home: https://starling.us/royal_star
by Ĝan Ŭesli Starling
copyright 2002
Background Info:
My favorite excuse for a motorcycle ride is to visit one of my old navy buddies. Last October I rode to Florida to visit one of my buddies from the Navy way back in 1977, Rick Veress and his wife Nancy. This year I’m riding even farther to visit another, Robert Shoeman and his wife Cindy in Couer d’Alene Idaho. I’m taking an even longer scenic route, up across the Mackinaw Bridge, across the UP, over the bridge above the Soo Locks into Canada, only then turning west. And bringing along my laptop to log my travels closer to real time.
Day One, August 3rd, 2002
Long about 9:15 on a Saturday morning I kiss my wife and son goodbye and head north from Kalamazoo, taking US131 as far as Grand Rapids. From there I switch to M37, a road I’d not yet ridden before. At first it is a bit stop-and-go with traffic lights, but only until I’m out of the vicinity of Grand Rapids which may well be Michigan’s second- or third-largest metropolitan area.
Once north of Newago it turns quite pretty as I progress into the Manistee National Forest. I don’t take any pictures here, though. The ride is just starting and I don’t care to stop and drag out the camera. Also it is close to home and I can come back anytime. Between here and Traverse City it is mostly forested. Traffic is light and slower cars all very easy to pass.
At one point I come upon a line of six or more cars backed up behind a slow-moving custom Honda trike, the gaudy kind usually piloted by senior citizens: extra lights, twin flags like dune buggies have (those for good reason) and all manner of tacked-on doodads. Come the first clear spot I pass the whole lot. I pull in ahead of the trike and turn to offer a questioning glance (tinged slightly with disapproval) and instead must give a hearty wave. Sure enough it is Mr. & Mrs. Retiree...and their dog. This actually makes the second time I’ve seen a dog on a bike. The other time wasn’t even a trike, but a regular two-wheeler with carpeting strapped over the thank. That’s a good trick, taking your dog along for the ride. I’d go a little slower too.
My short-term goal for this leg of the ride begins north of Grand Traverse Bay. I chose it on recommendation from another biker I happen to work with, Matt Denoyer, a tool and die maker and ardent Triumph fan. The road I’m seeking is M119, which I’ll come to shortly. But this is also my first time to Traverse City on a bike. So I stop by the bay for a look about, spying a schooner in the bay.
Swinging around the south end of Grand Traverse Bay I switch over to M31 and ride along the bay’s western shore, then at the top of it, along Lake Michigan’s shore. Largely it is wooded here with only a rare view of the lake until reaching Little Traverse Bay a bit further north. I’d been here once before on my trip to Cheyenne WY just two years ago.
Now I come to the south end of M119. The sign says NARROW WINDING ROAD NEXT 20 MILES. It winds up and down small hills, past wildlife, along the lake, through the woods until I get to Leg’s Inn at Cross Village.
Leg’s Inn serves mostly Polish food. Inside the decor is largely of smooth, finished driftwood. Very distinctive. Outside there is a garden overlooking the lake. I asked for a seat in the Garden, ordering golabki, a cabbage roll stuffed with meat and rice. The view from my table was very fine. So was my lunch. I call it lunch even though it is very nearly 4:00 PM.
Lunch finished, I head back to M31 by way of westbound C66. And from M31 very shortly to I75. With a quick halt for gas I’m soon across Mackinaw Bridge and into the Upper Peninsula. Previously I had turned west on US2 to ride along Lake Michigan’s northern shore. Been there, done that. So this trip I stay on I75 and continue north to the Soo Locks. At Sault Saint Marie (‘Soo’ and ‘Sault’ are pronounced the same, just like ‘Sioux’ out west.) I watch one of the ships pass through a lock with the bridge to Canada in the background.
Along the bridge I pass a line of cars waiting for entrance into the USA. A mile long at minimum it is, and not moving in the slightest. Later someone will tell me that the wait in that line is over five hours. I am dearly hoping it will not be so long as that when I re-enter from British Columbia a few days from now. Getting into Canada is not problem at all. The girl at the booth just asks a few questions and off I go.
A bit through town on the Canadian side, also named Sault Saint Marie, I find the exit I’m looking for: Route 17 which leads along the northern shore of Lake Superior. The speed limit here is rather slow. Everyone seems to blithely ignore it. And after a while, so do I. I’m not in so very much of a hurry. But having cars all the time crowd up behind is more than annoying. It is both easier and safer to go with the flow. I much prefer to have a bit of free road both before and behind. So even though I want to keep a good distance with the traffic behind, I still do not want to catch up with any traffic ahead.
A traffic anti-node is what I seek. And these are not so hard to find. I just go with the flow until it backs up behind a truck. Then I pass the whole lot of them and find a sweet spot right in the middle of the ever opening gap in front of the truck.
There comes a dilemma whenever I spy a photo opportunity. For I must surrender my spot in the anti-traffic in order to pull over for a picture. Some are worth it and others are not. I could wish for better photo weather, but it is what it is. Here there are some views of Lake Superior worth stopping to enjoy before taking off again in search of yet another null in the traffic patterns of Route 17. It is overcast and somewhat misty, off and on. I am getting just a bit cold, hoping that it may not start to rain in earnest. Some scattered drops I run into, but not enough to soak my leathers. And this being the southernmost road along the northern shore of Superior, there are no bridges affording shelter where I might don the rain suit in comfort.
