K11 Owners Group

[Paul Edlington]

Hi Guy's,

Yes I'm back in the land of the Long White Cloud (NZ) sorry I've not posted anything lately on the forum but have been busy sorting out things here at home and Gil as got me straight into home improvement mode, i.e. decorating the bathroom, but thats another story !

Well we had a great time at HM111 meeting up with you all and thanks for all your hospitality and making us really welcome.

23rd May
After HM111 we headed north up to Marlington W-VA for a couple of days and stayed in a really great B&B there called "Old Clark Inn" which is a very bike friendly place and would really recommend it if your are ever in that area.

25th May
From there we headed down to Cherokee to the Blue Ridge Parkway, we took a couple of days to ride it and decided not to do the Sky Line Drive but to head north up through Monterey and on to Bel Air Maryland where we dropped on a weekend Blue Grass concert, so had a look in on that which was really good, great music and people and everybody was having a great time, the only sad news of the day was that we heard the news that Dennis Hopper had passed away, who was made famous for his part in Easy Rider.

30th May
From there it was on up through Scranton to Milford PA for the night, then on to Hurlington the next day and took in the local Memorial Day parade, then on through Bennington, Concord and decided to say a night with our good friend Jim Fisk in Hollis, Maine to regroup and drop some of our gear that we didn't need, i.e. Thermals (hopefully we don't need them !!).

2nd June
Left Jim's place and headed up the coast of Maine through Falmouth, Camden, had a look in to Bar Harbour which had a real holiday place feel to it with a cruse liner docked in the hourbour and lots of people milling around, we ended up in Lubec for the night ready for the next days push into Canada.

5th June
Well the heavens opened and we had torrential rain for the whole day so the ride up to the boarder at Calis wasn't the greatest and by the time we arrived at the customs control we were like drowned rats but anyway they let us into Canada and we headed up to St Johns still in torrential rain for the ferry across to Digby, Nova Scotia.

7th June
The crossing the day before was good but the storms arrive back that evening so we just sat tight and the next morning was fine and settled, so headed out to Yarmouth and on round the coast on the Lighthouse route staying the night at Shelbourn.

8th June
On up the coast for lunch at Lunenburg which is a lovely old town and then on to Halifax, we debated whether or not to stop a night before going through Halifax as it was late in the afternoon and it would be busy, but decided to hit the road, big mistake as we hit all the tea time traffic, saw none of Halifax and got quite hot under the collar, anyway we finally found some private hostel accommodation at right out on the coast at Laurencetown Beach which turned out to be a great place for $30 each for the night.

9th June
Headed for Cape Breton today and took the coast road ( Hy211 & Hy316 ) and I have to say the sealed road surface was some the worse I have come across, "positively dangerous" which was a shame as it is a great part of the world with some great scenery but you couldn't take your eyes off the road, anyway we crossed over the causeway to Cape Breton and stayed the night in Port Hawkesby.

10th June
Set off to Sydney NS to fine a company called Harbour View Trikes to have a look at there Goldwing rigs which I have to see were very impressive but unfortunately didn't get a ride on one, from there we headed up the coast on the Cabot Trail to "Ingonish" and the Glenghorm Beach Resort, we stayed there for 3 nights as it was a really great place, everybody there was very helpful and friendly, we got roped into a local wedding BBQ which went on into the early hours, I bailed out at around midnight but Darryl stayed and party on till around 2.30am then decided to that everybody else should be up at that time too !, we did a few side trips around there, up to Meat Cove and some of the little fishing villages which quite reminded me of Cornwall in the UK.

13th June
Headed down the other side of the coast through Pleasant Bay, Cheticamp and stayed a couple of nights in Inverness, rode the Cabot Trail south and had a ride around Lake Ainslie.

