The MisterEd 8000; Grande Tour of America

SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE FOR THE LINKS TO INDIVIDUAL DAYS AND TRIP DETAILS

In early 2003, I got a burr in my saddle to take another big trip.  How big, I had no idea.  In initial planning that spring, I had settled on a basic route of something around 8000 miles.  I had done a Jeep trip in 2001 of about 7800 miles.  This one turned out to be, by far, the longest road trip I've ever taken and certainly the longest I've done on a motorcycle.

The trip took place from August 16th through September 6th 2003 and covered 8,366 miles east-west, 9,040 total.

Here's the routes:

EASTBOUND: 16 AUG through 24 AUG

WESTBOUND: 1 SEP through 6 SEP

------------ IT ENDS!! ----------------

In the same driveway 21 days and 9,040 miles later - 1745 PDT, Saturday September 6, 2003.


------ Somewhere along the way -------

These two shots are both from Labor Day.  On the left, at a rest stop in Pennsylvania.  On the right, the parking lot
of a Holiday Inn Express in Clearfield, PA.  Meanwhile, I have clothes hanging to drip dry on anything that will hold
them in the room - I discovered that the under-window HVAC units that are in those rooms make OK clothes dryers.
(Oh, WHY do I have clothes drying??  Not the ones I was wearing - the Aerostitch gear kept me nice and dry.  The
wet clothes were in my tour pack - which, in the driving rain at 75 MPH, leaked like a sieve - as did my saddlebags.)


Can you identify these??

Just SOME of the road-kill glued to my bike at the end of the trip.  I think there's at least a few different species here.

The RAW trip stats (details are on each day's trip page)

• TOTAL miles 8/16 through 9/6 - 9,040
• Total ROADTRIP miles - 8,366 (does not include local travel around New England)
  
• Eastbound; Portland,OR to Union, ME - 4,822 miles (avg 535 mi/day)
  
• Westbound; Hingham, MA to Portland, OR - 3,544 miles  (avg 584 mi/day)
  
• Gasoline consumed (roadtrip only) - 176.8 gallons
• Total gasoline cost - $321.89
• Average price per gallon - $1.82
• Average MPG for the roadtrip - 47.32
• Highest gas price - $2.11 (93 octane) in Portland, OR 9/6/03
• Lowest gas price - $1.68 (91 octane) in Columbus, OH 9/2/03
• 24 States visited (other than OR, in which I live...):
  Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee
  North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut
  Massachussetts, New Hampshire, Maine, Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, Iowa
  Nebrakska, Wyoming, Idaho

A few links