A Red Letter Day

First, I really dont know what the topic means. I think it was a chapter in the game Halflife2 and meant something good, therefore since I had a good day I'll use it. If its totally wrong and actually means something terrible, well, fuck it.

It took a lot to finally leave. The weather in the pacific north-wet is terrible. Just looking at the outside with the rain and no sunshine (normal) makes it hard to hit the road. I finally got fed up with it, and instead of checking out Mt Rainier and Mt St. Helens... I'm just going straight south to get out of this weather and see some sunshine!

I actually left around noon, once packing was complete and quadruple checked so I dont forget anything.

Once packed, I had to say goodbye to a friend I met just a DAY before. Its funny how just before you say goodbye to a place, you meet friends that you care about and it only makes it harder to leave. Thats life eh?

If you check the post below, you'll see that I was on the road for only 20 minutes before it was time to eat. Great thing about a Ural is they're built for goin a little bit (slowly) then stopping and checking things out.

After the breakfast, it was hitting the back roads on my way to the Pacific Coast Highway (US 101). I'm not there yet, but saw some stuff along the way:

Pretty dreary huh? It was raining the entire time, all day. Luckily my riding gear (full BMW ComfortShell suit) makes it easy, I was mostly dry, except for my gloves/hands. All in all, though terrible weather, it was a great ride. For the most part it was alongside water (no pics while driving!) with some real nice twisties in some parts. I say twisties, which im guessing for sport bike riders has a different connotation... twisties for a ural is probably laughable from a sport bike perspective..

All my gear is in weatherproof bags, and under the tonneau cover on the sidecar I have a blue tarp since the cover isnt exactly waterproof (future upgrade for sure!). She ran like a champ. She's like a bad girlfriend; though i hated the weather, she loved it, so we had to keep going. hah!

I dont plan on riding during the night because you cant see anything. So around 5pm, I find a nice motel in a small town. The owner, Bob, let me use his dryer to dry out my gloves and stuff. Really nice person, and the motel is right across the street from the Top Notch Bar. Dinner Time!!

Thats right, dinner of champions. Fully loaded cheeseburger, fries, and a cold budweiser. Had a great time meeting people (my bike, she's a real conversation starter lemme tell ya). Good times at this bar, and I'm even a part of it now!

I dont have the pics to show ya, but this bar was covered in dollars that people have signed. It was a really nice place, but my pics turned out too dark. I hope to get better with taking pictures, but for now, guess you'll suffer. hahaha.

With this weather, its gonna be hard to leave tomorrow. This front should be mostly out of here a day from now, so it might strike my fancy to just wait it out and get some good sunny riding in. OR just keep going and get to the good weather ASAP. I'm sure I'll miss the PacNorWet later, but not anytime soon!

Stats:
100-something kilometers (hah, i'll get better data some other time)
18 UDFs (for those that dont know, Ural Delay Factor. Its when somebody strikes a conversation about the bike and takes my time, which is cool and I welcome it. Usually starts with a "what kind of bike IS that??")

On the road

Finally hit the road on the cold and rain, about 20 minutes in, and its already time to eat! More later