Waking up in the mountains was great. The motel was nestled in a valley just down the road from Mt Washington. I have wanted to ride up the mountain for a long time. It is a famous place above the clouds with 200 plus MPH winds and extreme weather at times. It's always a gamble if the check in station will allow cars or bikes to drive up the crazy ass road.

This ended up being one of those days. After raining hard all night the road was closed to motorcycles for the day. The dirt and clay portions were too slippery for 2 wheels they told us and turned us away.

It was still spitting rain as we rolled down through the mountain passes weaving from one incredible vista to another. The little towns along the way are New England quaint and friendly with old bar/restaurants scattered along the way.

We hit a cool old place in Lancaster right on the vermont line. from there we rode 45 minutes up the border along the river to Colebrook hoping to find some T shirts from the Blessing of the Bikes festival the next day. The town was buzzing with bikes and the church was roped off in preparation of the ceremony that weekend. We found the bar that Mel in the last bar suggested but even after she made a few phone calls looking the bartender could not locate any rally shirts.

We did however have some of the best Poutine I ever ate for lunch. After a couple of Long Trail draughts and a belly full of fries, gravy and cheese we worked our way back to the bike to go back south empty handed. We hopped over the Vermont border over an old crickety bridge and ran a tiny little road down river. This proved to be a cool road long since forgotten by the maintenance dept.

Once back to US 2 we headed west until we rolled into the amazing town of Woodstock and found a great place to spend the night.

The motel backed into a huge deer filled lawn and a rocky little river. We spent a bit lounging along the river drinking a bottle of Long Trail beer before settling in for a dinner of cheese, crackers and sausage.