We did not do a lot a riding today. We took the motorcycle to the Canadian side of Niagara Falls to check out the sites an some of the tourist trap things. We ended the day riding the Maid of the Mist boat up to the falls… and that is where we got wet today!
Tomorrow we hit the road again. The plan is to travel up the coast of Lake Ontario then inland to Lake Placid. So for now here are some random picks from today!
Rolling out of Eire, PA we headed north along the Lake Erie coast on Route 5
(The Seaway Trail, an American Byway Seaway Trail, an American Byway). We made an assumption that this part of our motorcycle vacation would be along the coast. It was a great ride in good weather, for a change, but the road is not directly on the coast so that was a bit disappointing. For the most part you only see Lake Eire a few times.
Along Route 5 we stopped at several locations including a couple
lighthouses. The one thing that really surprised me was the amount of vineyards along the road. There was miles upon miles of grape vines, thousands of acres. This day’s ride, along route 5, has been our best, so far, for this year’s motorcycle vacation.
After a few hours we riding the motorcycle through the cool mid-morning we decided to take a side trip over to Gowanda Harley Davidson. Talk about being in the middle of know where, this is one of the most remote Harley dealerships we have been.
Riding out from that dealership I set the GPS to take us to Buffalo Harley Davidson. Unlike the past, the last update to the “infotainment system” seems 
to have fixed the problem of the GPS not quite finding the dealerships but, there are still some problems like the road showing up in Lake Erie. If you follow me on FaceBook you know I collect the dealership pins but Buffalo HD was sold out, dang!
After we checked into the hotel, and clocking 900 miles, we decided to ride down to the American side of the falls. BIG MISTAKE…not to check the 
weather radar. About half way to the falls we could see rain in the distance and it was very clearly a heavy rain. Turning around at the first opportunity, we made a run back to the hotel…. LOL we did not make it. Quite well soaked we stopped under an overpass to wait out the storm. I am very happy that the hotel has a laundry.
After dinner we tried it again…this time we had no rain and had a good time at the falls. Tomorrow we are going to travel to the Canadian side and check out the sites. I know for a fact that we will be getting wet again tomorrow, we plan on taking the boat ride to under the falls!
Today we started the second leg of our 2017 motorcycle vacation. If you missed the first day’s wrap up you can check out our ride across US Route 50 here.
Yes, todays 2nd leg of the vacation is subtitled correctly we rode in the rain…quite a bit. We delayed our start time leaving Debbie’s dad’s home for more than an hour waiting for the rain to end. That worked, to some level, as the morning rain ended but there was a lot of road spray. Wearing rain gear was mandatory all day.
About three damp, dreary hours later we arrived at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, OH. After spending about 2 hours walking thorough the very cool exhibits and videos we began getting weather alerts on our phones. Based on the projections we decided we had time to grab lunch at the hall before hitting the road. The hall has a small café (the entire facility is smaller then what I expected) that has three separate food preparation stations each with a menu from a famous chief, although I did not know any of them. Debbie ordered a BLT (Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato sandwich)…check out what she received LOL.
One thing of surprising interest to me was that there were 2 motorcycles on display plus pictures of rock stars on bikes were scattered throughout the hall. One of the motorcycles is a custom trike from the Elvis Presley collection and one owned by John Mellencamp.
Not forgetting the pending thunderstorm we quickly finished the lunch and got to the motorcycle. We made it just in time for the storm’s leading edge to make itself known. By the time we got the rain suits on, the bike mounted and on the road the thunder boomer was at full power. I attempted to find a place to pull off but when I did I noticed that every window in the homes and businesses were fully barred. That and some other noticeable clues told me to move on, which we did. This was some tricky riding, there was at least ½ inch of rain on the highway, big trucks and merging cars everywhere!
After about 30 minutes the rain let up and we picked up our pace. The plan was to make it to Erie, PA for the night. Tomorrow we are going to ride the coast of Lake Erie up to Niagara Falls. I hope that the forecasted rain is not as bad as it was today!
I have been taking my wife to some of the great cities of the old world. Last year I was able to take her to Lisbon and Damascus. Two years ago we rode the motorcycle to Paris.
Not sure where we will ride the motorcycle to next… but you can count on her getting to London and Glasgow sometime soon.
We started our motorcycle vacation today. We left the house about 8AM and headed out to Ohio on our Harley Davidson Ultra Limited. Our, path for all but a few miles on day one, is via US Route 50.
We picked up Route 50 just a few miles south of Leesburg, VA. I have to say that Route 50 from this point to our endpoint is a fantastic motorcycle ride. In Virginia you ride through horse and wine county (I quite counting vineyards and wineries at 15). In fact in Middleburg we saw folks preparing their horses for a jumping contest (I am sure there is a proper name for this contest, but I do not know what it is) there were dozens of horses and riders milling about. My wife said she thought it was called “Trials”, to which I replied then they are all guilty!
