It was a boring Saturday afternoon of September 17^th when we decided to take a ride on a motorcycle to someplace picturesque. The area in the Kawartha region promised to be a good choice, as it’s full of lakes, rocks and rough vegetation. For me, it’s the epitome of “picturesque” as far as Southern Ontario is concerned.

The route was a tip from the Greatest Road app. With no way to mount the GPS nor the iPhone to the bike, we spent a bit of time memorizing the route, and finally headed off. It was past 3pm, but who’s counting? It’s a Saturday anyway.

A secondary purpose of the trip was to test out trip tracking software. Below is the route as recorded by EveryTrail on an iPhone 4. The good part is that even after over 6 hours of continuous GPS use and playing music, oftentimes in areas with subpar network connection, there was still plenty of battery life left by the time we got home. It can definitely be used for a whole day worth of tracking, so let’s mark that as a successful trial.

The first stretch of the trip is the perpetually busy 401 passing through Toronto. As I have learned from an earlier trip to Niagara Falls, the high speed winds on the highway create the kind of noise in your head that can be more that just a mild nuisance. As the air curves around all the nooks and crannies of the helmet what you get in your ears is a very disturbing blend of high and low pitched sounds, and on a long stretch of highway it never ceases. By the time I got home from Niagara, I had a persistent head ache, it felt as if the high pitched layer of that noise was still hitting my ears. It took full two days for the effect to wear off completely, so for this trip I preemptively used ear plugs.

Once off the 401, the road remained fairly calm for quite a while. The passing landscape consisted mostly of fields and infrequently, small towns. Sometimes cows, horses, and even sheep could be seen grazing in the grass. The sun was still warm, the sky – mostly clear with just a few clouds, purely for decorating purposes. The rocky roads were not to be seen for some time, but the lakes and creeks already began to creep up. The leaves on the trees were still predominantly green, but a touch of yellow and red here and there warned that summer has in fact ended. We stopped on a side road to take our trusty camera out and started snapping.

I left the camera handy and kept taking photos on the go (on the run? on the vroom?). Hence whatever was close to the road (and the road itself) is blurry and in motion.

We stopped near a bridge in one of the small towns to take pictures and contemplated having a dinner in a restaurant across the road. It was a mildly tempting proposition, but ultimately we decided to ride some more while it was still daylight. So we took off.

And then finally, there were the rocks. They did not start at their most impressive, but they still had this monumental feel to them.

The sun was beginning to set and everything was coloured in a warm  orange glow. We were headed north and east on our loop of a road, so the sun was behind us, casting long shadows in front of us. For a long time what followed was just rocks, lakes, and occasionally – small towns. The roads were winding and beautiful. There were several deer warning signs along the way, and even one moose warning. Although we did not meet any moose, we did see a small deer on the side of the road. The car in front of us started slowing down and eventually stopped, apparently to avoid, and eventually to simply admire the animal as it casually went back into the forest.

What follows is a very long set of photos, but the verbal content does continue after a while.

After the sun gave out its last rays, it was turning darker and colder. The road markings got more challenging to see in advance, and eventually what really helped us not miss the turn onto the sophisticatedly named Y Road was the fact that the pick up truck driving in front of us turned on the same road. It was so dark by then that the small sign with the road’s name was only really visible as we passed it. Shortly after getting onto Y Road we stopped at a gas station. Instead of a full dinner we opted for a pair of candy bars. It was getting so cold and dark that the prospect of stopping over for 30min to get food before continuing did not seem so attractive any more. We swapped helmet windshields (I surrendered my clear shield in exchange for my partner’s dark one, to allow him better vision on the poorly lit roads), and headed out.

There was no more picture taking after this point, as after the stop it got pretty much pitch black in an instant. The idea was to try and get out of there as fast as possible before our extremities froze off. The roads were mostly empty, but if stuck behind another car we had to follow at a slower pace for a significant distance, as most of the road was curved and unsafe for passing.

At one point I looked up and almost let out a quiet “Wow”. There was a hypnotizing starry sky above us. Sure, I can see the usual suspects like the Big Dipper and Orion even from Toronto, but this sky was studded with stars to the point that I think they just ran out of empty space.

The stretch from the gas station to the 401 was tough. It was unpleasantly cold and dark to the point that you could see nothing but the stars, a patch of road ahead and infrequently, the lights of the oncoming traffic. There was no more enjoying the scenery, it was just tense anticipation of that beautiful sign that spells out “401 WEST TORONTO”.

It’s funny how that particular part of the trip seemed so needlessly long. While we could estimate how long it would take us to get there, the rational estimates were way too long for comfort. Over an hour? On this nameless road? Ok, it has a name, but it’s totally unfamiliar so it might as well be nameless. The road signs were not helpful. Sometime we’d see some of those signs that tell you the distance to nearby cities, and seeing “Toronto 132” did not exactly seem like too fun of a prospect. It was more of test for the clothing we were wearing, to see how long it could keep us warm in the cold night. Speaking of clothing, we were wearing the same outfits we use for snowboarding, in sub-zero weather.

When we finally reached the 401 it felt suddenly more at home. It was after all a familiar road, and time seemed to pass faster as you could visually track the passing landmarks, even if they were really just signage marking the exits from the highway. We exited in Pickering to gas up, and took the opportunity to stretch our legs since we were stopped anyway. The pump was acting up a bit as I was trying to use Paypass on my credit card to pay for gas. It flashed some messages in French and then just said ARRET  and quit on me. My French is virtually non-existent, but I do know what ARRET means. It eventually agreed to take my money once I swiped the card the old fashioned way. With the gas tank refilled, we were back on the road, approaching Toronto with an increasing speed.

One odd thing about the 401 is that for some reason it was much warmer than the roads in the Kawartha area. You could feel the temperature change almost right away, it was really obvious. It never got colder after that either. My theory is that the proximity to the large body of water – lake Ontario – brings warm air to the highway in that area. Or maybe it was the combined fumes of all the cars travelling on the busier 401. Whatever the cause, it was a very welcome phenomenon for us. Once off the highway and on the mellow city streets it got warmer yet again as we were now travelling at a much lower speed and hitting much less wind. Our desires at that point were pretty basic – get home, eat and rest. And give hugs to the cats, naturally.