Afterward their nephew and his girlfriend took me the hour drive to Blanc Sablon to board the plane. I had to leave a few things behind (the stove and fuel containers) that he promised to post back to me when I get back home. Otherwise it was a rush through the hand-check security since they don’t have an X-Ray there.

We went up in the air, taking off from the tiny Blanc Sablon airport, and landed just a few minutes later in St. Anthony. A few more folks got on making it a full plane. Around a half-hour after we touched down we took off again headed to St. John’s. The long leg of the flight in the Dash-8 lasted an hour and a half. The scenery that I saw out the window was as spectacular from the air as it was from the ground with the mountains, trees, water and the speckles of little towns scattered about.

Landing in St. John’s gave me the biggest surprise of the trip: a fellow I met on my way west in Gander, John, was there to pick me up! O. M. G.

I gave him the address of the blog while there and he checked it out on Sunday morning and saw Ennie’s post that I was flying to St. John’s. There’s only one flight from in from Blanc Sablon each day so he took a chance. Just about anyone I’ve met out here has been the nicest people I’ve ever met. We found me a hotel room, dropped my big crates off and went off to have some beers in an Irish pub on George Street (if I recall correctly). Beer is good. Seems a lot of Irish settled in St. Johns which explains the theme. A band came in to set up for some live music as we were getting ready to leave.

Before dropping me off at the hotel he took me up to Signal Hill where Mr. Marconi tested out his newfangled wireless gear. (Guglielmo Marconi: his name is fun to say!) I looked over to Cape spear a few miles south down the shore to see where I was standing in the rain just a week prior.

He dropped me off at the Battery Hotel for the night and I had an overpriced steak. That’s life. At this point it’s only money, eh?

Settling in to my room I looked out my window seeing a view that would be worthy to be on a post card. Wishing I had my real camera working I snapped a few shots with the small one hoping to capture a bit of the scene. Again, that’s life.

Blanc Sablon doesn’t have an X-ray so they hand check everything I hear. I packed things to try to make it easy to go through by hand.

I have my back pack which survived just fine with a book, laptop and various small items.

The Seal Line bag is my main carry-on with all my clothes, the remainder of the books. The remains of my camera. Toiletries. And a bag of rocks. Can’t forget the rocks.    (Some rocks from Cape Spear, the mantle rocks from the Tablelands in Gros Morne, and the Labradorite)

The smaller of the boxes is divided in two parts: motorcycle take-offs and small camping doo-dads. That’s the one I’m afraid of. The bike stuff is various odd-shaped metal parts and a whole rats-nest of wires. I guess if they hand-check it I can explain what each and every part used to do. The other side has camping food, gear, and whatnot.

Finally, the big box has my bigger things: boots, suit, seat, helmet, hand-guards from the bike, engine bash-guard, sleeping bag, tent, empty fuel bottles, etc.

I’m hoping they make it back OK. They’re both heavy boxes.

I still need to settle up for the room here at the B&B. Wade and Blanche did more for me that I could have possibly expected anyone to do. I’ll be eternally grateful for the help they’ve offered me when I needed it the most. Without their help I would have still been un-hurt, but I would have been a lot farther from help. I probably wouldn’t be going home today either.

If you’re ever in Red Bay, please stop in and let them know.

I need to go out and take pictures of the carnage for the insurance. I’m going to take as many as I can. They’re free.

Making lists of damage (roughly in order front-to-back)  (also a cost of parts to replace from memory not including labor)

• Beak – $250
• Headlight assembly – $600
• Headlight guard – $100
• Windshield – $300
• Windshield mounting bar – $230
• Right fog light – $150
• Telelever arm – $800
• Front sub-frame – $1500
• Forks (maybe – a lot of force on them) – $1500
• Crash bars (both sides) – $1000
• Cylinder-head-cover guards (both sides) – $250
• Damage to left cylinder-heads – $500
• Panniers – $1500
• Pannier mounting frames – $800
• Muffler – $600
• Rear sub-frame – $1500

I know for certain that either (or both) the front sub-frame or the telelever arm is tweaked. That’s the only way that the steering on the big beemer would not be straight. The forks may or may not be good, I’m finding it hard to tell. They took a lot of force though. The rear sub-frame is almost certainly bent as well, visually it looks a bit skewed and I’m seeing rub marks on the mounting points where it attaches to the engine.

