COGnitions Random thoughts and ramblings from your Area Director

We’ve just about wrapped up the 2012 COG activity schedule. All that is left on this year’s calendar are the Newburgh and Greater Toronto Area meet and greets. I think most of you will agree we had another great year. There were rallies, rides, camping, tech sessions, socials, and meet and greets. We hope there was a little something for everyone. Please let your staff know if there is something we could add to our activities or do different. Ideas and execution of club activities come from you, the members, and we do want your feedback. We also need YOU to step up to the plate. Your Northeast staff continues to do an incredible job putting on activities, but many hands lightens the load. With member support your great volunteer staff will not burn out so quickly and we will continue to have many great event on the schedule.

We closed out the year in style. The Fall Rally in Matamora, PA was a wonderful success. There were many choices for heading out for a nice ride. The choice of hotel worked out great. It provided places for attendees to congregate and socialize in the afternoon and after dark, and the banquet dinner was very good. Many thanks to Dave Fridirici and Jerry Gowen for all they did to organize the rally and ride routes.

Registration and room reservations are now open for Spring Fling. See the info on the last page. Jason has put together a no-frills July 4th get-away weekend in Stauton, VA and Pat Sprague is working on Dog Days in August. Terry & Scott are scoping out a possibly Lake George fall rally in September.

Member directory time is fast approaching. Get online and update your profiles and make sure they have the "Member willing to" questions answered to your liking. The membership report will be run at the end of the month and will be locked in.

The Northeast Staff has a few additions. Recently home from deployment and a very new member to COG, Rob Romano #10584, was recently appointed by me as Northeast Area Assistant Area Director (NE AAD) for Central NY. Rob is located near Cortland and looking to engage this region with more activity. If you live in this region be sure to come out to the events hosted or touch base and offer some help. Tim Anderson will be taking on the newsletter editor role full time with the next issue. You can read more about that in our editor’s column. I really want to

thank our outgoing newsletter editor, Neil Baldwin, for the incredible work he has done with the newsletter over the last 4 years. We have a quality publication and the changes Neil has brought to it during his tenure were a breath of fresh air.

I hope everyone enjoys their holidays and has a very happy new year.

Ride safe,

Ride & Event

SCHEDULE

on page 7

2012 - Issue #5 - Winter

photo courtesy Bob Barbanti #7134

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

2 2012 - Issue #5 - winter

Ayer MA Joe Spring #10432

Langhorne PA Charles Proto #10447 Fort Ashby WV John Foutz #10448

Monroe NY James Brandt #10455 Doylestown PA Rod Ammon #10466

Stanfordville NY Jim Reilly #10468 Meriden CT Martin Melanson #10473

York PA John Frederick #10474 York PA Charles Landis #10486

Windsor VT Michael Buckman #10496 Highland Lakes NJ Charles Hall #10499

Doylestown PA Mark Wallace #10500 Perkasie PA Emery Perkins #10523

Brooklyn NY Nef Rivera #10526

Stewartstown NH Robert Petrofsky #10533 Hamilton NJ Michael Lites #10541

Tenafly NJ Ted Van Poznak #10546 Toronto ON Bryan Pietersma #10559

Silver Spring MD David Proctor #10560 Falls Church VA Roger Horne #10561

Oshawa ON Peter Griffin #10565 Vassalboro ME Dan Grosz #10569

Brooklyn NY Ari Weissfelner #10574 Freeville NY Robert Romano #10584

Media PA Dale Snead #10585

Editor’s Corner Requests, random observations, and the

occasional rant.

Neil Baldwin #5762 As I do the final formatting on this issue, all the essen-tial stuff is in place and so, since it is my last issue as editor, I am hogging some space with a larger-than-normal column. I will use the opportunity, first and foremost, to say thanks to the North East’s AADs!... Area Reports are the core of this communication vehicle and I am very grateful to those who have put up with my prods and requests (and editing!), and sent in reports for the newsletter over the past 4 years, as I am sure COG members have been grateful to read news from their areas. I also want to thank Tim Anderson for stepping up and volunteering his time and energy to take on the editor post. We didn’t have to beg, it didn’t come down to the last minute, I put out a request back in the summer and Tim responded. This meant continuity and allowed us to make a transition, rather than a change. To that end, Tim and I worked together to co-edit this issue. In the next issue—the season opener—Tim is captain of the ship and will in-troduce himself to you. Please welcome him (contact info at left) and offer any ideas you have for the newsletter. Speaking of welcomes, a special one goes out to Brian Pietersma, who bought my Connie and joined COG.

