Four Corners Tour – Ride Day 26 – Tour Day 23 – August 9, 2015 – Sunday

Start Time: 6:46 AM EDT
Stop Time: 7:26 PM EDT
Start Location: Orford, NH
Stop Location: Presque Isle, ME
Lodging: Neil E. Michaud Campground
Breakfast: Campsite (cereal with almond milk)
Lunch: Oosoola Country Store (lobster roll)
Dinner: Campsite (turkey and cheese on flour tortilla, nectarine)
Miles Traveled Today: 554
Weather: 55-78, Cloudy and Overcast most all day

Route: NH-10, NH-116, US-2, I-95, US-1.

Today’s ride will be the longest ride of this tour. It started early, and although it was not dark, it was pretty foggy.

Within an hour or so, it did start to clear off, ultimately turning into a beautiful sunny morning, but the sun did not hang around too long.

  

I ran across quite a few covered bridges along the way, and decided that I would grab a shot of this one.

Then I crossed another state line, the one I have been looking for for four weeks now (that’s a lot of for words).

Another state that does not like to have extravagant welcome signs.

So I kept having people tell me that I had to have a lobster roll while I was in Maine, but I’m fairly confident that this is not what they had in mind.

I did however find a little store/gas station/restaurant that had lobster rolls, and I didn’t hate it. I almost got one of the McDonald’s lobster rolls to compare and contrast for supper, but just was not hungry enough to spend $8.00 for the experiment.

Then it happened, it really happened. I made it to the fourth corner.

  
  

For good measure, I also grabbed a few shots in front of the Madawaska Post Office.

Under that calm cool demeanor was a holy dance going on.
On my way out of Madawaska, the sky was looking pretty ominous.

But by the time I got back to the campground, the cloud cover was starting to breakup.

Now if I could just put this rig and myself on an Amtrak train…., just kidding. Although I’m not particularly looking forward to the next couple days of I-95 and major metropolitan areas, I am looking forward to Skyline Drive, The Blueridge Parkway, The Dragon and Cherohala Skyway.

After a long day of riding (554 miles today), I got to the campground just in time to catch the sunset. Pretty awesome way to end a great day of riding.

Tomorrow I start the 6 day journey home, with lots of Interstate riding for the next couple days.

I will say the today’s ride was completely uneventful. Not one person tried to kill me, so Thank you Lord for clearing such a magnificent path for me to ride.

The early part of the day in New Hampshire and Southern Maine was some of the finest scenic riding you could ask for.

Tour Tip:

While riding across the Northern portion of the USA, I’ve found that dressing in layers is beneficial. Keeping in mind that I am a cold weather weenie. I typically have my heated pants liners over running shorts, and my riding pants or jeans over the pants liners.

Up top I’ll typically have a long sleeve running shirt on, then my long johns shirt, then my jacket liner, then my riding jacket.

As the day warms up I can peel layers off to keep from getting too hot. For the past two weeks, this arrangement has worked extremely well for me.

Product Review:

If you have not noticed, I have had some pretty wide ranging temperature swings from morning to afternoon, with very brisk morning temperatures, and some pretty hot afternoon temperatures.

One of the best things to help with these temperature swings are WindWings, which give me the ability to deflect the wind off of me during the cool morning and sometimes late day temperatures, and to pull the wind directly onto me when it is hot.

Then there are all the positions in between as the temperature rises or cools. Another five out of five star review from me for WindWings.