SE Mass – Bethlehem PA
Thur Oct 10, 2019
(~305 miles)

Char had expressed some disappointment at not being able to ride any of the spring rallies together, due to work conflicts or my IBR preparation. Once the Big Dance was over, we looked at the schedule and agreed to take some time in October to tackle the mid-Atlantic VOID rally as a 2-up team for our second consecutive year.

The rally theme this year appeared to be related to diner-type restaurants, which are usually cool to visit. Last years rally had been fairly straightforward, so we hoped there would be an interesting twist or puzzle to work on, like those we’d heard about in past editions of this event. The VOID uses a “spider-start” format, whereas riders begin their ride from one of three different cities, all ending up at the same finish line in Fredericksburg, VA. We once again elected to start in Pennsylvania (Bethlehem to be precise), since it was closest to us. Other starting locations were in Georgia and Tennessee. Riders compete only against other riders from their start location, since the rally books and bonus point values are different.

The rally pack was sent out in three parts over the two week period preceding the ride. The second installment arrived one week prior and contained the electronic files with bonus location coordinates. This allowed us to import the data and see the scatter pattern in Basecamp (shown). Point values seemed to be directly correlated with distance from your starting location, with all the higher point bonuses in the Midwest or down south. There was also a mileage cap of 1700 miles.

Although it was possible that Part 3 of the rally pack would include a twist, I felt it was worthwhile to come up with some workable route options, just in case there was no puzzle to be revealed. I settled on a tough but doable route taking us through Knoxville, Chattanooga and Atlanta, with a minimal rest bonus.

Then, with 57 hours until start, the other shoe dropped when Rallymaster Scott sent out the final rally book with bonus descriptions and most importantly, the Blue Plate Special list. It took reading through the instructions several times to understand it, and I’ll try to summarize, so bear with me here.

In addition to all the “fixed” bonus locations, the BPS consisted of two categories of restaurants: chain restaurants (e.g. Applebee’s, Chili’s, etc), and fast food (e.g. McDonalds, Taco Bell, etc). We were given two lists of specific restaurants matching those categories. The following rules applied:

1. We could only claim a specific BPS restaurant once in the rally.
2. We could only claim a BPS restaurant if we claimed two “regular” bonuses since the last BPS restaurant.
3. Each “chain” restaurant would be worth 75% of the points from the regular bonus successfully claimed immediately before it.
4. Fast food bonus points would be calculated exponentially, with each additional one being worth approx 1.5 times the amount of the last fast food place. The first was worth 50, the second was 75, the third was 113, and so on.
5. You may start the rally with a fast food bonus.

It took some time to work through and understand all this. It took only a bit longer to realize that maximizing the fast food bonii would be the way to score high in this rally. Since fast food restaurants are everywhere, the focus now became identifying an achievable route with the greatest number of regular bonii, to act as buffers between each fast food. The actual point values for those bonuses almost didn’t matter compared to the fast food points. Now take another look at that scatter map above and see where all the bonus markers are clustered together? Yep, my favorite riding locale to hate (a la the IBR in June)…Long Island. Nooooooooo……

I strung together a route that would allow us to make 14 fast food stops, the last of which would be worth almost 10,000 points.  Try as I might, there was no escaping Long Island and the reality that we needed to maximize the number of bonuses. It was difficult to find a realistic way to squeeze two more bonuses in to be able to get another fast food place . Then I spent time researching and adding the actual fast food restaurants we would visit along the route. For better or worse, we had our route now and simply had to execute it well.

The ST was running fine after our recent Lake George trip and had only required replacement of the front brake pads, just to be on the safe side. We left the house at 08:00 Thursday morning under cool cloudy skies, skirting Providence on I-295 and following I-95 across Connecticut. There was a large storm system just off the coast, but it appeared to be staying there. We rode through a couple sprinkles of rain, but the skies began to clear as we moved west and traffic was flowing smoothly.

We jogged northwest on I-287 over the Cuomo Bridge and then exited on NY 17 along the Ramapo River. We followed some nice scenic backgrounds through two NJ state parks, joking that this would probably be the best scenery of our entire trip, given the rally route we’d chosen to take.

We met our good friend and fellow rallier, Bob, at Shannon’s Eyes On the Pies in West Milford, NJ. Shannons is an NER BONE restaurant that Char and I had intended to visit last year on our ride home from the VOID. We’d gotten behind schedule and missed closing hours, so this stop was settling unfinished business.

Boy, was it worth the stop! We entered the small shop and were greeted by a huge glass case full of pies of every type and size. The lady behind the counter was welcoming and patient with us as we looked over the chalkboard menus and selections.

 

 

I elected a small steak pie with a medium Dutch apple pie to share for dessert. Char ordered some form of veggie quiche. There is no inside seating at this location, though the manager confirmed there is some at the Warwick NY store. Luckily for us, it had turned into a beautiful sunny day with temperatures comfortable enough to dine outside at the high wrought-iron cafe tables in front of the store. The storekeeper heated everything up and brought it out to us, while we enjoyed the sunshine out front, catching up and discussing the rally theme and planning (without giving too much away of course).

The pies were delicious, though I think the savory pie could have stood a bit more time in the oven to thaw out. The crust is fantastic on both and I was in my happy place, feeling great about being on the road again with good food and companionship.

 

After this wonderful lunch stop, we headed south on CR-513 for the next hour or so, enjoying the more rural sights of NJ until hopping on I-78 and US 22 for the final run to the Holiday Inn in Bethlehem. Many of the PA starters had booked a room here, though we appeared to be the first bikes to arrive. A group dinner was planned at the PJ Whelihans pub next door for 18:00.

We took advantage of the intervening downtime in the room to clean up and finalize our route. Char got this photo of me working intently to finish up so that I could enjoy a beer that evening.

We met our friends in the lobby and walked over to the pub. We had a couple tables in a corner of the restaurant assigned to us and it was great to see some familiar faces from outside the northeast as well.

I had a rather blah Caesar salad and some OK sweet potato fries while catching up with folks and discussing tomorrow’s ride. After dinner, we all retired back to our rooms fairly early to get some rest. I continued to put a few final tweaks on our route and transcribed to a route sheet for the tank bag, while we watched the Patriots defeat the Giants on the hotel TV. Woohoo, positive energy going into our slumber!