Temperature zones

Everyone has seen the weather on the news with maps showing dew points, rain, snow fall, and heat waves, all shown in vibrant colors. 

or 

People look at these images everyday and base their day on what the forecast is, for most people the map, for the most part, is correct. These people walk outside, get in their car and drive to work, the map was right, it was cold when they got in their car, it was cold when they got out, or It was hot and humid when they got in the car, they turned on the AC, they got out of their car and it was hotter and stickier. The realities of the area never effect them. 

For the biker it is different, being on a motorcycle puts you more in touch with nature. For the biker the map is less accurate,  more a generalization. On a motorcycle you find the warm zones on Fall mornings, in Summer the cool shaded valleys offer relief. For the biker the map needs to be more precise, more pin point.

You walk out side into the cool air, you get on your motorcycle and start riding, the air is brisk as you pass through it, you pick up route 184 in Mystic and you head west, as you climb the small rise over the Flanders road area the temperature does a drastic change, in an instant you are warm, the windshield and mirrors on the bike collect condensation, you smile, as you drop down into the Poquonnock/ Ledyard valley and the temperature drops with you, it is back to chilly cool and will remain that way until you climb the hill leading to the Thames River valley, again the temperature rises, the condensation reforms, this time it stays longer, across the Thames and into New London, it stays warm. The Thames acts as a barrier holding the cold on the eastern side. This is true year round, on a late Fall or early winter evening you feel the cold attack as you drop into the Valley after the Thames river. 

These are things the car driver will never know exist, they will not feel the bite of the cold as you pass into a valley, they will also never know the pleasant joy of dropping into a tree shaded valley in the Summer when all the area around it is stifling hot and humid.

I will take the bike over the car on any day I can, on that bike you are at one with the world around you, everything is visible, everything around you is in the move. On a bike the air around you is alive as it's currents are affected by terrain, on a bike there are smells the car driver is unaware of, wood smoke, hay fields, wild olives along the highway, fresh cut grass, pine clusters, summer picnic grilles, a pond or swamp in the summer, or that of a brook running through the woods, and the smell of the Fall leaves. Sure they are isolated from the smells of skunks, and farms, but even those smells are welcome on a bike, they come and go fast, and are really not so bad. You can smell the difference of the country as you move between sea and forest, forests and mountains.
The combination of all these things, the temperature, the sights, sounds and smells make the biker more alive than a person in a car can be. 
So which do you prefer, being in the world, 
or riding along in that glass and steel bubble.