Motorcycles Are For Girls, Too!

Following our October AMA cover story, there have been many supportive letters to the editor about the cross country trip my daughter and I wrote about. But they were all topped yesterday when I read this entry in February's letters.

Talk about timing! I was asked to read a story to my granddaughter’s kindergarten class in Manchester, NH and I had picked out the kids’ book “Patrick Want to Ride”. Then I got my American Motorcyclist and saw the stories by Gail and Lisa Hatch. I decided to bring the magazine to class and see what the kids thought about the Hatch’s adventure.
Just about all the questions about the “Patrick Want to Ride” came from the boys, so I asked the kids, “Who thinks motorcycle riding should only be for boys?” I was surprised that eight little boys raised their hands.
I then told them I have proof that girls are just as good at riding motorcycles. I then read them the Hatch’s story and showed them the pictures. It was great to see all the girls standing up to look at Gail and Lisa’s pictures. It was also great to see a lot of the girls raise their hands when I asked who would like to go on a trip like that with their mother or father.
Thanks to Gail and Lisa for opening the eyes of some great little kids to motorcycling touring with their parents
Dan Leonard
Quincy, MA

I don't know Dan, but want to shake his hand and say thank you, it means so much to me to learn about this use of our story. Inspiring others, be they girls, women, boys or men; this is why I continue to write!

(Manchester, NH is the largest town in NH, it's just up the road, 20 miles from where I live.)

You've Come a Long Way Baby

Back in April I received a request from a Flickr member to use one of my Alps photos in the AMA. Unfortunately I do not own that photo, the tour guide took it. The writer said he'd pass my information to the editor of the mag, who might be interested in doing a story about my travels with Lisa. 6 months later and we are on the cover.

In reality, getting on the cover has been a 10 year journey.

In 1999 my now ex husband told me I shouldn't get my motorcycle license.
In 2004 friends told me I was nuts to ride my bike across the country.
In 2007 I listened too no one's advice and planned a trip across the country with my daughter.

My first bike, my K75 1999


Telling me I can't do something is a powerful motivator. I got my license in 1999, then my bike, then a divorce. But I was not all that sure of myself. I dropped my bike a lot. I worried that maybe he was right, maybe the bike was more than I could handle...maybe I should stay home with my daughter...maybe...maybe I should start thinking for myself.

You gotta go where you wanna go,
Do what you wanna do
With whoever you wanna do it with.
Mama's & the Papa's

On the Road 2004


Fast forward to 2004, I'm making a good living, I can afford to pack my 9 year old daughter off to summer camp for 2 weeks. I turn and face the open road. I've read about people who traveled so far, but could I be one of them? It took a couple of days on the road to shake the fears and turn the corner to self confidence. I am out here, and I am doing it on my own. My well meaning friends did not know what they were talking about. The indelible lesson learned: I can accomplish anything that I set out to do, I am the only one holding myself back.

Camping 2003


Yet I still balked at taking Lisa with me. My priorities were changing. I needed to share the road with Lisa. Everyone will tell you that it can't be done. You can't ride with children, they will be bored, you can't take a month off from work, it's a dangerous world out there. But I relied on my lessons of 2004. My well meaning friends did not know what they were talking about. We were going on a road trip.

Glacier National Park 2007


What did I learn in 2007? The motorcycle is not the center of my world. My daughter is. I have so much to teach her and she is an eager learner. The motorcycle makes for a fun and interesting vehicle of learning. But sometimes we go by car, sometimes we go by foot, most importantly we go out and explore the world together and learn about each other along the way. I can not tell my daughter to be an independent thinker, I can only show her. I am convinced that it's a lesson that will take her far in life.

New Brunswick 2008


Thank you AMA for letting us spend a month representing the American Motorcyclist!

Is the Road Calling You?

I've been pouring over my 2007 trip picture for an upcoming article and I've been fixated with the road shots.
If you long for the road...this collection might get you to gear up!

US2 WI, MN, ND? What does it matter?


MT200 - One of my top 10 pictures of the trip.


Idaho 20, Extreme straightness!


ID 20/26 Near Craters of the Moon National Monument


Eastern Washington State WA26 or WA27, just West of Pullman


CA96 One of the best roads we traveled.


Rte 138 Oregon, leaving Crater Lake


Black Hills of South Dakota, it was 105 degrees, I think the road was melting.

Just for Fun

Click on the picture to link to Flickr and find out how to make
one for yourself.