Shortly after crossing into WV you head into the Appalachian Mountains. These mountain roads are some twisty fun for a motorcycle! Swooping around turns, quick climbs and steep descents (up to a 9% grade) with spectacular views from the mountain tops and rolling farmland in the valleys make this a route, in my opinion, as much fun as any of the roads around the Tail of the Dragon. By the way I dragged the floorboards of the bike a few times without even trying!
I had forgotten that Route 50 passed into Maryland for a few miles so today we traveled in 4 states. When we left Maryland and rode the motorcycle back into WV Route 50 also became the Northwestern Turnpike one of America’s Byways. Stopping for lunch and gas in the little town of Grafton, WV we ate a McDonalds, which had to be one of the least clean stores we had been in…unfortunately I did not notice this until after we had received our food.
We did make a side trip to Cairo … I am still taking my wife to all the great cities of the old world, via motorcycle. I was able to get her to Lisbon and Damascus last year. Athens is next on the list!
The first day of our vacation motorcycle trip is now over. 315 miles through some of the best country for motorcycle riding. I highly recommend this part of Route 50 to anyone passing through WV, MD or VA. OHHH… for got to mention, that per Standard Operating Procedure, we got wet in a thunderstorm!!! Storm Chaser powers ACTIVATE!
Several posts ago I wrote an article about the wife and I trying to decide where to take our “motorcycle vacation”. I called it “Where Oh Where do we go ride?”, well now we know! We are going to tour New England on our motorcycle.
It took a while but we settled on touring the Northeastern states via the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and Niagara Falls. We are not going to be in any big hurry so as we travel along we will stop at anything that catches our attention. We are planning to stop and visit Lake Placid (home of the Olympics), Mount Washington and Bar Harbor, Maine.
We are also going to make sure we get to every New England state. That way we can check them off our motorcycle touring map!
So in a few weeks you should start seeing post about our motorcycle vacation. If you have any thoughts about places/things or roads that we should consider drop them in the comments below. New England is not an area either of us have been to before.
This year Debbie and I chose not to ride into the city to partake of the Rolling Thunder main event. We had went for several years so there was no great interest in doing it again this year. BUT I did attend a pre-Roling Thunder event and assisted our local HOG (Harley Owners Group) chapter with the marshalling of motorcycles for the police escorted ride from Frederick to the Pentagon.
Saturday was the pre-Rolling Thunder event at Washington Harley Davidson. Not only is it a collection of vendors of all types (t-shirts, food, parts and accessories) it is the site of the official Harley Davidson Owners Group Pin Stop. Harley Davidson Pin Stops are a half dozen or so events in which Harley Davidson gives out commemorative pins to the HOG members. Each one is different for each event. If you follow my FaceBook page each week I post one or two dealer or other pins and several of the pin stop pins are pictured.
While this is only a SWAG I think there were more motorcycles at this year’s v. last year’s pin stop. The parking lots were mostly full when I arrived and, unlike last year, still full when I left. The ride to the event was a Frederick Harley Davidson HOG club ride.
STORM CHASER POWERS ACTIVATE! About 15 bikes left that morning from
STORM CHASER!
the dealership under misty, overcast conditions, within 15 minutes the mist turned to full rain and stayed on us for more than half of the ride. Guess what! On the ride back we left a partial cloudy site and again got wet, although for a much shorter frame. Some days, when I ride my motorcycle, I just seem to attract bad weather.
Sunday morning I rolled out of my warm bed, shared by my wife, our dog and myself, and was out the door before 5:30AM. The HOG chapter was assisting the Frederick Harley Davidson dealership with the staging and marshaling of motorcycle going to Rolling Thunder.
There are two groups of motorcycle riders who participate in Rolling Thunder. Those that go to the Pentagon (the starting point for the parade) and those that do not go to the Pentagon. That second group seems to always be nearly identical in size to those that go to the Pentagon. This group typically rides into the city and then parks along the parade route to watch the motorcycle pass by.
By ten minutes after 8:00AM all the bikes were out and on their way to the either the Pentagon or somewhere else. There were just at 300 bikes assembled at the dealership. Nearly every bike brand was represented, I saw Triumph, BMW, Indian, Victory, Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki, there may have been others but those are the ones I recall.
It took just a bit over 5 minutes to get all those bikes on the road (see video below). A short while later we have all the signs, coffee, doughnuts and other stuff gathered and put away. The parking lot looked like nothing had ever happened. 365 days until the next Rolling Thunder.