I’m sure there’s things I’m not seeing on there too.

That’s a lot ov damaged parts just there not counting transport (my gut-feel estimate is $4000 to get it to Cleveland) and labor (60 hours (likely more)  @ 50/hour: $3000). To fix the damage you basically have to take the bike completely apart – all that’s left is having the engine on a stand – and build it again.

You could probably make it a good rat bike for $3000 if you do the work yourself. Less if you can straighten a subframe yourself. All you might need is a headlight and maybe a telelever arm.

Poor bike… I’m sorry to see her go.  :’-(  Like a good steed, it did everything I could ask. It’ll be hard leaving without her. Almost 26000 miles on the clock. That’s a lot of time to spend with someone. If I added up all the time I was on her it’s close to a month of time all told.

Making of list of things to take off bike that I don’t want to leave here without. I want the bike to stay a bike, but if it doesn’t need it to run, I don’t want to leave it here. (roughly from back to front)

• License plate – check
• Seat – waiting until we get to the shed
• P3 Lights – check
• Oil cooler guard (might need to leave it if I can’t unbolt the beak from the crash bars) – It’s bent, but check
• Engine bash plate – check
• Hand guards – check
• Autocom – check
• Fuse box – check
• Relay – check
• GPS mount + wiring – check
• Headlight ballasts + custom-made brackets. (The bulbs I’m writing off. One is broken, the other one would likely break in transport) – check

It’s probably around 3 hours of work to remove all the parts that need to be removed. Mostly since I need to take off the tank to get to some of the parts – the wiring. If I can’t manage it, no big deal. It’s $15 worth of wires. Nothing to cry about really.

I really wish I could bring the wheels with me. They’re true and great. It would be a crying shame if they get destroyed. If nothing else they are rebuildable.

I need to fix Wade and Blanche’s computer. Beyond paying for my room it’s the least I can do to show how grateful I am to them taking me in. Without their help I would be so far up a creek without a paddle it wouldn’t even be funny.

I need to talk to the reported. Wade called up a reported to interview me to help get the road made safer. I need to unpack the box to get out my helmet for a photo-op. The helmet saved my life pretty much.

Bike work

Well, after three hours of work (almost on the nose) I have all my bits and bobs in a box ready to take with me on the plane. Pulling the gas tank was a chore, but it was even more of a pain getting it on. It more-or-less confirms my suspicion that the front frame is bent.

Pulling the P3 lights required a removing the pannier racks – and reinstalling after I was done. An hour of work in total to get to the part that took 3 minutes.

Flights

Here’s my itinerary for getting back home:

Yes, I have a 20 hour layover in St. Johns. I could have shortened it to 14 hours for $300 CAD more, but I can wait. I think it’s one less flight too. I think I might catch a cab to a hotel or something for the night. At least I might be able to see a bit more of St. Johns that I did before. I’m just hoping for no rain in St. Johns.

I’m already trying to figure out what I want for dinner when I get back. I’m thinking Mexican. 

Computer work

After playing around on the store’s computer for a bit (Blanche and Wade own the store next door as well) I got a good working install of Vista working on the machine. A lot of waiting around, but at the end of the process, the machine was working good as new!

Morgue

The bike’s in the shed locked up. The spare key is in the ignition waiting to go. The real key is in my pocket as a memory of the poor beast. I have pictures from all angles. Last I took pictures of the panniers. That last bit was the hardest. In the shop taking the pictures felt like I was in a morgue. Throwing things away that couldn’t be fixed made me well up inside.

Even stupid shit.

The little oil jugs. One with 15w50, the other with cooking oil.

They’ve been to Alaska. Shipping them air would be a disaster. I gave them to Wade.

They were a gift from Ennie a couple years back.  :’-(

Tank bag: ripped from the fall. Burnt from the exhaust headers. Not salvageable. In the trash.

Liter of unleaded: in a four-wheeler.

.4 liter of white gas: ready to be disposed of.

Hell, even the spare key ahs been to Alaska in my handy hiding spot. Now it’s the main key in the ignition; no longer in hiding.