I pass most every car in sight as they bunch up behind some slower car or truck. But some few cars are themselves in a hurry to pass me. If a single car gets caught behind me, sometimes I’ll reverse-pass that car. That is, in a place where a bike could pass but a car could not, I will get in the on-coming lane, slow down and wave them ahead. Forty-some minutes after the Lake Superior photo a single car passes me on the left, not waiting for me to let them by. Then, hardly seconds after passing, they come to a bend, slow down, and halt on the shoulder. They have a good reason to abandon haste. It is the sunset, which is beautiful. After going by them, I too pull off to the shoulder and take a picture. And here again I must lament the color rendering on the digital camera. The sunset in my photo is far too pastel. I remember thinking at the time that my Mavica is not going to properly record all of this deep ruby and crimson. It did not. But still a nice picture, nonetheless.
A bit further on I stop for the night at the Continental Inn motel in White River, Ontario. At the check-in desk I meet the couple who had also stopped for a pictureand then gotten ahead of me yet again. We chat about that sunset till they get the key to a room. The Continental is a very ordinary-looking motel. And there is only a double room left. But I am tired and so I take it, remembering how hard it was to find any room at all in Ontario on my last trip.
I am also hungry. And the inn has a restaurant. After unloading the bike I stroll over to grab a bite. I order the Baron of Beef french dip sandwich. It is on a nice roll, has onions too boot; and the au jus is perfect. I could have eaten a second one, it was so good. Despite the motel’s otherwise total lack of charm, that meal alone suffices to heartily recommend it.
Meal finished, I go back to my room, drag out the laptop, load in floppies from the camera and edit my photos: scale, crop, rename....save. Then it is lights out.
Day Two, August 4th, 2002
On day two of my trip I awaken to the sound of voices. Folks in the room next door are loading up their van while their kids stand around looking at my bike. It looks to be overcast and drizzly again. Beads of rain cover the bike. So after a double shot of enthusiasm from the Mr. Coffee machine, I load up the bike packing my leathers and don the rain suit.
I cruise over to the gas station for a fill up and there meet two other guys on bikes. The station is east of the motel. So they assume I have come that way and stroll over to ask me about the weather. I explain about heading west myself. And then we end up talking bikes. As often happens I get compliments on the paint job for mine. One of the guys rides a Virago. The other bike I have forgotten (many I would not recoginize so easily an any case). And one is clad in blond buckskins versus leather. I have seen jackets in buckskin but never buckskin chaps before. The pair take off ahead of me, but I catch up and pass them later on.
Just barely thirteen miles west of the station I ride out from under both the falling mist and the overcast also. And soon thereafter I stop to shrug from out of the rain suit and back into leathers. As the morning wears on I have to shed first the sweatshirt from under the jacket, then the chaps, and finally the Brooks jacket. Heat makes me itchy and sleepy (aka distracted and inattentive) both worse hazards than riding sans an extra skin. So by noontime I’ clad only in boots, jeans, T-shirt and a thin leather vest. It is a beautiful day with yesterday’s rain all but forgotten.
Route 17 through Ontario is beautiful. Were I to stop to take every photo I might like, my whole vacation will be used up before I ever reach Manitoba. Again I must complain that the rocks are reder and the water bluer than recorded by my Sony Mavica.
After one fill up I pass a blue Harley ridden by a fellow and wave to him. Actually I pass a fair number of bikes who are mostly hugging the speed limit...just barely from its lower side. I like to hug it but just a bit over. The particular thing about this fellow is that I am to meet him again.
On one of my stops to snap a photo, the blue Harley passes by and rounds a corner. Then in a minute here he comes back again. Lest he think that I am in trouble parked here beside of the road, I gesture holding a camera. He makes a U-turn and pulls up behind me, lets down the kickstand and gets out his own camera. I say hello. His name is Mike. Mike tells me that seventeen years ago he was by this same way and had put off taking a picture for on his way back. But on return it had been pissing down rain. So Mike had second thoughts about passing up the same opportunity again.
There are too many of these picturesque little lakes to halt for a photo at every one. But one in particular I too must make a U-turn for on account of its being viewed through a cut-out in the red bedrock. A sign at Ignace promises a scenic look out and so I pull off and up the semi-steep gravel road to check it out. It turns out to be only okay.
After some hours I pass out of Ontario and into Manitoba. The speed limit goes up here from 90 KPH to one hundred, which is nice. Especially nice since the view flattens out and along with it is verging toward dark so that there is little to see. Now the highway widens out into a divided four-lane. And here now do the rest of the cars even more spurn this higher limit averaging in the neighborhood of 115 KPH, which is fine by me. It is starting to drizzle on and off again.
Nearing Winnipeg it is past sunset with twilight darkening toward night. The traffic has all slowed down to very nearly the posted limit. The cars crowd me in. So I pass them a hop at a time whenever I spy a safer opening ahead. This continues until drawing very near to the city, where I observe the inspiration for the sudden onset of law abidingness among all these former speed demons (some of who’s cars I recognize for having passed me in a great whoosh not so long ago). It is a Manitoba Highway Patrol car. I am going five over when I spy it in the right lane some half dozen cars ahead. Come the first red light there is nothing for me to do put pull right beside it on the left. When the light turns green he holds up traffic in his own lane so as to position himself behind me. On come flash colored roof lights and I must look for a place to pull over. The shoulder of the left lane is way too narrow. So I change lanes and halt on the right.
