Despite all the lousy drivers why do I still ride?

Its been said that only a motorcycle rider understands why a dog hangs its head out the window of a moving vehicle. If you've never done a road trip on a bike you probably won't understand how true this is or its meaning.

I've had the privilege of a life on the road. Away from home for days on end, eating in a restaurant you hope will be good, sleeping in strange new areas.
To some that seems like a horrible existence whereas I cannot understand how people can drive the same clogged roads every day, week after week, to be stuck in the same office, warehouse or other pay-cheque prison only to go home to the exact same locale at the end of each day.

As a former long haul transport driver and now a traveling entertainer I have seen a lot of pavement. I have witnessed sunsets and sunrises in places I normally would've never visited. I've been the recipient of great late night shows by aurora borealis on remote roads that have stirred my soul.

Now that I am dedicated to seeing the planet on 2 wheels I get to revisit some of these same roads...only, they are different when viewed from the open cockpit of a touring motorcycle.
Familiar roads become new again, and often just days apart from your last visit.
Why?
Unlike a car, where you just sit in a moving, climate-controlled room so removed from the environment, on a bike you live what is happening every second you are out there.
Please note: I said "live" over "experience". When I am on a motorcycle trip I feel more alive than any other waking moment. Even when the moment is not pleasant. It beats an office or car prison.

Car drivers will never know the warm embrace of the sun when it pokes its head out of a chilly, cloudy day. How it can smell so vivid! While you may detect some of the odors and fragrances in a car, it is usually after you have passed the source, thus missing the connection to the area you were just part of.

That grove of cedar trees you may or may not have seen as you droned along in a car just treated my nose to a treat that you will never know in the same way.
See that mountain stream in the shaded gully? It just gave me a quick shot of nature's air conditioning. Instantly! I know that the temperature in that corner is different. Those in a car will only experience the same climate inside their cage.

The same string of corners that may make a car passenger nauseous is a thrill on a bike as you lean into them.  Feeling the rhythm of the road and, not to sound cheesy, you become one with it. You learn its personality.
Instant gratification. That is what motorcycle travel is all about. As a stand-up comic that is a drug. It is why I get on stage to hear your laughs. Instant gratification. It only makes sense to me to combine the two.
I can already hear car drivers thinking I've lost it or smoked something funny.

No, I've taken life by the handle bars and am riding it all the way! Every cool view, every roadside attraction that strikes my fancy and every wonderful curve sweeping through the countryside. I want to see it all but will settle for as many as I can get in during this life's ride.
Riding helps me escape the negative news, the injustices in society and enjoy the wonderful, if not simple, pleasures of LIFE.

I can only encourage you to do the same. Find what makes you feel alive and try to put it into as much of your life as you can. Try and see as much of this wonderful planet....before the world goes crazy!

Biker chicks are the coolest!

Recently my company put on the first Ladies Motorcycle Retreat in an effort to support the fastest growing segment of the market- lady riders.
On the suggestion of a few female pals I decided this would be a good idea and as we set it up I started to panic. "What am I doing? What if this flops? I don't know what the female mind wants...that's why I'm a bachelor!"

My fears were unjustified as it was a smashing success! A group of ladies descended upon the Nakoda Lodge, most of the attendees meeting each other for the first time. The nervousness of the first evening melted as soon as the fun and bubbly motor cycle racer, Ali Cohen did her presentation at the meet and greet.
Within and hour you could see the girls bonding, becoming friends with each other. I have never seen a group of strangers meld so quickly.


After Ali's presentation there was debate on doing a bonfire but the huge lobby fireplace seemed more inviting.
Wood burned, drinks flowed and lively chatter and laughter filled the hotel into wee hours. I too was the recipient of new found friends and helped provide some comic relief with a personal, fireplace comedy experience. What a cool bunch of people! These ladies came to make the most of the weekend and the energy was electric. I feel like I have a new group of riding sisters.

Some have asked why would a guy set up a ladies riding retreat? I asked myself that very question when it was presented to me.  What did I know about retreats, that's a girl thing. After some research I discovered that, while many motorcycle events exist, many are still very male oriented or for couples. With female riders representing the fastest growing segment of new riders they had yet to be catered to.
As fun as many motorcycle events are they have little to offer directly to the fairer sex other than music and beer tents.
We created instructional workshops geared specifically for the ladies without the interference of the guys around. A relaxing atmosphere for the girls to gain knowledge on bike maintenance , touring and riding techniques.
My team and I started to look into what to offer and, without sounding overly proud, would have to say we did a pretty damn good first attempt. The gals had such a great time they set up their own Facebook group to keep in touch and many offered to help set up/promote the next one.