15th June
Headed out for the causeway off Cape Breton with very high winds and rain, the causeway looked like it was going to be a bit of a mission as the water was being whipped over the road by the high winds but we gritted our teeth and made a dash across, got to Antigonish for lunch, then took the coast road to Pictou, where the mighty K11RS clocked up its 200,000km so we stopped to catch our breath and have a word, stayed another night in Pictou and went over to Prince Edward Island the following day, while over there I noticed that the front tyre was almost shot and needed to be replaced very soon, then to top it off I spotted that the rear tyre was getting quite down but had a metal screw in it, "Great".

17th June
Rang around to find some tires and a BMW dealer in Moncton had a pair so headed off to them to get them fitted, they were very helpful and let me take the wheels out myself at there place while they fitted a pair of new Michelin Road Pilots, from there we headed to Sussex NB for the night.

18th June
Arrived at a small place called Chipman NB and decided to stay at the local motor inn for 3 nights, again a greta place and people, went to the local Canadian Legion for the Karaoke night but ended up playing pool most of the night and gave Darryl a good thrashing beating him 11 games to 0 so he wasn't very happy about that, hope he will forgive me !, had a good ride around the local area and found a really nice lake with a nice sandy beach so had to go in and have a swim as the weather was really good, even managed to get a bit of sunburn.

21st June
Carried on through Fredricton NB and stayed the night in Woodstock NB, the following day on to Harland and the longest wooden covered bridge in the world, very impressive, we booked into a motel in Grand Falls NB and took a ride up over the boarder into Quebec really just to say that we had set foot on that soil.

23rd June
Crossed back over into the US at Van Buren again the weather turned to heavy rain so we stopped at Sherman for a couple of nights and found a really great little local pub, had a great night there with the locals and was sad to leave, the next few days we worked our way down through Maine and arrived at Rangeley, Maine which was to be our final 2 motel nights.

28th June
From Rangeley it was a day ride to John & Cathy's place in NH where we had another couple of relaxing days and sampled there excellent hospitality and friendship.

30th June
Packed up our gear for the final time on the trip and headed out for Jim & Alison" place at Hollis Maine where it would be time to give the bikes a good clean ready for there journey back to NZ, we were just hoping that there would be no rain on Friday for our final ride into Boston as if it did we would have to re clean the bikes there !

2nd June
Well it turned out to be a beautiful sunny day and Jim and a mate of his led the way into Boston stopping on the way at Max BMW to buy that last T shirt etc, the traffic was very heavy getting into Boston but Jim knew all the twists and turns and we arrived safe and sound, we said our goodbyes to Jim and got the bikes packed back into there crates and headed off for a well earned BEER.

I have to say it was a great trip (but arnt they all) we had no problems at all with the bikes ( apart for the new tires and a new battery for the K) we met some really neat people and got to see some truly great place's, we ended up doing almost exactly 12,000km, we both agree that the roads down in VA & W VA were the best riding ones and the ones further north had to be treated with care and respect.

Hope I've not bored you all to much with my ramblings, after reading it back it does come over as a bit of a travel log, but when I get my pics sorted I will post some of funnier ones along with a bit of a story to them.

Paul & Darryl. NZ

Now back to the decorating !!!!!!!!!
_________________
Paul & Gill
93 K1100RS Mistic Red
72 R75/5 Toaster
72 R50/5 Toaster (Project)
Remember it's not the destination, it the journey

[SugarHillCTD]

[Stoked Steve]

Thanks for the update, sounds like a great trip. Glad you both made it back safe and sound!
_________________
Steve
Virginia Beach, VA
93 K1100RS Mystic Red SOLD
12 Suzuki DL650A VStrom

[Ernie-NH]

Good morning all...

Hey,,, great report eh? Glad that our NZ friends survived the sealed roads in NS and NB, they are indeed dangerous and not at all MC friendly to ride,, even worse when wet !

Regards............// Ernie-NH
_________________
AMA,, American Deaf Bikers
Airhead Beemers Club
'11 G650gs
'95 K1100LT
'76 R100/7