This cop is ultra polite. He has a bit of trouble finding the expiration date on my Michigan license, which is just a sticker on the back (a budget-conserving cheap-out on Michigan’s part). His accent is very Canadian, almost as in TV-comedian mock-Canadian. Kind of pleasant, and only the second such that I’ve heard so far this trip. So I am guessing that folks move around quite a bit in Canada just like in the USA. I could not say if either time those accents were local to where I heard them. Anyway, he points out politely how all the other cars are going 100 KPH and how proper it would be if I were to follow their inspiring example. I express agreement with his fine suggestion keeping quiet about those car’s same example of just fifteen minutes ago.
Very soon now it is dark, and full night as I pull into Winnipeg proper. Being nearly out of gas I take note in passing of the Super 8 motel. After fueling up the bike I next choose to also fuel up myself. This being something of a big city I hold out small hope of finding real local flavor so late in the evening. So I settle on the Perkins restaurant. The manager kindly permits that I may sit in a closed section in full view of where I have parked the bike. I’m not one of those kind who are paranoid about anyone coming near their bike. But quite a lot of my stuff is in an expensive Tour Master tail pack. And that is merely bungee corded and cargo netted to the rear seat. A quarter-minute’s un-hooking would be all that any thief needs to nab my camera and the laptop. So it is either for me to keep an eye on my stuff or else to haul it inside with me. I order a french dip sandwich in honor of the very fine one which I’d gotten the night before. The Perkins version nearly as good, with onions and all.
Then it is back to the Super 8 for a not-so-cheap room 231 on the second floor. I can see the bike from the window, but it is a long haul up the stairs with my stuff. I telephone home to to my wife and son, charging it to my 2nd phone line at the house. Here too the calling cards my wife gave me do not work. The would work, except that the 888 toll-free area code is not honored by the Canadian telephone company. Then it is to bed and to sleep.
Day Four, August 5th, 2002
I get a bit of an earlier start on this morning. Proceeding west I have lost an hour. So it seems a bit later to me. The Super 8 offers donuts, toast and such by way of a Continental breakfast. One donut and a can of Coke are sufficient for me. I load up and head out.
First thing that happens is I miss the turn off to Route 1 and have to double back for it, but not far. Route 1, as it turns out, runs right through the middle of Winnipeg, with no small number of traffic lights. So it takes some minutes just to get out of town. Just on the western verge of the city they have a drive in theater. These are all but extinct in Michigan. I only know of three. My dad used to manage several of them when I was a kid. Some of my earliest memories are sitting on a high stool in the projection booth watching movies from out one of the little square projector windows. Beyond the drive in, it breaks out almost immediately into open plain.
And the plain is very plain indeed, like in Nebraska. Perhaps even more so in a few places. Even last night I could tell it was pretty flat. But in the dark I could not see far. It is not all ironed out completely flat. There are some mildly rolling hills and areas of trees here and there. But it goes on half-way to forever, all pretty much the same. So I only get a single picture of Manitoba. If you want to know what the rest of Manitoba is like, then cut-and-paste a hundred copies of this photo end to end. You get the idea.
Nor do I get any pictures at all of Saskatchewan. It is very like Manitoba. This whole highway on the Rand McNally atlas is lined with green dots to indicate scenic vistas. It is scenic, I’ll grant it that. But it is pretty much all the same scene. So I expect that a single one of those green dots was genuine...and the rest were just ditto marks. There are a few interesting city names: Moose Jaw, for instance. Hailing from Kalamazoo I can well appreciate an interesting name that does not have to be explained.
Even the eastern part of Alberta is much the same. At Medicine Hat they have the world’s largest teepee. I don’t know why... Again I fail to note the turn off for Highway 3 heading south toward the USA. Not my fault this time since it is not marked at all. I have to double back and ask directions at the Shell station, topping off with gas while I’m there.
South of Medicine Hat is an area so flat and empty that it expresses the full essence of ironed-out flatness which the areas only half came near to. It is both more safe and dangerous at once. I could easily drift off to sleep here. Imagine the rude awakening to find myself having coasted down an undignified wobble some uncounted number of miles into the otherwise trackless loam...
One amusing incident occurs about then. Amusing ex-post-facto, that is. After having taken the picture, I ride for a while sans gloves. It is chill but helps to ease the fatigue of my throttle wrist. Further along I go to put them back on again, while in transit. The left glove is somehow always easier. It is the right one I tend to accidently let fly during these manouvers. I am holding onto the left grip and a bit of the right glove with my left hand as I try to ease the right hand into it. I have slowed down to the posted speed limit for this operation and just then the car behind gets fed up and decides to pass. Just then the glove blows out from between my thumb-and-forefinger grip. I slow down, make a U-turn and search for the glove. I do not see it anywhere at all on the road. I search the shoulder, nothing. Hmmm. I get this vision of the car which passed me, now miles ahead, with my glove decorating the front bumper or grill. Alas and alack... So I elect to get my spare gloves from out of the Tour Master’s side pouch. I pull over and stop. And there is my glove, draped over the left rear crash bar.
Then a bit further on I come to a place, Purple Springs or some such name, where a plane is crop dusting. Doubtless a mundane occurrence for country dwellers. But it is rather novel to me. I get a picture on the plane’s final pass. Another plane had flown into its air space so that now it circles a couple of times more, then heads away and lands someplace, perhaps to refuel, get more dust? or I don’t know what.
Then, at about Lethbridge, there is a sunset which always makes for a decent picture. But of course while on vacation it is none too likely I shall catch the sun’s rise.
