OK, today's the day. After hardly sleeping at all last night it was easy to get up and get on the road. I took the scenic route from Portsmouth to Rt 5 along the James River until I got on US40 headed west. What a delightful road! I rode the two lanes through
some of the prettiest rural scenery in Virginia. There were lots of small town, tobacco barns, old mansions, livestock in the fields, and exactly what one would hope to find while 'out in the country' until I got to Fort Pickett. That's where 40 bisects an Army post. Hence, the 'Tank Crossing' sign. That's for real tanks. I did not see any, just their tracks.
Along the way I stopped in Victoria for lunch. When you can have a country ham sandwich, iced sweet tea, french fries, and cake for $6.25 it's hard to complain. I particularly liked the OPPS! cake. That's where the cook made a yellow cake which the day crew topped with chocolate iceing...not knowing that the cake was a lemon cake. It was still good tasing.
When I was leaving Portsmouth I looked at the weather radar and saw bad stuff to the west. Thus I fully expected to see some rain before I got to Roanoke. True to that it started to rain in Gretna (about 2PM). Correction, it started to POUR. In fact, some trucks simply pulled over when they could no longer see the road. I was looking for an overpass, with no luck. My waterproof suit ain't waterproof. At least my boots stayed dry inside but there were a few rivlets of water which always find their way to my crotch. The rain continued all the way to Mark's house and in fact it's still raining now at 8:30. We expect rain in the AM and might delay our departure just a bit to let the worst go past us.
Mark and David met me in the garage
David decided to cut his hair off for the trip, with some help from his Mom, Beth. What a trooper she is.
Tomorrow we think we will have about 6 hours travel time. If it's raining like now we will take the Interstate to WV, then hop over to Ohio 555.
Today I only rode 276 miles but it seemed to take all day. I guess those stops to call Redline really cost me some time. The check engine light still comes on after the bike warms up. I finally figured out how to call up the trouble code and it says 'battery HI' which is not a greeting. It's either a bad battery or bad regulator. As soon as I got to Roanoke we bought a battery (last one this size in the entire metro area) and it is charging now. Oddly enough I am showing a charge of 14.2V when going down the road so everything should be OK. Go figure. If this does not take care of the problem the regulator is next. Gotta get that from a Ducati dealer, not what you find on every corner of the globe. Oh well, it's supposed to be an adventure.
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