Ooo eeee ooo ah ah, Boise to WallaWalla, bing bang

... and I'm guessing if you're under 40 you don't get the reference!

THE FACTS:

I was up relatively early this morning to "assemble" my gear onto the bike

Before

After, it looks quite heavily loaded but really is not

After adding a windscreen, two saddle bags and my "suit case". I figured out where to add the final item; one that I had not taken last year. I have been warned by several parties that the gas stations are few and far between in both Western Canada and Alaska. I decided it prudent to carry a (very small) amount of petro, as they say. The options for mounting the leather carrying case were few, after the afore mentioned accessories had been added. I found that mounting it vertically to the "D" rings on my suitcase worked well and actually helped to tighten up the fit on the new rain cover I had sewn.

So I woke up the house sitter so she could see me off and had the kickstand up about 8:30.

Last year, on my P48 trip (words that I no doubt will type numerous times), I was still adjusting to the operation of the bike with its many controls. I figured that, with 17,000 miles under my Fat Boy belt, I'd be in the groove right from the start.

Wrong. I accelerated out of my drive way, then knowing it was time to catch second gear, I pulled the clutch in and instinctively hooked my right toe under the brake lever and pulled up. This motion would have been fine had I been on the Spanish-built dirt bike I had raced back in the late '60s. However, Harley Davidson mounts the shift lever on the LEFT side of the bike. Pulling up on the brake lever, on the right side, does absolutely nothing except embarrass the rider who should know better!

I had quipped the night before that I wondered how far down the road I would be before I remembered the first item that was not packed. 

Answer: About a mile and a half. I forgot to grab Spuddy Buddy! So I did the first of what will certainly be a long string of U-turns, went back and gathered Spuddy up and placed him in his custom built seat, directly behind the windscreen. (By the way, by the time I made the 3 mile loop back to the house, my house sitter had already gone back to bed and fallen asleep. 8 a.m. Is just too darn early for a teenager!)

If you are not familiar with Spuddy Buddy, he is the mascot for the Idaho Potato Commission. Betty and I had adopted him back in 2011 to take on our many planned adventures, to appear in photos like Kilroy from WWII.

I circled through the Cemetary on my way out of town (I know, it's crazy, but I told my navigator I'd pick her up), got gas and was steaming up Highway 55 along the North Fork of the Payette, which was rip-roaring with high flows through class 5 rapids.

N.F. Payette

It was planned to be a short day as I have until Friday afternoon to cover approximately 600 miles, culminating in Bellingham, WA. I had tentatively planned to spend the night in Lewiston, Id. on the Clearwater River. Lewiston is named after Meriweather Lewis and sits at one end of a bridge that connects it to Clarkston, WA. which is named after... well, you guess.

Metal silhouettes commemorated the meeting of the Corp of Discovery and the Nez Perce Indians

I arrived mid-afternoon and after looking at tomorrow's weather forecast (high of 96!) I decided that tomorrow would be a much better short day (it was only 85 today and the combination of air rushing past me and open vents in my leather jacket made it tolerable). My hope is that as I travel norther (I'm going to copyright that word!) the afternoon temperatures will moderate. 

I rolled into Walla Walla Wa. at about 5:15 PDT, having covered an ambitious 391 miles (counting U.D.- U-turn distance, of which there was a bit).

Tomorrow should be a fairly easy day, but scenic. The path I intend to take should offer views (albeit distant) of Mt. Adams, Mt. Rainer and Mt. St. Helens. There is rain in the forecast for Thursday so I am hoping to be on the coast, either behind it or laying low for a day. Oh, and did I mention that one week after retiring, I'll be homeless! More about that later.

Some house keeping - I use a program called Strava to track my course and plot it on a map. Last year this caused some bruised feelings as several people wrote to me that Strava is for athletes to track their training runs/rides. So when I went to save the route I noticed there is now a button you can slide over that will keep your map from being published on their "leader board" for others to view. Perfect I thought, 

I slid the button over and hit finish and ... everything disappeared! So I have no map of my progress today!

Wi-Fi is going to be a problem on this trip. With cell towers few and far between I will be writing a blog each day but may not be able to "publish" it daily. Keep checking back, eventually something will show up!

Navigation may or may not be an issue. I'm told that the GPS tracking is done with satellites but the oral commands require a cell tower. I'll be checking the next day's route (hopefully) each night so I don't get too lost. 

Speaking of navigation, I use an app on my Droid phone called Navigation (where do they come up with this stuff?). I believe it runs Google maps which in turn utilizes two very similar sounding female voices. I have named them Gertrude Pauline Schuster and Gloria Pauline Stewart. I refer to them as "The Girls" and they are a constant source of frustration and entertainment. This morning I turned my GPS on, turned my Bluetooth receiver on, started Navigation and .... nothing, not a word. I exited Boise and travelled north 40 (?) miles to Banks, stopped and took a picture, then got back on the bike when suddenly Gertrude says "Turn left on U.S. 55" and, soon as that command was executed, Gloria said "Continue north on U.S. 55 for 75 miles". Stay tuned for more adventures of The Girls"!

And while I'm on the subject of maps, here is an approximate map of my route:

The biggest gaff here is that Google Maps won't let you plot a course on water! Point B (if you can see it) is Bellingham, WA. where I will board the Alaskan Inter-Coastal ferry, with my bike, for a three day trip to Point C, which is Skagway, Ak. The line between F and G is my return route from Fairbanks. Sorry I can't put a better map in the blog.