Overall, we both had an amazing, great time.

– no major break-downs
– no crashes
– no fights
– no breaking bottles behind gas stations
– no bears or moose… wtf
– saw 1 car crash which was 3 mini-vans piled up. Dumb
– my pants have a nice oil stain now from a leaking head gasket. sweet
– i don’t like french canadians. you didn’t make me feel welcome. i won’t be back. sorry
– upstate NY is actually really nice
– can’t say the same for Albany. i won’t be back
– canada was more expensive than i thought it would be
– new englanders can’t make breakfast as good as southern folks. fact
– i don’t want to eat mcDonalds for at least a year
– the z1 is fast but… i think i had more fun when i went to denver on a slow, nimble cb450
– i saw way too many old people. glad i work for a university. balance it all out
– mick is still good-old mick. seeing him was nice
– homeless people are zombies in Portland. weird
– i grew a beard
– adam grew a weird goatee, ha
– no girls flashed us… probably because of adams goatee, ha
– met a bunch of old guys that had z1’s
– ate fresh eggs straight from the chicken for the first time ever
– we each had a bag fall off (almost) on a bumpy mountain road
– saw some good friends. caught up on some alone / personal time
– being on the cycles for endless hours gives you time to really think about life
– past 2 years for me… shit… getting away from life for a couple weeks was needed
– doing this trip gave me more appreciation for Philly
– Philly is gross, but i’d rather live here than anywhere i saw on the trip.

That’s all I got for ya.
Go do your own road trip.
Take pics.
I wanna see.

About 50 miles north of Philly I got a flat front tire. Shit. So… We sat in a gas station and had a nice gas station dinner… Then I filled the tube with green slime which kinda worked a tiny bit.

Rode all the way home on barely any tire pressure at all which was super sketchy. Right when I got off our exit into Philly the bead broke which disabled me from riding at all. So I limped it to cast and salvage and then drank a beer. Real glad that bead didn’t break on 95 when I was going fast. Lesson learned… Don’t ride on a tire with barely any tire pressure.

Ten reasons I’ll never come back to Albany:
1) it’s colder than Philly
2) no one lives downtown. Deserted city.
3) people look / act like mutants
4) everyone is fat
5) no motorcycle scene here
6) zero attractive girls… Unless you like fat chicks
7) no good food / restaurants
8) no good colleges to go people watch at
9) there are no gas stations downtown… wtf
10) we’re sitting in the worlds most horrible McDonalds wet and cold

– after seeing too many homeless people we left Portland
– headed to mt. Washington
– climbed it like champs
– kinda a big workout for an old bike
– cold as shit at the summit. 30 degrees
– headed to George’s land in s.e. Vermont
– you know George… Burly guy with the cb500 four
– blasted the ton for a while
– on the way met some older gent who’s ridden across country on old bmw’s
– he’s also ridden across country on a 125cc Vespa
– Andrew Watson met us for the night on his cb500 four
– sitting by campfire now catching up
– Adams goatee beard is coming in real nice

Stopped by a local vintage shop and shot the shit with the guys at Metric Motor Bike.

Tomorrow we head further south slowing making our way back Philly. Shit is unfortunately coming closer to an end. We plan to be riding back into Philly Saturday night and are trying to end it with more than a few beers somewhere… So comment and call it out if something is going on.

The z1 clutch cable is about to snap. Noticed it 3 days ago in Acadia and have been riding and shifting without the clutch since. Called ahead to a shop in Portland and had them order the cable which should be in tomorrow. No show-stoppers here…

We did a short hike in the morning and then spent the rest of the day exploring the island on the cycles and enjoying the twisty roads.

One of the many awesome views of the day.

While hiding out from the rain in the park visitor center we ended up talking to one of the younger park rangers (most of them were super old). She gave us a bunch of cool things to check out and even invited us to the park ranger pot luck later that night. Free dinner sitting around a bon fire was pretty rad. Acadia park rangers are pretty cool. A shitty day of rain ended up being a lot of fun and we got to meet some cool people. One ranger had an xs650 and another had a cb750.

Spent most of the day in Greenville, ME. Changed z1 oil. Lubed our chains. Had a shitty breakfast.

Talked to some random dude who, him and his dad both have z1’s and said they’ve done 140mph on them. The dads z1 is bored-out to a 1496! Sick.

Came to Acadia national park, but it’s fucking raining again so we r staying in a motel which is a creepy country cabin thing. 1980 wants its wide screen tv back…

Ended the night hanging out in a teepee.

We barely made the long stretch back into Maine and had to buy some gas off a guy to make the trip. Maine is gorgeous so far with the leaves just starting to turn. Hung out at this overlook outside Jackman eating some lunch. Gonna try and find some free camping here for the night.

– swam in the hotel pool with a dozen old French fat people. It was super weird.

– our hotel bathroom had a ton of these great rags to clean our motorcycles with.

– found zero good bars downtown. Zero.

– saying wee wee to every single person and then telling them I don’t speak France when they try and actually talk to me.

– went to a motorcycle dealership and had them balance my front tire so my bike doesnt violently shake at 80 mph anymore. It’s confirmed by the French… Shinko tires are crap.

– went to a French girly bar and watched the bouncers beat the shit out of some guy who couldn’t pay.

– making our way to Saint Georgies, Quebec tonight.

Today sucked on the cycles. We hightailed it to Quebec City with a big storm that we tried to stay ahead of all day. Luckily we only had light rain all day. There’s supposed to be 30mph wind and 1 inch of rain so we got a hotel for the night.

Quebec city is a weird maze. If anyone knows of good stuff to check out or free camping let us know.

We people watched around town and then headed to north beach. Hung out on the beach, chilled in the sun, and finished off our whiskey. Weather was beyond amazing with awesome views and good swimming.

We left Burlington and headed north towards the Canadian border. Roads were amazing going through lake Champlain. Found a deserted state park campsite which was closed for the off season. Another night of awesome free camping on the lake and no one in sight.

Picked up some beer, cooked some food, drank a bunch, and fell asleep.

Best day of the trip so far.

Around 11pm a lady came up to our camp spot telling us it’s against the rules to camp. Talked her out of that and went to bed. Live free lady… Rules are lame.

Then we headed north to Albany which is a dead city. The cool section of the city is called Lark st. area. A street festival was ironically going on so we people watched for a while.

Afterwards, we went to upstate NY to meet Ben’s friend Adam who was putting us up for the night at a farm house. Sat by the fire and got drunk on good bourbon.

Oh… And right before getting to the farm we stopped at a gas station to sit and eat slim-jims… And 2 random nice kids on sportsters stopped in. They told us they wheelie sportsters all day long. Ha. Looks like the Philly sportster folks have something to work on…

Met up with Mr. B and went to a weird barn party / music show thing.

On our way to the Adirandacks in upstate NY now.