33 1/3 N C S + Cuba

Well the night before the Bday turned into a hell of a go, you'd have to be here to believe it. Coming up soon.

I gotta get this back to realtime before I lose my thoughts.

I woke up the next morning feeling good and got loaded up once again and took off, must a missed this in the dark of the night, I figured it was perfect to keep the bears away from me:


Fueled up again across the street from the great visitors' center were the hours just got cut overnight. I'd arranged to be on the 9am Churchill Falls tour if I would have left yesterday afternoon which I didn't so I called them up and changed it to the 7pm tour instead. I called from the hotel with the Jungle Jims and met the two guys traveling on KLRs from Ontario or Quebec, can't remember which. There rides they just bought a few months or weeks before the trip, they are breaking themselves in right:


The other bikes in town and the Labrador Inn:


I took off and went down the road and was looking for the Muskrat Falls hare because no signage going West bound that I saw. Went down the turnoff and ended visiting with a hydorologist crew working on stablizing the sandy loam for the power company so the river wouldn't erode the back and threaten the power poles. Go pointed in the right direction and went to the parking spot and then saw so tkc tracks and decided I would rather ride that walk. I single tracked the mule down the little section headed to the falls until I ran into serious mud and many fall trees across the track and hoofed it the rest of the way in to the falls. Very muddy and the foliage was holding on to a lot of mositure that soaked the outer jacket to the liner. The trail and the falls:

I wasn't up for this:

So I stopped infront of the first big mudhole I came to here:


I went down and had a look, this river could be next on the chopping block if things can come together:



I made a little mark on the adv rock:


On the way back to the mule I was not paying attention and went off on a side trail skirting the ridge that I should have gone up. I figured I could just bushwack an angle line up the ridge and get back un track but I didn't push far enough to get back to the trail. I thought best to go to the beach and follow it back to the falls and start again and get back to the right path. On my way down to the beach I ran upon an overgrown little cabin and checked it out, looks like it hadn't been used since early 2000s:

I let em know like the others:


I got soaked from the sweat on the inside and the water on the bushes on the outside, it was tight timbers making your own way through.
I was winded too:


I got back on the bike, took a little effort to turn the beast around on the tight trail and head back out, where I came up on a group of tourists coming in for a look, I think I surprise the hell out of them when they saw the mule and me.

Got back to the big road not burning too much fuel I hoped to make the run to Churchill Falls and get there for my tour that evening.
I have seen the future and it looks like this, damn fine pavement to ruin a good gravel road:


I could really fly down this road and twisting so hard causing considerable increase in the burn rate and I could run out if I didn't watch. I only saw one other bike and a handful of vehicles, all gave no problem, the road was mixed, rained off and on put I thought the 4 to 5 inches I needed was in great shape. The moto I'd met in St. John's few days earlier at the ToyBox, his name was Jamie and he was in a hurry to get back home and wasn't stopping much.

He was new to rider and not much experience on the dirt with the 1200GS yet, I passed him slow and sped away and then I think he tried with more speed and it got better for him I believe, I know I like riding fast on them.
I pulled into the company town and had a look around trying to find me a spot. I pulled up to the main center and about that time Jamie rolled in and we had an early dinner at the only place in town that I could find. The little ribs couldn't have been much better than doggies treats but it did the job at a hefty price.

And my tough stuff.

Jamie wanted to get going and I had time to goof off for quite some time before the tour started so I road around some more and scoped the place out. They had a small ski slope with a lodge:


When I was looking around down by the lodge and snowgroomer shed I found this little guy, neater than the moose:


I went to see what they where cranking out at the damn, its low time, when its full boar its right about 5500:

Hard to get the display in the shutter right, they had 3 or 4 units down at the time I think, takes 20 something minutes just to get one started up or shut down:

Couple of dual sports in town, this XT, and I think I saw a KLR and a WR250R even. On my way into town I saw a very large hydralic crane going back to GB/HV where they had been lift out one the transformers or something very heavy, this stuff is big. There mega mover minus the trucks they sold for some reason, now they used these rubber tired articulated dozers to haul the heavy stuff to the railroad near Lab City, takes about a week or something in the winter when the roads are frozen solid enough.


