usually clean and service is quick.  Now in America where Tim’s does not reign supreme you are stuck with pot luck or Starbucks, and Starbucks, whilst great, is expensive and mainly confined to bigger towns and cities. If you stop at a café or diner you may get a decent cup of coffee, but chances are you won’t. Mac Donald’s has attempted to fill that gap in the market, but not terribly successfully, and I am not fond of the food there. So if you are travelling and 90% quality with 100% predictability and quick in and out, Tim Horton’s is the greatest thing. The downside is the loss of the small business and variety. Certainty versus interesting. In a way it is a metaphor for the North American way. If a recipe is found that works, repeat it over and over until the whole damn world looks the same – new ideas struggle to get an airing because there is business risk in deviating from the recipe. By the way Hollywood is another prime example, that’s why we get Rocky VIII, and why it is so hard for new talent to ‘make it’ and why once an actor has ‘made it’ they become gods amongst us.    

The 90% ok double espresso and grilled cheese sandwich fills the hole and I head north ignoring the speed limit with the rest of the traffic. Through Southampton, which doesn’t remind me of the English city in Hampshire, and split off from the 21 and take the Bruce County Road 13. I’m in an Indian reservation, the Saugeen Nation, but there is little that makes this apparent apart from a few smoke shops and a sign or two that say so. There are lots of properties between the road and the river, I speculate if these are weekend cottages belonging to wealthy regular Ontarians or if these are the homes of Saugeen people, I am guessing the former.

Sauble beach, I have been told is really great, the best beach in Ontario. At first glance it seems to live up to its reputation, if you measure this by the number of people milling about, it sure is busy. I notice, ominously, that all the motels I pass have ‘no vacancy’ signs up, there is a storm brewing and I am tired. I’m about to head towards Owen Sound to see if I have more luck there when I see a motel with ‘vacancies’ and what is more it’s got cabins that look similar to the cabin I stayed at in Caseville. With hopes raised, I enter the motel reception, which doubles as a purveyor of souvenirs most ghastly. There was a faint, nasty smell about the place… I should have fled, but as I said I was tired and had set my heart on seeing Sauble beach. Yes there was a vacancy, but only a family cottage, two bedrooms, and it would cost me $125 for the night. Shit that’s a lot, but as I said, I was tired. It turns out to be identical to the Caseville cottage (I guess there was a factory once upon a time that manufactured these for motels) except that this one is very run down, very grubby and there is no air conditioner at all.    

Sauble Beach

I decide to shower then head down to the beach area for dinner. Showering is less than pleasant as the shower cubicle is so rickety that I feel in danger of the thing collapsing on me. Water runs freely onto the ancient linoleum floor and the smell of rotting timber and bacteria permeates the bathroom.  Oh yes, and they don’t supply towels or soap, I had the foresight to pack the latter and dry myself with a T-shirt. I am not an economist (who would want to admit to being a dismal scientist since 2008 anyway), but I took two economics courses way back in my first youth, so I know that price is a poor indicator of value. It is about supply and demand, and right now the power is in the hands of the supply side, but it is odd that by far the worst place I have stayed in on this trip is the most expensive, nearly DOUBLE the price of the best.

Just the sort of place I would choose to add permanent decorative marks to my person 

Sauble Beach, on closer inspection, is not in the same league as St. Ignace or even Caseville, but I suppose it is catering for a much younger set than me. It reminds me a little of Durban Beach of my youth, lots of little shops selling plastic crap and beach wear. For Canadians, think Clifton Street Niagara Falls, too tacky for my taste. I decide to try the Red Road Café and Grill for dinner, it’s a little away from the main activities and right on the beach, but it turns out they are full as they have closed the verandah due to a gale force wind that is now blowing.  I walk back along the beach and get to see actual breakers crashing on the beach. In the end I just get a pizza and take it back to my smelly, expensive cabin to eat, I make it there moments before the sky opens and a thunderstorm of note gets going. At least it cuts the humidity down to bearable levels.

Actual breakers

Your point is? You serve ice-cream from a window.

Plastic crap and beach wear for sale

In the morning I eat the last slice of pizza, cold and congealed, but still a great (albeit unhealthy) breakfast and then walk down to the lake shore for a last gaze out over the water. I know that I may catch a brief glimpse of the lake when I go through Owen Sound, but this is my official farewell. I dry the saddle with the T-shirt, put on the rain suit as it’s now cool and threatening to rain some more, and head out. Sauble Beach disappointed on many levels, but I am sad to be riding with the lake behind me.

Shades of Durban beach circa 1970

I cross County Road 10 at Hepworth and close the loop, once around Lake Huron. The trip is done and I want to be home for lunch, but there will be more, and I’ll keep writing about them. 

