The Portland Postcard mural I sought appeared to be covered up and possibly under reconstruction. I had another whaling wall in my back pocket a few blocks over, but as we passed the far side of the building with the Postcard mural, saw this beauty of urban art and had to collect it:

We chased this guy for a while heading out of the city, but he wouldn’t stop to let us on:

Headed north on Rte 88, paralleling the Interstate to get to Garmin’s store (formerly DeLorme) to see the big rotating globe.

Char’s nose is much better than mine, and she smelled a burnt oil odor, as we were about to re-mount the bike. I looked down and saw some drops that were unmistakablely fresh motor oil on the pavement. I laid down next to the bike to take stock. The center stand had a coating of oil all over it, as did the oil filter, which was again where the seepage seemed to be sourced.

As we crossed the Kennebec, caught a glimpse of of what I think is the USS Zumwalt, one of the Navy’s newer class stealth destroyers, built right there in Bath. Pretty weird looking.

Completed our side trek thru Alna, down to Salt Bay on the Damariscotta River.

Hit US-1 again and sought out a lunch stop, which we found at a little joint in Waldoboro called Deb’s Diner. Service was slow and indifferent and the ambiance definitely road-side, but the clam roll was good and not too pricey. Spent a little bit longer there than I would have liked, as we had many miles yet to roll. Probably not a place I’d return to.

After lunch, it was time for another new BONE road (for me), Maine Rte 220. 55 miles of nice inland back road headed due north, with the occasional small town intersection. Not much traffic and easy to pass when there was, it was a nice alternative route to make some miles rather than the slab or busy coastal route. This route ends in Detroit,  ME, several miles west of Bangor and I pulled in to the empty lot of the fire station with the though of possibly using it for a tag photo, as well as a stretch break.

As we prepared to mount up, I noticed several drops of oil on the pavement under the bike and this time checking the oil level it was not visible at all in the indicator window. Time to try to tighten the filter to stop the seepage. Found some level(ish) ground and broke out my travel tool kit. Didn’t have a 17mm wrench, but attempted to tighten the filter with an adjustable. K&N apparently shaves off some cost for their filter manufacturing by cutting quality on the bolt-head on the end of the filter, because the wrench started to strip it almost immediately. Vice-grips had similar results.

As I was lying there under the bike, a pick-up pulled in with a couple young fellows who let themselves in to the fire station. After the vice-grips failed, I approached and introduced myself, explained our predicament, and asked if they could loan me a 17mm box wrench. They were friendly and accommodating and quickly loaned me the wrench, which didn’t work and only continued to strip the bolt-head, and then a small oil filter wrench, which wouldn’t fit up under the bike well enough to get around the filter. I thanked them for their help and got some directions to the nearest motorcycle shop and parts stores. At that point, I was thinking a filter strap wrench would do the trick, as it always worked for me at home.

I accidentally got on I-95 before we hit the AutoZone, so Char used her phone to locate us one in Bangor, as that was our next bonus destination. I also pulled up my list of Custom POIs on the GPS, where I had previously uploaded a list of all Honda dealerships. Turned out there was one right next to an Advanced Auto store just west of Bangor, so we headed there. The Honda dealership had closed at 3pm, an hour ago. By the time we pulled up to the Advanced Auto next door, they had just locked their doors as well, closing at 4pm. Not our day! We plotted and planned a bit and found an AutoZone in north Bangor that closed at 8pm. That was our next stop, but I couldn’t resist getting a shot of this giant pencil across the street to use as a tag photo:

Back on 95 for three exits, found the AutoZone and to surprise, they actually carried the Mobil-1 MC-specific oil that I use, in a separate section from the car oil. Bought a 17mm wrench, just to have one on-hand and a couple quarts of oil. I noticed they also carried the K&N filter I use, but I wasn’t considering a full oil change on the road at that point. I did NOT see any strap-style filter wrenches.

The new 17mm was indeed useless on the filter as the bolt-head continued to strip rather than be grabbed by the wrench. I poured a quart and a half of fresh oil into the bike out in the lot, until we could see the level above the minimum mark. I wasn’t pleased with this whole turn of events, but I am determined to get to Quoddy Head on this trip and be damned if I won’t keep IV’ing oil into the bike if needed in order to get there and back!

Oil added, we headed back south into downtown Bangor for a bonus shot of Paul Bunyan:

I made a decision at this point to eliminate the planned routing over BONE roads 182 & 180. We were running much later than planned due to the bank  mishap, slow lunch service, and oil worries and frankly I was mentally tired of it all! Let’s just get to the coast for the last part of the ride and we may just make it to Quoddy Head before nightfall. So we stuck on Rte 1A and US-1 to get us eastward back to the coast, with views across Frenchman’s Bay to the hills of Mt Desert Isle:

Stopped in Columbia Falls for a bonus photo of Wild Blueberry Land (which was closed this late), quite a sight to behold:

We were both feeling exhausted and stressed from the day’s events and Char’s rib was hurting her despite her Advilled-up forbearance. Another look at the oil level there on the side of US-1 didn’t improve the mood, as the oil was once again below the min mark. I added the remainder of the quart I still had, but it still didn’t hit the mark. At this point we had some thirty-odd miles to go to Quoddy Head and our hotel was only a few miles from there, so we pressed on, skipping the BONE loop down to Jonesport on Rte 187 for now and hoping the motor wouldn’t burn up on us before day’s end (!).

We left US-1 in East Machias (pronounced Ma CHEE us, I later learned) on BONE route 191 and enjoyed a very nice curvy coastal ride as twilight set in.

I think Char became obsessed with getting a good picture of this one particular cool-looking cloud formation, as she took like 20 shots of it. Here are a few of the better ones:

Darkness fell within the last several miles of the Quoddy Head, but my LEDRider LX5 aux lights on high-beam lit up the road (and surrounding towns most like) just fine and we reached the lighthouse with just enough light (including from the bike) to get a few shots in.

Despite the long day, I was thrilled to finally be standing here at West Quoddy Head Light after hearing about it many years ago. Not all that far from home really in the scheme of LD riding, but mentally it had been a huge undone adventure for us, and I was very glad Char had decided to make the trip to share the moment together. Of course, at the time, it was all business… “Quick let me get the photo. OK great, let’s go find the hotel before the bike fails on us and we’re stuck on this peninsula in the middle of nowhere!”

We checked in to the Eastland Motel a few miles inland, a cozy place on US-1 on the southern outskirts of Lubec. The furnishing and rugs were direct from the 60’s-70’s, but the room was spacious, clean, and comfortable and you could tell things were being maintained  pretty regularly. Having made a dash to get here by nightfall, we’d skipped dinner and that loaf of bread from When Pigs Fly was now much appreciated after a little warm up in the microwave. The desk clerk provided some advice on where to buy motor oil in the morning and we identified the nearest Advance Auto Parts on the Internet as being 20 miles south in Machias. We’d see what they had available when we got there in the morning, and decide how far to take the roadside repair work.