And finally another sunset some twenty minutes later, this time the Sunset Motel at Ft. Macleod, where I stop for the night. This is the kind of local favor I much appreciate in a small motel. The room is very nice as well as being affordable. And I can park the bike outside the door for easy un- and re-loading. It even has a refrigerator and Mr. Coffee in the room. Cable TV also, not that I care too much about that. I break out the computer, edit my files, and then go to sleep.
August 6th, 2002
My fourth day on the road starts with a 6:30 wake-up call. My real wake-up does not come until after two cups of enthusiasm via the room’s Mr. Coffee. Then I load up, lock the key in the room and head south.
It is chill and just a bit dreary this morning. Looks like will probably rain, but isn’t yet. And, just barely, I can see the mountains. This is the McDonald Range of the Rocky Mountains. Nowhere so high as in Colorado. But it is still a big deal for me.
I stop off in a little place that does not even show on the map to fill up and ask about the chances for snow, up there. The girl tending the pumps is surprised to see my Michigan plates. She tells me that it will be cold in the mountains, that last week they had some snow, but not so much, and very likely none at all will remain on the road. She suggests that I should bundle up. It still looks like maybe rain. Nothing like being wet and cold. So I decide to keep the rain suit. I manage to get sweatshirt and Brooks jacket on under the rain suit, and the chaps on over it. I break out the liners for the Army gloves I tend to prefer over more trendy biker gloves. And I put on the neck-warmer thingy: a leather, cloth and velcro-fastened collar. One of my first foul-weather investments that. And very handy in dire cold.
The route runs through Crowsnest Pass. And the view is very beautiful. I did not get pictures though. The way was steep and winding, with narrow shoulders. There are not much in the way of places to stop. And it was all too close, with mountains so near that the camera mostly would have not captured more than a side of any one of them. Further, it is indeed just a bit cold. And I am too bundled up to fiddle with little camera buttons. But remote it is not. There are a number of resorts all through here. RV campers are everywhere. And logging trucks. For much of the way there is one right behind me. I gain on it going uphill. It gains on me down the other side.
Going through I hit patches of blue sky, and less and less falling mist. I also cross the Continental Divide and pass from Alberta into British Columbia. Then a bit further I come to Lake Koocanusa, which has some mud flats. And on the mud flats are quite a number of eagles, all hungrily sitting at the edge and staring into the water. I make a U-turn and halt for an 8x zoom on a pair of bald eagles. And then trot across the road for a photo of the whole area. But in this shot the eagles are hardly more than dots.
In Cranbrook I stop for lunch at the Bavarian Inn where I have brat wurst, sour kraut and potatoes...of course. German is not my favorite cusine, but variety is always good. I enjoyed it very well.
Highway 3 joins with 95 for a ways, I stop to consult my map, and take a picture before hopping back on again.
Now the highway comes to a tee. To the left is just plain Highway 95, which I take. And this leads me to the US border. Coming into Canada I passed a mile or more of cars in their five-hour wait to cross the border back into the USA. I dreaded maybe something similar here. But there are only three cars ahead of me when I get there. And the wait is only eight minutes. I had dreaded in vain.
Northern Idaho is very pretty, very like British Columbia. There are a lot of wheat farms, and some others (straw?, alfalfa?) of which I’m not certain. Anyway there are heavy bails of very green something scattered about here and there. And after a while US95 starts to get congested. There is construction with the traffic wholly stopped in certain places. Well and truly I am back in the USA.
In due course I make it into Coeur d’Alene, to Ironwood street. My friend Bob Shoeman works someplace on Ironwood, so I find a phone booth and give him a call. I am just about three blocks away from his office at the Idaho Department of Labor. I head straight there and we set eyes upon each other for the first time in over twenty four years. On the wall of his cubicle is a laser print of a picture I’d once taken of him which he’d downloaded from another of my web sites. His current haircut is not at all military. But aside from this he has not changed very much at all. I hang around till his chores are complete. Then I follow him home, with a stop or two on the way, where we talk of our old navy days while waiting for his wife Cindy to get off from work.
August 7th, 2002
My first full day at Bob and Cindy’s house they both have to work. So I am free to make friends with the cat, Blackie. Already I get along fine with their dog, Dolly. Also I have called ahead to the local Yamaha shop in Post Falls, ID for a tire change. And a good thing I did, because they do not stock ME880 tires in sizes for the Royal Star. In fact, they did not even have the stock Dunlop 404’s. They open at 10:00 a.m. But first I will have to clean the bugs and dirt off.
Luckily there is a truck/RV do-it-yourself power wash very near the Yamaha shop. Power wash is bad if you spray from too close. But it is convenient, and I stand back far enough so that it does not hit the paint any harder than would riding in the rain, which I also do. And I always give it a good soak first, to loosen the dirt and all. I never just blast it off with force of water (aka erosion).
I have paid in advance for Metzler ME880 tires. Both front and back, even though the Dunlop 404 in the rear which I bought in Florida is still okay. Tired of having them never match. The job is done in an hour and a half. During this time I peruse the outlet malls in search of gifts for my wife, Karen and son, Skajler. I find a Lynx Beenie Baby for Sky, kind of a tradition, to get a stuffed animal appropriate to wherever it is I have gone. When I get back the bike is ready. I am pretty sure, though, that the tech gave me a new chip in my custom paint. Right in the brush-work of the right, rear saddle bag (which was removed to do the rear tire). It was not there before I am fairly certain. I had just washed it and semi dried it off in broad daylight. I am sure I would have noticed. It is annoying. I tell them so but do not press it further. Next time I shall have to take a digital photo and see that the tech shall see me do so.