Take care of her, Bryan, and start rack-ing up some of these miles (well, kilo-meters actually… sorry, we’re both Canucks) that I should have. We all join COG for different reasons. The many rides, rallies and events are certainly the centerpiece. Having cop-ied-and-pasted the newsletter Ride Sked together over the past 4 years I am in awe of how many events take place all over the NorthEast! For me, I never got out to many of them (though did make it to the first-rate Johnstown Rally in 2004) but one of the COG bene-fits that made a big difference to me, as a rider of moderate experience and lit-tle technical knowledge, was having all these people to help out and offer ad-vice (even for the notorious “tire” ques-tion!). I’m only half joking when I say that my 10 years of COG membership surely paid for itself (in potential plas-tic and footpeg repairs) even just in the advice I got early on about putting my C10 on the centre stand... and not be-coming a member of the CDA :-) Being more of a solo-rider, and not so much into the social end, I took on the editor role as an alternate way to con-tribute something to COG, which only exists due to volunteers. It has been a wonderful way to connect with great people, useful information and positive energies around riding. I encourage you to consider how you might get involved. I also encourage you to be grateful to a very long-time volunteer, our AD Steve Smith, who has given up significant personal time, effort and energy over the years to bring it all to-gether here in the NorthEast.

NORTHEAST AREA NEWS is published 5-6 times a year for Northeast Area members of the Concours Owners Group. Submissions are welcomed and members are encouraged to share their COG experiences. Email: necogeditor@gmail.com Snailmail: Tim Anderson, 1040 Ocean Ave. New London, CT 06320 Many of the opinions stated in this publication may make no sense to those sound of mind and may just be conveniently ignored. If you use any of the information in this rag to incur damage to yourself, your motor or any innocent or not so innocent bystanders it is you own fault...you were warned! © 2012 Concours Owners Group

New Members First things first, a warm welcome to our newest NE area COG members!

To Be Done: Register for Spring Fling(May 16-19).

(details on back page)

To Be Done: Register for Spring Fling May 16-19

(details on back page)

Remember to check www.cog-online.org

every few weeks for newly posted events to

plan ahead and to stay motivated during the

winter!

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

2012 - Issue #5 - winter 3

Around the NORTHEAST News from your Assistant Area Directors (complete list of AADs on back page). Metro NY/NJ Terry Faherty #792 Greetings all! Hope your Thanksgiving holiday went well, I know mine did! Just so ya know that brining the turkey thing really works. This is the final winding down of the season for most of us in the area, although there are a few die hards out there who refuse to put their trusty steeds to sleep for a long winter's nap. I usually try to get out every 2 or 3 weeks just to keep the carbs from gumming up (yeah I still got em!) weather permit-ting. May all of you have a happy and healthy Christmas, Hannukah, Kwaanza, New Years, etc. Anyone planning to attend the Javitz Show this year keep in mind we will be gathering for an early dinner/cocktail at the Connie between 2 and 2:30pm on Saturday, getting a count and walking/grabbing cabs to Times Square. I'm giv-ing Blue Smoke a rest and heading back to the Heartland Brewery, 127 W 43 St. It’s got a decent burger/sandwich menu and their own microbrewed beer! Mmmmm beeer!!! If the turnout is light we might mosey down the road a bit to the BXL Cafe, 125 W 43 St. It’s a nice Belgian restaurant/bar but a bit small if we get a big group. Mmmmm Belgian beeeeer!!! Hope to see you there, have a great holiday! Let me just add a quick thank you to all the members who expressed their con-cerns for me and my family following Superstorm Sandy. We are lucky enough to be far from the flood zone and just had the wind to deal with. Many other parts of Staten Island were devastated. Keep those folks in your thoughts and prayers over this holiday season.

