You missed a good one!

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You missed a good one!

Postby jpellenbarg » Wed Sep 06, 2017 3:18 pm

The Finger Lakes rally that is. I'm sure any of our club members who had been thinking about going were put off by the possibility of rain with Harvey. We almost didn't go due to the weather reports as they unfolded. By the time we got to Thursday, Eddie had changed business appointments so he and Bobby were planning to leave on Friday am since the weather was looking up. Mikey was having a hard time deciding whether to go Thursday or Friday since plans had been changing daily along with the weather reports. Thursday of course turned out to be beautiful. Mikey, Janet, Eddie and Wolfie decided to leave from Hunt Valley Friday at 6am. I elected to ride alone on Thursday and go the back route through the mountains and had a great time riding. As I proceeded into the valley on the way to Jersey Shore, I could see the rain off in the distance. Sorry I didn't take a moment to stop to take a pic as the rain was back lit by clear skies where the two mountain ranges came together. Got a bit of rain as I approached Elmsport. Enough to get the roads wet. A few miles later at Jersey Shore it opened up and rained pretty good. I was wearing the cooling vest up to this point as it had been in the mid 80's. Now the temps went down to the mid 60s. Pulled off to remove the vest and put the liner on. Wet roads to the top of the ridge then pretty clear sailing. Just the occasional areas where there was dampness on the roads. Riding by myself I was able to make some pretty good time in spite of the damp road surfaces. Got to Colton Point at 5:15 and continued on to the Burning Barrel restaurant a few miles down the road. After dinner it was back to Colton Point. Nancy and Ron doing well. Good to see them! Sat out by the pond til the light disappeared and the temps were getting a bit chilly. Never had that problem before as it's usually hot and sticky. Back to the room for a quiet evening. Next morning it was a cool 42 degrees! Nippy! A breakfast for champions and packed up and off to the rally site. The plan was for me to cordon off enough tent space for the gang as I would be there long before anyone else. I was there at 10:50am. As I set up my tent I discovered that one of the two tent poles had split and of course it was at the top of the tent. Repair consisted of wrapping with wire and then electrical tape. That held thru the weekend. The rest of the gang showed up after 1pm. and the party was on. The high Friday was in the low 60s! Saturday am was 42 again. What a "problem" the temps were proving to be. As the weather forecast was calling for rain late Saturday and Sunday, I went on my own to see the National Warbird museum at Geneseo NY. It's near Letchworth State park if you remember that one. A round trip of over 150 miles. When I came out of the museum, the clouds were approaching from the southwest so I made tracks for Watkins Glenn. By the time I finished the interstate portion of the ride the temps had again fallen into the low 60's so once off the interstate at Bath, NY I stopped to put on the liner. Made it back to the rally site with about 15 minutes to spare before the first brief wave of rain. Not bad for timing! A bit more in the way of showers in the evening and then apparently things happened mostly during the overnight hours. Only about and hour and a half of rain on Sunday then the rest of the day remained cloudy but without precip. During the night it cleared and Monday was stellar for the ride home. While I'm sure a lot of folks didn't attend because they were concerned about Harvey raining on the parade, it didn't work out that way and for a first we had autumn like temps. No complaints from any of us. It was a great and supremely comfortable rally!

Jim
jpellenbarg
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Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2005 9:50 pm
Location: Baltimore, MD

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