I would have gotten an oil change too. But they don’t stock Golden Spectro 20W50 full synthetic. Nor do they stock face shields for my HJC CL-12 helmet (pretty common, those). They do not seem to stock very much there. Guess I will have to call ahead on those items too, next trip I make.
Last thing I do is ride the bike back to Coeur d’Alene. I go downtown and find a nice necklace for Karen: carnellian and silver finding.
August 8th, 2002
The Royal stays parked at my friend Bob’s house today. These pictures are first of the Shoeman family: Blackie and Dolly at home in Coeur d’Alene; then of Cindy and Bob at the 1313 Club in Wallace, Idaho.
The 1313 Club: So as not to be a complete sponge on my visits to old friends, I like to take them out to dinner at least once during any stay of more than just a day. Bob and Cindy had used to live in the historical, Old West mining boomtown of Wallace, Idaho. The 1313 Club, he suggested is a good place for sandwiches, burgers and such. So that’s where we went. Blackie stayed home, but Dolly goes with them everywhere. She had to wait in the car, though, while we ate. My burger was excellent indeed: a one-third pound with pepperjack cheese and beer batter fries.
The 6th Street Melodrama: Our meal over, it was time to give Dolly a bit of a walk before going home. Cindy had been hinting, ever so politely, that the Melodrama might also be very nice to see inasmuch as we already found ourselves right there in Wallace. The 6th Street Melodrama is a live theater house where they put on nightly plays, vaudeville follies and the like. Bob was thinking it might be too late, what with having work in the morning and all. I weighed in on Cincy’s side breaking the tie. Dolly’s walk finished, Bob took her back to the car. And we cued up at the Melodrama.
Tickets are just $10 apiece. Cindy was fishing in her purse almost before I noticed. But our meal for three had hardly cost me anything at the 1313 Club. So I was feeling a bit cheated over my opportunity for restitution. So I insisted on springing for the tickets.
Seating was a bit short. So I got a chair in the isle, which was perfect for the camera, as you can see by the pictures, of which I took several. First there was a 25-minute mini-play. The second half was more like old-time vaudeville. Some segments were truly hilarious, like the one where they sang the theme song from Mighty Mouse. And where they all donned chicken head-dresses and clucked Beethoven’s Fifth in multi-part harmony.
And in another segment, Joy Persoon sings Princess Pupui Has Plenty Papaya (And She Likes to Give it Away) which for all I know may be an all-time Hawaiian classic. One from the audience is invited up on the stage to dance the hula. I believe he was there with his mom and a sister. They were from Calgary, Alberta, as I recall. I gave them the URL for this web site. Click here to e-mail me (link updated 2003-07-18, old email was at work...where I got downsized right after) so that I may identify him by name...
August 9th, 2002
For lunch today, while my hosts are at work, I take the Royal back to Wallace. My burger at the 1313 Club was good enough to merit the 45-minute ride by itself. Also I am wanting to take the tour at one or two of the museums. In very particular I am interested in the Oasis Bordello Museum. Price is five dollars. It is very interesting. Wallace was what they refer to as an open town as late as 1994 when the mines were all still in full swing. By open is meant that many a victimless crime was overlooked in the interest of preserving the peace in a region where men outnumbered women by as 200-to-1 at times. The Oasis is one of the four main bordellos that did business right in the middle of town, with signs out front and everything. The local police overlooked it with certain restrictions in the interest of public health. The ladies were required to submit to a doctor regularly, and pay a regular monthly fine of $50 for indecent behavior.
The high school had used to even hold band practice on the street where these four main houses did 24-hour business. The houses sprung for new band uniforms on the condition that they practice elsewhere. The houses even once donated a new squad car to the Wallace police department.
The end did not come until the FBI itself planned a raid. But the girls were tipped off by an informant and fled just in time with only the clothes (such as they were?) on their backs. A local family later bought the building, which had remained intact with every item just where the girls had left them. What else to do but with such an interesting cultural and historical treasure except to open a museum? In my opinion the tour is surely worth five dollars to any (such as I...yes really!) who had never had occasion to explore such an establishment before.
My own attitude toward the oldest profession is that it is no business of mine to criticize. I was once in the military after all. As a sailor I was once paid poorly to pretend I hated folks I knew not at all with the purpose that I should labor to make them permanently dead. Surely this is more ignoble than for another to be paid well for pretending to like folks and make them temporarily happy. I shouldn’t care to do it myself. But then I shouldn’t care very much to be a miner either. If the churchy crowd so disapproves the answer is simple, let them not go there. It only shows how weak their faith is that they must destroy a thing to prevent themselves from being tempted. But then, of course, it was ever thus.
Wallace Idaho itself has a long and colorful history as a mining boomtown that went full blast right up until the 1990’s. I had lunch at the 1313 Club, ordering the one-third-pound pepperjack cheeseburger just like last night from Mike, who is co-proprieter with his wife LV. Except this time I order onion rings. I should have gotten the beer-batter fries again. Those were excellent, whereas the onion rings are just okay. The burger was just as good however. I would have bought a T-shirt as a memento of my trip, except that they only carry large, which on me would flap like loose circus tent at highway speeds on my bike.
The Melodrama is not open this early. But after last night’s performance, I definitely wanted a picture of the building in daylight. The Rail Station also has an archetectural history, the bricks to build it came from China.
Then I leave Wallace and head back to Coeur d’Alene for a picture of the lake and another of a very interesting antenna tower which is desguised to look like a tree from a distance. This photo is at 8x zoom, because I wanted to see how they did it. But without zoom, it does indeed look very like a real tree, albeit a monster of a tree.
