H14 and Campcook wandering aimlessly 2-up

I bought my first bike a DR650 in 2008. At the time I never could have dreamed the places it would take me and all the friendships that would be made. Three years later I get a deal on a DL650 I just could not pass up. To help smooth this over with the wife I told her about all the great trips we could go on together (like that was going to happen, but it sounded good to her and I got the bike).

About a year later after watching me go on trips she starts shopping the ADV flea market for gear. Summer gets here and we do an overnight trip to Gettysburg, PA and two nights at Goosecreek's camp out in Moneta, VA.

Two things I started to realize were, I wasn't the only one with a passion for this, and when we got away from worrying about raising kids and the pressures of paying bills and just being out on the bike together we really enjoyed being with each other.



She teaches so she has the summer off. We're planning several overnight trips to the mountains of VA, WV, MD, PA, and who knows we might even venture out farther eventually.

My buddy JaxObsessed has an ongoing thread in DayTripping and I'd like to follow his lead and do something similar. No promises on entertainment value or quality photos but I'm sure we'll have a story to tell.

In the meantime, let's go to Maine and eat some Lobster................................................

Bout time.

Really!!!

Excellent!

I used up most of my leave from work last year to ride the Continental Divide with a bunch of my buddies leaving no time to take for a family vacation. With maybe a little bit of a guilty conscience and the fact that this year would be our 25th wedding anniversary I told her this years trip would be ours to go where she wanted. She said she would like to do a long camping trip on the Strom. How are you all liking her so far?

Neither of us have been to New England so we decided we would do a loop over ten days through New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and Pennsylvania.

Friday night we loaded the bike and went to bed early since we had a 400+ mile day ahead to get to Marathon NY. I spent most the night wide awake mind racing going over every detail for about the hundredth time and thinking how good it would be to get a good night's sleep. I guess this happens to everybody before a big trip, it happens to me every time.



We head out Saturday morning following the remnants of tropical storm Andrea. We chased rain all the way to New York but never got wet. Our goal for the day was just to knock out miles and get closer to Vermont. 422 miles later we get to Marathon NY and check into the Three Bears Inn(thanks Old Lion). After unloading the bike I turn the key to the wheel lock position for the first time since owning the bike. What I didn't pay atention to was, one position past wheel lock is park. If you take the key out in that position the taillight stays illuminated and that's what I did.

So our Sunday morning starts with a jump start.




We're good to go now honey, I won't do that again I promise.




I told Rhonda we really needed to get some shots from the bike and the job was hers. She tried it and said it scared her to death and she wasn't going to do it. So for your viewing pleasure here is our one and only "on the fly" photo of the entire trip.



As we rode through the Adirondacks the cloud cover finally started to break up and it turned into a perfect day to ride.



We rode by the Olympic Jumping Complex in Lake Placid. These people must be crazy, I had no ideas these things were so high until I saw them in person.



On the way from Lake Placid to the Essex-Charlotte ferry the road got real twisty and I turned my head hard to the left to check out something. When I tried to turn my head to get my eyes back on the road my head won't turn, my helmet is somehow caught on the collar of my jacket. In a brief moment of panic I turn my head as hard as I can, I hear a pop, my helmet frees itself from my jacket, and my brand new intercom setup stopped working. Apparently my intercom unit mounted on the helmet had caught on my jacket collar and when I snapped my head around it broke the mount. So after only one day with these brand new intercoms this is now how mine is mounted to my helmet.




Next up, ferry to Vermont.

Going to get Jodi to lurk this thread with me.

I like that a Suzuki jumped your Suzuki

Don't let Dixie know how much fun you had w/o her...

Hey Mickey.

I never noticed it was a Suzuki. He told me he had a Harley but wound up in the car because he lived 150 miles away and the were calling for a chance of rain.:eek1

When I told him we did 400 miles the day before he looked at me like I said 1000 miles.

Hey Jack, Scott, Wayne, and Tom. I'm going to miss you guys this weekend. Looks like you all are going to have a good time.

How's it going Todd, you all still in Colorado?

UUUMH.............it's next weekend

You should come.

We get to Essex, NY and line up to board the ferry that will take us across Lake Champlain to Vermont.



First look at Vermont and it looks like it's going to be fun.



Campcook likes what she sees.



Smooth ride.



Just about every day no matter how early we would get going the day would seem to get away from us and we would be late in the evening getting to our destination. Today was no different so we decided to skip camping this night and we found a room a Stowe Hotel in Stowe VT. After checking into our room we walked to the Cactus Cafe, Rhonda had a smoked salmon enchilada that was out of this world.Another great day, the only issues were a dead battery and a broken BT intercom mount.

Nice end to a long, fun day.

Working both weekends.

Kevin,

glad to see you and Rhonda out and about. I look forward to the adventure.

Garrett, I see you're famous now with your pic in some BMW magazine.
Let me know when you're out this way riding again.

Dave

I gave the DR too much credit in my first post. Finding ADV and getting to know some of the great people here changed my life. That may sound a little over the top but if someone would have told me five years ago that in a couple years time that I'd buy a motorcycle, meet a whole new group of people that would become life long friends and we would load up our bikes and ride a trail from New Mexico to Montana and that I would buy another bike and spend my vacations riding around with my wife and sleeping on the ground again like a kid I would have laughed my ass off.

When I discovered your ride reports and read your stories about you and Julie travelling together on your Strom I thought it would be so cool to do that. We're fortunate men to be married to women with a common passion. I can emulate you as far as the wife as a riding partner and a silver VStrom, the awesome heartfelt storytelling and the incredible pictures, not so much.

If someone would say H14 and Campcook are the B-movie version of iDave and iJulie I would take it as a hell of compliment.

You said that as well as Dave would have.

No offense Dave! and Dave. I'm ready to lurk the next LoveShack joint.

This looks like fun and your campfire looks cozy.