Monster Bikes and Mount Washington

On Thursday morning Sept 13, as Penny, Jackie, and Barbara headed to Burlington to catch flights home, and Ron and Jim started their three-day ride home to VA and NC, Old Blue and I headed northeast towards Nova Scotia.   But first, there was another place high on my bucket list and sort of on the way....Mt Washington in New Hampshire's Presidential Range of the White Mountains.  Gorham, NH is the closest town to the start of the pay-to-ride motor road that takes you to the top of Mt Washington, so I headed for Gorham.  On my way there, I passed through the tiny town of Bethlehem, NH and caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye of a metal sculpture that made me turn around and go back for a closer look.

You can see why it caught my attention.  I had never seen anything quite like this monster on a bike.  It sat in front of a shop called Indian Brook Trading Company that had many more unusual metal sculptures, constructed mostly of old motorcycle and car parts.

The owner, Gerry Ramback, told me that he imports them from Asia (I can't remember the country, maybe Indonesia) and sells them for around $5,000 each.

I continued my ride into Gorham, arriving there about noon, and had lunch at J's Corner Restaurant and Lounge consisting of a bowl of award winning seafood chowder.  From there it was a short 8-mile ride south to the entrance of the Mount Washington Auto Road.  The cost to use the road is $25 for cars and $15 for motorcycles including the driver.  Each additional adult passenger is another $8, but it is well worth the experience.

If you are too afraid to ride or drive up the mountain yourself, you can take the cog railway to the top, or ride in a van with someone else doing the driving.

The second-highest wind speed ever observed on Earth was on Mt Washington. The record for highest wind fell two years ago to Barrow Island Australia for a gust of 253 mph during Cyclone Olivia. They have yet to amend the sign at the top of Mt Washington.

On this beautiful day, the wind speed on top was a moderate 17 mph and the temp was a comfortable 60 degrees.

At the summit, I met another V-Strom rider, Walter Wilkins from Prince Edward Island. He convinced me that I should visit PEI on this trip, and I ended up following his advice. He was riding one of the new redesigned 2012 V-Stroms, and he was very interested in the tool tubes attached to the back of Old Blue which come in handy for carrying spare gas or bottles of wine.

I returned to Gorham late that afternoon and got a room at the Northern Peak Motor Inn, a Mom & Pop place right next door to J's Corner Restaurant and Lounge.  Thus, I didn't have far to go for dinner which consisted of J's Shrimp Milano, one of the best shrimp and pasta dishes ever. The next morning, I was heading east through the Maine woods and into New Brunswick.