Spring has sprung across the world (in the northern hemisphere), and riders are starting to come back out in force. Despite my near-debilitating seasonal allergies this is one of my favorite times of year! Nothing gets me psyched up like the first Sunday that it’s warm enough to ride after winter where I’m pretty sure every person that owns a motorcycle where I live is out! (Side note: motorcycles are out in much greater numbers on Sunday compared to Saturday around me, is that true for anyone else?) The strong sense of community, camaraderie, and kinship I feel on a warm (or at least not cold!) spring day is part of why I love riding so much.
But motorcycling isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. As we all come out of our winter cocoons to spread our wings on the road, it is important to remember that motorcycling is not without its fair share of danger. In many parts of the world, four-wheeled motorists still are not properly trained to accommodate us on the road.
TIPS FOR YOU TO KEEP YOURSELF SAFE
Make Sure Your Bike is Properly Maintained
I will probably do a whole post just on this in the future, but motorcycle maintenance is much more frequent than cars and very, very important. I’m only going to touch on two items today as I feel they are the most overlooked maintenance tasks, and they both pertain to your chain.
Maintain your chain! That’s a refrain I’ve heard across the internet in regards to proper bike maintenance. Chain-driven bikes are the single most common type of bike, and the chain is pivotal in making everything work, yet so many people neglect to take care of it. If you don’t properly care for your chain you could one day find yourself riding down the road on a sunny afternoon one minute and on the ground the next because your chain jumped off the rear sprocket and locked up the bike. This is a worst-case scenario, but it does happen. Here are two simple tasks you can perform to help prevent that:
Regularly monitor your chain’s slack. Slack allows your motorcycle’s chain to adjust as your back wheel bounces up and down on the road. Every motorcycle has a recommended chain slack, and it’s usually even printed on the bike’s swing arm (if you have a swing arm bike) or somewhere else near the chain. You want to keep your bike’s chain slack within the manufacturer recommended specifications so your chain has enough slack to adjust as needed, but not so much that it can fly off the sprocket.
Lube your chain. I’ve heard many people say “I lube my chain and change my oil at the start of every season” not realizing that while that’s fine for your oil, chains need to be lubed much more frequently. Most manufacturers I’ve seen recommend lubing your chain every 500 miles, but the usual common accepted practice among owners is about 500-1000 miles. I commute 450 miles a week for work, so I just lube my chain every weekend regardless. It takes 5 minutes and could save your life. Finally, lube your chain EVERY TIME after you ride in the rain. That’s right, every time, even if you just lubed it before riding that day. Rain cleans your bike, but it also washes all of that sweet, sweet lube right off the chain!
Wear A Helmet
I personally am an ATGATT type of guy, but I get that some people don’t want to go through the trouble of putting on special pants, boots, gloves, and a jacket every time they go out to ride. Motorcycling is about managing acceptable risk after all. One thing that I try my hardest to convince every rider that I meet to do, though, is wear a helmet. Broken limbs can heal, shorn skin can grow back, but a crushed skull is often 
pretty permanent. Once again, I intend to do a whole post on the topic of helmets, but for now I want to leave you with this one thought:
A friend once told me “You buy a $40 helmet for a $40 head, and a $400 helmet for a $400 head.” I really like this, it makes a lot of sense. What’s not said is you’re unique and regardless of what you think your head is worth, it’s worth so much more to someone else out there somewhere that cares about you. Every head is at least a $400 head, please protect it.
Pretend You’re Invisible
I feel this too has been said a lot, but it cannot be stressed enough. In a fight between a bike and a car / truck / whatever, the bike will lose. Every time. While it’s important for other motorists to look out for us, we also need to be looking out for ourselves. Be proactive, before passing someone consider the likelihood of them wanting to get into your lane as
you pass. Assume that they won’t see you when they consider their lane switch. And in this specific example, if there’s one thing I’ve learned about passing other motorists, do it QUICKLY. Motorcycles are in part about speed. Speed is fun. Speed can also be a lifesaving tool if used appropriately.
A note specific to intersections: intersections are the most deadly place for motorcyclists. That person in the SUV crossing the other way may have looked you dead in the eye from your perspective, but odds are good they didn’t even see you. They’re not trained to. Proceed into intersections with the utmost caution; make sure you are aware of every car within visible distance of the intersection. And only proceed through once you’re 100% sure no one is going to cut you off, and do it QUICKLY (see the theme here?)
So those are just a few quick tips to stay safe throughout the riding season, but wait I thought this post was about Motorcycle Awareness Month? That is a very astute observation, and absolutely correct! Which brings me to the second part of this post…
Put a “WATCH FOR MOTORCYCLES” Decal on Your Car
Bumper stickers and decals are annoying, I get it, but how many random things have you gotten stuck in your head because you were stuck behind someone with one at a stop light? If you ride a motorcycle you owe it to yourself to put one of these on your car. This is one decal that could actually save a life. In the United States, the MSF gives out these stickers pretty often at the end of their courses, (that’s how I got mine) but if you don’t want to go through that, and don’t want to go through the hassle of looking up where to find one, here’s a couple direct Amazon links to both a high-visibility one depicting a cruiser and a standard black and white one featuring a sport bike. I recommend getting the high-vis, but if you are the type of person who absolutely can’t stand the idea of having a cruiser stuck on your car, I understand.