Like a morgue. Disposing of effects.

Having a good horse with a broken leg and needing to shoot it.

I have a big box packed with big stuff. I have a small box packed with small stuff. Ready to go. All I have to do is pack my backpack and my Seal-line bag. I’m all ready to go.

Without my poor bike.

/me is very sad to leave the faithful steed that got me here.  </weep>

My first bike.

.

.

I went from Lanse Au Clair up to Red Bay this morning and it was a nice easy scenic ride. Everything was going good. All the while I was looking for rocks to see if I could some labradorite. I wasn’t having luck and I knew Red Bay was somewhat touristy I stopped at the souvenir shop to see if they had any. Sure enough they did. I picked up a stack of them.

As I went out I found myself surrounded by Danes. They were really interested in all the bits and bobs I had on my bike. They loved talking about the bike and we spent the better part of half an hour talking and having them get on the bike and what-not.

But it was time to leave.

Time to meet destiny.

I headed up the road back to the trans-lab and took a right onto the gravel.

The bike was skittish to say the least.

Knowing what I know now the right choice was to say “screw it” (or possibly far less polite words) and head back with my tail between my legs. But with both tail and legs intact.

The maximum speed on the road was 70kph and I was going around half that not wanting to push it.

Now here’s the events as I remember them plus what I can piece together from the evidence of damage and road marks (this all happens in just a few seconds):

• I try playing with my speed to find a more stable speed that is more stable, I got from around 30 up to 35kph
• The front end starts getting a bit less stable
• I let off the throttle a touch to slow back down (no brakes involved)
• The front end weave gets worse
• From here on I might be doing anything with throttle or steering – I don’t remember since it’s all on instinct.
• (here on in I’m just a passenger)
• The rear-end loses grip sliding left
• The front-end loses grip sliding left
• Bike falls to the right
• Right-hand engine crash-bar touches down
• I dismount bike head-first (this I remember very vividly – the road surface coming closer and closer to my face and gravel moving past my eyes as I hear the sickening hollow sound of the gravel on my fiberglass of the helmet) I slide to a stop fairly quickly
• Bike catches on something in the gravel an pivots on the right-hand engine guard
• Bike rolls up, cartwheel style, hitting the right-side of the front beak, right-side of the headlight and right side of the windshield
• Bike launches over the front-wheel torqueing the front sub-frame
• Bike airborne rotating clockwise if looking from the top (road right-hand side)
• Bike comes down hard on left pannier
• Left pannier catches something in the road and starts to rotate counter-clockwise (looked at from above the road surface)
• Tank bag comes off (rips off stitching holding the back-end of the bag onto the bike) and somewhat separates from bike
• Bike continues to rotate counter-clockwise (looked at from above the road) as it goes off the built-up road onto the rocks on the left side of the road
• Tank bag slides after bike landing slightly short of bike
• As bike leaves the road surface it moves past vertical (tires down) and settles on its left side in the grass
• Bike leans back onto tank bag breaking camera (and nothing else of note)

Epic fail.

After this point I quickly get up skipping the check of “are all systems functioning” based on the adrenalin.

First thing I do is try to right the bike.

No go. Too heavy.

Next, I take a picture. (Date stamp is 11:28 AM Eastern Time, 12:58 PM Newfoundland time)

Run back down, pull out the camera from the tank bag that wedged under the bike. In two pieces. :’-(

Try to right the bike again. It’s still too heavy. It didn’t lose any weight in the minute since last I checked.

Pull off some of my bags that are strapped onto the bike and get them to the road.

Go back up to the road and look for traffic.

Wait.

Wait.

Ponder pressing the 9-1-1 button on the spot since it’s near me now.

Look at road. It’s loose stone on hard-packed dirt. “No finds.” Marbles. This road is worse than wet red clay, snow or even ice.

Wait.

Car comes from the north and I flag them down. A few guys get out and help me over the course of the next 20 minutes to get me back on the road.

As this is going on I smell the clutch burning as he’s slipping it to get it past some soft, marshy dirt. I look down at the rut he’s making and see a bakeapple growing next to it. Pretty little thing. Jam made from them is mighty fine. (Apparently you can make moonshine out of them too)

With a giant lunge the bike leaps back up onto the road. It’s an impressive bike when it’s moving like that. I never saw it third-person before.

