Word of Caution: It's Spring

This post deals with an incident that occurred during my first ride of the season this year.  I didn't mention this in my "Maiden Voyage" post because I felt it worthy of its own post.

It's spring.

Children are on spring break this week (i.e. running around in the street, unsupervised)

Birds are coming back north and pretending nothing has happened in the 5 months since we last saw them.

Animals are out running around exploring the newly-uncovered grass, streets, etc.

Cellular phone-talking, coffee-drinking, nail polish-applying, cigarette-smoking automobile drivers are still not expecting to see motorcycles out and about, yet.

(Borrowed from http://dr650.zenseeker.net/Conspicuity.htm)

Not even two minutes into my ride, I found myself behind an elderly man driving a Honda CR-V carrying several passengers.  We were nearing an intersection that leads from the neighbourhood out to the main road.  I was following from a good distance, and there was one car approaching from the opposite direction.  (Hyper)vigilance is a great thing when driving a car, and even better when riding a motorcycle.  People do silly things.  The aforementioned driver decided, for whatever reason, that rather than turn around in a cul-de-sac, he was going to make a U-turn in the middle of the street.  He underestimated the turning radius of his CR-V, and had to execute a 3-point turn, instead.  I was following from a safe distance, had plenty of time to slow down, and didn't actually even need to stop.

We all need to be vigilant when riding.  This is true all season-long, but especially so during the spring, when automobile drivers are even more oblivious than usual to the presence of motorcyclists.

Ride safe.