NY-Hudson Valley NW Bob Barbanti #7134 Winter is pretty much here, so now the winter depression can set in from lack of riding (otherwise known as PMS - Parked Motorcycle Syndrome). As I write this, we have already had two snow storms and a hurricane this fall. Although unlike last fall, the hurricane and snow were very minor. Last year’s devastation from both Irene and then the Halloween blizzard were extremely bad for our area. So I can understand how the folks who received the brunt of Sandy's wrath this year are dealing with it. My thoughts go out to the folks along the NY/NJ coast. I have been kind of a slacker for the last few months. Between personal events, the summer & fall rallies, as well as the hurricane, I haven't had as many Meet & Greets this year as in the past. But I'm back on track now and by the time you have read this, we would have had a December M&G. I have also posted Meet & Greets for January 12th, Febru-ary 9th, and March 9th. Yes, I under-stand that this is probably winter by now. But we have them anyway. They are about folks getting together. So basi-cally that's what we do, we get together. Motorcycles are not mandatory for par-ticipation, so most folks come in the cages during the winter. Although a few folks do get a ride in to and from. The Meet & Greets take place at the Neptune Diner in Newburgh, NY. I nor-mally have them on the second Satur-day of the month. So to keep on sched-ule, all of these scheduled events are on the second Saturday. You can find out more by checking out the the NE events calendar on www.cog-online.org. I also figure that the newsletter itself should have a listing. Your third option of course is to contact me. And as always, I recommend folks checking that morn-ing before you leave for the events to make sure something has not changed. There's always the possibility of something changing at the last sec-ond. I don't think that it hasn't hap-pened yet. But there's always a chance. Anyway, as always, we are trying to put

together some events for next year. I have a couple of ideas bouncing around in my head. (Yeah, there's a lot of spare room in there for that.) But I'm always looking for input and ideas on what folks might like to do as far as rides and events. So if you have ideas and sugges-tions, contact me and we can discuss it. Maybe we can add another cool event. In closing I just want to reflect on this last year. Although I didn't have as many events as normal, we did manage to do a few. Actually better than I thought. We had eight Meet & Greets. We also had the Motorcyclepedia event and the Independence ride. I also per-sonally did a few other cool things like The Habelloy Spring Tech session in Monson MA, The CT camping ride, The Spring fling in RI, and the Dog Days summer rally in WV. I also did manage to stop up and say hey a couple of times at the fall rally in Matamoras, PA. Al-though I didn't actually attend the rally itself. So I am truly thankful for a decent and safe year. And it's been a real pleas-ure spending time with and meeting COG members and visitors as well. I hope to see a lot of y'all next year, God willing. Thanks for another great year. MA/ME/NH/VT Greg & Tracey Habel # 7010/7010A It is hard to believe we are winding down our first year as Co-AADs. I guess that old saying “Time flies when you’re having fun” really is true. Boy, what a year! With the help of many volunteers we were able to keep the calendar full of fun events. There were 8 meet & greets, 2 camping weekends, 2 un-rallies, a tech session and a few full day rides for eve-ryone to enjoy. We could not have done it without all the help from some of our members who stepped up and assisted us with planning or hosting events and assisted with planning a ride route. To prevent a lengthy list of all of those who contributed to this year’s

(report continues + event pics, on page 4)

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

4 2012 - Issue #5 - winter

success Greg & I would just like to say, THANKS! You know who you are. J You are the people that make our area, and this club, so successful. At our End of Season social , which was hosted by Pat & Sherry Mulloy, we an-nounced the winner of our Ride Con-test. Wayne Geiser ran away with the bragging rights and a Whitehorse Press gift certificate by visiting 17 of the 20 locations on the list, which was com-prised of 20 interesting sites that were widely scattered around our 4-state area. We also had a slideshow put to-gether by Sherry of our 2012 Year in Review. Thanks Sherry! There was a little brainstorming for the upcoming year and we got some great feedback from those in attendance. We will start to work on next year’s events shortly and appreciated all of the ideas. If you have any favorite roads/ride routes in your area please forward them to us so we can include them in our rides for next year. Well, I think that’s it for now. Wow! What a year! Thanks to everyone for all of your support. This has been a fun year for us and we look forward to having another fun time with you all next year. Looking ahead..... Join us for our winter social on Sat. Feb 9th at 12 pm for lunch at the Horse-shoe Pub (29 South Street in Hudson, MA). Please sign up on www.cog-online.org as soon as possible so we can get a head count for reservations. As always we want to hear from you, what you liked, didn't like, and any ideas. If you have an idea for a ride or are interested in hosting an event, please contact us and we will be glad to help you put it all together! Check out the calendar regularly for additional events and rides scheduled for the season as we will be adding in all of our events for 2013 over the next month or two. Please be sure to register on-line at on the N.E. events calendar, if you plan to attend an event. This will help us to make reservations for lunch and plan accordingly to keep the ride group size at a safe number. Until next time!

