I knew it was going to be cold, but 36 degrees (feels like 26, according to my phone) was a definite awakening. The room at Hunter Lodge had stayed warm with the HVAC running all night, which made the dark, cold hallway outside it feel like a different climate entirely.

Outside, it finally felt like fall. The hotel had pumpkins and fall flowers all over, and the trees in the parking lot were a beautiful orange. As I made my way through Tannersville and down toward Palenville, I was caught off guard by the face of the mountains covered in deep red. I’d spent plenty of time wondering whether I’d missed the color. Here it was.

Google Maps wanted to send me all the way up to Albany and then back down to avoid a toll. This was my first toll road of the trip, and I decided the $1.65 to cross the bridge, plus whatever administrative fees came with it, was worth saving myself 60 miles in the wrong direction. I’ve had my frustrations with Google, but I wasn’t going to spend that much pavement avoiding $1.65.

Hudson surprised me. I parked to take a couple of pictures of the town and its old brick buildings, which are so common here and near impossible to find in California. I ran into a couple who told me there was a motorcycle-themed coffee shop in town called MOTO. That opportunity was worth a walk.

The old helmets and a few designer Ducatis were neat, but what brought me farther in was the actual motorcycle shop in the back. They had T-shirts and memorabilia from a number of Japanese motorcycle brands, along with two active service bays. This wasn’t just somewhere to drink coffee surrounded by motorcycles. They worked on them.

The guy who was second in command came over to chat, and honestly, it was great to talk motorcycles with somebody who got motorcycles. He was heading to Cape Breton Island the next morning and understood the cold I was dealing with so early in the season. I laughed and told him I’d been thinking about Cape Breton back in Savannah, then realized Boston was only halfway. He laughed too. Most people don’t realize how far east Nova Scotia really is.

I thought about the Look Out for Bikes sign I’d seen near Phoenicia the day before. I guess I didn’t expect so much motorcycle culture in a place with a hard winter. California doesn’t have a monopoly on people who love motorcycles. Insular of me, I know.

As much as I enjoyed Hudson, I had to make some trade-offs. I wasn’t going to finish the planned route if I kept hanging around, and I was concerned about climbing Mount Equinox late in the day. I needed to be there by four. It was the coldest day of my trip, and I was planning to go up another 3,000 feet.

So it was time to make some miles toward Bennington on New York 66 and County Road 9. As much as I’ve been frustrated with Google Maps, this was a day it actually delivered. Highway 66 lazily wandered through the countryside, and County Road 9 was the real find. I didn’t see any other cars, and the fall color was in full display. There was only one oh-crap moment, when something small and brown waddled out in front of me and I had to swerve hard. I still don’t know what it was. It was bigger than a squirrel, a little like a porcupine without the spikes, and it was the second time I’d seen one on this trip.

Back toward Highway 22, I realized this area reminded me of Canada in one respect: everybody uses the same road. I hadn’t expected so many eighteen-wheelers on these tight, winding mountain roads. There wasn’t much room to pass, either. You could have a great stretch of pavement in front of you and still be going whatever speed the vehicle ahead was going.

Getting into Vermont was a bit surreal after I’d realized too many things were working against me back in Rome, NY. I stopped at the welcome center to see whether they had postcards. They didn’t, but I met two lovely ladies who had all kinds of things to say about why Vermont was wonderful.

Farther north, I stopped to see the Historic Chiselville Covered Bridge and was tickled to actually be there. In Dark, I’d worried I might not get a covered bridge with fall color around it, and here it was. It was busier than I expected. It wasn’t some historical thing sitting off the radar. It was a small street, for sure, but traffic through the bridge was steady.

I’d looked up Mount Equinox a few days earlier and initially discounted it. A private road with a $30 toll seemed like a lot. But I wasn’t sure I’d get another summit view of this area in the fall, and that was something I really wanted to see.

At the shop, I finally found postcards. I also met a couple from Connecticut who told me the best pizza in America was in New Haven, just like my Connecticut-born host in New Jersey had said. Apparently, there was some agreement on this. A young guy, maybe 22 or 23, really wanted to ride on the back of the GS to the top. He had no gear and no helmet, which was unfortunately a deal breaker. We were both a little sad about it, but I wasn’t taking him up that road without a helmet.

The ride up was good. At the top, temperatures dipped into the very low 40s, but I could see for miles: rolling hills of trees in fall color. The summit was beautiful, but it was decidedly East Coast: deeply forested, rolling hills, a stark contrast to the sharp, craggy mountains out West. There aren’t many views like this where you can see for miles from above the tree line, so I pulled out the SLR and spent some time photographing it. It was worth the toll and the cold.

I’m learning that fall isn’t a switch. Coming north, I’d seen trees without leaves and thought it was over. I’d seen trees looking brown in the soft, overcast light and rain and thought I’d missed it. Up here, I was still confused. Looking out across the mountains from the top of Equinox, the color that kept coming back to me was brown. There were leaves on the trees, though, so maybe brown is some kind of transitional color. I asked the docent whether we’d passed peak. Absolutely not, she said. Between you and me, I didn’t believe her.

In the high Sierra, I’m used to watching aspens go from dark green to light green to yellow, with the other aspens acting in relative unison. Here, the colors were more subtle yet more varied at the same time. Every tree seemed to have its own timeline. That might have been part of why I wasn’t getting this right.

Manchester was easy enough to get through, but full of tourists doing the same thing I was doing: soaking in the fall colors. Eventually I made my way onto Vermont 100. It’s a fantastic road, and I can see why it’s the well-regarded Vermont mother road all motorcycles pay homage to. The speed limits, however, seemed absurdly low. I’m sure the DOT was trying to signal something with 50 rather than the more familiar 55, but I didn’t see any police either.

The color looked great in the fading light. The sun caught the tops of the trees and brought out their full shine. Fall color isn’t just the trees. The sun has an important role.

I snuck into Wilmington right before dark. My room was on the third floor, with no cart and no elevator. Further confirmation that the money for the case liners was well spent.

After the coldest day of the trip, dinner had one job: stick to my bones and warm my soul. Back home, I love New England clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl, and I wanted to try the real thing in New England. A bowl of chowder, a beer and a packet of oyster crackers did the job.

Thirty-six degrees that morning, a bowl of chowder that night. Fall might not be a switch, but warm apparently is.