The Stories We Could Tell

Tom Petty - Stories We Could Tell

Talking to myself again
Wondering if this traveling is good
Is there something better we'd be doing if we could
And oh the stories we could tell
And if this all blows up and goes to hell
I can still see us sittin on the bed in some motel
Listening to the stories we could tell
And if you ever wonder why you ride this carousel
You did it for the stories you could tell
And oh the stories we could tell
And if this all blows up and goes to hell
I can still see us sittin on the bed in some motel
Listening to the stories we could tell...

This song runs through my head as I sit here on a cold night editing and uploading travel pictures. I do it because I have a story to tell. I travel so that I will have stories to tell. I love sharing my story through pictures.

I’ve been exploring a variety of motorcycle related pictures on Flickr lately. I set up my account in the spring, wanting an easy way to upload and share pics, but I hadn't looked around the site much. What a wealth of groups and keywords to explore! I’ve been key wording my pictures more so that others can find them - K75, Motorcycle, Travel, mother, daughter etc. I’ve joined a few groups to share my pics with people of similar interest. I wonder what the members of “Mothers and Daughters” think of the new motorcycle pictures? There are many hits for motorcycle groups. Women on Motorcycles is hit or miss, too many nudes draping on bikes, but also real women riders, I decided to post there in hopes of encouraging more real woman riders to do the same maybe we can push out the posers. Plenty of BMW Motorcycles here and here Adventure MC Club . Bunch of Rounders in the Winter MC Riding

Speaking of stories, I'm finishing up a story for Outdoor Woman Magazine. It's my first attempt at writing for a non-motorcycling audience. It's been a challenge to keep my audience in mind.

The Lost Picture Folder

On our trip this summer, I traveled with a Toughbook computer. Almost every night, I downloaded the pictures from our two cameras. For some reason, the last set of downloads did not get under the 2007 Trip folder. When I was home from my trip, I copied the 2007 folder to my desktop machine. I've periodically had the feeling that I'm missing some pictures. Today, I powered up the Toughbook, and sure enough, there was the lost folder.
I just love this picture of Lisa. On the 34th day of our trip, we left DC and headed toward home. As it turned out we landed at my brother's in CT. In this picture, Lisa who by this time was a little jaded about the whole riding thing, is reading a teenager type magazine, outside of a gas station. She kept that magazine in her pack, and sat in the back enjoying it for the rest of the day...completely tuning out the "boring" Pennsylvania scenery. I love her independent thinking.


On the last day of our trip, day 35, we had one more important stop to make. Before heading home we needed to go to the Atlantic Ocean. It's not as if we'd never been there, we live an hour away from it, but our trip had always been sub-titled "From Sea to Shinning Sea". We needed to head to the beach. What a day for it. I like the picture of us with the bike, we have so few of the two if us together. But I think Lisa's face says that she's ready to go home...now!

What A Season!

It's the end of the MOA mileage contest. 6 months, April through October. 15,600 and something miles, not my highest mileage year, but certainly my best season ever!

I topped off my miles this weekend meandering the back roads of Cape Cod. The temps where high 50's, 100% sun but the days short, going dark at 6:00. Kevin and I headed to a family party at my aunt’s in Falmouth. We said our hello's, enjoyed some food but got antsy quickly. We made an impromptu decision to grab a hotel on the Cape so that we could do more riding Sunday; it was a very good idea! As with most of our trips this year, we really enjoyed our miles, making more stops, taking pictures…smiles not just miles this year.

We kicked off mileage season in April with a trip to Corning, NY. It was the weekend of the Rounder’s gathering and we had wanted to join them, but the thousand mile trip to Indiana was going to be all slab miles, have dinner, turn around and high tale it home. We both realized this was not how we wanted to spend our time. We’d already taken the Friday off, so we decided on the Corning trip. Remember the scored roter incident? Funny, how I forget about mechanical problems.

Late in May I enjoyed a day at the track at Loudon Int’l Speedway. I love the pictures I came home with and memories of opening the K12’s throttle on the backstretch. Check that off my list. I don’t think I’ll be going back.

Memorial Day weekend found us dodging the rain drops in Plattsburgh, NY. As we talked about this trip recently, Kevin had to remind me that it was raining that weekend. We had such fun hiking at Ausable Chasm, watching the Sox win a game while sitting in a New York sports bar and enjoying the riding in Upstate NY and Vermont. With the right state of mind, you make your own fun, no matter where you are.

