Turning Point

Well, I've gone as far as I'm going to go.  Tomorrow I start on the return ride home.  I'm staying in Roanoke, VA tonight, which was not quite as far as I planned to go up the Blue Ridge Parkway, but even so I rode until after 6 pm.  It was a pretty rainy day and I gave the rain gear a good test.  Some of it worked and some not.  My waterproof boots were not.  I was afraid that would happen after I got some loose stitching repaired at a shoe shop.  The shop stitched through the waterproof inner lining.....I doubt if they had any choice....and I think that is where the leaks happened.  My rain pants and jacket worked well, even after I removed the mesh lining from the pants last night.  The mesh was catching on my boots and I couldn't get the pants on without taking the boots off, which doesn't work when you are already standing on wet ground.  I am on at least the third iteration of rain gear since I moved to Washington, and none of it is without fault, although the jacket comes close.  I first tried a one-piece suit, which makes sense, but a pocket would form in my lap when sitting on the bike and that pocket would fill with water right where the zipper was.  The final straw was when I rode for a whole day in a hard rain and arrived soaking wet from the waist down.  Then I tried a two piece suit but the jacket was a pullover type and I couldn't get it over my leather jacket by myself, which wouldn't work on this trip.  So, I bought another zip up jacket and use the same pants from the other set; the ones I removed the lining from.  Some day I am going to find some rain pants that have a leg zipper that comes at least to the knee so they are easy to get on over boots.  I have some really nice waterproof winter gloves, but here's the problem with them:  They are a gauntlet type glove, which keeps cold air from going up your sleeve, but in a heavy rain like I encountered today, water runs down the sleeve of the jacket and gets under the gauntlet, eventually soaking the glove.  Lucky for me I have grip heaters, so even when the glove is wet it is at least warm and wet.

Enough with the gear review, how was the ride?  It was another Good Road but in not so good weather. I think I was a bit harsh with my fellow humanoids in last night's post.  I realize that I am riding in an area noted for its spectacular fall colors in the prime time for that color to appear.  It would be like going to Mt. Ranier in the middle of July......there are going to be crowds.  Today, because of the rain, the crowds were gone, and although the colors were muted they were still spectacular.  The pics don't do it justice, but here are a few:

The road itself was good; not as curvy as yesterday, but curvy enough to be interesting, especially with wet pavement.  I got my Ipod going for the first time in several days and that thing is a real pick-me-upper.  When my energy level is dropping towards the end of a long day, all I have to do is plug in, turn on, and tune in.  Instant riding high.

I did manage  to upload one of the Dragon video segments to YouTube late last night and here it is: (remember to full-screen it)