Day 27 - Wednesday September 1, 2010
Kilometres: 355.0
Time: four and a half hours (ride time)
Weather:
Winnipeg: Mostly cloudy, 16 C at 10 AM
Dryden: Scattered clouds, 23 C at 3 PM
It was a rather uneventful ride today. I retraced the roads I ridden only a few weeks ago. There is more construction, though, which is challenging. In one section just east of Kenora, there was about 7 kilometres of scraped pavement, which is really dangerous for motorcyclist if the grooved pavement is deep. The wheels tend to follow the grooves and take control of the direction of the bike. Fortunately, only a portion of it was deep. Another part of the same construction zone reduced the road to gravel. It's not as bad as mud, but there were a few white-knuckled moments.
I know I'm back in Ontario when I have to share the road with dangerous drivers who should never have been issued a licence. So there I am, trying to negotiate a gravel road (that is a highway) and I'm doing the posted construction zone speed limit of 60 kph. I'm following good motorcycle safety procedure by riding in the blocking position, which is roughly a metre or so to the right of the centre line. Some idiot decided that I'm not going fast enough and that I shouldn't impede his speed. He drove on the gravel shoulder to pass me on the right.
This is the fourth time this has happened to me this summer. One idiot woman decided to pass me (in a school zone outside of the Toronto police college) by driving in the bicycle lane. Only in Ontario has this happened to me.
The best drivers are in Saskatchewan. They pull over and slow down to let you pass. They'll let you merge with traffic without trying to push your off the road. They follow the rules the road. Drivers in Alberta are all just speed freaks. The posted highway speed is 110, but to keep up with traffic you have to do about 130. Some go much faster than that. Red light runners are few and far between in the Prairies. I saw mostly yellow light runners in BC, but not one red light runner. I felt really out of place when I ran a yellow in Winnipeg. I was the only who did it.
After driving in many major cities in five provinces in the last month, I think Ontario drivers are horrible and GTA/Toronto drivers are downright deadly. Now I know why insurance rates are so high into Toronto.
On to a better subject, though. The weather finally improved ... but not for long. When I packed up the bike this morning it was sunny. Fifteen minutes later, it was cloudy and rain threatened. Fortunately, it didn't catch up with me. It even started to warm up. By the time I arrived in Kenora, I changed into my summer riding gloves and removed my polar fleece jacket.
It was a short ride today. I guess I planned it that way for a reason, but I can't figure out what the heck I was thinking. I finished today a bit after 3 PM, but I could have gone for another three hours without a problem. I guess there isn't a whole lot between here and Thunder Bay, which is just over 300 kilometres away.
The weatherman is calling for rain starting tonight and going into tomorrow. There is a possibility of thunderstorms in the afternoon, so I will get an early start.
I have an eight hour ride ahead of me tomorrow so I'm hoping that the forecast is wrong.