More or less the route  about 1850 Km. 

Day Four

I unhitched my bag from the passenger seat and carry it in to the cabin. For $80 I get a two bedroom cabin with bathroom, not recently updated, but well maintained, clean bright and neat. The only downside is an air-conditioning unit that will give a Go Train diesel locomotive a run for its money on the noise making front and when set to the lowest power and on the cusp of producing hot air, pours out a stream of frigid air that turns the hot humid room to the inside of an igloo in seconds. Later on I solve this by sleeping in the second bedroom and leave the door open just a teeny bit, enough to defeat the clammy warmth and moderate the noise sufficient to get a good night’s rest. But that is still in the future, I unpack my bag, shower and dress in clean, if very creased clothes.

The Cabin 

A word about the bag. I have discovered that despite the apparent look of spaciousness of the saddle bags, they actually don’t carry very much and are impractical as luggage - I don’t fancy to have to carry my delicates (ha, ha, I love that word) and other bits, from the bike, in my hands. I bought this square, faux leather and nylon little number from Royal Distributors in Innisfil, for about $100. It can fit on your passenger seat, or luggage rack, probably on your rear mudguard or hang off a sissy bar, and despite its small size seems to accommodate a huge amount of stuff. It’s amazing, like the horn of plenty, but in reverse. It comes with these really cool straps that work with Velcro… so easy, loop around a convenient bar, pull tight and push the two sides together and the Velcro grips and hold. Brilliant, sometimes technology really does comes through.  

Feeling somewhat rejuvenated, I pour myself a small Scotch from a bottle bought at a shop, designated a “party shop” at one of my rest stops along the way.  I cool it with ice from the fridge thoughtfully put there by the proprietor, and relax outside, have a small party for one. That is something I do like about the US (and Quebec), none of this LCBO bullshit, the evil liquor is available for sale where ever and whenever you want and a bit of competition keeps the price of this vice within reach of your average Joe.

The sun is still high in the sky even though it is almost 7 p.m. and it’s hot. I grab my camera, douse myself in insect repellant and take a walk to the beach. This is a very real beach with acres of yellow sand, girls in bikinis catching the last of the sun, someone paragliding, people swimming and life guards. Beach front homes to the right of the public beach where some affluent looking kids are putting a pile of logs together in preparation for a bonfire, this could be Florida or California or Cape Town (except of course in four months’ time it will be bloody freezing here.) I take some pictures and sit on the beach and stare out over the lake. What it is with people and a piece of water, funny isn’t it, it draws us like a magnet. Eventually the emptiness in my stomach overcomes the attraction of the lake and I walk to the Riverside Roadhouse recommended by the hostess at the motel. http://www.riversideroadhousecaseville.com/

Real Beach Stuff

Her faith was not misplaced, I had a well prepared meal of shrimp followed by a Portobello mushroom sandwich and a few pints of a local beer in a convivial atmosphere. Finally I waddled back to my cabin at the Rainbow Motel, day three blues dispelled, and fall into a deep dreamless sleep, the Go train diesel loco in the next room didn’t bother me at all.

Day four. I hit the road early, plan to breakfast in Port Austin, there is a long ride ahead. I am toying with the idea of making it all the way home.

 After breakfast the road moves inland again, but I settle in quickly and enjoy the ride. I feel good, in control, which of course is a little bit of a fallacy. I have learned that when you ride a bike things can change from great to pretty bloody awful in the space of milliseconds. An oncoming car drifting into your lane, driven by an asshole texting on a cell phone, for instance…last year I had just such an underpants soiling moment. Even an indecisive squirrel can cause a serious problem or a sharp object deflating a tire. Let’s face it, an incident that likely would only be an inconvenience if you were in a car can be fatal on a motorcycle. Of course I don’t dwell on this for long, perhaps it’s the danger that adds to the intensity of the experience. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with us, our ancient ancestors lived on the edge every moment of everyday, and we miss that in our safe suburban little lives. We evolved to thrive on danger and adrenaline, now we play video games, golf and corporate politics or pop pills…or if we are lucky we get to ride motorcycles, ski or skydive, you get what I’m saying?  Anyway I love riding this machine, but there are moments when my inexperience makes me just want to cringe in embarrassment, sometimes embarrassed by the danger I put myself in.