Late June and July had Lisa and me on the road for our big trip. Big Big Big. 35 days, 25 states and 9,000 miles. Countless hours of planning. I don’t regret a minute of the planning and would strongly urge you to do likewise if you want to undertake your trip of a lifetime! The last week of our trip had the most glitches, and it’s not surprise it was the week that I planned out the least.

My miles slowed to second gear after I got home from the trip. It was a combination of things. It’s no easy task to come back to “the real world”. Completing such a big event left me blue, and being blue it no time to hop on the bike. And because I did not want to do any forced marches, I passed up many mediocre opportunities to get out on the bike.

I really left all of that behind me this weekend. I felt the joy of a newbie as I rolled down the hill Saturday morning. All my pent up frustration over missing the previous sunny weekends was gone. I was out, riding on my own, nothing to prove, no deadlines to meet; just me, my favorite bike and a gloriously sunny New England day. There couldn’t have been a better way to top off the odometer for another riding season.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

As expected, one of Lisa's first assignments for English class was the timeless 'What I Did On My Summer Vacation" paper. The kids were asked to write 3 paragraphs. Lisa could hardly keep it to three pages. Here is slightly condensed version of her submission. When you are 12, things are very cool.

I can’t believe it; we’re already back to school! I had the most fun, busy, exciting, summer EVER! I was only home for three weeks! I did some usual things. But I did one very, very unusual thing that I will tell you about in a little while. I’m going to tell you what I did in the opposite order of which I did them. First the usual things. These are probably the top 3 things that people do in the summer.

I went to the YMCA Teen Adventure Camp for the last three weeks of summer. That was pretty fun, we all piled on a bus everyday and went on field trips. I think every week I hung out with different people. My favorite field trip was going to Six Flags. We also went hiking at Pack Monadnock, visited the Flume Gorge and enjoyed a day at Canobie Lake Park.

I also visited my great-aunt on Cape Cod. My mom’s Aunt Louise lives in East Falmouth, along with her 14 year old deaf dog named Blue. Blue knows sign language! My friend and I went to the beach three times that week. That was really fun. I got a pretty good tan too. The last time we went, the water was rough and we were body-surfing the waves.

The week before visiting the Cape, my dad and I went camping. We stayed at a camp ground, on Lake Winnipesaukee for a week, and slept in a tent. My dad has a WaveRunner, which is a large jet-ski. There was a place to “park” your jet-ski near a small beach; I saw a big black blotch in the water. My dad thought it was tadpoles. I stuck my hands in the water and scooped some up, they were baby cat fish! They were so tiny. They all swam under a bush, then I saw mommy. She was about 7 inches long, and she would circle the babies and chase away and other fish that got near the babies. Almost every night we had a campfire and made s’mores.

Now we get to the really interesting part. In the first 5 weeks of summer I went across the country… on a motorcycle… with my mother! 35 days, 9,000 miles, and 25 states. It was a life-changing experience and I learned more than I ever could from a social studies text book. It is hard for most people to grasp the magnitude of this trip. I hope these next paragraphs can help you.

Our destination for the first day was Ottawa, the capitol of Canada. We got in around 5pm. The next morning we toured Ottawa. We saw the Parliament buildings. They were very old and beautiful. We also saw the U.S. and Kuwait Embassies. The U.S. Embassy had major security around it. We saw the Natural History Museum and an art museum. One thing that I thought was really interesting where the black squirrels!

Glacier National Park, Montana was one of our big stops. It was actually the cause of this whole trip. My mom went on a cross-country trip in 2004. She stopped at Glacier and just had to bring me. That day we left from Grand Forks, ND. I could see the mountains off in the distance the whole day. From 350 miles away! They just got bigger and bigger until they were looming right over me. We went on a road that wound through the mountains, beside a river that was emerald blue. My mom had shown me pictures of her stop at Glacier, but it’s not the same, you can not grasp the feeling from a picture. You must see it to believe it!

We stayed in Glacier for 3 days. We went white water rafting one day, and that was really cool! Literally; the water was 35 degrees. It was in the emerald blue water I mentioned. One afternoon we took a ride to the Hungry Horse dam. We stopped at a small area on the side of the road to look around. The mountains were awe-inspiring. I was standing on a cliff, contemplating what it means to human, when my mom took a picture. It turned out to be one of our best out of 2,000. I was watching hawks soar and float around the mountain and was thinking what it would be like to fly.