Pittsburgh/Western PA Joe Cyprych, #4665 Hello fellow COGgers! Well another great season of riding and get togeth-ers has passed (well for most of us) and I would like to pass along a big thanks to all of those who made the effort to get out and attend some of our events this past year. We met a few new mem-bers and friends this year and it’s al-ways great to meet up with new folks and catch up with the old ones. Our latest ride, held in September at Canaan Valley had a great turnout with over 30 folks attending. Canaan is probably one of the best areas that you can ask for with riding and scenery rolled up into one package. Those that attended no-

ticed that their new buildings are mov-ing along rapidly and the folks at Ca-naan assured me they will continue to work with us to make it affordable for us frugal COGgers, LOL. You can look forward to another Canaan event on the schedule next year and a few other events that we are working on. On an-other note, if you have a ride idea or suggestion for next season let myself or Steve know and we will help you make it happen. With the holidays approach-ing myself and Michele would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and we are looking forward to meeting up with all the gang next year. The Northeast area truly rocks! Thanks, Joe & Michele

(MA/ME/NH/VT Report, continued from page 3)

MA/ME/NH/VT Event Pice 1: End-of-Year Social 2: Bubbs BBQ

VA/WV Report Pat Sprague #1887 Wow! Another one bites the dust. Time flies when we’re having fun. Or not…so it’s always best to enjoy life and keep riding whenever we can. This past year I came back on board as your VA/WV AAD, a position I held for some five years back in the last cen-tury. It’s been great to meet new riders in COG and see many long-time friends. January started out with some of us drooling over the new Connie 14 and Superfluous Tenere at the DC bike show. Of course, great food and brewskis followed afterwards. We had a ‘non-winter’ here in Virginia, but the February ride was cancelled due to temps in the teens and winds above 25 mph. Live to ride another day. And a Mid Atlantic area drought nonetheless brought heavy rains to cancel both the Crabcakes Ride and the April ride at Marshall, VA. Russ Fleming’s Sport Touring Camara-derie ride was well attended in early May. Our little water crossing proved that ‘waterproof’ boots are that only for the first 10 inches of water, above that it gets right in! A few riders from the NE Area did at-tend a really nice COG National Rally at Eureka Springs, AR. I had never ridden in that area and this was a real treat. Clyde Watson, Wayne Tenney and I rode a hodgepodge of bikes on the 2,400 or so mile trip: an R800GS, a Connie 14, and a “you did not ride that here” DRZ400 SM. The ‘No Bad Roads Rally’ was very well organized…kudos to Bob Smith and his capable crew! The roads were excellent and lightly traveled. Ken Ford led a small group of dust lovers on a superb dual sport ride. Ken stated that he just loved his Triumph Tiger 800XC and by the easy way he rode that bike quickly, I’d say that was true. The rally venue was excellent as were the many attractions in the area. Fun! July saw us meeting in Gordonsville for brekkie and then riding back roads to have lunch at super hosts Bob and Patty Dombrowe’s new home. A fun ride,