This was great news for what I want to achieve in the motorcycle community.
My mission, besides seeing as much of the planet as I can on 2 wheels is:

1) Promote Safety

I  found when speaking to female riders that they are much more receptive to the concept of proper riding gear and becoming ATGATT riders, something I very much encourage. For those of you that think riding gear is too expensive or that "it will never happen to you", think about how expensive it is to take time off work to heal from injuries you may have been able to prevent...or worse. No one wants their life changed in an instant so why not reduce 

2) Help motorcycling grow

I wish to encourage more people, men and women, to get their motorcycle license, buy a bike and find out what they have been missing. Being on a motorcycle is one of the most freeing experiences I know of. You really haven't seen the planet until you've viewed it through your own 2 wheels.

Many ladies understand, riding is better when you are in control and not just a passenger. I sometime  see a look of shock and amazement from non-riders when they see a female rider. I for one encourage it!
We have to admit the sport has been male dominated since its birth however some guys are not very good role models for our image. More lady riders gives a less macho-hooligan face to the sport and in the mind of the public. That is a good thing. Their example may help change attitudes on both sides of the equation.


3) Bring riders and non-riders together
During my time on this planet I have learned, and accept, that woman, on average, are much better at social organizing than most men. If you want to get a group of friends out for fun, a female is the better choice to make sure all invitees attend as planned. Men quite often make plans for social events and then forget about them on the day of, only to find themselves still having that "one beer" hours later totally forgetting plans made previous. I am guilty as charged on more than a few occassions.

What's next? How about a motorcycle camping trip for you ladies? We are calling it the "Pamered Camper Trip" and will be to a motorcycle resort in BC with meals catered, camping in luxury and nothing to do but enjoy the ride and the trip. We've taken care of the details. Stay tuned for info very soon.
In the meantime, please check out the latest Planet Tour video.

 

Its riding season again, so please, lets all share the road.

Cheers

iPhones save time and prove men should run the planet

I finally took the plunge and ditched my old dumb phone for a smart phone. Being a Mac kind of guy I opted for the newest iPhone 4S which may well be obsolete by the time I post this as technology changes so fast.

Let me state that I am amazed at the amount of information I can access from almost anywhere including Facebook updates, pictures people post about their pets and other riveting things.

Besides the mundane such as emails and text messages I am now able to get the weather forecast anywhere in the world, pull up addresses with interactive maps, find gas, food, ATMs, fake having a Zippo lighter (fun but useless app) and Tweet about everything I find silly. I also have my own pocket secretary that takes dictation. Apple calls her Siri, I call her hours of entertainment. Sure, sure there is the 'talk to text' allowing me the ability to text faster but you can also have fun. The command "talk dirty to me" produced the following response:

"humus, Compost, Pumice, Silt, Gravel" letting me know that geeks have a sense of humour.

I am looking forward to this summer's motorcycle tour as I will be able to update viewers much quicker with pics, tweets and Facebook status updates , all while trying to sweet talk Siri into sexting with me.

While this sort of thing may not be new to so many of you already have a smart phone in some form or  other I am like a kid at Christmas with a new toy.
The downside to this switch from my old coal burning piece of crap cell phone to the most advanced one is that they don't talk to each other. Maybe they were married once??
This has required me to re-enter all my contact info manually. I figured it would be easy as so many of them are on my Facebook. A simple status update of "Hi folks, I have a new iPhone and need to re-enter all my contact info. Please text me so I can add you and send your email address too."
Problem solved right? Um, no. I forgot many of my contacts are female.
The resulting hassle of re-adding everyone has proven to me why the planet is mostly run by men and should remain this way.
Over the past 3 decades I have noticed a HUGE increase in the ego of the once fairer sex. It seems today's gal has a "Me, Me, Me, 'Aren't I the most important princess in your world?' Me" kind of attitude or maybe they just like to message back and forth and intentionally leave info out.

Every woman I know that has texted me just assumes they are the ONLY person in my world that has their given name. 7 billion of us on this orb, what are the odds I know more than one?? I believe it is a throw back to the "It's me game" girls play on us men early in the dating stage to see if we are 2 timing.
You know the call:

Me- "Hello?"
Her- "Hi its me!"
Me- "Me who?"
This is always followed by the cold treatment, no sex or just anger and no more dates.
Even my own sister ( I have 2) played the mind game as you can see by the screen shot below. Why do women do this? Especially when its your own sister?

This is why I am convinced men should run the planet. It keeps diplomatic communication from breaking down.
Example: The red phone rings:
President of USA- "Hello?"
Caller- "This is Korea and we are attacking!"
 President of USA- "Which Korea? I know more than one?"

