50/50

Not sure what brand of tent you have, but I have the Dyson Vacuum Company’s—Black Hole, sound and light sucking model.  Almost every morning one of two things happens, or more often than not, simultaneously, I’m woken by those special features of my tent.  Minding my own business, in my own cozy sleeping bag, I get awoken by those two features, the sun’s light amplified, illuminating the inside of my tent like a Las Vegas marquee, and a couple of campers whispering in morning conversation two counties over—their sound waves bouncing around inside the tent walls like they’re speaking into microphones, broadcasting inside my tent using AC/DC concert speakers.  So, wishing for a few more minutes of sleep that don’t come I wake and fix myself some morning tea.

Changed the brake pads today, that Ike transported up from Marysville, on Trafalgar this morning while the Norwestar gang went into town for breakfast.  When the gang returned from town we all rode to Sandon, a once thriving mining town, now a ghost town, with most of the ghosts washed out by avalanches that occurred over the years.  It was a great road through the mountains and along the lakes, and even the dirt road wasn’t so bad.  Rose, rather a novice to this whole motorcycling thing, proved her off road prowess.  The museum was interesting, and demonstrated how vulnerable human endeavor is to all the whims of this world.  A robust city deep in the mountains, “the Monte Carlo of British Columbia,” reduced just a few short years later to two residents.

En route to the campground, I needed to stop in town so I could adequately participate in the upcoming, and all important meeting, get cold beer (and hard cider).  Met a guy sitting by himself at his campsite picnic table, so I threw out a grappling hook and dragged him to the important meeting.  Dave, from Alberta, is now a full-fledged member of Norwestars.  Some where, at some time, the details are a little foggy, but a quorum was reached and a successful coup achieved—I declared, with strong-armed unanimous approval, myself Emperor of Norwestars.  And, Emperors need empires.  Therefore, I placed it upon myself to get 25 members before next riding season.

Dave from Alberta, one; Dave Hugh, the author of Proficient Motorcycling, etc., two; Judy, Mya’s mom, three; Jeff from Poulsbo, four; I’m on a roll!  Getting back to the story….

Hot Springs or bust!  the Norwestars went to the Hot Springs to soak, I went to the beach to read.  How does a mountain surrounded, land-locked lake have a sandy beach?  Where’d the sand come from?  I read while peering up at the bikini-clad lone swimmer.  From my distance, about 200 yards, she looked like a sea nymph from the gods.  Thankfully she kept her distance as to not tempt me or ruin my image or her.  I walked back for more important rally stuff, namely cold beer.  After getting buzzed on beer and hard cider, we all meandered over to watch the motorcycle games.  I think the biggest game was chasing the shadow to stay cool and out of the sun.  It provided entertainment for the afternoon, watching middle aged guys pretending to be 20 again.  Damn, look at the time!  Gotta go to the next event, the really important one, food!  The steak dinner was a little shy of the Metropolitan Steakhouse, but it’ll make a turd.  After dinner, as I was about to leave to get something critical back in the campsite, what else, whiskey and cigar, “Stay, they’re going to announce the winner to the 50/50.”  I would have paid $50 to sneak away from the 2 and half hour ceremony, where they dangled that carrot of some huge grand prize out, by giving away merchandise from the store that didn’t sell.  Like the $61 small BMW swim trunks, or the BMW Motorad “Limited Edition” Chinese built multi-tool.  Oh, they meant well, money was raised for charity, and 300 sheep sat patiently in their seats, awaiting the slaughter of boredom.  After about 200 prizes (or non-selling merchandise, as it’s called in the industry) was pushed on to the unsuspecting sheep, we blah-blahed our way back to pasture, a.k.a., campsite 21.

Ah, the next event, cold beer!  This was our last night and the beer, cider, and whiskey was emptied, Ike even had to make a beer run in Roxanne’s white Dodge.  This, the last of our board meetings, was fruitful in establishing new Norwestar policy and long term strategy.  I can’t remember a thing from the meeting, but I’m confident it was very productive.  The new Secretary, Rose, forget her steno pad to take notes, but the new policy predicate date is sometime in 2032.  Arthur kept me company late into the night, we were on fire watch.

Sunday morning, I woke a little less than 100%.  Must’ve been the mountain air.  By time I crawled out of my tent after all the Norwestars had packed.  Thank goodness I wasn’t riding with this bunch of sadists.  We all said our farewells, and then I packed and rode a very enjoyable road from Nakusp, via Little Denver, thru Kalso, to Balfour where I boarded the same ferry I took a week (s?) ago.  Down the same 31A to Creston, across the border into the US, and finally stopping in Troy.  I was obviously dehydrated, tired, hot, and in need of some tender care.  I found a nice place owned by a young couple, bought water, Gatorade, and ice cream (strictly medicinal for cooling the body).  I finally cooled, but was exhausted and crashed early.

I hope to make Bozeman today, about 370 miles away.  We’ll see what happens, making sure to drink plenty, which means I’ll be stopping every 50-100 miles to piss and that will slow the progress down.  Nonetheless, I feel good that I am finally heading east.