tasty lunch, and some local history thrown in by none other than our COG Historian. Thank you to the Dom-browes and all who attended. For August we gathered at Marlinton, WV for the Dog Days Down ‘n Dirty weekend. One Cogger ended up in a rental cage after his Wee Strom munched a nasty submerged rock; you can’t keep those Navy guys out of the water! No other calamities to report; a super event, with several of the PA, NY, and New England folks attending. Nice door prizes were given out courtesy of COG and Aerostich. I missed out on the COG in Canaan and Memories of Dan events and in late Au-gust departed VA for a two-week, 4,200 mile trip over Newfoundland and Lab-rador. With four wonderful Canadian friends I rode ‘The Rock’, then three of us crossed over to ‘The Big Land’, rode over the Trans-Labrador Highway and down to Baie Commeau, PQ. In north-ern Quebec I learned something new: the roads signs twelve feet above the ‘road’ are for snowmobiles, not bikes. So is the ‘road’. Brian Jordan, Jordie Hall, and I forged onward for fifteen miles of barely passable rock garden. Maybe you have been to the ‘point of no return’, i.e. no going back now? Oppor-tunities for that abound up there, but it sure is beautiful country. Two thousand thirteen is shaping up nicely! Rides and events are still being added to the COG NE Area calendar. Check our website, sign up, and come on out! Come February we’ll meet in Gordonsville, VA for our usually cold-est ride of the year and Crabcakes will be in the offing for March. It’s a ride-eat-and-ride in Marshall, VA in April. In June we have the Trans Allegheny Lunatic Asylum and Blizzard run over in Buckhannon, WV. Jason Kaplitz is organizing the Independence Day event in Staunton (say Stant un), VA for early July. And over to Slatyfork, WV for Dog Days near the end of August. Sharry and I will host a No Frills Camp and Ride at OWO in October. No year would be complete for us without the Brrrrrrrr Ride, and the 17th Brrrrrr is planned for November.

At the end of 2012 I’d like to offer my Thanks to Neil Baldwin who has served so well as our newsletter editor, and has kept a friendly fire under our tushes to ensure that you get this. Thank you, Neil! And to Steve Smith, our NE Area Director, whose leadership makes the North East Area Rule! COG would not be here without these great volunteers. So, ask Santa for mo’sickle goodies, stock up on oil, filters, tars, chains and tubes if you use ‘em. Dig out the shop manual and get yer motor running. It’s going to be a great year to be alive and riding your bike with COG friends. ON (GTA) Dave Clancy #5452 We were able to take ad-vantage of a mild late October day to repeat by request the Fergus to Collingwood to Primrose ride which we did early last summer. The roads in the Collingwood and Creemore area are excellent and judging by the large number of other motorcycles we saw, it seemed like eve-ryone in the GTA who owned a bike was out enjoying one of the last riding days of the season. The folks who at-tended provided great company – thanks guys. This year the Motorcycle Super Show at the International Centre near Pearson airport is the first weekend after New Year – Jan. 4,5,6. Our area will have a booth there to let folks know about COG and encourage them to join and to visit the cog-online web site. We ould appreciate more help to crew the booth, so if you can help out please contact me dnclancy747@gmail.com soon. Thank you to all the folks who have already volun-teered their assistance. It looks like this year will help us out by provided a bike for the booth. You get to attend what they bill as the largest motorcycle show in North America and have some fun talking to other mo’cycle nuts. Remember the snow will melt and more great riding waits in the spring. Have a happy holiday season and a great 2013.

(MORE Area Reports, continued on page 6)

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

2012 - Issue #5 - winter 5

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

6 2012 - Issue #5 - winter

MD Report John Hamilton #9279 The fall was a blur for me. I rode a lot of what I rode in pretty bad pain, and it started to not be fun anymore. And 2013 is not looking to be much better, I might be able to make a couple NE events, like in May to Bedford, but if the VA decides to cut on me some more in March or April I'll end up missing that. And it will go like that for most of 2013. When we rode to Mr. B's Barbeque for lunch at least 20 members showed up at one time or another, coming and going from around 10am until a little after lunch. As always, I greatly enjoyed the BBQ sandwiches, and go several times a year just to get one. I'd like to schedule another Crabby Pig in Cumberland RTE but need someone to actually take lead on it, because there is no way I can com-mit to anything in 2013 with any cer-tainty. Give me a call at 240-291-8603 if you would like to make it happen. I will certainly attend if my health permits. Central NY Rob Romano # Hello to all Central New York COGgers! I'm Rob Romano and I'm the new Central NY Area Assistant Director. I've been riding for about 30 years on a variety of brands and types. Standards, sportbikes, classics and an oddity here and there. The present stable has a ZX-11, a CB750K, a NightHawk S, a 1965 Honda Dream, a 2010 C14 (in the blessed blue of course!) and for the oddity - a 2007 Ural. With this kind of a mix, its clear I like to ride. If you live and ride in the Central NY area, you know how many great roads and destinations we have available to us. Its my hope that by organizing our area, we can introduce these riding op-portunities to the greater North East Region and establish ourselves as a group for rides and tech support. Feel free to contact me with any ideas for rides and the names of dealerships who may be supportive of the COG.

