The Andre 360 Breakfast Run - Part One
This entry will be about the events of the first leg of our journey. It was a great day and had more diverse conditions and adventures than is typical in a trip like this. Our ending mileage was about 470 miles.
When Andre approached me on the idea of riding up to St. Petersburg for breakfast one day my thoughts were of a nice long ride in the Florida sun along back roads to the west coast. The idea was so appealing that I thought this would be the perfect major ride to bring in the new year for our riding group at 360Bikers. It has all the elements that we like on our motorcycles… nice roads, turns, great bridges across waterways, food, fellow riders, great experiences and none necessarily in that order.
Our adventure was much more interesting than I ever anticipated. It started about 6:00 AM on Sunday morning where I was pleasantly surprised at my arrival at the mall. Typically, I’m waiting for riders as I arrive about 30 minutes before departure. When I got there Allen was there with his two friends and Ian was there, too. (See members at our meetup site) Within minutes, Andre arrived and it looked like we were all there. After introductions and talks about riding experiences to get familiar with the group, and an overview of anticipated weather including some dense fog in some counties, I outlined our trip quickly and by 6:30 we were on the road. Since I was the organizer I took the lead on our ride as we left the Wellington Mall.
The group consisted of three Harley-Davidson in the Electra-Glide class, two Hondas (a Gold Wing and VTX1800), and a Kawasaki Vulcan. We fell into formation and I felt good about riding with these bikers in a very short time. Their experience showed immediately as they not only fell into riding formation, but also seemed to be aware of everything the other riders considered as we drove down Forest Hill Blvd. There was a little fog in our area, but it looked like it was going to be a great day.
We turned onto SR80 and headed west into increasing dense fog. I found myself looking for vehicles in front of us to which I could attach my eyes. At times taillights were the best thing I could see. The further west we went, the thicker the fog seemed to be. Visibility was dropping to under 2,000 feet quickly. Our group tightened up to maintain visibility to traffic and to stay as a group. Occasionally we dipped out of the thick soup and found areas where we could almost feel the sun trying to come up, but they were short lived. As we rode cautiously towards Belle Glade we came upon a light show shining in the distance. We all immediately knew that the fog had claimed an accident and saw the fight between a cane truck and a small white vehicle had the east bound traffic stopped. Fortunately, I didn’t see any cars going east at that point. But the vision of the accident made me a bit more cautious.
My biggest concern was the tendency for small animals such as muck rabbits to come out onto the road. While the sounds of our bikes may make them pause before entering the highway, it could also startle them in front of us causing an accident with no time to react. The fog was getting worse and at times visibility was less than 1,000 feet.
Moving through Belle Glade and South Bay was effortless in the early hours as the dense fog lingered in the streets. The few vehicles we saw out were driving cautiously even at lower in-town speeds. We moved north onto US27 which would take us the length of this first leg. The highway was quite eerie with the feeling the the fog could swallow you at any turn. It was hard to believe we were riding at speeds of 65 MPH at times as we stayed in the left lane for the distance. I followed the lights of trucks at times until they went faster than I could see. Perhaps they had better visibility above the ground as our line of sight often drifted below 150 feet. I often felt I was slowing down just to see if I was still on the road. The group stayed close and followed my lights. Allen stayed close, which helped my visibility, gave me more confidence, and provided more lights for the rest of the group to follow. The ride had become dangerous not because of a great storm, but from the fog robbing us of visibility to ride. The recent 55-car pile-up on I-4 was fresh on everyone’s mind. It, too, had been influenced by the dense fog of central Florida. The damage there was so severe that even the highway was damaged to the point of being closd for 3 days while it was rebuilt where cars had burned away its surface. We did not want to be statistics.
Undaunted, we continued into Clewiston with the few other cars and trucks on the road. Then, a police truck came from behind us and went speeding by. Moments later, another police vehicle followed by an ambulance. We knew the fog had found another victim. Using the bright flashing lights of the ambulance for guidance we stayed a close, but safe distance as we rode several miles north of Clewiston. Eventually, the ambulance slowed as the other emergency vehicles came into view and eventually we saw the small white car lying in the ditch. Apparently the driver had lost track of the road in the fog and went off the shoulder without knowing.
A few times the sun pushed on the fog making it bright and giving us hope that it would lift. Then, just as quickly, it would disappear and it was all I could do to follow the yellow line at my left. The fog thickened and at times I swear I couldn’t see more than 30 feet in front of me. It was the second most dangerous ride I’ve been on and just a few steps short of riding blindfolded. I concentrated on the yellow line so much that my eyes tried to trick me into seeing oncoming curves on a road that had few turns in it at all. It’s Florida and you can drive for miles without seeing a true curve, yet my eyes were trying to create them from the soup we rode through. The moisture in the air was so great the those of us without lower fairings had our legs soaked.
As we road north we found the visibility improving somewhat to where we could see cars more than 1,000 feet ahead. Yes, at highway speeds visibility was a challenge. Our first stop was going to be around Lake Placid and as we approached this milestone the fog seemed to ease back. It didn’t go away, but the view was safer on the highway. We found a gas station for our fuel stop and grabbed a drink or snack while we talked about this first part of the journey. I hoped this was the worst of it. After about 20 minutes, we were off on our second leg. I’ll write more about that tomorrow.