The loop (and the Arrow)

For the first time in ages, it seems, the stars aligned and I had a whole day to myself. Sunny, temperatures in the mid-20s (70 – 80F), and a honey-do list that was more or less under control meant that I could spend the entire day riding if I wanted, so I did. Well most of it anyway.
There’s a 400-kilometre loop (~250 miles) I’d wanted to ride for some time that heads west from here through some really pretty back country to the headwaters of the Madawaska River. Dotted with small tourist towns the curvy roads are well maintained and generally not too heavily travelled, making for perfect riding conditions.

So in the vernacular of the locals I “headed up the line” to Whitney, passing through the villages of Eganville, Golden Lake and Wilno among others. It’s great cottage country so these tiny settlements were all quite busy with tourist traffic as craft shops, liquor stores, and outfitters were all doing a booming business.
In Barry’s Bay I stopped for lunch (apologies to Bobskoot, no photos of my Subway sandwich) and came across this memorial to a famous Polish-Canadian.

But first some history.
After the Korean War the Canadian government started a project with A.V. Roe Canada to build the world’s most advanced supersonic fighter aircraft.The CF-105, or Avro Arrow as it was known, flew its maiden flight in 1958 with Janusz Żurakowski in the pilot’s seat. In subsequent test flights the aircraft exceed all expectations, achieving a top speed of nearly Mach 2.0 and establishing a benchmark for other fighters in development at the time. (My wife is one of the few people who actually saw the Arrow flying as they lived near the test field.)
Then in 1959 in a surprise decision, the newly-elected Conservative government under John Diefenbaker killed the project, putting nearly 30,000 workers out of a job overnight. The rationale for the decision has been explained at various times as a reallocation of funds from fighter aircraft to Bomarc missiles, or that the US government, the Arrow’s largest potential customer, refused to buy foreign-built aircraft, no matter how good, or that the project had been infiltrated by a Soviet spy and therefore had to be cancelled and all plans, prototypes and flying aircraft destroyed. In fact it was probably more mundane than any of that and was simply politically motivated. Diefenbaker’s new government came to power with a mandate to reign in the previous Liberal government's spending, and this was clearly low-hanging fruit with approximately $500 million spent to date and many millions more to come. And the directive to destroy all assets associated with the program would ensure that even if the Liberals regained power, they would never be able to resurrect the program.
The end result was that many of Canada’s brightest aerospace engineering minds headed south to the USA, seriously damaging Canada’s aerospace industry for generations to come, but hugely benefitting America’s nascent space program.
As the Arrow’s chief test pilot Janusz Żurakowski left A.V. Roe and settled in Barry’s Bay where he died in 2004. This model of the Arrow and a series of information plaques concerning his life as a war-time pilot in Poland and later in the UK, and his subsequent years as a test pilot are on the main street of Barry’s Bay in recognition of his contributions to both the aerospace industry and in later years his adopted community. Very cool.
But I digress.
From Barry’s Bay I continued west to Whitney, at the entrance to Algonquin Park, then dropped south to Bancroft for a weird parking lot conversation and a rest break before heading back home through Denbigh, Khartum, Dacre, and Renfrew.
All told, 396.4 kilometres, and a realisation that I am seriously out of shape for any kind of distance riding. I obviously need more saddle time that isn’t just 1/2 hour spurts into town or to the golf course. Will have to work on that.

Weird conversation

I took a long ride today (which I’ll post on later) and I had stopped at the Tim Horton’s in Bancroft for a break. I was sitting on the curb beside my bike with a cigar in one hand and an iced cappuccino in the other – just chillin’ - when a minivan pulls into the spot beside me. An older, white-haired gentlemen gets out, looks down at me and says, “Nice day.”
“Yes,” I said “it’s beautiful… hot, sunny.”
“Well you don’t want to overdo it. 70 years ago I was born with a mole on my back and they had to remove it last year.” he said. “Melanoma. 70 years I had that mole and it was okay until last year.”
Not being quite the topic of conversation I was expecting I was a bit taken aback and mumbled something like “70 years, eh?”.
“Yep,” he said. “My mother is still alive – she’s 92 – and she told me to watch out for that because it was going to give me trouble some day. She was right. 70 years.”
He shook his head. “Enjoy your day.”
And with that he walked into Timmy’s and I was left thinking, “Thank god he didn’t have colorectal cancer.”