COG Experienced Rider Courses in Connecticut By Norm Walton #7011 It's been several years since we've organized an experi-enced rider course for COG members in Connecticut. There are 2 MSF courses offered by Connecticut Rider Education Program: the Experienced Rider Course (ERC) and Advanced Rider Course (ARC-ST). Both are reasonably priced. Success-ful completion of an ERC gets the student a completion card that can be used to obtain an insurance discount. You will need to check with your insurance company if the ARC-ST qualifies as this course has no evaluation or completion card. We hope to have at least one COG member as an instructor for these courses. The community college will not offer dedicated course(s) to the club unless as a club we collectively submit enough paid registrations to fill the class in ad-vance. We tried it this way in the past and it was a royal PITA to coordinate. It was suggested we pick specific courses/dates, and then inform our members to register for those specific courses using the standard registration process.

2013 motorcycle course registration will open after Christmas. Registration for either of these courses is through Naugatuck Valley Community College. Keep watch for these schedules to be posted on their web site and then register by downloading the forms and following the instructions on the web. Be sure to register early as these courses will be open to the public and the early dates tend to fill quickly.

Naugatuck Valley Community College Motorcycle Program www.nv.edu/Motorcycle 203-575-8123

Experienced Rider Course (ERC) May 11, 2013, 12PM-6:30PM. On-cycle: Naugatuck Valley Community College, Waterbury, CT This one-day course will help you improve braking, turning and evasive maneu-vers and teach advanced “street strategies” for riding. There is no classroom session and approx. 6.5 hours of on-cycle instruction. Fee: $85.00 for rider; $20 for passenger.

Advanced Rider Course (ARC-ST) June 15, 8AM – 6:30PM Class session: Naugatuck Valley Community College, Waterbury, CT On-cycle session: UCONN, Torrington, CT This one-day course is to provide rider development in the areas of risk man-agement, decision making, riding strategies, and rider behavior choices. Exer-cises focus on more advance braking, turning, swerving, utilizing a performance oriented body position. There is a classroom session in the morning and on-cycle in the afternoon for a total of approx. 8.5 hours of instruction. Bikes will be inspected. Fee: $50.00 for rider.

For both courses, participants must present a valid motorcycle license (driver only), current motorcycle registration and insurance card. You must also use your own street legal motorcycle (no straight pipes) for the course. Bikes will be inspected. Arrive at least 30 minutes prior to class start time to check paperwork.

Concours Owners Group NORTHEAST AREA NEWS

2012 - Issue #5 - winter 7

RIDE&EVENT SCHEDULE Time listed is START time. Visit www.cog-online.org for updates.

(ON) TUE 8 Jan 7PM South Central Ontario Meet-Up 2nd TUE each month Mohawk Inn, Campbellville, Guelph Ln, just N of 401. All welcome, friends, wives, girl/boy friend. Many hungry people arrive earlier to their dinner - road house food, salad, wings, burgers, fish & chips etc. A mainly social function to meet other riders, shoot the breeze, plan rides. DAVE CLANCY 905.389.7681 dnclancy747@gmail.com

(NY) Sat 12 January 11 AM Newburgh Meet & Greet Come join us for lunch at our monthly meet and greet in Newburgh, NY. It’s a chance to meet some of the COG family and friends and have a great time. There is the possibility of a short ride afterwards. All are welcome to attend our get together. BOB BARBANTI, 845.895.1130H, 845.206.7406M, ny.neaad@yahoo.com

(NY) Sat 19 January 2 PM International Motorcycle Show Gathering Interested parties will gather for our usual late lunch/dinner on Saturday January 19. Meet at the Connie in the Kawasaki area between 2:00-2:30 PM. We'll grab some cabs and head to Heartland Brewery for a change of pace. Keep your eyes on the forum or this calendar page for additional details. Ticket discount promo code was published in the fall 2012 Concourier. TERRY FAHERTY 718.227.2099H, tmcefah@aol.com.

