CC48 Day 1 (Tuesday 9/6/2011)

The waking hour arrived at 3:30 a.m. and it was raining and dreary. Oh well, everything is packed and ready to go so there is no turning back. Two of my riding buddies deciced to exercise good judgement and leave tomorrow, meeting me day 2 in Silver Creek, NY and then ride with me for part of the day on Thursday. The third has business obligations and will probably not be able to join us at all. I am kind of relieved, as the last thing I want is for anyone to get hurt riding in less than desireable conditions. On the other hand, one of the members of BranchCreek, Dan Li joined me for the first day of the trip. He was all loaded up and ready to roll when I met him at his house in Harleysville. The two of us pulled out of Harleysville at 4:30 a.m in the rain. We only made it to Quakertown before we had to detour because of a bad accident on 309. The road was totally shut down. I didn't think people were even out on the roads at this time of the night. Hoping this was not an omen of things to come, we skirted around it with the aid of the GPS and were on our way. Eleven and half hours and 545 miles later we had transited the dreaded I-95 cooridor, skirted New York, visited (8) states and arrive safe and sound at Mike Ormont's home in Keene, NH. Mike is an old motorcycle friend from back in the days whe he was a resident at Jefferson Medical School. He and his wife Mary, who is also a physician, live with their two young sons here in beautiful Keene, NH. When we arrived the garage door was open and a great meal with old friends followed. Don and I did not stop to take a lot of pictures along the way today as it would have been dangerous with the weather conditions. We did take a picture in Maine to document the most northern state of this leg of the trip as well as a picture here at Mike's home. This part of New Hampshire seems to have been spared the wrath of Irene, but Vermont was not as lucky we hear. At one point on I-95 we passed a string of bucket trucks that had to number over 1,000 headed south. We don't know if they were headed home, or heading to damaged areas of CT. A quick check of the 511 highway traffic site tells us that about 15 miles of our intended Rte 9 crossing of Vermont tomorrow is washed out and closed. Oh well, head further south to Springfield, MA and pick up I-90 toward upstate NY there. Something, tells me the early part of this trip is going to be a challenge with the weather. As a coach once told me.. "challenges build character". Do you think that is why people call me a "character"? PS. the satellite tranceiver seems to be working fine, so please do follow along from the website.