We don't often get really bad fog around here, but when we do it's really bad.
Last night was one of those nights.
As I was riding home from a continuing education class about 10pm, I noticed my visor fogging up as I got closer to the beach. I popped it up, got a few seconds of clear before my glasses fogged up too. Took me a minute to realize that the fog I had entered was so thick it was building up in droplets on my visor, then on the glasses underneath (and of course, on the front surfaces of the bike too). Anything moving through that air was just getting misted.
My winter gloves have a visor-wiper built in. I was not wearing those because it really was not all that cold. Best I could do was remove my glasses (I'm legal without them), slow the hell down, get onto some side streets and proceed home very slowly and mostly out of traffic.
Lesson? Have something available to wipe your visor down with. Have it where you can get to it at a stop (would not recommend doing this while riding in traffic, though I'm sure long-distance touring guys do it all the time while moving steadily). And if something impairs visibility, don't be too proud to pull over, to move to a less crowded route or even, as I briefly considered, parking the thing and getting home some other way.
And be mindful of the times of year when this kind of thing is most likely. This time of year and late spring tend to be the times in this area.
Last night was one of those nights.
As I was riding home from a continuing education class about 10pm, I noticed my visor fogging up as I got closer to the beach. I popped it up, got a few seconds of clear before my glasses fogged up too. Took me a minute to realize that the fog I had entered was so thick it was building up in droplets on my visor, then on the glasses underneath (and of course, on the front surfaces of the bike too). Anything moving through that air was just getting misted.
My winter gloves have a visor-wiper built in. I was not wearing those because it really was not all that cold. Best I could do was remove my glasses (I'm legal without them), slow the hell down, get onto some side streets and proceed home very slowly and mostly out of traffic.
Lesson? Have something available to wipe your visor down with. Have it where you can get to it at a stop (would not recommend doing this while riding in traffic, though I'm sure long-distance touring guys do it all the time while moving steadily). And if something impairs visibility, don't be too proud to pull over, to move to a less crowded route or even, as I briefly considered, parking the thing and getting home some other way.
And be mindful of the times of year when this kind of thing is most likely. This time of year and late spring tend to be the times in this area.