(NY) Sat 9 February 11 AM Newburgh Meet & Greet (see Jan 12 info) Sat 9 February 12 PM MA/ME/NH/VT Winter Social Please join us for our winter social at 12 pm for lunch at the Horseshoe Pub (29 South Street in Hudson, MA). We'll talk about plans for 2013 and update you on other COG news. www.horseheadpub.com. GREG HABEL, 508.444.2235H, COG7010@verizon.net. (ON) TUE 12 Feb 7PM South Central Ont. Meet-Up (see Jan 8 info) (VA) Sun 17 February 9 AM Breakfast and Ride We will meet at the Inwood Restaurant on Route 15, just North of the roundabout in Gordonsville, VA, at 9 AM Sunday morning. A

ride will follow, weather permitting. Hope for blue skies and clean roads; this is normally the coldest ride of the year. Got electrics?PATRICK SPRAGUE, 540.743.4874, 540.743.5132, pesprague@comcast.net . (NY) Sat 9 March 11 AM Newburgh Meet & Greet (see Jan 12 info) (ON) TUE 12 Mar 7PM South Central Ont. Meet-Up (see Jan 8 info) (MD) Sat-Sun 23-24 March 9 AM Crab Cakes Ride Meet for breakfast at Holly's Restaurant, located east of the Bay Bridge on the service road north side of Rt. 50 at exit 43B, heading east (exit 43A if you’re heading west). For map see www.hollysrest.com. Depart Holly’s around 10 AM and ride eastern shore of MD and DE, ending at Elk Neck State Park in northeast MD to camp for the night. Campsites allow 2 tents per site. Hookup with a COG friend and make reservations by calling 1-888-432-2267 or www.reservations.dnr.state.md.us and ask for camp site #230 to #240 area which is close to the bath house. Dinner 6:30 at WOODY’S CRAB HOUSE 29 South Main Street in North East MD. If you cannot make the ride and want to join us for the evening please let me know to put your name on list for dinner. Sunday morning breakfast will be at PIER 1 RESTAURANT at 8.30 AM, located at 1 North Main Street, North East MD. RUSSEL FLEMING, 410.374.9687H fleming@qis.net (MD) Sun 14 April 8:30 AM C14 Riders and Friends Ride Meet for breakfast at Golden Corral in Frederick, MD on Rte 355 south of Rte 70 at 5621 Spectrum Drive, Frederick, MD 21703-8301. Route sheets will be handed out for a 150 mile self-guided ride ending at Shippensburg, PA which will take you on some of the FINEST riding roads in the area. Come out and show your support for Sport Touring at its finest. You will ride in MD and PA. If you would like a copy of the ride in GPS format ahead of time RUSSEL FLEMING, 410.374.9687H fleming@qis.net. (PA) May 16-19 COG NE Spring Fling Rally (see back page) (WV) June 13-16 Trans Allegheny Lunatic Asylum & Blizzard Run Held in Buckhannon, WV. Here’s your chance to tour a famous (infamous?) old institution, eat some really good food, and ride excellent roads with your COG friends. Since Buckhannon is a little remote for many NE area riders, we have Thursday and Sunday as travel days. TALA info is at: www.trans-alleghenylunaticasylum.com/index.html. We will likely do the first floor tour only for $10. Very interesting history and this is a

really huge building! A Blizzard in June? Yeah, it’s a tasty proprietary ice cream goodie offered by Dairy Queen. Lodging will be at the Centennial Motel at 22 North Locust Street, Buckhannon, WV 304-472-4100. More details on the COG online Calendar. PATRICK SPRAGUE, 540.743.4874, 540.743.5132, pesprague@comcast.net .

PLAN AHEAD FOR SUMMER 2013! Details to be published in forthcoming newsletters and www.cog-online.org

(MD) June 21-23 North & South 16 Get Together Arrive Friday for camping, come and setup your tent and have a cookout in the evening. There is plenty of tent space in the backyard. Saturday will be Breakfast, Ride and Cookout. Breakfast will be at 8 AM in the driveway, serving bacon & eggs, juice & coffee, then you can leave at your time on one of many routes that could take you in PA, VA, WV and MD of 260 miles or 1 of 2 short routes of 100 miles or a DUAL Sport Ride. Around 6:30 PM will be the evening cookout. Sunday breakfast will also be in the driveway at 8 AM with a guided ride afterwards. RUSSEL FLEMING, 410.374.9687H fleming@qis.net (VA) July 4-7 Independence Getaway Weekend Come celebrate the Independence Day holiday with COG and enjoy the great riding in the historic Staunton, VA area. You won’t be disappointed. Within a few miles you can be on the Blue Ridge Parkway or in the Mountains of VA & WV with routes 39, 33 and 250 all at our back door. This is a ride-in event and will be very loosely structured with no planned events or registration fees. JASON KAPLITZ, 814.535.8669H, 814.659.6865M.

