Hopefully Sunday/Monday

A

Any closer to a ride yet?

I think the bike's ready now. all I need is the time to take it out for a good run. I swear, the older I get, the less time I have for the fun stuff. There is something fundamentally wrong with this picture. On the positive side. It should be ready for next season as ours is winding down. It is a sweet old bike though. How do you wind the wind control/buffeting on your new bike as opposed to the old one. One of these days I'll get out on a Rushmore touring bike but with our dollar going in the tank it makes the new bikes a lot more money so it'll be just the test ride for now.

Where you from Sleepy?

Buffeting is still there, just not as bad. Might be from a combination of the beefier front end and the draft hole in the fairing. Its not a over whelming difference though.

I'm neither a borrower nor a lender.

Calgary Alberta Canada, about 300 miles slightly north east of Great Falls Montana. It gets windy up here so you really notice the breeze when riding. I'm getting soft. I never used a windshield when I lived east. [Quebec/ Maritimes Canada but it didn't take me long to put one on out here. I really noticed the wind when I'm on the FXRS without the windshield.

Was hoping to ride thru there some day. Been all up and down nova scotia to Winnepeg

Friends of wife and me has a daughter that met a Canadian young man on a cruise. He's a geologist from Calgary Alberta area. Works for an oil company there. They got married and now she lives there. It Had to be hard on her parents . The guy is pretty cool. He and I fly fished together . He goes to MT often to fish.

I would love to make it to Dawson Creek, the beginning of the ALCAN. Not sure I'd want my bike chewed up by the ALCAN highway? How much is gas a litre out your way?

Isn't that all paved now?

Parts here and there are under constant construction due to perma frost and the way they patch spots. Chuck it down (dump spread) and let passing cars pack it down. Thats fine if you're a car.

Heck that's how they patch roads here, chuck it and maybe pat it with a shovel. Mostly leave it to the cars to pack.

Lots of oil money here. They live in a whole different world, a good field to have gotten into. Montana has some fabulous fishing and it's a great place to ride in as well. the Bow river here in Calgary is well known as having good fishing as well. When I first moved here 35 years ago Calgary was about 400,000 people, nice size, great people, lots of energy, had it all. Now there's 1.3 million, the road system is overloaded, still lots of energy and great people but in a boom town, as is Calgary, you get the stuff that follows money around and some of it ain't so good. We're dealing with that now. Still good but not the same.

Gas in Calgary right now is 1.15 a litre. last week it was 1.20. You start heading up north and it can get to a buck fifty. I remember 25 years ago riding from here to LA and we took a shortcut off of I 90 just west of Spokane and headed down thru the Tri Cities area and onto Weed California. Great name for a town. In a coffee shop in Weed they were selling mugs stating that the ALCAN highway [Number 97] starts in Weed. I found that to be interesting

It gets pretty flat east of here Marc, The good riding is west of here or south. much cheaper south.

once you get west of Winnipeg it's pretty flat and straight for the better part of a thousand miles. there's some nice stuff to see but it's a lot like the high plains, the Dakotas, till you get into the mountains. I'm sure you've ridden more in Nova Scotia than I have. I lived there as a kid for a few years but haven't spent quality time in the saddle there.

The 401 from Montreal to Toronto...FLAT. But Canada has loads of motorcycle history.