Days 15, 16, 17 - Kentucky Rain and Family Time In West Virginia

Day 15 (Friday, Sept 18) brought the first serious rain of the trip, and as expected, the rain put a definite damper on the fun for for a while. Although the cover that I carry/use kept the bike pretty dry overnight -- I still had to load up and depart the hotel in the rain. It did cross my mind to just wait out the rain -- but I was committed to arriving at Deb's Dad's house in West Virginia in time for a family reunion of her relatives. So, I put on all my rain gear and headed out into the dreary morning with plenty of ground level fog.

I stayed on my planned backroad route for quite a while -- and learned quickly that neither my gloves nor my overpants (complete with the rain liner but previously untested) were adequate for the drenching. The going was slow and challenging. In addition, the backroad routing kept speeds down (as cars around me slowed) and that added to to the discomfort as sometimes there wasn't sufficient speed to keep my helmet visor clear. So, it didn't take long before I routed myself onto an interstate where I could gobble up miles safer and faster.

I ended up doing about 100 miles on the interstate as the weather finally started to clear and when it did I decided to go back to my original plans when I crossed into West Virginia. I quickly found alternate backroads and enjoyed the last 70 miles on some fantastically fun, curvy WV backroads.

It was great fun to arrive in WV and be with Deb again after 15 days apart -- and that evening Neal and Anna arrived for the family reunion on Saturday. Saturday and Sunday were full of lots of fun family time and good food.

Current plans call for me to continue on toward Williamsburg, VA in the next day or two -- but it looks like I'll be riding in more rain -- which means more freeway time. The adventure continues.