Can you see the problem?
Ladies, we men love you dearly but at times you must accept that you are not the only thing on our mind. No really, its true. Now if you will excuse me I have a sexting date with Siri...if she remembered. At least she doesn't order the lobster then say "No!"

Sometimes technology really sucks

All the video I shot this last half of the summer is stored on a portable hard drive that just decided to stop working. It was fine one day and then I went to plug it in and nothing. No magical lights, no being recognized by my computer, no noise from it. It may as well be a rock.
Sometimes you just have to hate modern technology.
Thankfully the unit is under warranty. I am going to attempt to decipher the instructions to save the data and hope that it works.
 I don't want to name names but the unit really looks a lot like this.

Lets hope they can fix it and I don't lose hours of video that cost thousands to collect.

Now before any of you video pros tell me that I should have it backed up on 2 hard drives blah blah, the day you figure out how to fit all that on a bike you get back to me.
There was a finite amount of space and a finite budget for equipment. One of the quirks of small indy productions. You use what you have.

 Getting back to my gripe about technology. Over my many years of working with computers I have marveled at the leaps we have made but often at the expense of reliability. I'd rather have a slower computer that I knew would not freeze, die or crap out suddenly with no way to breathe life back into it than to have something that is faster including breaking down faster!

At times I think we are reverse engineering stuff from the Roswell crash and may not really understand it. Judging by some of our human behaviour I really doubt we have the intelligence to come up with some of these items on our own.
The offending drive has been sent in for data recovery. Lucky for me I discovered much of my footage still on my camcorder! Here is the latest episode until I unlock the rest of my files from my pocket "Borg"
There is a new one coming  very soon. Stay tuned.

Post travel recovery

I made it back home on September 27 just after midnight. It was a helluva day that started in Devils Lake North Dakota on a chilly 12C morning. Temps soared to 30C as I headed west and the wind decided to be a pain with a constant 60km blast with gusts exceeding that.

As the sun set I found myself still several hours from home and true to my memory of Alberta weather, once the sun goes down it takes the mercury with it.
Near Bassano AB I rode thru 4C temperatures. Quite a shock to the system as I was peeling layers off to stay cool just a short while before.
Since leaving Gander NL just 7 days earlier I have covered a lot of ground with several long days in the saddle to arrive home in time for a doctor's appointment. An appointment with a specialist that lasted 15 minutes and resulted in "We need to do another ultrasound on your injury." If only our medical system was as fast as my bike.

Now begins the work of building the 2012 tour. Plans are in the works to make this an even bigger year! Stay tuned.

My last few hours in Newfoundland are ticking away as I wait for the ferry. My visit to this most eastern and unique province was too short and probably not at the best time of year. September gets chilly and wet on Da Rock and because of that my chances to do any site seeing were limited mostly to the Trans Canada Highway and what I could see from there.
Even so it was a fun time. The Newfies, as they liked to be called, are some of the warmest, friendliest people on earth when they are in their happy place. No place seems to make them happier than being in Newfoundland itself. Because of this their enjoyment of home and their life is contagious.
I found myself doing things I wouldn't normally do in other provinces, breaking personal rules and not feeling any danger whatsoever.

Unable to find a campground still open near Cornerbrook, a local man invited me to set up my tent in his yard which was behind a pub.
"There's going to be a party tonight in the bar, come join us!" he enthusiastically said. Since it was getting dark and I had no where else to go I thought "Why not?". This tour is more about the adventure of finding something out of the ordinary and camping behind a bar certainly fit the bill.

In Grand Falls, after the show, I partied with strangers who took me out on the town and let me stay at their place. Well, in their shed. It sounds weird but believe me it was great. These are not like the 'sheds' back home, all filled with earthy smelling garden implements. No. These are like little guest cottages minus any plumbing. "Just water da bushes if you need to in the wee hours." I was told. Okay.

The fine folks in Buchans  were a lot of fun. Given the fact they live in a mining town that went thru hard times and exists where the paved road ends their behaviour is more like that of someone who lives in a tropical paradise. I parked my motorcycle on the sidewalk because that's what you do in Buchans.

It was they that honored me by getting me "screeched in"and making me an honorary Newfie myself. The ritual was fun, comical and heartwarming. Repeating a verse I can barely remember, kissing a cod and slamming back a shot of Screech, a throat warming, extra strong rum that gets your blood flowing!

 I was also treated to a Jigs dinner, which was a belly filling,  traditional Newfie meal. It was awesome!