There are two things in particular that for some reason I constantly screw-up. Firstly not cancelling the indicator after a turn. Now I want to pose this question to Suzuki - really you couldn’t add $150 to the price and automate that? You know that a dead motorcyclist is not the sort of motorcyclist that buys your new model. It is the single biggest complaint I have about the Boulevard and seriously might get me to buy a different brand next time that actually has this fairly rudimentary feature. Come guys if this were a British bike I could understand, but you make cars that virtually park themselves,  a little automatic indicator cancel feature should be standard. The second thing is sooo stupid, I have practiced this and tried to drive it into my head from the beginning, but still I screw up. Coming to a complete stop before putting the bike into 1^stgear. I have tried to cross busy intersections, from an uphill start, in fifth gear, for goodness sake… just awful, really bloody awful.  

The road swings closer to the lake, and its forest on my right, lake on the left, it’s clear and bright and the sun bounces off the water. The forest has changed character from predominantly conifer to mostly deciduous - maples, ashes and oaks… here and there I spot a few leaves starting to turn colour, but I pretend not to notice, the fall is not something I feel like contemplating right now. 

My mood is good, my ass is holding up better than on other days, even my throttle hand is good, I wish this would go on forever. But of course it doesn’t, forest turns to parking lot and lake to Walmart, Sarnia arrives without warning. I take the motorway and cross the bridge into Canada, “Your majesty, your faithful, humble servant has returned.”

I could make it to Newmarket before dark, it would be a hard ride on mostly 400 series motorways, but that’s not the decider. I’m just not ready to end the ride. I leave Highway 402 by way of County Road 27 and then onto County Road 7 or Lakeshore Road – North East to Sauble beach – going home will be stuff of tomorrow. 

Quiet little drinking village with a fishing problem

If you are from South Africa, think Fish Hoek or Simon’s Town, North America, Corpus Christi or Sarasota. St Ignace, Michigan was a nice surprise. Loads of hotels and motels right on the beach, place to walk next to the water, parks, marina, harbor, some really nice restaurants and pubs. This would be a great alternative summer beach break much closer to home than the ocean.

Once I’d settled in the room at the Village Inn, and showered away the grime of the day I decided to take a short ride through the town, naked, in a manner of speaking. Well my head was naked and it was the least amount of clothing I have ever worn to ride my bike, short trousers, short sleeve shirt, and running shoes. My usual attire is jeans (I don’t wear chaps, but I’ll talk about that on another post), boots, mesh biking jacket, leather gauntlets and a modular full face helmet. It was late afternoon and still pretty hot and humid, helmets are not required in Michigan and I’d seen plenty of other bikers wearing less, particularly the women, spaghetti straps, miniskirts and sandals were not uncommon. At first I feel very vulnerable and nothing sounds quite right, does changing gears really sound that loud? With the wind in my bald patch, I start to relax and feel a bit Dennis Hopper, bad ass and free, but although it was fun, I was relieved to park the bike without having fallen off. Tempting fate is not recommend and coming off at any speed without proper gear can only be a lot more painful than necessary. As an aside, I have heard that the states that allow biking without helmets do so because it is considered cheaper and better for society to have a biker, post-accident, to be known as an organ donor rather than disabled. Cynical… perhaps.

 Yours truly , feeling Dennis Hopper, looking more Jack Nicholson 

Dinner is on a patio overlooking the lake – spicy blackened lake whitefish, a wonderful salad and potato wedges, washed down with a couple of pints of Blue Moon wheat beer. The Star Line ferry boats shooting plumes of water make quite a sight. I noticed that the flag is flying half-mast and enquire at the Star Line Ferry ticket office, “Lieutenant Governor passed.” Man these Yankees are proper!  

Not my picture, I couldn't seem to get the plume in the picture 

 I spend a comfortable night at the Village Inn, the room is bright, fresh and newly renovated and leave in the morning after breakfasting on fresh warm muffins and coffee. The coffee could have been stronger, but here in North America the folks seem to be happy with monkey’s piss rather than coffee, I deal with it.

No arguments from me, especially the chewing (chewing comes with spitting!)

First stop is gas. I suppose that I am a little paranoid, but I don’t like to go far when the fuel indicator shows two bars (full equals 5 bars empty is 0 bars) and now it displayed only one bar. It’s not a terribly accurate fuel gauge, but it is a whole lot better than nothing. Helena’s Harley Davidson has no fuel gauge at all, now that would engage my paranoia big time and I would become, with gas stations, as my dickey prostate has made me with public washrooms, never pass one un-visited. Tank full, five bars showing and I hit the road, Lake Huron on my left as it has been since Owen Sound. Over the Mackinac Bridge, just awesome… I mentioned I like bridges, especially suspension bridges, this one is a duzie.  