Went down to the outlets from the turbines:

Then up top to one of the earth dams that hold it all in:


Had to get a pre tour light snack before the dam tour:

What had to be done for it to happen:


To this:


The tour was finally getting ready to start, Karen was the later and I was the only one touring, rock on. The overall layout with the 11 units:


The turbine/stator assembly:


My new gear:


Over 60k of earthen damn flood a very large area and shuts off the falls, there area couple of other gated damns that can divert flow as needed remotely:


The tour takes you to two of the main chambers in the underground structure, the higher room where the large transformers are and the next level lower where the top of the stator assembly can be seen and the level where the pieces are removed for turn-arounds with two 400 ton travling cranes. First stop on the tour after the introduction show was the intake area above the underground structure:

Then down down down to the transformer level, they had just removed one earlier that day and thats what the trucks are doing at the other end, very impressive cavern:



This path way is for the 3 large copper bus system overhead that takes the energy up to the transformer level:


Back to the elevator to go down another couple hundred feet the main operations and repair floor for the turbine/stator assemblies:

Nice and clean, they have only cleaned the stainless steel ceilings once by hand with rags and spray bottles off the traveling crane carriage. It was impressive and very large scale project. One dissappointment was not being allowed to go down to the surge level one lower on the output of the turbines, don't get to do this often or if the production is over 3000 megawatts, just barely missed I guess. Some of the heavy lifting pieces:




One they where working on:


Dam well worth the trip and best of all its free and you get some free ear plugs to boot.
Dam self shots:


The loud spoken tour lady Karen, I was wishing I had the ear plugs when I was riding in the van around town with her, I hitting at some volume control but she didn't pick up on it or want to:


Then the after tour snack:


It was plenty dark and looked to be a nice and clear night but I know it hardly ever holds so I wanted at least a roof and got this:

Good dry spot right behine the local skating rink and sure enough it came down hard in the early morning hours and I was happy to be here.

Tomorrow I would take care of some business and head out to Labrador City after some fun.

More to come...

Got up late in the morning because I had no reason to leave my comfy spot and the rain was steady. I wanted to use the library computer for the net since my laptop could hook with their wireless signal and I wanted swim in Labrador and wash some clothes. Nothing was open so I went and got me a big box of lemon sent and set about my business. I'd asked two people that said I could just use the apartment washers on the bottom floor so that what I did and I donated my big box to the cause. Real nice to have clean clothes again:


I had to fold some dryer homestedder's laundry so I would have a spot, so I waited on the wash cycle and threw in the dryer while I went for the sauna, swim, and internet for a while.


Everything was slow to open and 10am was the magic number for most stuff here. The pool people wouldn't let me swim till noon so I went for the computer first for a while and then hit the sauna to sweat a little:

I'd bought me a nice waterproof camera and had yet to use it and was dying to try it out and this seemed the best place to test.

My private swim time for an hour:
ole fisheye, camera works great:

Eyes are bluer than the water. Big breath hold here with an interesting bubble booger:


A rare captive great white :


I laughed my ass off playing with this thing. Cheap entertainment. Good springy diving board too:


Time to load the laundry back up and head to LC. Fuel up again and headed out to another easy ride until I picked up my first flat of the trip ~60 some miles from town. Grader must of pulled up a sharpie for me, it was more of a tear than a hole so I was creative with the scrooms and used two to make to town, still leaking a little, stayed up until I made it to happy hour, I had some nice products to make it easy, and I didn't even have to use my spare tire yet.



One here:


Two would do:


With a slow leak I make the last 60 or so miles into LC and find the happy hour at a nice place called Corbie's and then it starts to go down hill long after happyhour is over.