August 10, 2002
I bid goodbye to Bob and Cindy on Saturday morning. It has been a really great visit. North I head back along US95, but only as far as Sandpoint. My plans are to wind my way to US2 first via Highway 200 eastward into Montana and then north by Hwy 56. Lake Pend Oreille is even larger than Lake Coeur d’Alene.
But when I get to where the south end of 56 tees into 200 it is under construction. No other routes are convenient. So I take it even though the sign says LOOSE GRAVEL and I see it is indeed partly gravel and partly dirt, wetted down here and there. The construction goes on for some few miles. But there is hardly any traffic. Only a single car passes me, going not so fast as to raise a cloud or throw gravel in my direction.
In due course the dirt gives way to brand new pavement. And all along the view is pastoral, really quite beautiful, in fact. If you search, you can see small signs of civilization: a house, fence, or some such. But in several areas it is wholly untouched. One in very particular, except for the road itself, looks just like a painting.
Hwy 56 only runs from Hwy 200 north to US2, just west of Libby. I’ve ridden US2 before, but not this far west. I will keep on it until just past reaching where I had turned south when coming the other way. Then I’ll branch off some other direction so as to cover new ground and highlight different routes on my atlas. US2 is all but deserted, hardly any traffic at all.
I come to Kalispell, a good-sized town, and then Evergreen. Here I see beside the road a parked Harley and its owner looking unhappy. No helmet on the ground (sign of distress), nor any on the bike (non-distress). But out here helmets are not required. And I don’t know what other signs there may be. So I change lanes and halt beside him. Sure enough he has troubles. The bike won’t start.
I had once owned a Harely, so I can well share his grief. Not that I’ve had no troubles since, only that they have been far less rampant. He is glad that I have stopped. Says a bunch of Harleys rode past, no wave or anything. I suggest maybe they were looking for that helmet-on-the-ground sign. I can’t now remember the fellow’s name. But he says the bike was running fine and then just cut out. He gives it a few more kicks. No spark at all. His bike is somewhat chopped with no place to store any tools. So I unlock the Mustang seat from mine with a key and get out my own tools, such as they are. With the screwdriver he takes of his own seat and we poke around.
This fellow has nothing but kind words for his own mechanic, doubtless someone good with engines. The top end was very recently done, he says. And it ran fine up until cutting out suddenly. But I can say the electrical system has been sadly neglected, even abused. The battery is free to bounce so that the positive terminal grounds against the frame on really big hops. I can see the dents in the lead of the terminal, and the scrapes on the frame. But it is not shorted now, so that can’t be it. Even so I break out some electrial tape I happen to have (self-stick sun visor for the face shield) and apply it around the frame where the terminal had sometimes shorted...just because.
He has a cell phone and calls a friend of his to come help out. I suggest turning on the lights. Nothing, not even a glow. So he checks the main fuse. It is blown. He fishes out some spares from his pouch, puts in a new one, kicks it and she fires right up...for all of less than a minutes. Then that fuse too blows.
Soon his friend arrives in a blue pickup. Meanwhile, though all his spare fuses have been used up in the hopes of a longer run, some of which blew just as soon as he put them in. On the phone his friend had suggested using the foil of a cigarette pack. Now though, after blowing a series of 20-Amp fuses, this seems not such a good idea. I offer that twenty amps is a lot of current. More could easily cause an electrical fire.
Closer observation reveals that where a missing lower half of the tank panel had ought to be are a fair number of loose, un-insulated eye-terminals at the ends of wires...half a dozen or more. And one of them is in contact with the side of the tank. I hand over the roll of tape, suggesting that each of these be wrapped up before trying again. We all shake hands; they get to work with the tape; and I take off. I’m still kind of wondering what that wire went to which would blow the main fuse instead of some other but was not needed to get the bike as far as it got.
Further along I follow the signs to West Glacier and enter Glacier National Park. My friend Bob Shoeman has recommended this route. Entrance fee is only five dollars. Bob is right, except about it only being a one-hour delay along my route. He did not calculate all the times I will have to stop for a picture. I take quite a few of them. And for some I have to wait while others make room or else get out of the way.
Most I will not describe all the park photos individually. The thumbnails above are in order from west entrance to east exit. There are thirteen of them.
I exit the park and make my way back to US2 via US89. Traffic here is practilly nil. The road is two-lane, but in good repair. I cruise at eighty. Could have done ninety or better had I wished. But I am enjoying the ride and do not want to complicate it with having to be on the lookout for cops.
Now I come upon the reason for there being such scanty traffic: construction, eleven solid miles of real bad road... Nothing but dirt washboard, pot-holes and loose gravel. But at least no mud. Top speed: 25 mph. And in some places, down to fifteen. This is just west of Cut Bank, Montana.
Towards late evening it is getting dark. I have no pictures since it also turns quite flat. Not quite so flat as Saskatchewan and parts of Alberta. But flat enough to be just as uninteresting. This is the Great Plains. And storms here can be quite intense. There are some ahead of me now. I would be glad to stop if there were a motel. But towns here are too small to warrant any. Up ahead should be Havre, which is big enough to warrant bold print on my atlas. Surely ought to be motels there, right where the storm is heading.
There are three cells of it that I can identify by the lightning. One dead ahead, one to the north and another to the southeast. Lightning is flashing cloud-to-cloud and cloud-to-gound ten times a minute. From my tornado-watcher days with Skywarn as a ham radio operator I know this to be a bad sign. There are sure to be high winds, lots of rain, a good chance of hail and maybe, possibly, a tornado.