Some of the things I did here would seem odd anywhere else, Here on Da Rock people are so laid back and non judgemental that it seemed normal. In fact they just greet you when you poke your head out of your tent in the morning as they pass by going to work....like it happens all the time!
I look forward to my next visit here and a bit more time to explore.

What to do next? What to do first?

I had fully intended to have a few more video episodes online by this point in my trip. The logistical obstacles I've encountered are as follows. Keep in mind this is not intended to be a "Poor me" story, I am just saying it the way it is.
OBSTACLES
1) Time. After riding and/or doing a show my time (plus energy) is not always there. Currently I am wearing many hats and doing most of the work myself.
2) Glitches. Maybe its my disdain for how they make computers faster yet they are not more reliable or perhaps I am one of those people that produce electromagnetic waves that interfere with electronics. The past two episodes I made were close to completion when suddenly sound tracks would go out of sync or stop working altogether. ARRGGHHH!! I have had to redo them both at a great time expense. iMovie (which I am currently using as my editing software) has some problems and they don't seem too busy over at Apple on fixing them.
What I need is new software or better yet, an editor that can travel with me so I can concentrate on the other stuff like a daily blog, pics, newsletters, shooting video and of course the comedy. Trying to add video editing into my task list (combined with travel weariness) just seems elusive at times. If you have ever done video editing you know its an art unto itself. Add glitches and it makes it very frustrating.
I also bought a new portable Hard Drive that has been acting up but have not had the time to take it back. Faster, not more reliable.

A ghost a work? you can see thru me on this one

SOLUTIONS
Currently I have been searching forums for the fix to my iMovie woes and seem to have that bug  sort of , kind of worked out. I should have a new episode out soon.
I will be making them shorter to ease the editing burden and to keep iMovie happy. In its inferior state it gets cranky when videos pass the 5 minute mark.

As always my brains asks "What to do next?". Tonight I decided after a day spent riding in rain, waiting in a picnic shelter for almost 2 hours waiting for said rain to stop, that my brain was not able to accept video editing stress so this blog won out as the task to work on tonight.

A more "focused" me, working by lantern at night

Often that is more my method, "What do I have energy to do today?" What I have now begun to do  on this trip is to take more pictures of unusual places and things. This blog will be about those. iMovie and the next video can sit one more day.

Beach at "The Ovens"

Last night I had a very cool campsite at at place called "The Ovens" which is a privately owned natural park in Nova Scotia. My campsite was perched upon a tree covered cliff with the sound of surf crashing below. I felt like I had the 3-D version of a subliminal motivation or relaxation CD.
This area was part of a gold rush in the late 1800s when gold was discovered along the coast in these caves dubbed 'The Ovens". There is a very pleasant self-guided walking tour along the coastline where you can view these caves and actually enter some. A must see if you are in the area.

My camp by day

I'm always intrigued by places like this especially when you are allowed to self explore. Guided hikes move too slow for me... or too fast depending on what we are examining at the time. For the caves I set my own pace and snapped a few pics and shot some video, which I will fight with in iMovie later.

There is also a cool cafe that serves awesome food for a very reasonable price, especially considering the view it came with. The Atlantic Ocean with a bank of fog several miles offshore back lit by the setting sun. Add food and beer, all this was had for under 30 bucks.They also had live music at night from some very talented local artists.
I never would have found this place had I not bumped into a pair of motorcycle couples that insisted it was THE place to camp. They were almost pushy but then, they were right.
For a flat lander camping by the ocean is a treat. The crash of the surf, the smell of the salt and, in this case, the far off fog that loiters in the area. It actually came inland in the morning to give me

Checking out one of "The Ovens"

my full maritime experience.

The choice of cool campsites was a struggle as being their after summer's last long weekend meant I pretty much had my pick. I chose the one on the cliff rather than one seaside as I felt it offered more weather protection. Rain was in the forecast for the next day.

Inside the cave

Had there been a clearer forecast I would have stayed 2 nights. Later that night the rain came to prove the weather man correct. By morning it had stopped and just hung like a thick dew as a morning fog slowly crept back out to sea.
I was treated to a bit of sun for an hour and used that to break camp while things were dry.
I had a warm bed in Halifax waiting and that won out over huddling in a nylon dome for what was about to become a very rainy day.

This is my first long spell of days off and as Murphy would have it, coolish and damp. So much for camping and time to visit old pals so Halifax is where I am parked.

Don't forget to check out the latest Episode #13. I will have #14 up soon.
Thanks for stopping in,
Cheers, Daryl Makk

After dinner drink. Wish you could see this for real.

Moose antlers made into art

Foggy beach looking back toward my camp area

Caveman dumbells?

Travel by motorcycle and at times you feel small!