An early morning ride

I had a tournament start time of 7:30 so I had to be on the road shortly after 6:00 to get to the course with time to sign up and get a brief putting practice in.  I was running late and was tempted to just jump in the car and go without having to pack my golf clothes, put on a jacket and helmet, and perform all the other minor but time-consuming activities involved in getting ready to ride.
I decided to hell with it – it was too nice a day not to ride and if I was a bit late, then too bad.
The sun was up and just starting to rise above the trees lining the road. The air still had that early morning fresh smell (I’d make a million if I could figure out how to package that in a spray can) that lifts the soul with the promise of a brand new day ahead. And best of all, there was no traffic.
But there were deer, lots of deer, having their breakfast alongside the road. I haven’t hit one yet, but with two motorcycle-deer collisions in the area so far this year (one of them fatal), my spidey sense was working overtime trying to judge which way they’d jump as I went past. Fortunately they all either ignored me or went the right (i.e. other) way. (As I reread this last paragraph it reminds me of those headlines, “247 passengers survive as plane lands safely at O’Hare!”.)
After 15 minutes or so I left the the winding roads and forest and entered the more-or-less deer-free zone of straightaways and farmers’ fields. So with the wind in my face, the sun on my back, and the steady throb of the engine beneath me I relaxed and let my mind wander. And I found myself slipping into that Zen state where riding becomes effortless and the man-machine interface disappears. As anyone who has experienced this will tell you, you become “one” with the machine which seems to anticipate and respond to your thoughts without physical input. Time slows to a crawl.  It’s just you, your bike, and a road… to somewhere, anywhere.  It really is a magical experience that, if I’m lucky, I will get to enjoy once or twice a summer.
In this state I was sorely tempted to just keep on going, and would have but for the expectations of my playing partners. So I made the turn into the club parking lot, promising myself to do more early morning rides.
P.S. I should have kept riding. I may have been up at 5:15 but my golf game managed to sleep in until about 9:30 and arrived bleary-eyed and in an ornery mood.

Slip slidin’ away.

For some reason we northerners insist on being able to drive like it’s mid-summer, even in the depths of winter. And for that reason the authorities apply road salt by the tonne from December through March. (The other reason being, of course, it’s a conspiracy by the auto industry so their cars rot out after 7 or 8 years and need to be replaced more often than would otherwise be necessary.)
Fortunately there are some islands of sanity, including our township which doesn’t use salt in our area. The reason is to reduce the amount of salt that runs off into White Lake and, as a by-product, cut down on the number of deer hit while licking salt off the country roads. Instead they use sand – lots and lots of sand. Which is great on icy roads in January, but not so great on paved roads in June. And since our township is too poor to operate a sweeper, the sand can linger on the roads until well into the summer, inexplicably concentrated in corners and intersections. 
Hence this, the end result of a front wheel hitting a skim of sand in the middle of a off-camber corner.
Fortunately there was nothing hurt but some pride, a bit of confidence, and a signal light lens, but it serves as a good reminder to pay very close attention to the road surface ahead as the wrong stuff in the wrong place will put you down in an instant.

Flashback

Back in the days of my, some would say misspent, youth when I was riding Hondas, Yamahas and Kawasakis (never a Suzuki although I did once contemplate the acquisition of an ‘83 Katana) I was forever lusting after something more exotic than the ubiquitous Japanese iron.
For a pure head-turning, WTF factor there wasn’t much that would exceed the Munsch Mammut (Mammoth) with its transverse 4 cylinder 1200cc NSU engine. This brute, at 550 pounds, was considered massive for the day. But compared to my Dyna at 675 pounds it’s a relative lightweight by today’s standards.
If riding an engineering marvel was more your forte, the Benneli Sei would scratch your itch. The 750cc engine was basically a Honda CB500 with 2 cylinders added. With a rated top speed of 120 mph this machine was a goer, and six separate mufflers were sure to capture any passer-by's attention.
But up there among the illustrious Moto-Guzzis and German-engineered BMWs (this was before there was a BMW parked outside every Starbucks between here and Portland) one bike really stood out for me, the Laverda 750. In it’s finest orange livery it was hard to miss, but if you happened to be visually impaired, or busy staring at one of the “nicest people” you just met on a Honda, the sound was a dead giveaway. You have to hand it to the Italians, they do sound very well, and the Laverda was no exception, you could hear it coming a long way and there was no mistaking that twin-cylinder rumble when under full throttle. 
And what brought on this trip down memory lane?
Well today I was in the city running some errands (on two wheels, of course) and I pulled up beside a 1975 Laverda 750 at a traffic light. It has probably been 5 years since I last saw one on the road so I engaged the rider in conversation and found out that the bike was still all original. Of course after 36 years it is showing its age, but it is still a daily rider. The paint has lost some luster and he’s thought about repainting but would like to stay with the original orange. His wife hates the orange and wants to change it, so he avoids the conflict by leaving it just as it is. And when the light changed I held back just that extra few seconds to listen to the bark as he pulled away smartly knowing, I’m sure, just why I paused. Nice.