With the bike on the road they hop back in their car and continue their drive. I never got their names but THANK YOU!

I get back on the bike and drive back to Red Bay. The steering isn’t straight. The bars are cocked to the left to go straight.

I drive back, very slowly, to the gift shop to see what I can do for a room. At this point I’m in shock. Thoughts are not coherent.

They don’t have a room but call the B&B down the road. They have a room. I go up there slowly. I go down the hill that’s the same crushed stone as the road I just did.

Clench.

I check in. I drag all my crap into the room.

*Ponder options*

I need to get to a phone. The lady of the inn, Blanche, takes me to the community center where they have internet access.

Their internet is down. Has been for a week.

The guy there looks at me and decides this is an emergency and lets me use their phone. I’m on for around 10 minutes talking to En (first call) on their dime. I need a hug. They need a gift basket.

I call my insurance, Progressive. The woman on the phone has such a nice calming voice. I don’t remember my name, but she gets a +1 in my book. Things start rolling.

I call up Blanche and she picks me up and brings me home.

Her husband, Wade, shows up and we have lunch. Chicken salad sandwiches and some salmon. He gives me a beer, bitches that he’s complained that the road isn’t safe; the provincial government doesn’t do anything. He talks to a reporter and sets up an interview for tomorrow to talk about the road’s safety.

I wait a while and call Progressive since they haven’t called the B&B yet. I talk to Tiffany and she passes me off the Canada claims rep, Jennifer. I leave her a message.

Deciding that I can’t carry all my crap as carry-ons on a plane I start boxing crap up. I get a 28kg box together and we take it down to the post office. $402. WTF?!   !  ?  !!

Drive back to the B&B. Miss the call from Jennifer (Progressive) in the progress of the post office.

Call back 800 number and leave a message.

Call Air Canada and be shot down; they don’t fly out of Blanc Sablon. SOL?

Blanche’s cousin offers me a ride to the airport. We try to figure out flight back. He’s been to Cleveland a few years back! Small world, eh? We talk for a bit and we decide a travel agent would be the best bet. Gives me some clues about travel agents that are local.

I call the one he recommended and start working on that. First quote: just north of $2000 CAD. I told him I have some leeway. Second quote, $1760CAD. Full-fare, no cost to change flights (assuming availability), full refund if not used. Pull the trigger not knowing what Progressive wants. Leave Sunday. 18-hour layover in St. Johns. Arrive Monday around 5:45. Blanc Sablon, St. Johns, Toronto, Cleveland.

Get a call from Ennie!   Y
AAAAY!!!!!  She tracked me down!

Much rejoicing!

Talk for a bit… everything OK. Progressive is fine with me taking pictures they told her. It sounds like they don’t want to deal with Labrador. I don’t blame them one bit. It sounds like they really want to total the bike. From the damage I think it’s warranted. The engine runs fine, but both sub-frames are likely tweaked. It’s fixable – almost anything is – but there’s a lot of labor between now and working. More than that is the transportation of the poor bike. Just to get the bike somewhere else would take thousands of dollars. Then getting the bike back to me in Cleveland. I think it’s a write-off myself.

Head finally wrapped around the situation. I’m here. Uninjured. Safe.

Have some dinner. Yummy soup. Another beer. A month ago I hear some old guy in his 70’s got medivaced out to St. Johns from a spill and died afterward from the same stretch of road.

Note to self: if someone ever comes to my door in the same situation: do the same thing. No questions asked. Karma thing. Really. Gotta pay this forward. What would I do without Blanche and Wade?!

I hear their computer isn’t working right. Yes! Something to do to repay! As sick as it may sound, I love to work. It must be a defect in my character. Their Dell computer at their store isn’t working right; the partitioning is all F-ed up. Need to find install disk and reformat. Not something to do without asking. Walk back down to B&B.

Ride out with Wade when he’s supervising some ditch digging. Really. The road is too wide and the ditches too narrow. We visit the back-hoe, then visit where the dump truck is dumping what the back-hoe’s dug up.

