Could this be the end of the road... 1

THE summer of '18 will be fondly remembered for the length of consecutive hot days.

                        XT 600 and I are ready to go...

Oil checked, tires set for a compromise between dirt/gravel and rough pavement, no saddlebags but had my mounted tail bag and my Bert's Cycle Mall bag bungied on as well. Bottle of frozen water, several snack bars, printed Google map, GPS and tourist map. I'd rigged up a make shift power supply to run the unit but as often happens, what works fine in the garage doesn't necessarily translate to the same in the field.

Me... the Tourist

Today I was being a tourist! 

I was headed over to nearby N.B. for a look down the north Fundy coast.

Generally when traveling, people tend to "drive/ride through" to get to their destination.  I like to make my rides into "the destination" and anytime I ride my dual purpose bikes (XT 226/350/600) I was doing just that.

As I age, and eventually my memory fades, I wish I can look back on the dozens of stories I'd written about riding Baja CA, the Forestry Trunk road, Arizona not to mention nearly 30 countries in Europe. 

When Kazue and I met at the Kootenay ferry parking lot on hot summer day, we'd tossed around the idea of riding her home country of Japan.  Hard to believe that was over 20 years ago! 

Thank Goodness for Tim's

I didn't make it to Japan to ride Serow's but I had great memories of being invited to the Yamaha factory in Hamamatsu for a tour.

My ride distance was calculated at around 250 km... like often happens though, I ended up clocking 458, drenched in sweat much of the day and riding through beautiful countryside some of it along the very rugged Fundy coastline, in and out of Cape Pele, Sackville, Dorchester and even made it to Johnson's Mill.

Like the sign says... Welcome.  Pretty little burg.

I'd tried to ride from Lower Rockport road along the coastline to what appeared as a connection to Upper Rockport road but simply, I ran out of road!  

I'm sure there is a way to do it but it will have to wait until I return with my much more nimble 225! 

I did ride past the Closure sign, about a kilometer and a half and the two halves of the road which I am certain connected at some point in the past couldn't have been much more than that again, but what I often find traveling like this, is a maze of logging roads, atv trails, and farmer's tractor roads. 

This time once past the warning sign I may or may not have been able to connect.

It was a point of interest for certain and I will just as certainly return on the smaller, lighter bike. 

The 600 is quite nimble, certainly more-so than my Adventure bike DL 650 V Strom, but my criteria for turning an about face depends on whether I can easily or at least without back breaking work, point back into the direction I had come.  I have ridden trails in Baja or more recently Arizona where what seems to be a track peter's out coming from a sand wash and simply ... disappears!  Of course riding in the desert, getting caught short in the back country could get you a one way ticket into a coyote's belly!

Not so bad in New Brunswick but again, when traveling solo, I always leave room for error. Didn't someone say once that "discretion is the better part of valor"?

I crossed the Confed Bridge at about 9 am Saturday, not in a rush and in fact vowed to ride as little of the main paved highway's as possible.  As so often happens on these voyages... I much prefer what awaits me in the bypassed towns and villages.  Sometimes I find gold... and others, I'm fooled by it!

Not yet the end of the road

Shortly after I got off the bridge I took the off ramp to Murray Beach road signed rte 955.  A couple of months ago I wandered to the end of the road at Johnson Point road only to find that it was indeed closed across the short peninsula. 

Can't get much closer to Sea level than this.

Seems the Closure sign was for real.  I spoke with a helpful local, standing in 90 F heat under a relentless sun, dressed in off road gear (me not him!) and he informed me that the road was impassable for cars.  He thought a Jeep or ATV could make it but warned me that it had just been abandoned.  I was going to try tackling it on this weekend from the other direction thinking riding me XT 600 'Big Blue' gave me an even 50/50 chance of making it whereas the V Strom I was riding that day, was a ready to sink out of sight if what I saw was any indication of the condition of the closed connector!

I headed to Sackville NB via 940 at Shemogue, on a rough oft patched forested road with small tidal streams, lots of fir trees and virtually no traffic.  After all, only local folk traveled here, well the odd motorcyclist like me!

Yeah, no idea...

Without a working gps unit (wasn't charging) I was reliant on dead reckoning and taking the right back roads to get me to Sackville where I arrived in due course. 

This was really my jump off point, and after a very relaxed breakfast at Tim Horton's and a fill up at the ESSO across the street, I made my way through the city, only having to stop once at an open bay door of a small automotive service business, where the helpful gents pointed me in the general direction of my second destination. Highway 106 diverges from route 935 at this point.  Just about half a kilometer from the Y in the road, I topped a small rise on the outskirts of the city where I had to stop momentarily as a mother duck shepherded 7 tiny little balls of feathers the last meter into the brush. Mother Nature is full of surprises!





I angled off 106 heading for the coast via Upper Rockport (not even a dairy bar out there) past some sort of alien creature obviously transported from another Galaxy via some Black Hole where it was mauled by unforeseen forces, across a very quaint old metal bridge to where I arrived at lower Rockport where... as mentioned earlier... I simply ran out of road.

Okay... now what?

A senior's couple were taking their folding lawn chairs to sit and read and admire the view (hopefully he wasn't planning on pushing her off the cliff for insurance money, with which to run away with his much younger secretary...) which I must admit was incredible and when queried about his knowledge of the area he admitted he's lived nearby all his life but this was the very fist time he had come to this particular point on the map.

Next trip... Serow.  I'm going to make the connection!

a Fundy shoreline in morning mist.

Having Googled the area and as often happens on my trail adventures, you just keep zooming in and eventually squiggly lines appear where the scale may be an inch to a quarter mile or thereabouts.

Same is true for Arizona as it is for Maritime Canada. 

My goal, if I have one on these types of trips was to see if I could get "there" from "here" especially if the map shows even a thread of a road or often only a trail.  Looking at this particular area prior to leaving home, I discerned that at one point that road connected to another abandoned roadway somewhere in the brush.   I took a few pics, and entered the 'zone'...