On the Road Again

(with acknowledgement to Willie Nelson)

“…And I can’t wait to get on the road again…
Going places that I’ve never seen
Seeing things that I may never see again
And I can’t wait to get on the road again….”

So sang the man with the guitar as we supped Desperados (beer, tequila and triple sec with lime juice) at the bar at Waskesiu Lake, watched the sun slide down through a thick cloud of enormous dragonflies and talked about our next day’s ride, looking forward to the delights of our first dirt roads. We’d all enjoyed a day of rest at this beautiful lakeside resort and had caught up with laundry, email and blogs, and some of the group had enjoyed meeting some Canadian Legion Riders who had ridden for 3 hours from North Battleford specially to talk to Ian, Gary and Sam who are members of the Royal British Legion Riders Branch (RBLR). Legion Riders are all on active service or are Veterans who combine their passion for motorcycling with fundraising.

The following morning we set off early for Flin Flon, a fairly remote mining town with a pioneering feel. The dirt roads made a nice change, slightly slippery in places from several days of rain, but nothing we couldn’t deal with. The rain had also caused one creek to overflow across the road, which meant an impromptu “river crossing” for all of us. It was quite deep, and some of us discovered our boots are not entirely waterproof. We were lucky – one day later and the road would be closed whilst they dug a culvert, which would have cost us hours of delay.

Our route took us through several one-horse towns where the horse was actually dead but we did stop at some interesting gas stations where every other person that stopped was very keen to talk to us and find out where we had come from, where we were going to, how we got the bikes out here…sometimes you feel you want to hang an “information” sign around your neck to save yourself from having to repeat the same stuff over and over again, but on the other hand it is very nice to be made so welcome and the bikes are certainly a conversation-opener. Most people here haven’t seen anything so “exotic” as a motorcycle fully kitted-out for overland travel and are amazed at what we are doing.

After leaving Flin Flon (where they really did say “you should’ve told us you were coming and we’d have laid on a dancing band”!) we headed out onto the plains, the flatlands, the badlands, the bread-basket – whatever you choose to call it. It’s big, it’s flat, and there are hardly any trees but for all that it’s quite spectacular. The local saying is that if you live on the plains you can watch your dog run away for days. In some places the road was dead straight for hours, just an up-and-down rollercoaster with as much as 4 miles between crests of hills, and the side wind was fierce. Every truck passing us in the opposite direction pushed us across the tarmac with a huge WHUMP of air. In fact one of our group, who had stopped by the side of the road for a moment, was actually knocked over by a whump of air, bike and all!

However we all arrived safely at Russell to a warm welcome at the Russell Inn. They’d even hung a welcome sign out for us in Reception, and gave us all key ring tags and jacket-pins shaped like Bison (the emblem of Manitoba). The next morning most of us, faced with a 425 mile ride to get here to Sioux Narrows in the scorching 30 degree heat on the plains, chose to be Early Riders and leave at 06.30h. At that hour the world was beautiful – fields full of crops made iridescent as the sunlight shone through the dew on the stalks. It was, however, quite a smelly world. There were a few squashed skunks on the road, the drains were overflowing due to the rain and all the dead dragonflies in our radiator grilles scorched as the bikes heated up. It was difficult to get the smell out of our nostrils for the rest of the day but the beauty of the Whiteshell National Park, and the huge ice creams we had at our rest stop, did take our minds off it a bit.

We all arrived hot and windblown at Sioux Narrows after a very long and thirsty ride but were soon revived by an ice cold beer and, for some, a swim in the crystal waters of the lake. The temptation to just jump in the water with all our bike kit on was almost overwhelming but we did manage to change into our swimming costumes first.

Just across from our motel are a couple of houses with boats and float planes parked on the water, which looks just like a picture-postcard. It’s scorching hot but later this evening we plan to BBQ under the trees after our rest day. Some of the group have gone fishing on the lake and hope to bring us some fish for the grill. John and Marion have gone for a stroll, complete with brollies for protection from the sun – very English! As I type, several others are splashing about in the lake and there is laundry a-plenty draped across the bikes drying in the sunshine. Tomorrow, early, we set off for Kakabeka Falls…