I'd met some good people: the barmaid Channel #5 Chantell??

and one name Mike:


even offered up a spot to crash so I was set, gonna leave the bike at the bar and taxi it to Mike's later that night but never got the chance. Rounds of beer started flying and a change of bar tenders and bunches of miners coming off shift and it was getting crowding and I was doing my thing on the net and things started to get wild. Some words got said someone took it wrong way and it was throw down time, I'm not gonna take too much shit off anyone especially if they are calling me out, its on. This was the first one, nothing major just a litting wacking and then landing on the floor and broken up pretty quickly by the more the reasponsable patrons. One fella just could leave well enough alone and for no other major reason some else wanted some more and here At this point I distinctly remember one of the sorry bastards had my real nice heavy duty carhart raincoat on, at the bastard stole it, thats the last I saw of it. Then the talk kept coming so here I go again, shirt ripped a little, lip popped little, and cops called, and of course its me. And hell yeah I was drunk, I knew where I was going to set up shop that night at Mike's but somehow lost his address info and no one else at the bar offered it up. The two cops showed up and started off a little bad but after they knew I was coherent and with it they wanted me to get on out of the place.

No luck finding Mike's place so they wanted me to get a hotel to start with and then I was kinda wanted to go set the cot at the previously thought location over at the town bandstand a few block away where there was good cover. Problem is now the bike is going to be left with the wolves who I was just sure would ripped off the Garmins and slash the tires amoung other things and I didn't want to leave out for them. The solution at this point was for me to get a tow truck to move the bike and then go to the nearest hotel. I bulked when they said it would be $175 to move the bike a just a little ways to the police station. We negociated a little and came up with the solution to let me push the loaded bike a few blocks down the road near the police station and let me camp in the area I told them about so it was going to take some work.

I had to air up the rear tire that had leaked flat and then reload my computer and stuff, I took my dear time and got everything ready while the assholes at the bar where gawking and this dumb crew leader lady thought she was somekind of police liason officer and tried to talk up me and I just ignored her to my delight. I ran the bike to fill the tire and planned to slip the clutch to make it easier going but johnny law would have no of that. To his credit the nicer of the two officiers helped me push the bike a few blocks down the road where it would be left and then they took me up the road to the stage area where I could camp under cover.
They dropped me off with my stuff at the rocks that blocked the entrance to the stage area. I just passed out there with my helemet and most of my gear on in the cool early moring where I did surprisingly well for around an hour before the two cops came back to rouse me and offer me the jail cell or the shack a couple hunderd feet away. I took the shack but only had my tent with me as my cot was locked in the bike, so I lay on the floor for a while until I got cold enough to walk down and ride the bike the next block or so on the flat tire up to my new home. I deftly set up the cot, pulled the bag out, dropped the outer gear, but the hoodie on, and snoozed it all away until late next morning when I could finally do damage control assesment under a nice headache.

The carnage was the stolen nice $100+ carhart raincoat, a stiff lower lip, a torn shirt, and the worst my beloved pentax-sure hope that extended warranty works out. It must have taken a bunch somehow in the shuffles:


Got up and took care of the broken bits the next day. The camera was a big blow as well as the jacket- I hope that sorry bastard has hell the rest of his days.
The early start of my birthday came with some excitement. Who would have ever thought swimming and fighting in ole' Labrador. Wild times here

Lost the update somehow on the thrid but it was short because the camera issues. It still works but you can't tell what you got, kinda like shooting 35mm all over again, but I can't do my beloved panos any more

Got me a used former lease camera at the shopping mall and new 4g memory stick so maybe it will work out.

Anyone know how to get a date stamp on the picture with a Sony DSC-W55 model. No luck so far, the dates helps me keep them organized on smugmug and helps the thought train.

Maybe go to Quebec to have a look around and stay out of trouble, will see

It could always be worse.

Awesome Sounds like you're having a grand old time up there.

Well WTF



The bat looks rabid but




Since its " Safety Third" I understand. I'm guessin Girls first, beer second

I'm still tryin to get a handle on your pub night but


The carnage was the stolen nice $100+ carhart raincoat, a stiff lower lip, a torn shirt, and the worst my beloved pentax-sure hope that extended warranty works out. It must have taken a bunch somehow in the shuffles:

doesn't sound too bad considering.

How did your butt hole feel in the morning, I've heard stories about those miner's coming off shift

Happy belated B'day bud. Sorry to hear you ran into a few assholes in Labrador City.

Did a quick google search but I don't think the camera you have does Panos. Tough break

I think the name of the falls you visited in Goose Bay is called Peter's River Falls.

Found the shot of you walking on the water back at Cape Spear... perhaps you should have used some of those super-powers to protect yourself from the hooligans..... or at least escape to a quieter, more peaceful place.

