Mir's Motorcycle Adventures: September 7, 2012

This started as a normal work day. I worked my shift and was on the way home. I decided to take the highway and stop off at the Shell before heading over Humpback road. I was making good time. I looked at the clock on my bike and thought, "2:07...great, I'll be over Humpback by 2:10 and be home before 2:30.

Then I was waylaid by a pothole in the middle of Humpback road.

the darned pothole..the demise of my bike and my confidence

And there she laid

I wasn't going fast. I actually was doing about 25 km/hr when this happened. It just happened as there was oncoming traffic. I moved over to pass, didn't see the pothole and continued on down the hill.

My first thought as I was looking up the hill at the people looking at me was "shit". I hit my kill switch and looked at the guys looking at me and asked them if they could pull the bike off of me while reassuring them I was okay. As they were lifing the bike I felt my ankle and told them to stop lifting and pulled myself out from under the bike. I thanked them and reassured them that I was okay so they went on their merry way.

At this point I was hobbling around on this sore ankle and thanking my lucky stars that my gear did it's job. Then I thought about how I was going to get to the kids. The reason I was looking at my clock in the first place was that I wanted to be home in time to pick up the kids from school. I phoned Pete and he was on the way to get the kids. Then I phoned my mechanic and said, "HELP! Come get me guys, I just hit a pothole on Humpback and I'm in the ditch"

Looking at my bike I realized that it was actually 10 feet down the ditch and the only thing that stopped me and the bike from going down another 15 feet was a tree that had fallen down. I didn't ride faster than my angel that day.

By this time I had made all of my phone calls and a nice man stopped to check on how I was doing. He offered me a bottle of water and could see that I was shaken from what had happened. He was going to Sooke and offered me a ride to pick up the kids from school as he was going there to pick up his granddaughter anyway.

So, my mechanic was on the way and all I was going to do was stand there anyway so I took him up on his offer.

I tried to get a hold of hubby but he was already gone so I figured I'd just meet him at home. We got the kids, the nice man dropped me off at home, and Pete came home mad that I "left the scene of an accident". Hell, I didn't know that it would be a big thing...My first oops and all....

So we went back to try and meet up with our mechanic and he was already gone with the bike but there were tons of cops and ambulances there. The news camera was also there but I declined to make a statement.

From there we went to the shop to survey the damage. The left fairings were now a mess and my new windshield was broken and I lost a mirror but otherwise the bike was not bad. when it landed it was not only on it's side but it was almost upside down so a lot of oil got in the gearbox.