Ok, we’ve made it to the other side. It took us 2 weeks to get to Oregon. We rode down the whole coast in one day. We stopped at a beach and collected some sand. I touched the water’s of the Pacific Ocean, so I could officially say I went sea to shining sea!

On July 3rd we stayed in West Yellowstone, in the town right out side the West entrance of Yellowstone National Park. It was in Montana. The next day we missed our bus tour so we toured the park on the bike, and rode a western stagecoach. When we first stopped for gas I was saying to my mother “I hope we see something cool today”; right on cue, a bison lumbers across the parking lot. It was defiantly cool! On the second day we were stopped in traffic because of three bison in the road. We also saw elk and moose but no bears.

Heading back east, we traveled to South Dakota for the Black Hills BMW motorcycle rally. We were riding in the hills, and all of sudden we turn the corner and we could see everything. We were riding along a cliff and I swear you could see for at least 1,000 miles. It was amazing! And the rocks next to the road were red! It was beautiful! When it was time for the rally, about 150 motorcycles enjoyed a police escort into town. Main Street was closed off just for us.

In Wisconsin we went to the 35th Annual BMW MOA International Rally. We volunteered at the registration tent, looking up peoples’ names. When we were there we camped in a tent, I had my own tent. One night was really scary because of a storm with heavy rain and 30+ mph winds! We won two awards: Long distance two up- female. And I won second place for youngest female passenger

Leaving Wisconsin, we headed to our last big stop on the trip: Washington D.C. We only had one full day in the city, but it was a very good day. We saw the Capitol building which was special to me because I made the Capitol Building for my landmark project. We also saw the Washington monument, where 3 helicopters flew over us and one landed at the White House. It could have been the President! We visited one of the Smithsonian museums, the Natural History Museum. We saw the World War 2 Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and The Vietnam War Memorial. D.C. was one of my favorite stops.

In the Blink of an Eye

Lisa went back to school today.
She was all excited about her new clothes; fixed her hair just right, wondered who was in her class…her summer’s done. I did my best to make it the best summer ever, but it’s behind us now, and I feel a little blue. I want to linger in it a little longer; I want to be back on the road, brush out her hair at the rest stop one more time, take a couple of more pictures, lean into another corner... I don’t want summer to end.
2,000 pictures were not enough to capture the feel of our journey, but they will do. We’ve promised each other we’re going to work on a scrap book together. I have a box filled with the flotsam and jetsam of our trip – some gas receipts, wrinkled maps, dog eared tourist brochures, hotel letterhead with some hastily captured route numbers. I have some zip lock bags filled with sand from the Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean and tiny colorful rocks from the tiny beach we played in at Lake McDonald at Glacier.
Every year seems to be better than the last. I don’t know how 2008 will top 2007, but somehow it will. Until then, we’ll write our stories, gather our pictures and otherwise pack up our memories from our summer of a lifetime, which came and went in the blink of an eye.

Photographs and Memories

Thanks in large part to the efforts of my back seat photographer; I came home from my trip with about 2,000 pictures. Large volumes of pictures can be daunting to track. Having an organizational strategy before you leave for a trip will help you avoid a mess upon your return. I hope you will find some of my strategies useful.

I was traveling with a laptop, so I was able to download our two cameras every day. No matter how tired I was, the download and battery recharge was a days-end must do tasks. The only time I strayed from this where the final few days of the trip. But at that point, we were taking only a half dozen pictures a day.

I began organizing the pictures into trip day folders e.g. DAY1, DAY2. The flaws of this system quickly became obvious; I had to cross reference the location with the day. I switched to location folders: Ottawa, CA, OR. I also created subfolders for significant stops in those states: Redwoods, Crater Lake, Glacier. Glacier rated its own subfolder for Going to the Sun Road and Hungry Horse Dam. This system held up, I occasionally have to cross reference the pictures with the day, but for a 5 week trip, I’m more interested in where the picture was taken then what day it was shot. Additionally, picture properties can reveal the date.

Find the complete write up here: Photographs and Memories - BMW MOA

Every Trip Needs a Little Luck

Picture: Sporting her now trademark purple hair-glove, Lisa ponders life in Hungry Horse Montana

They say that luck favors the prepared. We had a lot of luck on our trip. Most of it having nothing to do with how prepared we were. Here are some incidents that I can recall.