(NY) 6 July 9 AM Independence Ride to Big W BBQ What better way to continue the Independence Day celebration than to go for a ride and enjoy great BBQ. Like last year, the hope is to set up 3 meet points to kick off rides and make a three prong attack (like the three corner hat of the time) and converge on Big W BBQ. STEVE SMITH, 203.720.7575H, nead@cog-online.org, TERRY FAHERTY,718.227.2099H, tmcefah@aol.com, or BOB BARBANTI, 845.895.1130H, 845.206.7406M, ny.neaad@yahoo.com. (ID) August 26-30 COG NATIONAL RALLY 2013 Rocky Mountain Rendezvous Idaho Falls, ID

photo courtesy Kevin Martin #145

NE AREA STAFFNE AREA STAFF

Area Director (AD) Steve Smith #3184 203-720-7575 nead@cog-online.org

Web Editor Wayne Geiser #4627 978-851-2710 wayne@mypowercouple.com

Newsletter Editor Tim Anderson #9470 860-444-7544 NECOGEditor@gmail.com

Assistant Area Directors: (AADs)

VT, NH, ME, MA Greg & Tracey Habel #7010 508-444-2235 COG7010@verizon.net

CT, RI Norm Walton #7011 860-836-5162 ctaad@live.com

Metro NY/NJ Terry Faherty #792 718-227-2099 tmcefah@aol.com

NY (Hudson Valley NW) Bob Barbanti #7134 845-895-1130 ny.neaad@yahoo.com

NY (Central) Rob Romano #10584 607-227-3899 ensoniqdude@yahoo.com PA (western) Joe Cyprych #4665 724-796-1401 cyprych@windstream.net

Northcentral PA Duane Shaffer #9189 570-726-4676 dkshaff@kcnet.org

South East PA+NJ south Jim Ansbro #8443 215-805-0909 bluecon06@gmail.com

DE, east MD Bob Chappell #1283 302-791-0582 cog1283@comcast.net

MD John Hamilton #9279 301.733.5387 john.hamilton@myactv.net

VA/WV Pat Sprague #1887 540-743-5132 psprague@shentel.net

ON (Greater Toronto Area) Dave Clancy #5452 905-389-7681 davecla2@sympatico.ca

ON (eastern) Ken Fader #8534 613-865-7995 kensc14@gmail.com

QC (Montréal) Christian Dupuis#10098 450-427-0182 d1user@mac.com

Spring Fling May 16-19 in Bedford PA!! Join us for the 2013 Northeast Area Spring Fling. Bedford is ideally situated for our membership; sitting in south central Pennsylvania, just off the Turnpike and Inter-state 99. The town and our motel make for a great base to explore the region. Our motel, Clara’s Place, will surely please our group with a room rate of $76 including a FULL breakfast buffet, with down home cooking! There is a lounge on site and most rooms open to the parking lot making it convenient for all. The riding is great in all directions with little traffic and many scenic routes to enjoy. To the north are Central Pennsylvania’s vast valleys, including Happy Valley for those Penn State Fans. You’re only an hour away from Historic Altoona PA and its railroad history. Heading south you’ll enjoy some of Bedford County’s best two lane byways! We know this area and will have some great routes laid out for you. You’re only an hour from Cum-berland, MD and parts of West Virginia. Heading east you’re less than 100 miles from Gettysburg, PA. The Lincoln Highway (route 30) is a great piece of Americana with many interesting things to see along the way. Heading west you are less than an hour from the home to many Flood City COG rallies, Johnstown PA, and the many historic sites involving its three floods and its rebirth. The Flight 93 National Memorial is only 25 miles from our Motel and we will have a special tour arranged for our group on Saturday. Details to follow. So start making your plan now to attend the 2013 Spring Fling. Consult the website for more details and watch the forum for updates and factoids as they become available. Questions or SNAIL MAIL REGISTRATION FORM: JASON KAPLITZ, 814-535-8669, or STEVE SMITH, 203-720-7575H