Talk to Non-Riders About Riding
Depending on who you are this may either be a no-brainer or easier said than done. Motorcycle awareness starts with you and the people around you. For some non-riders talking about riding could be difficult as the fact that you ride worries them, and thinking about it makes it worse. I am writing this tip for those types of people in your life. Do your best to let them know that if they truly worry, then the best thing they can do is talk with you about it, and learn better how to share the road with motorcyclists. Every non-rider that listens and learns is a step toward a safer world for motorcyclists. With any luck that one person will then educate other people when the topic inevitably comes up among four-wheel motorists every Spring.
This second part is specifically for those of you with kids. I used to always play a game with my friends called “Yellow Car”, which, as you might expect, is played by saying, “yellow car!” before anyone else when you see a yellow-colored car. As a kid on long trips, my family would try to find as many different states’ license plates as we could before getting to our destination. These games are silly, but they also teach very important observation skills. For example, I can spot yellow cars in my sleep now. So when you’re on the road with kids, play “Motorcycle” where the first person to yell (or say, but it usually turns into excited yelling) “Motorcycle!” as one goes by gets a point! This will not only keep them entertained, but will teach them a very important skill once they grow up and become licensed drivers: they’ll be able to spot a motorcycle from a mile away.
Join SyncRIDE
SyncRIDE is actually the inspiration for this whole article! EatSleepRIDE is hosting SyncRIDE on May 27th to raise motorcycle awareness. It’s a worldwide synchronized ride. No matter where you are at 10 AM EDT, just turn on your EatSleepRIDE app, (if you have a smartphone) and go for a ride with thousands of other riders! As long as they continue it next year, I foresee SyncRIDE becoming a annual event for riders with the ability to create some real awareness.
And if you live in the Lancaster, PA area, hit me up at readysetmoto@gmail.com! I’m trying to coordinate a group ride around here for the event as well!
What other things do you think we as riders can do to raise awareness and create safer motorways? Let me know in the comments!
Michael Morris is a motorcycle enthusiast living in the middle of Amish Country Pennsylvania. He runs and owns the motorcycle blog and news site www.ReadySetMoto.com. When not working on his blog, he loves to interact with fellow motorcyclists on Twitter (@ReadySetMoto) and Facebook (facebook.com/Ready-Set-Moto) as well so drop him a line!
I have just completed reading the latest book from Lois Pryce, “Revolutionary Ride”, recording her solo motorcycle expedition to and through Iran. The book vividly recounts her story of finding the truth about the “real” Iran while also accounting to why some of the stereotypes of the theocratic regime exists. All in all a well-balanced story of modern Iran while also a great motorcycle adventure story!
Lois Pryce at Timonium Motorcycle Show 2017
While I thoroughly enjoyed the writing style and prose in her last book, Revolutionary Rides is even more polished. At many points in the book I could sense Lois’ excitement of the moment and of the people she met. Her story telling ability also allowed me to feel the palpable trepidation and fear when things went askew.
Regardless of your affinity for motorcycles this is a good adventure story. You will be doing yourself a disservice should you not purchase and read Lois Pryce’s latest effort. I am giving Revolutionary Ride five stars.
This is the second of her books that I have read. Check out my review of “Red Tape & White Knuckles”.
Struggling to decide where to ride or tour on your motorcycle in the coming season? How about the two following websites to help generate some ideas.
The first site is a repeat of one from an earlier post. A few years ago I wrote about a website that could help you plan some cool motorcycle tours. This site by the Federal Highway Administration (can you believe that the federal government got a website right?) is called the American Byways. America’s Byways is an interactive, map based, website that will provide you a listing of each of the 150 different roads. Those roads are comprised of the National Scenic Byways and All-American Roads. You can select the road from a national or state map to see basic information on the road (length, average time to travel the road and historical background) as well as route maps, directions and photos.
Interactive map of American Byways
The second website to help you pick some motorcycle rides or destinations is “Only in Your State”. With this website you can find some out of the way or quirky places that you may never even heard or read about near your home. For example, here in Virginia, this website recommends the “Southern Virginia’s Donut Trail Is Everything You’ve Dreamed Of And More”. So the saying “Ride to eat. Eat to ride” fits in well.
There are a lot of other websites like this out on the ‘ole interwebs. If you have one that you like to use when it comes to finding a destination for motorcycle ride, tour or destination please share in the comments below!!!
I JUST WANT 2 RIDE!! 