1. Leaving the Great Falls, MT area at the end of our first week, I see Lisa in the mirror waving her pony tail to me indicating that she’s lost her hair-glove. The hair-glove is that divine invention that has kept her long beautiful hair from becoming an unmanageable rat’s nest. My heart sinks at the prospect of managing her locks without it. We pull off at the next exit; I need to get gas and air anyway. We get off the bike, chattering about how the hair-glove came loose, when we both look toward the tour pack and at the same time spot the purple neoprene glove wedged between the back seat and tour pack. It fell from her hair and landed safely. We were ecstatic and did a little happy jig right there in the parking lot. What luck!
Read the complete ride report here: Every Trip Needs a Little Luck - Rounders Forum

Mission Accomplished

Oddly enough, the one question that was seldom, if ever, asked of us on our trip was “Why?” Do people assume they know why?
I have about 2,000 pictures from the trip. This week at work, they are running in a random slideshow on my personal laptop. I spotted this picture of Lisa; it best expresses my answer to "Why?" I would ride 9,000 more miles to see my daughter this happy surrounded by the best that Nature has to offer.
When we arrived at the turn around point on Going to the Sun Road in Glacier National Park, Lisa yelled out from her helmet: “Mom, you where right, YOU JUST GOTTA SEE THIS TO BELIEVE IT”.

We got by with a little help from our friends.

I bought a few thank-you cards today for the people who welcomed us into their homes during our journey. But Hallmark doesn’t really sell all the types of thank you cards I need, so I’ll have to make up some of my own.

Thank you to the folks at Max BMW, they really understand what it means to support riders who are on the road.

Thank you to Jim, my trusted mechanic, who said I could call anytime, and set me off on a bike that didn’t need any support.

Thank you to the blog readers who donated quite a few tanks of gas, you made our miles a little lighter! We got anything from 130 – 190 miles a tank, and paid 2.65 to 3.65/gal. – And who knows how much a liter in Canada!

Thanks to those of you who left blog comments, sent emails, PMed, IMed or texted me! Isn’t technology grand? I wasn’t always able to reply back to your well wishes, but I shared them with Lisa and they brightened our day.

Thank you to the people who followed the blog and took the time to mention it to us when we met in person. It’s been very good to share our adventure.

Thank you to all our forum friends, who offered advice, rooted for us and read our stories.

And a big hug, kiss and thank you to Kevin for holding things down on the home front, sending pictures of kitty to Lisa, clearing the deck, and riding out to play with us for a week!

R&R in DC

We're at friends house in the DC area. We left the MOA Rally on Sunday (more about the Rally later). and rode to Cleveland with Kevin. We went through Milwaukee, Chicago and Cleveland - just passed through on the highway. It would have been nice to make a pit stop, but as with so many other sites, just too many things to see and not enough time. We couldnt have asked for better weather in the past couple of days, mostly clear, sunny in the 80's. As we got into the DC area the humidity shot up and the thunder clouds loomed, but we only saw 2 minutes of rain.

The fan on the K75 decided to quit in Chicago traffic and the bike began to overheat. Luckly we got out of the stop in go in time. I'm going to try to track down a fix, but may end up riding it home. I'm ok if we keep moving. 8,000 miles and this is the first mechanical problem, fingers crossed.

We're off to see the sights in the city, and take in a baseball game tonight.

SD is one Hot Place!

Picture: The motorcycle gods looked upon us kindly today as we skirted these thunderstorms, we had only the road spray to contend with as it passed over the road in front of us.

We're resting comfortably in our air conditioned hotel. Sometimes this is the only cure for a hot day. We heard that it was 106 in the Black Hills (SD) yesterday. I believe it. As we decended out of the mountains the air was unlike anything I'd felt riding. It felt more like I was tending a fire. One road we were on was freshly oiled...or was the aphalt melting?

We had an enjoyable stay at our first Black Hill BMW Rally. We won the long distance two-up award. Easy to do with almost 6,000 miles on the clock. The first place solo rider was from the North West Territories, look it up, it's adjacent to Alaska.

I also got my first tastes of being an MOA Board of Director, and people figured out where they knew my name from I enjoyed listening to other riders' concerns about the MOA. I just enjoy talking about bikes! Poor Lisa, she just wanted to get back to the hotel pool! I owed her some time off. So we called it a short day today. We enjoyed coffee in downtown Spearfish, headed to Wall Drug, and ended the day in Pierre, SD.

Things You Learn Along the Way

As you go across the country, you’re bound to learn a thing or two. Here are some things I’ve learned.

-That restaurant Sonic, that you always see commercials for, it actually does exist. Maybe it’s a western thing.