T-Meister gets down with some Oklahoma-Fu!!
Happy Birthday John!. I have to hear this story in-person next time I see you. Enjoying your report and your narrative....you're sure keeping me laughing.

P.S. the river is down and the trout are bitin' something viscious at the cabin.

Would be nice to do some of that fishing again, that was a good time.

Get together will happen before SA

Those are some of the high points, not many low points on this trip. The Surf House was one of the favorite hangouts.

Glad you got back safe and sound

Haven't found a drinking partner like you that can hang. Glad you had a great trip to man.

Thanks Dave and I think your right, Fred told me the name but I forgot, was a fun rider wacking alders going down there.

The pool pics were funnier than shit! You are frickin hilarious John! still laughing my ass off. Then I read about your Bar brawl. Holy Shit man I am pissing my pants! I bet that would have been so frickin funny to watch! You are so entertaining my friend. Be safe and careful. Oh and stop pissing the miners off!! Lol! Mary told me to tell you Happy late Birthday old Man!!!! She is still pissed your gone. Keep the funny shit coming!!

Yeah I still laugh outloud when I see them too

You tell Mary I feel as good as I ever did now, bar fights and all


Its starting to be a strange feeling being gone and not working, I think I will be okay if I can just keep on riding and living right...as I can

I did some of my updating and decided to make a trip over to Fermont for BD purposes and I was not dissappointed only wishing my Frenchie was much better. Did some size comparisons with the cracked up pentax, the tires are damn big:


Big damn tires are all over the place, lots of these this size and bigger can cost more than $20k a piece:

Two more bikes in town, only other traveler I saw at the hotel next to McD: Edit check those forks out

I came back to LC and back to my litle little shack to get another good nights rest. I woke up the next morning around 08:15 local and was told by Mary Lou to show up at the Safety Office around 9am for a possible sneak in to the IOC mine tour with some contractors that where being breifed on the dos and don'ts. This doesn't usually happen any more and stings have to be pulled, I think the farther you ride to get here the more likely you'll get in uless you know a miner and they can arrange it with some added paperwork from what I hear, I was lucky:

Nice vtwin crusiser rider name Fred? hooked me up with a great tour and load of information from his 30+ years in the mine here.


Big thanks goes out to Johnnie at the Yamaha shop in Wabush for pointing me in the right direction and Mary Lou the receptionist at Safety Company and to Fred the guide. It was really neat to go down and see the whole operation, gave the new cybershot a hell of a workout, lots of moving and bumping (picture quality suffered somewhat) along the mine roads, over 100k of connecting roads in the mine complex, many 250 ton trucks and other larger 300+ coming online. Lots and lots of heavy equipment, and supersize road graders. Neat system of pits, dumps, and remote controlled production trains. Speacial treat for me this morning and meeting and visiting with the nicer folk of LC contractors. Are bus and driver, another Mary or Cindy Lou:



The mine montage, just a few of the better of the hundred or so almost all taken behine moving bus window.

The storage next to the concentrator and pellet plant area:


The previously mentioned:


The boobie truck, got a pink dumper on it, probalby a big boobed driver too, lots of women running the heavy equipment here:

Fred said maybe 25 or more of these big boys running around.

A supersize blade:

Heavy truck traffic:


Big P&H loading a smaller truck:

I lived this as a kid with my tonka toys, this is cool stuff to me.
Big equipment needs big cranes to help put it all together:


They blast 15" diameter holes, drilled and filled with Ammonia Nitrate fuel oil slurry and can do 400 holes blasts a wack, just nuts to think about it, let alone see it lit up.

The drillers getting it.

The big one, Humphey Pit, just amazing not the sign, its just okay:


This is big:


They got many other lesser pits, but when I think mine this is what I think above.
An oldie but a goodie:


My contractor special, I'm making sure this place would be good for ADV riding, this place would be perfect for another Erzberg:


Fresh bucket getting ready for service:

Check those green teeth, mean looking.

