This morning we had an early departure from our hotel to Boston HD. We arrived and checked in to find out where our bikes were located in the parking lot that house 200 Harley’s! Dawn and I are from different areas, but our bikes were relatively close. We both got the new 2017 CVO Streetglide in the orange and black paint. Boston HD was awesome in the whole process and they installed my sissy bar for me that I mailed to them in advance. We got the bikes loaded and headed out. Just for some idea of the craziness that is this ride…probably about 30% of the people on this ride are not from the U.S!!!!

My new ride

My dealer plate had survived burn outs

So, I have a 2015 CVO Streetglide in Alaska, and I am on the same bike here. Well, I failed the Dealer test, because I have yet to really learn the new 6.5 stereo system on the Harley’s, because I never need navigation in Alaska! So, I immediately start our trip out by going the wrong way, primarily because I followed someone else. Then we go the wrong way again while it was recalculating… Despite that headache the navigation did get us where we needed to go and I didn’t have to experience any bad drivers. Dawn had to trust that I was on the right track for the first part, because she couldn’t get her navigation to the right setting…this is why it is important to read the manual!!

So, we followed HD’s route which took us through primarily rural areas on back roads. The whole trip was beautiful. We headed West from Boston and then eventually north toward Stowe Vermont. We took a few side trips, like one to get as and water after the first 80 miles or so. Then we were heading on the right path and I had finally gotten the gist of the GPS, so I turner the “bitch in the box” down so she wouldn’t yell at me. Dawn and another rider (unknown) where behind me and I went left and left again when I should have gone left and right. I knew as soon as I went left that I was wrong and then Dawn and the unknown rider went right and she honked at me. Luckily I was able to make a quick loop since the streets were all one way and get on the right track.

Birds of a feather

The rest of the ride was pretty smooth as far as following the GPS from that point. We started to get hungry so we stopped in Weston and found a little restaurant called the Bryant House. This was an old house that had been re-purposed into a restaurant. It had great food and the layout was kept very much original including a cool room upstairs that they had the original bedroom set from the 1800’s!!

Bryant House

Original owners of the house, clothing and furniture

I really was hoping that along this beautiful road we would find little spots to pull over and take photos but unfortunately there was rarely any shoulder and the pull off spots were all sand and gravel. Mostly we rode through the hills and through forests. Right outside of Stowe we make a quick detour to the Cider Mill, I’m not gonna lie, I thought it was going to be “hard cider” but instead it was a family friend place with apple cider donuts and a pack of Goldwing Riders..you know, you meet the nicest people on a Goldwing 😛

Cider donuts are not as exciting as hard cider

We got some cider and then headed to the Stowe Mountain Lodge which was our final destination. We arrived to covered parking in the garage and great assistance to get our bags and our sweaty hot messes to the room. (It was very hot and muggy…ALL DAY). We had a dinner schedule for the HD Ride at 7pm so around 7:10 we headed down for a drink before dinner was served. As we passed the lobby we saw about 50 people waiting to get checked in, apparently about half of the riders were late getting in, so the line kept getting longer and the dinner kept getting pushed back.

They had a great fire pit outside, so Dawn and I mingled with the folks that were there and waited for dinner to start. It was an early night, as we are all tired from the long ride and warm weather. Tomorrow we will be riding from Stowe, VT to Portland, ME.

Campfire at the end of the day