Scoot Maine

Today was finally the day of “Lobster Roll” scooter ride. I’ve been looking forward to it for a long 6 weeks since I first found out about it.

This ride found me both apprehensive and excited. It would be my first large, group scooter ride (ridden with mopeds but never more than one or two scooters!) and it would be the first significant test of my used Helix.

Wanting to have plenty of time I left the house this morning around 8:20 am for the 10:30 meet time in Portland. I decided to go for broke and take Rte 1 to 295, sticking to high speed roads for the whole trip. It worked out fine. The Helix was a trooper and carried my substantial carcass at highway speeds without so much as a whimper. In fact the slowest we were ever forced to go by gravity was 60 mph. Not bad at all.

I arrived at Deering Oaks Park in Portland about 10:10 am. There were a few scoots already waiting. That garnered a huge sigh of relief. I was not lost! So far so good. Now I ask that you bear with and forgive me because I am horrible with names and thus will include them only as I get confirmation of who owns what. That said we started with 14 scooters. There were two Suzuki Burgman 400’s one owned by Diana, a Scarabeo 500, a Scarabeo 200 owned by Mary, a highly modified and insane little 68 cc two-stroke Malaguti F10 owned by Will (this thing could match my Helix 250 in performance… not kidding), a Genuine Buddy, a Genuine Stella, a vintage P200 Vespa in incredible condition owned by Deb, a SYM Symba owned by Steven, and the rest were all big dog modern Vespas including the ride founder Malcolm’s. A diverse and fantastic collection of scoots.

Deering Oaks Park

The scooters!

The sick little tuned Malaguti!

The Genuine Buddy International “

The Genuine Stella 2-stroke.

Eventually we were all present and accounted for and prepared to head out. The rider of the Genuine Stella gave a brief group ride safety speech, set lead rider (Malcolm), sweep rider, and volunteered to ride block at intersections. We fired up and moved out!

We headed around the park and took back cove road to 88. We followed 88 into Freeport and then stuck to Rte. 1 for the rest of the ride. 88 is a sweet road for scoots.

Don’t ride and take pics! I am a moron.

The main drag in Brunswick

In Brunswick the SYM Symba and Aprillia Scarabeo 200 (Steven and Mary) went their own way as they had other obligations. Great people. They were missed! Now we were 12.

Stuck in Traffic WAY outside of Wiscassett.

Pit stop for fuel and refreshments still WAY outside Wiscassett.

As we topped of either with fuel, hydration, or both Diana’s Burgman decided not to start. Turns out it had a wiring problem with one of it’s accessories. It shorted out, drained the battery and nearly caused a fire!!! The scooter gurus in the group descended upon it like a pack of wolves, dissected the offending accessory, jumped the battery from another Burgman and got her running again. Our only close call the whole ride. Once we were refreshed we headed back into the DREADED stop and go traffic that is Rte. 1 before the Wiscassett bridge. Alone any of us would have just gone down the breakdown lane and snuck ahead of everyone else. As a group we elected to suffer. Suffer we did. 40 minutes in this stop and go hell, 85 degrees, skin burning, and temp. gauges climbing. Never was I so happy to reach a bridge.

40 miles from Wiscassett later on clear roads we arrived at Malcolm’s mother’s house. We elected to go there as parking nearer the Lobster Festival can be difficult.

A great time was had by all. Some (myself included) headed our separate ways at this point. The rest headed down to the Festival to see the sights and hopefully eat some Lobster!

The Lobster Festival

All in all a great day. Plans are in the works to repeat next year. I hope so, it was fun. One final note the ride leader/organizer Malcolm got us all patches for participating.

Unexpected, but gratefully received! Thanks to all who participated and as always, ride safe!

Aaron