I slow down to 45 mph so as not to catch up. I draw parallel to the one to the north. The sky is dark green over there. Still lots of lightning. And the wind is kicking up even where I am out from under the rain. I slow down some more.
I pull into Havre just barely after the storm. I have gotten a little wet, but not much. It is dark. The place seems to be not much more than a solid string of bars and casinos. And all the motels seem to be full, except for only the Budget Inn. I get one of the two or three remaining rooms. Not that they all were really full. Motels nowadays keep a minimum cleaning staff, which comes only every so often. They will put on the NO VACANCY sign when rooms are empty but as yet uncleaned. But I am lucky to get even a smoking room. The clerk agrees that I will not be required to smoke during my stay, so I take it. At least it is on the ground floor where I can easily unload the bike.
Next I call home and tell Karen and Skajler about the park and the storm. Then I go hunt up a restaurant. Can not remember the name. But all the specials I tried to order from off the menu were no longer available. So I ended up with a hamburger. It was okay, but that was all. Leaving, there was a couple who asked after the bike. They liked paint especially. I told them how it was hand brushed not air-brushed. And then it is back to the room.
August 11, 2002
I take off again from Havre, Montana after having quit the road early to cower from three-cell thunderstorm. The storm had looked very impressive from some miles to the west. But I would not have thought it capable of so much damage. So I am thinking that what I now see may have been from some prior storm. Not a tornado, no. At least I don’t think so. For miles and miles all along the south flank of US2 there are lines down. Telephone lines mostly I think them to be, even though they are all on glass insulators. The ground is littered with loose wires snaking all over the place. And even some of the telephone-pole crosspieces are either blown crooked or blown off completely. But not any poles knocked over. Nor is the ground torn up. Only a few lay on the road, and then only in a manner which is easy to drive around.
The scene is erie. It is a fine sunny morning. At home, the crews would be out immediately to repair it. But here there is nothing and no one. I should like to stop and take a picture. But I have only just gotten back on the road again this past half hour. None of the wires are spitting. But the ground is still wet. So I talk myself out of it and ride on past.
I have lunch in Wolf Point, Montana. It is an interesting little restaurant called the Old Town Grill which remindes me of one from my youth. Servicc is fast due to a telephone at every table. I just pick it up and give them my order. A waitress, or possibly bus-girl, is interested in bikes. Says she would like to save up for a Harley. And may she go out to look at my bike. I surely allow, explaining though that it is not a Harley. I see her out there looking at it anyway. And then che comes back to ask about the design, which I tell here is Tibetan, and what all it means. She says she likes it. Politely, I suggest that she might want to look at several different kinds of bikes before spending so much money. If she must have Harley, I add, the newest one is very nice...what with water cooling, DOHC, and all.
Come North Dakota I cross paths with myself from two years before at US85. Then I turn off on Hwy 1804. The wrong way, I soon realize, when about for miles hence it jogs back west. So I stop at a convenience store just ahead in Trenton for a fill-up. Very convenient indeed. The gas pump is right on the curb. I just put down the kick stand beside the road and top off.
Inside I break out the atlas to see how I’ve gone wrong. Hwy 1804 is somewhat segmented, I observe by the map. I should have gone straight ahead and then it would just turn into 1804. But it is worth the stop. I needed gas anyway. And out here you can never be sure of where you’ll find an open station. And the store owner tells me that this is one of the only four-digit highways in the country. It is on the LEWIS & CLARK scenic trail. So I am supposing it might be named after a date. I’ll bet that is it. Let me check... Yup, that is it. On GOOGLE, I find that Fort Mandan was the Wintering Post of the Lewis & Clark Expedition in 1804-1805. Mystery solved.
I have a number of pictures of Hwy 1804. It is a nice scenic road, and all but non-travelled, as you can see.
All too sone Hwy 1804 runs out and I hit Bismark where I turn onto I94, a modern two-lane. Modern, that is, but not in too very good repair. Seventy mph is easy to do, but none too comfortable. And there is traffic. Alas and alack.
Soon after dark I encounter a plague of large, soft-bodied bugs. I will have to stop soon if only on account of these. I am running out of clean spots to look through. When I slow down at the next big town I find them to be something very like mayflies.
And, of course, yet another thunderstorm brings me up short that eventing at Valley City. The motel is clean, and in somewhat better repair than the Budget Inn back in Montana. But it is un-remarkable. The price is right, though. Just $35 per night. The owner is very talkative. I am glad for a chat, but hungry. I am informed of the construction on the exit which shut down that whole end of town for two whole years nearly killing his business. Yet I also learn how, after midnight, he puts on the NO VACANCY sign and goes to bed. It gives me to wonder about some of those other filled up motels I had passed sadly by in the wee hours on earlier trips. Business can’t be too bad if that is the case. It makes me a little mad, too. I like to ride until after midnight.
I get directions to a 24-hour restaurant where I order a hot beef sandwich. A fellow at the counter asks for a ride into town. He is not drunk, and looks okay, so I say okay. It takes him a while though to get money from the ATM to pay for his meal. Meanwhile I clean bugs off from my windshield. It and my headlights are a solid sheet of squished bugs...mostly from the last very few miles. There is a river and a big lake nearby.
I give the guy a lift to the residential area of town, which is just a couple blocks from the center of town and only a mile or so from my hotel. Then I go back to my motel and call it a night.