-The black and white crows on the Windex commercial, they exist too. We saw one in Washington.

-There are no Dunkin Donuts in the West or The “middle” of the country. I knew this already but I didn’t want to believe it. Once you’re past the northeast, say good bye to D+D’s … and maple syrup! Ugghh… pancakes just aren’t the same with icky fake maple syrup!

-You can write with pen and a pad of paper on the the back of a motorcycle going 65mph on the free-way. That’s how I remembered all these things that I learned.

Hot Enough for You?

At a rest area in the Blackhorn National Forest, an old duffer shuffled over to us as we geared up. "You heading up or down?" he inquired, "you won't be needing those coats if you are heading down". "Oh yes" I replied, "if we go down, we'll need these coats". He didn't get my play on words. I find it hard to convince myself at times, but you are better off with the jacket and full-face helmet to keep the sun off you...and bugs too! E-VAP-O-Dana from Aerostitch offers some relief. It's a bandana you soak and tie around your neck and enjoy some cool relief.

How hot was it?
Imagine your Joe Rocket mesh jacket feels like a snowmobile suit.
Now imagine you are wearing it in a Sauna.
While drinking hot tea.

Well, maybe not a Sauna, because it was bone dry triple digit heat today. The only relief came from elevation. And at 9,300 feet we found lots of relief. What beautiful riding on WY-14 through Blackhorn. Amazing red roads, red rocks.

Relief From the Heat

Picture: Road to Crater Lake, OR

Since the slight rain we encountered on our Coastal Oregon ride on last Monday we've had nothing but nice weather. Watching the Weather Channel, it appears we've been very lucky travelers. A couple of days before arriving in Glasgow, MT, hail storms struck the area. A couple days after leaving Spokane, WA rain and wind damage struck the city. Heat has enveloped the area we are in now (Boise) but we've kept our cool riding in the hills. It was about an hour of the hot stuff getting to our hotel yesterday, but no big deal. We hit the pool upon arrival. Today we'll arrive at Yellowstone, I expect it to be a little cooler there too and plenty of elevation to take us there. It also looks like the rain is on the other side of the mountains. So we'll be watching the Weather Channel closely as we get ready to depart the area and head toward Spearfish, SD. It's been happy trails when you've seen more snow than rain in July.

The Long and Winding Roads

Yesterday I was pondering the following: Can a road be too long and winding? We left Brookings, OR (at the very southern tip of coastal 101) and headed for the Redwood Forest. We had an amazing ride there and got some nice pics. I’ll post them in the Picture of the Day section. We continued south on 101 to Arcata where we reluctantly took a left. It was 2:00 when we got onto 299 and then turned North onto 96 and spent the rest of the day. It was on 96 that I wondered about the long and winding road. 5 hours, on the second half of the day was tiring. What a road. It follows the Klamath River. It has tight turns, long winding turns, up hill and down. I was too tired for this road. 5 hours of a road that is 10x as challenging as our beloved VT-7. No doubt I’d feel differently if I was fresh, but I was one tired camper when we rolled into Yreke, CA (near Mt. Shasta) around 7:00pm. It was like a yummy ice cream Sunday…but it was to much of a good thing!

No where to go, all day to get there.

No Place To Go and All Day to Get There.

When I was in Spokane in 2004, I didn't do much riding. I definitely missed these roads! If you are from the area, these roads are probably no surprise. But as a visitor to the area looking for some nice roads to head westerly on, I found this route to be a real treat. It was the first day of the trip that I really felt like I was just out for a day ride. No place to go, just roads to explore.



We had a change of plans due to Monday’s weather and found ourselves in Spokane on Tuesday morning. I left Garmin alone and picked up the atlas. Being as 27 is my luck number WA-27 seemed like a good choice try. It was a comfortable winding road with great trees and fields. It felt very New England like. And was a pleasant change of pace from the very straight US-2 we’d been on for days.





The terrain changed regularly as the rolling green hills where replaced with crops, and them barren brown hills


My back seat photographer didn’t appreciating the twisty sections of road as much as I was and found the arid land a little boring.






Finally as we approached Yakima, we began to see more irrigated crops: apples, grapes and cows. Well, not irrigated cows, but they were getting watered.

Here are the routes we where on: WA-27S out of Spokane. WA-26W, WA-127S (very twisty), WA-12W, WA-261W (because we wanted to go to Starbuck, WA), WA-26W and WA-24 into Yakima.