Well, enough was enough. I hadn't had a day for amusement purposes since February, so I took Friday off work and headed for the Berkshires in western Mass.
The weather gods were smiling but the traffic gods were belligerent. RT 2 was moving, but there was a lot off traffic. I had hoped that it would have eased up by the time I got to Deerfield, but this was not to be.
There were two spots with major road construction not too far from Shelburne, so traffic was down to one lane with LEOs coordinating east/west traffic flow. The result was something of a tailback that toook a long time to ease up once traffic moved again This was a shame, as this part of RT 2 (known as the Mohawk trail) was very twisty and had nice surface conditions. Given the heavy traffic, double yellow lines, and blind corners, I decided to just relax and go with the flow.
Not so for the guy on the RT who passed me in a slight corner on a double yellow. I'm not sure what his hurry was, as he had no place to go. He then passed the car in front of me but couldn't see any way past the other 10 cars in front. He kept trying though, weaving and bobbing across lanes but making no progress.
To me, that seemed too stressful, as traffic was moving ok at the speed limit +10 or so in spots. 30 minutes later, I saw him pulled over at a gift store, hands on his knees and drenched in sweat.
A little further on, I came across this monument to members of the Elks who were killed in action:
Next stop was Williamstown, where I had a burger at the Moonlight Diner. Not much else to say about that, except that the decor was funky 60s retro.
I headed off to scoot up Mt. Greylock by taking Notch Road from North Adams. Well, my intentions were good - the road up the mountain was closed. Turning around, I decided to take a different branch road down. After 2 minutes, I questioned the wisdom of this decision as I don't think it had seen a wheeled vehicle since John Quincy Adams' time. In any event, I got down in one piece and headed home, back the way I came.
Stopped off at a touristy gift-shop, but the view was good:
On the way back down on the other side, I just had one "special moment" when I met a car that couldn't take a corner and was on my side of the road. I stil had room to get by and a nice blast of the Fiamms got the desired reaction out of the dim-wit behind the wheel.
There were lots of state troopers out and about. I saw 2 people pulled over by them, and 1 stopped by Concord police.
I covered about 320 miles and saw about 12 bikes. No Ducs on the road - mostly Harleys, a couple of Yamahas, and a BMW.
It was good practice run and it got the cobwebs out.