Also not my picture - great bridge though

Through Mackinaw City (City? Really...more like teeny village), pick up Highway 23 and follow the lakeshore going east. It’s a great ride, pavement in excellent condition, paved shoulders and not too much traffic. I’ve worked out a reasonable system for translating KPH to MPH that does not involve too much mental arithmetic - the advent of calculators just as I was becoming an accountant put an abrupt end to the development of that particular skill. The system works like this, 50 MPH is equal to 80 KPH, so 55 MPH is about 90, 60 is 100, 70 is therefore 115. On the slower scale if 50 MPH is 80 KPH, then 25 MPH must be 40 KPH, 30 is about 50 and 35 is about 60. That pretty much covers the range, except of course that nobody gives a rat’s ass for the limits, and traffic speed is generally at least 20 KPH over the limit, except inside the towns. I travel through lots of forest on my right, but there seems to be a good deal of housing between the road the lake, holiday cottages, mile after, mile after, mile of them.

This leads me to a short Chautauqua – the cottage discussion. When I was growing up we had a saying, “do not cut a stick for your own ass.” (It worked better in Afrikaans, “Moenie ‘n riet vir jou eie gat pluck nie.”) I suspect that buying a cottage is a terribly romantic idea, but is ultimately the equivalent of cutting the proverbial stick for your own ass. Some Torontonians take this concept to heart… throughout the summer every Friday evenings they sit in traffic jams for hours crawling their way to the cottage, where they spend half the weekend fixing shit and mowing, then another traffic jam all the way home on Sunday. Now these particular cottages, next to Lake Huron, are wedged between the lake (wonderful) and highway 23 where trucks, cars and assholes on noisy bikes are zooming past at 110 KMH. Anyway, I think cottages are for people that can’t ride motorcycles.

Lunch at Rogers City, a little early, but the muffins don’t last as well as I had hoped.  Hamburger at the Harbor Café – kiosk really, Rogers City does not make that much of the waterfront, but the food is okay and I don’t stop for long. Main thing is to be able to see the lake when I eat… growing really fond of this piece of water.    

Water lilies in the marina. 

After lunch the day starts to drag a bit, day three and I am feeling tired, a little lonely and damn, my ass hurts, saddle sore is not just for cowboys. It’s not just my ass, my right hand on the throttle gets so numb I completely lose any feel…not good. Endless green and the road is way too straight, I start to   lose concentration, you may think that it’s not possible to fall asleep riding a bike, believe me, it is entirely possible. I stop and drink both cans of Red Bull that have been in my saddle bags from the very beginning, essential supplies on any long ride.

I’d sort of planned to stop for the night at Bay City, it seems a nice small city, bit like Newmarket where I live, lovely old city centre, but with garish periphery of strip malls with the template shops you find in every town in North America, Walmart, McDonalds, Home Depot, Crysler/Ford/GM, etc. etc. – there really is ‘nothing new under the sun’. (Ecclesiastes 1:4-11). I decide not to stop and push on, now on highway 25, looking for another St. Ignace.

The road leaves the lake shore and I pass through farmlands, pretty much the same sort of landscape I ride through on my Saturday and Sunday rides. Jedi like, I feel the presence of the lake a few miles away to my left, but for many miles I don’t even get a glimpse of it. It’s getting late and I’m getting tired, but I don’t see anywhere to spend the night. Finally I reach Caseville and the Rainbow Motel. Another great find. 

Thank You Murray

Webbwood was only the start of what turned out to be a really superb ride. Highway 17, is the Trans Canadian Highway, reasonably busy, but the pavement is in pretty good shape. (Note to my South African friends - here in North America the word ‘pavement’ refers to the road, assuming it is paved, and not the ‘sidewalk’, as it is used in South Africa. So the joke, keep death off the roads and drive on the pavement does not work very well here.) The route takes you through some farmland, but mainly forests, mostly conifer type species - spruce, pines and probably cedar - here and there are broad leafed species, but I am no tree expert and I don’t get to look closely enough. Though I don’t see much of Lake Huron, there is plenty of water, including the Spanish River – which apparently gets its name (also the lovely town of Espanola) from French exploders encountering Spanish speaking Ojibwa in the area that had learned Spanish from a Spanish woman they had captured on a raid to the south. I took a short detour at Deans Lake Road, over a single lane bridge and explored the area for a half hour or so, stunning, with some of the most picturesque farming scenes.

