Ooo, It's Saturday, this must be the USA!

By the time I turned in last night I had really had enough of the incessant whining from the nearby factory, so for the first time on this trip it was earplugs in and I slept like a baby! It’s 6.30 am as I type this and breakfast calls. Although it’s going to be fairy slim picking this morning as I finished up most of the supplies from a couple of day ago in my pork and veg curry for dinner last night. So it’s going to be Onion omelette, I even have a small pot of sour cream to go in it from my huge platter that I had on Wednesday.  I also need to check the oil and try to get the wire to the neutral light switch pushed on a bit firmer as it seems to keep slipping back and making the neutral light flash as I ride. Then it’s across that huge bridge and heading north to the St Lawrence Seaway although I don’t think I’ll get quite that far up as it’s about 650 km away.

 

I discovered something quite earth shattering today… If I don’t stop every couple of hundred yards to take photographs I get a lot further in the same amount of time. Not rocket science really is it? All in all it’s been an interesting day. Not particularly for the scenery although there was nothing wrong with that. More for my state of mind I guess! I got on the road about 9 am which seems to be becoming a bit of a habit. Bit takes me a couple of hours to get breakfast and sort my kit out at a leisurely pace, but then I’m in no rush, and I like the day to be warming up a little. The first part of the ride was fun, across the bridge into New Brunswick, then hugging the twisty coast road which was virtually traffic free. Then switched to the main Highway for about 60 miles to get some distance under my wheels. I stopped at a little roadside dinner for lunch. It was a real mum & pop types place at the back of a service station but the food  was great value and lots on offer. Being rather chilled I thought a bowl of soup on the menu sounded good. It was even better that I could have wished; a bowl of home made Clam Chouder with crackers and a roll and butter came to just $4.50 less than £2.50 ! I rounded it off with a nice hot cup off coffee at $1… Now that’s what I call value. Pondering over the map whilst I was drinking the coffee I noticed a bit of a short cut which just skimmed the corner of the USA and saved a good few miles. A Sat Nav re-programmed and a couple of miles later I took a left turn onto the 108 a much smaller and bumpier road, but great fun to ride with once again virtually no traffic save for the odd logging truck.

Wild camping is weird; when you don’t need a site you can find dozens of them, however once it get time to pull over, nothing, zilch, nada! So I tought I’d try a different tack tonight. Spotting a house all on it’s own but with a large agricultural type workshop next to, I stopped and knocked on the door an asked if I might camp in on the patch of grass opposite which was occupied by what appeared to be scrap vehicles. The woman had a quick chat with another unseen woman in the next room and BINGO I had somewhere to camp. No problem! So here I sit far enough off a very quite back road for it not to be a problem and tucked in next to a huge truck. I have been warned that there are bears in the area though !!! To be fair the guy in the workshop assures me that they aren’t a problem. They are black bears so fairly timid…I hope!

I'm just north of Grand Falls which is just about as close as you can get to the border without actually being in the USA after my highest mileage to date although still only about 460 km ! I've become a bit of a lightweight in my old age, no 1000 miles days on this trip, but time is on my side… for the moment. Oh and I got my first good soaking of the trip about an hour or so before I camped up. 

Hey Ho! I'm sure there will be a few more to come over the next few months

What a great night I had last night. Ruth, the woman that gave me the OK to camp, and her husband James invited me over after tea for a beer. I just goes to show yet again what lovely people you meet whilst on the road. James and Ruth are potato farmers with about 350 acres. They are helped on the farm by their son, the guy that was telling me about the bears, and oldest grandson. A real down to earth couple in their late 60s, it was a pleasure to be so welcomed into their home after cheekily knocking on their door! We spent a good couple of hours, doing what a couple of old codgers do best… putting the world to rights!!! I was also told invited to pop in for a coffee in the morning before leaving. That’s hospitality for you.

I stuck my head out of the tent at about 6.30 am this morning… and pulled it back in very quickly; it was gently snowing. Not enough to stick to the roads but certainly enough to make me realise it was going to be a very cold ride. I knew that I was likely to encounter extremes of weather on this trip but I didn't expect it to be on a day to day basis and within just a couple of hundred miles. So far I've had highs of 27c and lows of -2c. Today it struggled to get into double digits all day with a bitterly cold wind blowing hard straight at me.

I made a few photo stops today. Grand Falls as it name suggests has some very grand waterfalls that just had to be visited. Stopping for an early lunchtime coffee and doughnut at Tim Horton’s I spent a while studying the map and had a change of plan. If I crossed to the USA just up the road at Edmundston I could ride through the Appalachians and who knows, I might even bump into Dolly. Well it was a good idea but there don’t appear to be much in the way of roads other than highway 11. I did find a very promising dirt road running roughly in the right direction, only to be told that neither motorcycles nor RVs are allowed as it is a privately owned logging road. I tried politely pointing out that I would be riding the Dalton Highway in a few weeks and that too was basically a dirt logging road but all to no avail. So I had no option other than to turn around and back track about 25 miles and take Highway 11 south…It is a good road with not too much traffic. Certainly not an Interstate more akin to a British A road. 

As it was getting towards 4pm I was keeping my eyes open for good wild  camping prospect when I spotted a sign to a lake side camp site down a dirt road to my right. A quick u-turn and I was on my way. Calling at reception the very chirpy young lady asked “do you want to check in?” “it depends on the price” I replied. I was very pleasantly surprised to be told $18, a little under £9, so I checked in. She asked me if I had a heater for my tent at which I chuckled… Then to my amazement she said I could stay in their smaller cabin for the same price if I was happy to sleep on the futon so she didn't have to put clean covers on the bed. Happy? I was ecstatic! So here I sit looking out of my little window across the lake. Nice and warm, full of spaghetti and meatballs and as I don’t have to worry about getting eaten by a bear or being moved on by the police, I'm just about to have my first Scotch of the trip. I spotted it in a supermarket for $10.99 a bottle about £5! Bargain! Of course it might make me go blind or mad. No it can’t make me go mad… I'm already there!