Weather and Motorbiking

Sarah and I are sitting here watching The Voice under wind advisories and a flash flood watch. 60mph gusts and quarter-sized hail have been reported in this line of storms rolling in from the west. It was a tight squeeze, but we fit both the civic and the motorcycle into our little garage for the night. I don't want to see what hail like that could do.

There are lots of reasons people will tell you not to ride a motorcycle in the rain.  Consider lightning, getting wet, cold, impaired visibility, etc. In general, it's wise to heed such warnings.

Photo from LeatherUp.com

However, I had ordered a new full-face helmet as a late Christmas present. For the daily highway riding I've been doing, the full face is really more practical, safer, and far more comfortable in the wind. Sunday was warm with passing showers possible and I wanted to try out the new helmet. The good news is it performed great at highway speeds without the windshield and protected my face from the stinging rain. The bad news is that I had a little tumble. I was on a rough secondary road turning left into traffic on a two lane highway. It was raining, but not hard and while trying to accelerate from a stop and turn I fishtailed and dumped the bike. No injury to me save my pride, but the bike had some cosmetic and not-so-cosmetic damage. Nothing so bad that I couldn't ride it home, but Bonnie is no longer the pristine machine she once was.

No Pictures of the damage. I've ordered parts and want to try my hand at fixing her first. When I finish, I'll give you some sort of before/after comparison.

Odometer: 1366