Day 1

Well, as you saw from my post, we got away. To quote a Jerry Reed song from Smokey and the Bandit "West bound and down, loaded up and truckin, we're gonna do what they said can't be done, we got a long way to go and a short time to get there, we're west bound, just lock on Bandit 1"

That's enough with the Country Music!!

So I get out of GP, and it starts to rain, and I don't just mean a sprinkle, it's pouring. My "waterproof" riding gear...not so much... I was soaked less than 30km outside of GP. Oh well, it adds to the adventure. Iam just happy to be on the road that the time I said I would leave.

I had to stop at the Southview rest stop, I was so cold, my hands were numb despite the heated handgrips. My fun meter was pretty low. As I pulled into the rest stop, I see another bike parked beside a very wet looking tent... I thought to myself, I need to get out of the rain, it's really coming down, so I entered the outhouse. Now if you have ever been to the Southview rest stop you know the usual condition of the outhouses is not great... it sort of looked as though the last guy to use it just sort of stuck his ass in the door and tried to aim at the toilet, he was not successful. But necessity trumps grossness... I needed out of the rain.

So here I am standing in a shitty outhouse (literally) in my wet riding gear, helmet still on, trying to warm up my hands. 15 minutes later, the rain is letting up, I head outside. The other motorcyclist is out of his tent and says hello, my immediate thought is to tell him I am not responsible of the mess in the outhouse... he beats me to the punch. Apparently someone had done this yesterday. Anyway, he was a nice guy, riding solo to Alaska from Virginia. Cool.

I left Southview, got fuel in Grande Cache and also prevented many raindrops from hitting the ground by catching them with my jacket. Off again. I rode to Jasper, took a photo of the sign (which I will post later) and then headed for Valemount. I was trying to meet up with a rider from the VSRI forum, kept texting back and forth, but never did get to meet him.... met his bike, found it on the side of the road, probably with no fuel (confirmed later in the day).

I continued on got fuel in Little Fort, had a nice discussion with some BC Paramedics at the fuel station. Continued on to Kamloops... more freakin rain, this time a little warmer, but lots more of it.

Road through that storm, got on highway 97 over to Vernon and arrived at my sisters place just before 8:00 pm BC time. so all totaled I travelled for 13 hours and covered close to 1150 km. Not a bad first day.

Vanessa has some issues though... we need to replace a bolt that holds the left muffler which has gone missing, apparently someone (me) forgot to tighten is yesterday after loosening it... dumbass move.. sorry Vanessa. And the chain that I put on last week appears to be failing, it has a tight spot, it should not have a tight spot. This is sort of serious, I would hate for the chain to fail. I will see if I can get it replaced tomorrow.

We will have company riding with us tomorrow, my brother in law (Don and his Honda 919) are going to join us for a day or so. This will be great. I have never actually ridden on the street with Don. I am looking forward to it.

Thanks for tuning in, it's time for some sleep. Good Night.

Posted with Blogsy