Stop Tour

I got done with the tour and was going to have some lunch and met up with the carwash owner by the Safety office and he recommended Charlie's Place for lunch, it was still early so I was going to go to the shack and load my gear and get ready to take off South. I pulled out of the parking lot and onto the main road and the mule took her last gasp of fuel and died, while I coasted her gently to the side of the road to do a quick field diagnosis and figured it was fuel delivery related, good time to have a spare. I got a little run with her in neutral and coasted thankfully down the hill to a gas station unfortunatley right near the air hose. I swear they should charge for air, you could make a million, there where at least 13 people come get some air in the time I spent working on the bike.

I pulled the seat to really start checking the electrics with the fluke. And what did I find but a sheared top shock bolt wedged in at an angle in one half of the top mount, I told you I could break anything, bolts included:

I had my choic thanks to not finding that one to give to Allan from BC at the Latin Rally earlier on.
I noticed during the last big service this past Spring that the bottom bolt looked bent so I got another and saved the one I took out and it just so happens I saved it and had it with me in my bolt kit and even had a growdy matching nut full of gunk that worked perfectly, I even had a longer one in the same size, can you say boy scout. I went ahead and fixed this before moving on to the fuel thing.

I wanted to make sure it wasn't some electric switch and checked everything I could do before pulling the tank and I verified that the wires feeding the pump where hot. I empty some of the fuel load into a locals little gas tank donating to the cause and then popped the tank with just a little left. Dissconnected all the lines that needed it and pulled the pump/filter.guage assembly and disassembled the fuel pump, I even hooked the 12v to the pump directly when I had it pulled down just to satisfy myself right before I took it from its mount and zilch:

Then when I got it totally lose I hit it once more and it turned over, what the hell-maybe its on its way out. I had my new one and was going to change it anyway to be on the safe side. I think be moving it around and jiggling it a bit caused it to run, I'm thinkking.
The assembly with the new:


Came back together pretty nicely added some more fuel and check for links then button her back up:


Studdered a sec then ran like a champ and the ride was 100x better I think.

Had some many numerous people come by and ask "How's it going" and then saying "How bad of a thing that is" They just don't know who they are dealing with, I give them a nice quick reply of it could be worse, I'm still walking and talking and have a spare pump, who hoo! It went as smooth as possible and even got a little help snakeing the lines from some of the more helpful bystanders that wanted in on the help. Good to be able to do something to help a person out, the secret of life heard off the CB by some genius trucker-People Helping People, he's pretty much right on. Do what you can.
A naked mule draws alot of attention here:


I got it fixed up soon enough taking pictures as I went for some documentation and location of the tubes and such. Got back to Charlies to catch the tail end of the buffet that wasn't too bad but not a good idea, my stomach has gotten a little smaller here lately and hate to cram it full with too much food.
A fat person's hell thinking its heaven:


Thought it best to come back to Corbie's Bar and have a little drink and get some of their sweet wifi signal and upload a hundred or better mine tour pictures here.
Did I mentioned how much I like this tire, shred betty, gravel roads best friend:


Want to get going south and catch up with a crew going up the TT road but need to find a tube or tubes for the front and rear as some nice spares to haul around since I lost my cut up metzler after 5500 miles or so.

I'll finnish this upload and then load at shack and go for some hot laps down at the runway at Gagnon and hopefully a tour on Manic Cinq if possible. Have to play catch up with the TT boys.

The missing grapes of wrath, there will be more coming...


Maybe out of wifi for a bit who knows, no schedule is the only way to go and I'm loving it, just need to pick up some major sponsors to go round the world riding and writing and raising a little hell on the way.

Good Stuff! Thanks for posting!

Lucky you couldn't find that bolt in Carbondale

Insomniac With Dave Attell

Comedian Dave Attell heads out with a camera crew after hours in cities across the country to see what people do in the wee hours of the night. From a tattoo convention in Memphis to ice fishing in Montreal, Attell stays up all night meeting bartenders, party-goers and anyone else that will talk to him.

I loved that show
How much fun can on man have

Hey John! They do charge for air at my local station in Dartmouth... $.50 buys you around 3-5 min. on the air-pump... what happened to the good old free air days?? The amazing adventure continues! The underwater pics are a hoot! Great mine tour pics too! Sorry to hear of the losses in the conflab with the miners! Loving the backyard mechanics... minus the backyard of course! Marlene : )