August 12, 2002
Now it is, I hope, the last day of my journey. I am soon into Minnesota. This too is pretty flat. I probably would have gotten not a single picture if not having to stop for gas and finding a giant statue of a booming prarie chicken in Rothsay. Kind of retro, fifties-ish, giant statues beside the road.
I press on without event. It looks like rain again. So I am tempted to don the rain suit, even though it is a bit warm and muggy. Off and on there is very light rain, mist really. At one point I stop for gas. And here I find a state official monitoring the punps. He is testing the meters for accuracy. I have never seen that done. It is pretty simple, as you can imagine. But I was still interested to watch. The operator told me that when he arrived it was sprinkling. So I break down and don th rain suit.
At Minneapolis there is major construction. Traffic is halted. And of course I am low on gas. And it is hot and muggy. I have to shrug out from the top half of the one-piece rain suit, wrapping the sleves aroundmy waist. After a while I take of the helmet to avoid being par-boiled. There is no passing on the shoulder since all the big orange signs obstruct it every one hundred feet or so. And finally I have to take the ear plugs out too. Then, finally, the construction is past.
Now I get a chance to zip off for some gas and to re-don my helmet. I have a love-hate relationship with helmets: I hate how uncomfortable they are after four or five days; but I fear to go without having once before gotten two major concussions (bicycle at 8-yrs old, Yamaha 100 cc at 14-yrs old). I sometimes joke that these suffice to excuse any aberant behavior so that I have no further social requirement for others. I will definitely be shopping around for a model better ventilated than my current HJC CL-12. On these long trips I sometimes have to take it off for up to a half hour on account of how it itches around the cheek pads and upper forehead. The lower vents get little air on account of my medium-height windshield. And the upper vents are none-too well designed. Before my next trip I have got to myself a different helmet.
Then I am out of Minneapolis and very soon into Wisconsin. Interstate 94 is not in too very bad shape here, but still no fun on accout of the traffic. And also the construction. Traffic comes to a dead halt again. But at least I can get off on the right and pass the first mile of cars so as to get off at the rest stop and use the facilities. I am very tired about now. Must not have slept so well last night. Some sugar and caffeine helps out a bit. Then I get back onto the highway and pass the rest of the cars slowly, just creaping past them in the bottom of second gear.
Every now and again a car pulls halfway out into my lane but it is only so the driver may have quick look ahead. I sure don’t want to bang into one of those, which is why I am going slow. Also, you never know what someone is going to do. Some folks are just plain mean. Another good reason to pass on the right, versus the left. Very few of these cars have passengers. So a door is that much less likely to open in front of me. Also, drivers (in theory) tend to pay less attention to the passenger-side mirror. So mean drivers are that much less likely to notice and take offense of my not bing held up the same as they.
Finally I get out ahead of most of the construction. But the whole right lane and shoulder too are un-passible now. A trucker with a heavy load of steel is slow to accelereate very near the front. And this affords me an opportunity to get easily back in. He also kindly maintains his distance. So while the cars ahead crowd up close, I have a nice little sweet spot in between.
The construction ends, finally. And I make progress once again. But I am behind schedule. At best it will be 2:00 a.m. before I may get home tonight. Not sure I have the endurance for that today.
Now it is past dark. I am past Madison, but there are, of course, storms ahead. Yet another big thunder-boomer: lots of lightning. I am hoping to skirt the edge. But at Edgerton I plow into driving rain. Can’t see anything. Visibility is on the order of twenty feet on account of the mist from the truck ahead being lit up by the truck behind. And the rain only gets worse. At one point I am not even sure of my own lane. So I take the very next exit which promises a motel: a Comfort Inn, expensive, but I hardly care at this point.
It is $72 a night for one. I take it and gladly. Almost as soon as I pull in, so do a lot of other cars. My bike is under the car-port right outside the door. Four other vehicles crowd in around it as I check in. The rain is still coming down buckets. It is more than an hour before I am able to move the bike to a more conventional parking location.
In the morning I turn on the news to find that the Menominie River is out of its bank and 600-700 homes are out of power. Glad I stopped for absolute certain.
After a shower, coffee and a two donuts (so as to derive maximum return from my $72-stay) I pack up the bike. I meet a Canadian who is doing the same. His is an 1800 Honda touring bike, very fine. He says he too used to own a Harley, but that he wanted something more suited to long-distances. He loves his 118 HP flat-6 with overdrive in 5th and a reverse gear (it needs it...those things are near 900 pounds). He asks me if I was in the construction a ways back. He had tried to pass on the left, and sure enough some redneck jerk in a pickup opened the driver’s side door on him, trying to run him into the ditch. I wonder if ever a biker has dragged someone like that out of their car and given them a good sound beating? It isn’t very Buddhist of me, I know...but I would not grieve to hear that it had been done sometime. I fear I might be tempted myself. I have kicked in a couple of car doors what cut me off seriously in traffic. Once the fat battle-axe driver with her tripple-chin got my license and called it in. A city cop telephoned me at home to suggest politely that I ought not do so again. He said he told her they don’t do that for no reason. Obviously I am not the first to lose my temper in that fashion.
From this point on it is not too bad. There is construction, and traffic halts, in Chicago...of course. But after that, smooth sailing straight home to Kalamazoo. Karen and Skajler are both home waiting. I present my elf gifts: a carnellian and silver necklace for my wife, and a Beenie Baby Lynx for my son. He is a bit old for Beenie Babies, really. But it is kind of a tradition: a stuffed animal of a sort particular to wherever it is that I have been.