Just to be sure, we tied the motorcycles to the hotel railing with parachute cord. While we were pulling mine upright, it had began to hail. Tiny sharp beads struck my bare legs, bounding off the rain jacket I’d thrown on when I saw my bike blow over in a microburst. Upright and rolled now against the tenuous security of the deck outside our room, Raven turned and handed me a small piece of black metal.
“Here, hold onto this. Its half your clutch lever.”
So went our “rest” day on what by now on day four we’d already dubbed the Trip of Trials.
Loaded up and ready to go the morning of day 1
We didn’t even make it a mile on the morning of day one before the lump and bump of Raven’s front tire pulled him over. The bead on his new tire wasn’t seated correctly. Reverse directions for an hour of Raven cursing in the garage while I took the opportunity to rearrange my stuffed baggage. I couldn’t find anything to take off, but did make it comfortable to at least sit on my KLR650 motorcycle. Getting on and off was still awkward, but at least I didn’t feel like I was trying to ride on a bicycle seat anymore.
Back on the road, it was just after lunch as we were giving the motorcycles a once over that Raven realized his front tire wasn’t holding air. The handy pressure indicator was showing red while green to slight yellow was the visual poundage of choice for our bikes. Investigating, Raven discovered that the helpfully colored valve cap looked damaged. He replaced it with the original saved in the tank bag. I felt a sigh of relief, Raven still looked anxious. He’d just spent an hour spooning his tire to fix the bead. What if he’d nicked the tube? The amazingly boring two hours on Maine’s “Airline” road to Canada was an anxious time spent alone in his head, feeling for any odd twinge from his front tire.

The dogs hanging out in their 'T' bags before we zip up doors- ballistic nylon, 2 point harness system, mesh openings for air. They were quite happy!
A pressure check at the gas station at the end of the Airline confirmed his fears. The tire was down 10 pounds. The tube was leaking. Bad enough to have a flat in a car but when you only have two tires on the ground, losing one was a show stopper. What to do? Ride home on a bad tube or go into Canada, only a few minutes away now, and find a motorcycle shop. There was one across the border in St. Stephen, though most likely it wouldn’t be open until Monday, the next day. We’d already gone several hours – over 100 miles – and had faced two problems. We turned the bikes further north and queued for the border crossing.
Crossing into Canada on motorbike is usually straight forward. This time the novelty of what we were carrying earned us a dual question and answer session, a quick check of papers, a smile and a wave. You see, we also had our two Cairn terriers along in “T” bags – specialized motorcycle dog carriers secured on the rear. At least something had gone right on day one. We headed down the peninsula to a campground in St. Andrews were we’d stayed at once before. It harbored European fire ants in the gravel, but had clean, free showers and an amazing view.
However when we stopped to register, Raven’s already worried face was even more exasperated.
“My bike isn’t charging.”
We were feeling rather glum as we unpacked the tent. Was this to be our only night on the road this vacation? Raven quarantined the dogs to the tent so that no fire ants would cling tenaciously to their fur and then attack us all night like the last time we’d stayed. He started trying to sort out the charging system while I headed into town for food, arriving at the grocery store with 10 minutes to spare until closing.
Cooking dinner in St. Andrews. Dogs locked safely away in the tent!
I came back with scallops, salad, candy bars, and chocolate milk to find that Raven had discovered a corroded connector. He knew there would eventually be a price to pay for that January first motorcycle ride in the snow with the side car. Charging problem hopefully solved! Surely the day’s misadventures were a fluke to our normally serendipitous exploits? Falling asleep, I pushed aside unease and wondered why I hadn’t filled my air mattress more. The end of day one closed with 167 miles ridden, three problems faced, and no fire ants in the tent.
Read part 2: What Turned Us Around here