Go back to the B&B.

Head up to the store. We find the install disk for the computer and decide to fix things the next day.

Chat with some folks.

Look! There’s a petition to fix the damn road that’s unsafe! Sign it.

Back to the B&B. Al & Max show up and we chat for a while. Sit on the bike. Talk guns. Ruminate on the events. They say I should sue the government of Newfoundland and Labrador for making an unsafe road. Good guys.

They eventually head out… I chat with Wade a while more before going to bed.

Live every day like it’s your last. The world ends tomorrow you might die. Today I did. Today wasn’t my last. Tomorrow might be. Would I do it again? What’s been done can’t be undone. I didn’t get injured. If forced I would say yes. With a lot pain to wad up a perfectly innocent bike. I can’t live in a bubble. Shit happens. Shit happened today. Today you didn’t die, tomorrow, you might die. You have to live life while you still have it.

OMG, Wade’s been up to Iqualuit. Damn that’s cool.

Later…

On a brighter note though, I talked to one of the workers here on the dock and she was quite confident that I’ll be able to get to Goose Bay even though I don’t have a reservation. While it’s not perfect, I’ll take her word over almost anyone’s at this point.

I started talking to the biker (bicycle biker), Guillaume (French for William), I spoke of before and if the ferry leaves tonight we’ll; likely split a double hotel room if there’s one available in town. No reason to spend more money than you need to. He speaks far better English than I speak French, we manage fine and chat for a few hours about our journeys.

We leave!

The ferry actually started boarding at 8:30 and we were on our way by around 8:45.

As I’m writing this it’s just gotten dark and we’re in heavy waters. I see people all around me going for the sick bags. All of this is in complete contrast with the ferry that took me over from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland which was a smooth and relaxing ride. This ride is not fun in any way. I’m just happy that I’m on it now. It gives me more time to get to Cartwright for tomorrow night.

The ride tomorrow shouldn’t be too bad – around 255 miles according to the map around two-thirds of it dirt. I figure around four or five hours aught to do it. From what I’ve heard the ticket office opens at the Cartwright terminal at 8:00 AM for the evening’s journey that leaves at 7:00 PM that night. That being said, I want to be there when they open! I don’t want to figuratively and literally miss the boat!

More bikers

As we were about to get onboard, a bike pulls up. It’s a big Victory cruiser. Atop are a couple that hop off and start taking to me. They are far more hardcore than I. Last year they circumnavigated the continent on their Victory over the course of four and a half months. Not just something like a four-corners thing, or just the United States and Canada, but the whole frickin’ continent. Down to Panama.

!

On the Kawasaki Vulcan!

Awesome! Hats off to those two! Congrats to Susan and Richard for following their dreams! You can see more of them at chasingtheroad.blogspot.com.

They had other cool stories to tell too, like crossing the North Atlantic on a ship many years ago in very rough seas.

As we got closer to the other side and we were exchanging stories, they even had a question for me: about camping in Alaska, is it cold? When we were up there it wasn’t to cold. In fact the previous night seemed colder than any night we had in Alaska the year before.

Goodbyes said and internet information exchanged we mounted up our bikes and drove off the ship back onto the mainland.

Landing on the other side

We got a late start and the rough seas compounded things. We disembarked the shore at around 10:30. And it was dark. And the fumes from the ship had fogged up my visor something fierce.

Nothing worse than going through twisty roads, in the dark, with moose, and your visor up.

A few miles up the road, on the Labrador side (we landed in Quebec), I thankfully found a hotel with rooms! I just didn’t feel like trying to drive up the coast without seeing the scenery or seeing where I was going.

The Northern Light Inn in Lanse Au Clair up inLabrador had the front desk closed, but a party was going in the bar. One of the employees was playing pool and came back to the desk to check me and another fellow in.

They promised internet access, but something is hosed up at the moment.

Let’s hope this thing works anyway.

If I can find another from another make that I can Frankenstein on I’ll do it… but I think I’ll be fine until home.

