Kicked off 2019 Tuesday by participating in the annual Happy Hangover motorcycle ride with the Roanoke Valley Harley Owners Group and it was a good, exhilarating trip.

The ride began after breakfast at the iHOP in Salem. We headed up Route 322 through New Castle to Paint Bank, then into West Virginia along Potts Creek on Route 17 through Laurel Branch and Waiteville back into the Old Dominion on Stony Creek Road and Giles County U.S. 460 not far from Pembroke, through it on 460, then by Blacksburg to Christiansburg.

Ride leader Rob Lipes next took us through C’Burg to Rte. 8 and on to Floyd and the Circle K/Exxon station, our first stop since Paint Bank.  My arthritic arms and legs welcomed the break.

As the group headed Northeast towards Roanoke on U.S. 221, I turned off on Harvestwood for the short trip home, pulling into the garage just before 4 p.m. — a full New Year’s Day that began when I left shortly after 9 a.m. to the ride down 221 to the iHOP.

The trip odometer read 173 miles through the winding roads over to Paint Bank then the stretches through West Virginia on winding roads — a great way to start the New Year. The thermometer said 56 degrees when I left the garage that morning and read 57 when I returned.

Weather forecasts this morning calls for rain starting in mid-to-late afternoon with a high around 43 degrees, then showers on Thursday and Friday before clouds and sun on Saturday and mostly sunny Sunday with a high around 57.

We should enjoy such weather because the National Weather Service office in Blacksburg says colder weather — and the likelihood of winter storms — are coming, most likely dominating factors in February and March.

Oh well.