Together is the Best Place to Be, Day 4: Cooks!

Nova Scotia 2007

Tuesday June 18, Cook’s!
Copyright(c) 2007, Jim Beachy

Contrary to popular belief and, in common with Columbus, we did not fall off the edge of the world last night. The Swiss Inn features a full breakfast as part of the package, and I am lamenting to the hostess about my connectivity problems. “We have a cable modem by the bar,” she says. “I’ll dig it out.” Then, on second thought, “Are you set up for Wi-Fi?” It turns out they have Wi-Fi in the lobby and so I’m able to connect and after a fashion upload yesterday’s trip report. Who knew?

Yesterday Kitty and I had talked about two possible routes for our travels today. Our destination is Brunswick, Maine, and within that destination lies yet another: Cook’s Lobster House. It’s an automatic itinerary entry whenever we travel to New England. We’ve eaten lobster there at least a dozen times over the years, dating from the time before it was made famous by a Visa commercial, when a pound-and-a-quarter lobster cost $3.45 (extra lobster: $2.75). So today we want to arrive early enough to make it to the restaurant at a decent time. “Do you want the eight-hour version or the six-and-a-half-hour version?” I ask Kitty in the headset as we turn left out of the hilly driveway to the inn. “You have 1.4 miles to make up your mind.”

“I’ll have the eight-hour route,” she says just as we reach the cutoff point. And thus we turn northward on Vermont Rt. 100, which is one of the scenic elements I’d hoped to incorporate into our wayward wanderings through New England en route to Nova Scotia. Rt. 100 through Vermont is indeed a road worthy of seeking out. It runs north-and-south through the heart of the Green Mountains, and since it roughly parallels the mountain ranges, it’s an easy and diverse ride. Once more we are blessed with a cloudless sky and a crisp mountain morning. I’m not in a screaming-through-the-twisties kind of mood today, and so we ease rather gently around the curves and enjoy the steep green mountainsides, the few little villages, and the occasional farmland to either side. The best of the route is between Londonderry and US 4 at Killington, as the route north of the Killington ski area features some fairly dubious road surfaces. But all in all, it’s a great slow-down morning ride.


I love to take pictures of old buildings, or more properly, dead buildings. What stories they could tell! This morning there are plenty of photo opportunities but I pass them up one after the other. As we ride onward and I wonder why I do this, a new term comes into existence. My affliction could be called Destinational Tyranny. I really, really want to stop and look at stuff, take a few pictures, listen to an old house tell its sad, sweet stories, but my destination for the day looms large and I don’t want to delay my arrival. It is Destinational Tyranny. Today, the destination involves eating lobsters; I have a serious case of Destinational Tyranny and haven’t found the cure.



We hold Rt. 100 until we hit I-83, then Jill, the owner of my friendly GPS voice, flawlessly leads us via 62, 302, and 112 into New Hampshire and finally to Woodstock. Woodstock is the western terminus of the Kancamagus Highway, the last of the three scenic elements that more or less dictated this route from Dad’s house to Cook’s Lobster House. (http://www.byways.org/explore/byways/2458/) It’s a 37-mile road (Rt. 112) that runs between Woodstock and Conway as it crosses the White Mountains in New Hampshire. It features long graceful curves and one second-gear hairpin curve as it makes its way up along Kancamagus peak. There are a number of 4,000-foot-plus peaks along the route, and the road itself reaches an elevation of nearly 2,800 feet. Mountain peaks rear their grizzled and worn heads far above us, their slopes impossibly steep, massive granite scars betraying their existence as veterans of the fiercest weather patterns on the North American continent.


My Garmin StreetPilot 2720 GPS has four independent mileage logs. I check the active log that I’ve labeled “NS2007”, which logs the total mileage for this trip: 1,040. Here, then, lies the true heart of the motorcyclist. Could anyone else understand the reasons I would ride 1,040 miles just to experience a 37-mile stretch of highway? Kitty and I joke in the headsets that it’s probably not normal. “Well,” she says gently, “It’s normal for you.”


The route is not particularly challenging, but it’s a fun ride. Until we reach the unexpected construction somewhere on the downhill side heading to Conway. “Pavement Ends,” the sign reads. “Bikers use extreme caution.” Well, that will certainly get your attention if you are riding a two-up Gold Wing towing a trailer! I can hear Kitty sigh in the headset, undoubtedly remembering, as do I, a stretch of deep mud and gravel near Fishing Bridge running eastward out of Yellowstone National Park, eight miles of absolutely the worst riding conditions I’ve ever encountered. I should have listened to Gibby when he warned me the day before!


“How far is it?” I ask the flagman. I don’t need to specify what “it” is. “About half a mile,” he says. I breathe a sigh of relief and when the flagman signals, we head off into the gravel. It turns out to be fairly easy as the dirt road surface is well graded and packed pretty well.

We cross into Maine and follow Rt. 113 and 25 to I-95 and soon arrive at the hotel in Brunswick, Maine in good time to shower and then ride the 14 miles on Rt. 24 to Cook’s Lobster House on Bailey Island. Connecting Bailey Island to a series of other islands is a unique cribstone bridge, the only one of its kind in the world. It’s a series of giant granite blocks stacked like a kid’s “block-house,” leaving space for the ebb and flow of the tide. Check out http://www.cookslobster.com/ and click on “About”.


“We rode our motorcycle 1,200 miles to be right here, right now, eating your lobsters,” I tell the host. Ah, lobster! Kitty and I each have two one-and-a-half-pound lobsters. I am convinced that there is no better food in the world than lobster. None! We savor each morsel as we sit by the window watching the sun set behind a golden Atlantic Ocean while a seal plays among the lobster boats anchored in the harbor.



Today we’ve ridden 316 miles including the ride to Cook’s from the hotel. And so a simple 650-mile trip to Cook’s has turned into a complicated 1,200-mile version. On a bike, the ride trumps the destination nearly every day. We’ve incorporated my three scenic elements into the ride, each one different and enjoyable: US Rt. 6 through Pennsylvania; Vermont Rt. 100 through the Green Mountains; and the Kancamagus Highway in New Hampshire. We’ve been in eight US states so far on this trip.



Out of many shining moments in my life with Kitty, today’s adventures stand out in harmonious near-perfection. Slow-down riding at its best under cloudless skies with the person I love to ride with, topped off by a perfect lobster feast in a perfect setting. God, You know I don’t deserve such a perfect gift. But thank You!