Rain and mud

We begin this morning early without giving beaver a chance at the breakfast table. Boog and I devise a plan to get him going by promising food and coffee "down the road". Well beaver is a pilot not a navigator so he has no idea that there will be no breakfast or lunch this day. By noon he knows he's been had. The first clue he gets is 20 miles out of Lab City the pavement ends and the fight is on. Rain falls steadily and the road has hundreds of little visible ruts that are impossible to see with our clouded face shields. Early experience entering muddy turns teaches us to slow down and weight the pegs. Now Boog and I are in communication via our new toy, blue tooth scala rider headsets. After I take a dab to save myself from a mud bath after a particullarly "interesting corner entry", I ask boog if he thinks the girls might enjoy this ride two up. As I wait for the usual snide remark, I look up to see boog's little wee strom shaking from side to side like a cold puppy. All I hear is oh sh..t. He was silent for a while (ususual for him). I took his silence as a qualified "not likely". By the time my fuel warning light got my attention we had covered 175 miles mostly in fourth gear. The afternoon brought a little sun and more complaining from a now very hungry beaver. We fuel up in Gabriel and meet some folks from NY who give us some real encouragement. Only 60 to 70 more miles of dirt before it gives way to pavement. The road dries somewhat and beaver smells the barn and the trough. He's leading today and puts the hammer down. By the end of the dirt section we come to Manic V. A huge dam and power station. Beav and boog stop for a photo and boog notices that my right side bag has broken free of it's mount. Yep, that fancy Jesse mount has finally fatigued under our constant battering over stutter bumps and pot holes. After a cleaver fix with multiple tie downs by the boog, we are off on the final stretch of undulating and broken pavement. What a relief for at least for the weary smoke. Baie Comaeux is the stop for tonight. Tomorrow, lunch in Quebec City in defference to the beaver and then on to CONUS. I learned this is military speak for continental US. More from boog later...............smoke