Dad’s natural wake up call came a little too early this morning for my comfort, but we did want to get moving for some accumulated miles. To help us get out on the road fairly quickly, we did the bulk of our motorcycling duties the prior night. Dad also concocted a gizmo on my throttle grip such that a small bracket protruded out perpendicular to the handlebar. I was having trouble with my throttle hand: a lack of circulation due to the hard grip needed and the high frequency vibration from the engine, compounded with many hours of many miles. The bracket and clamp acted as a hand rest, allowing me to palm the throttle open instead of constantly squeezing it. This day’s 596 mile test session had marked improvement in all quantifiable aspects of hand performance. Experimental methods soon to be published.
The poopysuits earned their share of baggage space that morning as well. The weather was clear and very cool, with layer over layer of wispy clouds stretching in upward directions. It warmed nicely during the day, though. After a slow ride through gravel road construction areas (with not much cooling air swishing over me), I peeled off the poopysuit and replaced it with a black leather jacket at the next gas stop. I paused in between to drink a refreshing root beer and let some of my ski-suit-induced sweat evaporate away.
Wispy clouds bulked up during the course of the day; most of the late afternoon and evening became overcast. The cloud designs were great to see, especially when I still had my shades on as a left-over from when it was sunny. Light streaks filtered through to the ground from time to time, and layers of clouds created the wispy patterns over top of diffused oil paint shapes, all with an occasional dash of watercolor stains on paper. It was elongated chromatography in the sky.
We rolled through many landscape transitions. The early going was similar to the day before, but I became somewhat desensitized to it all because of input overload. I was getting mildly complacent about the beauty, probably just like the locals who drove through every day. It was becoming normal. The number and proportion of coniferous trees gradually increased, reaching 100% for one stretch of road that made me feel as if I was washing down a trough lined by pines. The trees were periodically being hacked down in rectangular sections for timber or pulp, though. Somewhat jarring.
The land flattened considerably to the point where an occasional rise would attract my geologic attention. This increasing flatness eventually served a purpose for Canadian homo sapiens: farmland. The horizons suddenly opened up about forty miles before Winnipeg. Somewhat jarring again, but the openness and flat, straight roads were a productive change of pace for our mileage-busting cruising.
Other areas were much more visually and aesthetically interesting, but this provided a glimpse of Canadian-style farming. I could see far enough in one direction that floating mirages appeared over the horizon beyond the fields. Coming up on Winnipeg was also a strange sensation. Seeing a city of skyscrapers out way beyond the fields, in the middle of wherever-that-was, rising up after hundreds of open miles on miles, was surreal. We circumvented the city and continued rolling down the Trans-Canadian, which had changed route numbers from 17 to 100 to 1 over its course. The land transformed into a topographer’s nightmare: groups of small, rolling hills all oddly shaped and tightly packed together. The trees were sparse and short; bushes and grasses had the upper hand.
I continued to be impressed by the pleasant people we met. I talked a while to a backpack- and guitar-laden hitchhiker who was European in origin but lived and worked in Toronto. He had travelled in a friend’s car to Banff and was hitching back, mostly with truckers. No room for him on our bikes. Dad also struck up a conversation with the proprietor of an Esso gas station. We had just ridden 208 miles non-stop and our numbed butts were ready to do some hanging out. Both the proprietor and her huge St. Bernard gave us their full attention.
We ended up at The Little Chalet in Brandon, Manitoba. I had never been in a real honest-to-goodness prefab chalet before. It even included color TV and a wavy bathroom floor (from water rotting it). It was quiet and comfortable, and simple. The shower was a bit cramped and I had not tried the bed yet, but a table was performing very well as a hard writing surface. The plan for the next day: count up a bunch more scenic miles, possibly to Calgary.
Did you hear that, butt? Enjoy the chalet while you can. Vibration awaited in the morning.