Not wanting to ride in "Pappy's Run", preferring ...more of a ride, I made plans for a 10 o'clock ride leaving from Friendly's in Norwich-town. Reuben came over the house at about 7:45am to watch the Formula one Turkish Grand Prix, the race ended at 9:30 and we headed to out to meet Rick and Craig. We arrived about five minutes late. We headed across Norwich-town via West Town then East Town to rte 169, I used Tom's technique of having the instructions written and in my vest pocket, pull it out, refer to it, slide it back in. The route was East Town street to Ox Hill rd to 169. I blew it right from the start. Instead of East Town street I took Town street which took us to 169, still not aware I had taken the wrong road I missed Ox Hill which was good because we were already on 169. We followed 169 to Taftville then up to Newent for 138, all the time passing bikes coming in for Pappy's. In Newent we picked up 138 over to 12, the next planned move was 12 to 201 so I took 12 and turned right on 138, oops, I hooked a left on Pleasant View street and hit sand, the front of the bike washed out but stayed up-right, Turned right on 12 then onto 201, back on track.
During the race in the morning I looked at Google Maps to find a road less traveled and find it I did, Stone Hill road off 201 in Hopeville. This road on Google maps is yellow, which means it has been video recorded. I should have done a street view. The road is two lane only in that traffic flows both ways, the entrance to the road looks like a driveway, about a car width and a half, about 500' down the road there is a sign that warns that the road narrows, I looked back at Reuben and started laughing. The pavement is almost non-existent cracked and broken, I was waiting for the road to turn to dirt, but it never did, it just kept leading us through the woods although by the pond there was a large pile of sand to traverse. The road did as it promised and brought us out on rte 49 in Ekonk about a mile and a half south of the Brown Cow. Had I paid more attention to the website I would have found the road has a second name, “Hell Hollow road”.
From 49 we proceeded north to rte 14 which we followed into Rhode Island, past Carbuncle Pond and up to rte 102 where we crossed onto Old Plainfield Pike. We followed the Pike to the end and picked up 12 south across the Scituate Reservoir dam to 116, A right on 116 a left on 117 though Appanoug, picked up rte 1 and ran north past T.F.Green to Airport road where we stopped at Hooters for Lunch. During lunch we discussed our next move, I was going to head to the Shoreline but Rick reminded me that it was Memorial Day weekend and traffic would be impossible. Rick decided he needed gloves so it was off to Hot leathers in East Providence, Craig headed for 95 and home, we took 1 and 1a north through the City. At Hot Leathers Rick got his gloves and we headed back through Pawtucket to Providence and rte 10 to Rte 6. We stopped along Oswansicut pond for Reuben to tank up, then it was 6 to 116 south to 14 where we crossed the middle of the Scituate Reservoir and south to Ct and 49 to Ekonk for Ice Cream.
From Ekonk we ran south to 138 for Rick to fuel up and I figured I top off also. From here Rick followed 165 to Norwich and Home, while Reuben and myself took 49 to Wyassup road into North Stonington, then 201 to Wintechog Hill road, through the Corkscrew on 2 (only because its better than just tuning left twice) We crossed to 214, 214 we slowed to let traffic clear so we could run the twists, at Shewville we turned left then left again onto Whitford then back onto 201, then down through Old Mystic to Jerry Brown road, then right on Pequotsepos where had I been in a car I would have been owned by a moving company truck on the wrong side of the road. A left on Mistuxet and a right on Hewitt brought us back to Mystic for Ice Tea at Dunkin. From there we split up, Reuben sat parked in bridge traffic in downtown Mystic while I Slogged along at about 3 mph past the seaport and home.
Meanwhile...the Club went on Pappy's run, the had close to 40 bikes, the turn out for the ride was very good with parking at the Gun Club at a premium. the Club did the ride but due to the amount of bikes broke off at the end instead of going to the grave site and headed off on a ride of their own, a few members including Mister Dunn headed to the Rhode Island Shoreline, (Silly people...Traffic) about 6 bikes went to the after ride Party at Sprague Rod and Gun.
