Maine is less than an afternoon away (from NYC)
I woke up early yesterday, ready to begin a grand adventure
around Nova Scotia. Unfortunately, my partner in crime Jay had a last minute
work call, and we didn’t end up hitting the road till 3pm. We’re booked on the 12pm Wednesday ferry from
St. John New Brunswick to Digby, Nova Scotia, so with half the day gone
already, I decided we would just push as far as we could, and make up any
outstanding mileage the following day. Leaving from Harlem, we criss-crossed across
the Bronx, up through Connecticut, scissoring through EZPasses and traffic in central
Mass and New Hampshire, making incredible time.
We hit I95 just south of Maine a little after 7pm, and when an
eight-lane highway suddenly arrived beneath our wheels, pristine and empty,
and when we began to see moose crossing and motorcycle caution signs (as well
as notice of an apparent severe penalty for contraband out of state firewood),
we knew we had entered motorcycle country…
We hit South Portland Maine sometime around 8pm,
shocked that this great northern state was less than an afternoon’s drive
from New York City by motorcycle. Maine
occupies some mystical, nearly foreign corner of this country in my psyche,
like Montana or Alaska, a fallacy which I was happy to have dispelled by its
actual proximity.