Bridge on Deans Lake Road 

From Highway 17

My next door neighbour, he rides a Goldwing, suggested that at Bruce Mines I should take the 638. Well, all I can say is “Thank you Murray”, I think that short ride may have been the best stretch of the whole trip. The pavement is in good condition albeit grainy and a bit too much gravel on some of the corners for my likening – I came off last year thanks to gravel on the road, fortunately I was doing about 10 K.P.H and no harm done, but now I am super aware of gravel on corners. But other than that, really great road, with lots of bends. But take care, some of these you would not want to take at 100 or even 40, also passed a horse drawn carriage, this is Amish country. Had one great moment when I rode behind a raptor (I don’t know what it was, it had a wingspan of at least 2½ foot and was brown with black markings on the wings) that was flying about 20 foot up, following the road. I accompanied it for at least 300 metres, when it decided that was enough and flew off over the forest.

Rest Stop on Trans Canadian 

All good things must come to an end, the 638 crossed the Trans Canadian a short distance from Sault Ste. Marie, where it had become double lane highway. I don’t know why, but somehow I had it in my mind that Sault Ste. Marie or ‘Soo’ as the locals refer to it, is a charming city, with roots in a French past – in my mind I’d conjured up images of Trois-Rivières in Quebec - that sat on the junction of Lake Superior and Lake Huron. No Dice, it reminded me of Vaughan (for the South Africans, read Germiston).  It was a bit earlier than expected, so I rode around the city a bit in search of the charm I was sure (still am a bit) was there, just hiding from me. Eventually I gave up and lunched on a chicken wrap and a diet Pepsi at a soulless chicken wing franchise and headed for the US border and the State of Michigan.

Over a great bridge (I love bridges), a few questions at the border post to establish that I actually was who a pretended to be and off onto the Interstate 75. Initially you don’t notice any difference between Canada and the US, even the road signs look the same. “Maximium 70” identical, mind you that does seem awfully slow for a two lane highway. Of course they mean MILES per hour and all the angry eyes you have been getting from motorists is explained. I travel for a few more miles at about 120 KPH, but still the traffic speed is way past that. I decided that there must be a more pleasant route, exist the motorway and find the H63 that runs parallel to interstate, nice road, lovely forest nearly all the way and fairly empty of traffic. I settle into the ride.

I must confess that I like Americans (or as George W. calls them, Merikuns) and I like to visit their country. I have found them to be friendly (of course I haven’t been to New York, so this opinion may change) and self-confident in a nice inclusive way. They will strike up a conversation with you while you are pumping gas and seem genuinely interested in what you say to them. They may be pig ignorant about the rest of the world, but they know what’s happening in their neck of the woods and they are willing to tell you about it. There are some things that they really do extremely well, like the roads and rest stops. The roads are really well maintained and well built, the same class of highway in Canada has soft shoulders, in the US will have paved shoulders and seems to be repaved at shorter intervals. Of course this is just an observation and may not stand up to scrutiny. Rest stops are immaculate. There seems to be a prosperity there, at least in the parts that I have visited, that is palpable. Things are definitely cheaper so your $ does go further. I could go on for several pages on the good stuff, but that is not what this blog is about.

That said, I don’t want to live there. There are some things that all the prosperity in the world doesn’t compensate for. Their politics are driven by three things that cause them, as a nation, to follow some very destructive courses of action. These are, worship of might, worship of wealth and worship of God.

Sometimes these three all act together and results in the US version of gun boat diplomacy that has been foreign policy since World War II, to mention a few examples, Korean War, Vietnam, Bay of Pigs, Afghanistan, Panama and Iraq and use of drones to hit targets in countries they are not at war with. The list is not exhaustive and the catalogue of human suffering that is the result is just unbearable to contemplate. Sometimes the worship of ‘might’ is enough. The gun control laws are a case in point. The availability of really lethal weapons to any old Joe or Jo, is mind numbingly stupid and the resulting catalogue of human suffering is also unbearable to contemplate. Mass killings at schools is only the tiniest tip of the iceberg, family murders, gun accidents, gang shootings and so on. Take the guns away and 95% of this becomes history. When the right to bear arms was put into the constitution they were thinking of single shot front loaders that were lethal up to 150 metres and pretty darn inaccurate at that. Now we have 9mm machine pistols and assault rifles in the hands of some very immature people and the politicians are unable to pass sensible laws because the people worship the might of guns. The worship of God has become a problem because they are blurring the separation of church and state. So they throw millions (yes millions) of people into prison for marijuana related offences, not because marijuana is actually bad, alcohol is worse on many levels, but because the godly think smoking pot is a sin. Anyway enough Chautauqua.     

My plan was to stop at St. Ignace for gas, cross the bridge and pick up the 23 and look for somewhere to stay for the night, but riding through the town changed my mind. A real seaside town, just on a lake, but as I am discovering Lake Huron is more like a sea than a lake anyway.  The Village Inn had a very pleasant room for me at a mere $65 that included muffins and coffee for breakfast.

   The Village Inn