Here’s my plan for the next week. I think this is quite doable without trying to be a hero on the bike. (i.e. I could do it in half the time if I really felt the urge)

Monday: Head most of the way to St. John’s. Camp if the weather’s descent, motel otherwise.
Tuesday: St. John’s. I want to see the Atlantic from as far East on N. America as you can. Some rocks will be collected for interested parties.    Head half-way back toward Gros Morne.
Wednesday: Easy day. Head to Gros Morne and camp! (should be only 3 or so hours of road time)
Thursday: Head north and camp near St. Barbe (another easy day of exploring the coast)
Friday: Catch the early ferry to Blanc-Sablon (10:30 AM) Start heading to Cartwright. Probably camp near Mary’s Harbour. Collect some more rocks, hopefully some Labradorite, for other interested parties.
Saturday: Final 150 miles to Cartwright. Make it there by 5 or 6 and I’m golden! Catch the ferry to Goose Bay and relax for the trip over!

Off to get some coffee and breakfast and head on over in the direction of St. John’s.

The upshot of all this is that I want to give myself enough wiggle-room that I don’t miss a ferry. That would be a bad thing. If it puts me back another 5 days, that would put everyone in a sucky position.

After I get to Goose Bay, it’s just around 40 hours of road time to get back home — with no ferries blocking the way. Figure a week or so to get that final leg done.

Here’s a of tentative timelines to see how things work:

• Aug 5 evening: Leave Cleveland (first day or two are long transport days)
• Aug 10, Arrive @ North Sydney (33 hours road time, 5 days calendar time)
• Aug 10 @ 20:00 board ferry (The Smallwood)
• Aug 11 @ 11:00 get off in Argentinia
• Aug 15 (Saturday) by 19:00 arrive at Cartwright (21 hours road time, >4 days calendar)
• Aug 15 @ 19:00 board ferry (the Sir Robert Bond)
• Aug 16 @ 8:00 get off at Goose Bay
• Aug 23 arrive back home (43 hours road time, 7 calendar days)

If I miss either ferry, I still have a two-day buffer to catch the next one. If worse comes to worse I’ll hole up at a hotel in Cartwright and work remotely for a few days… LOL.

The same (roughly) can be pushed either a week or so forward or back.

Some of the considerations that went into this are some training that will be happening at work along with a wedding (Jerry and Sharon’s wedding to be specific) that I want to get to.

I think that this is a doable time-line and gives me the flexibility to screw up a bit without getting myself stranded in Cartwright.

Overall I’m aiming to be on the road around 6 hours a day on average. I think that’s a good amount of time based on experience last time. On the Alaska trip we had plenty of 12 hour days. That kinda started to suck after a while.

I talked to Joe today. Laying things out, all cards showing. Going in I fully expected an answer to me asking “So, would me going for two weeks to Labrador this summer be a bad thing?” The answer I expected was something along the lines of “I’d really rather you stay here to make sure things work.”

The answer surprised me. “There’s never a good time to take a vacation. Go.”

(pick jaw off ground)

Time to really start gearing up.

From the Alaska trip I learned that one of the biggest limitations in my existing gear is dealing with the wet. Rain sucks when you have to stop, get off the bike, pull on a sweat-inducing oversuit… then repeat the process in reverse when you need to take it off. The suit I think I need to pick up is the BMW Trailguard suit. It’s a textile suit that, depending on the zippers, can either be breathable or waterproof!

UPDATE: The BMW Trailguard suit is not waterproof without it’s liner!! Be warned!

New tires are also on the docket. Most of the trip is going to be on tarmac so I’ll spoon on another set of Continental ContiTrailAttacks. They served me well on the Alaska trip and I don’t have to worry about wearing them out. I went 9000 miles on the last trip. This time will be around 5000.

Another key point is that I’ll be doing around half the milage in roughly the same amount of time. The miles and time dragged the trip down to the point of weariness. Hopefully this time around I’ll have time to smell the roses. Time to relax and re-center. Time to write. Time to reflect.

One of the side-goals is to hit as many states as convenient on the way. Why not? New England (NE = Nebraska; NE != New England) has such a concentration of states I’ll be able to scratch a whole slew off my personal list. Why keep a list? No real reason. Why do people collect spoons? Same reason I guess.

Finally, I want to thank Insurance.com for letting me take the time. I promise to to everything I can to make it easy to miss me by setting things up as well as I can.