June 5, 2022
Day 1: to Red Springs, NC
- Start: 29,093
- End: 29,428
- Miles: 335
Well, that was good time. I left a little after 08:00—after waking up at 04:30 (!)—and I stopped once[1] east of Columbia, SC to get gas and have a granola bar. I pulled into Walter’s just after 14:30.
The BMW R 1200 GS ran flawlessly. It’s strong and agile, even carrying 100 extra pounds of shit. However, even though I figured out quite a bit of the Garmin Bootcamp, the GPS was still quirky. I actually had to stop and manually put in Walter’s address, as, for some reason, it reset my programmed route and would not let me reset it. Weird.
I wish I had more to report, but the journey was pretty uneventful. I guess that’s a good thing. Traffic was light and generally free of the usual dipshittery. I followed this Subaru Outback with a Jersey tag for a while on the Redneck Parkway.[2] The weather was nice through most of the ride, only hitting 80° after noon. It did climb close to 90°, but I was never really hot. The new riding gear performed admirably.
I got a bit tired on the last fifty miles of this leg, but did well. In all, a good first day. Tomorrow I’ll finally get to some new roads and a long bridge/tunnel.
notes
