Albany, New York to Brattleboro, Vermont

What an incredibly difficult day today was! This ride was listed as a 76 mile journey, although my bike computer and I put the mileage more at 79 miles. Regardless, this was one of the most physically demanding days of the trip. I don't know when I have sweated more on a ride.

We left our motel in Albany, New York, and found ourselves immediately in high volume urban traffic, that further aggravated by rather impressive and disorganized major road construction. New Yorkers who are en route to work are remarkably intolerant of cyclists. It was difficult and also a bit frightening. Regardless, we all made it intact.

At only 4 miles into the ride today we crossed the Hudson River! That was neat. The river at this location is quite wide. I wanted to stop and take a picture, but there was no safe place to do so. Anyway, it was impressive.

The further we got away from Albany, the less disturbing the traffic and road conditions became. That was merciful. At 31 miles into the ride, we made it into the state of Vermont! As always, state line crossings are a big deal for us.

Entering into Vermont, we found ourselves in the town of Bennington. That is a really neat place. It has the appearance of probably everyone's image of a typical Vermont small town. There is a central green town square. There is a huge church in the center of town, that almost resembling a gothic-style cathedral. There are multiple cemeteries also. If we had the time to look arround, I am certain that we would find graves dating in the late 1700s.

We left Bennington on Vermont route 9, and we stayed on that road pretty much to our final destination in Brattleboro. Right out of Bennington, route 9 took us on a brutal 7.1 mile climb. I was effectively at my physical limit on that climb, pretty much the whole time. I don't know when I have sweated more. It was a truly beautiful ride up into the mountains, but it surely was difficult! Many of the riders on this trip have heart rate monitors on at all times. Thank God I don't, as I really don't want to know what my heart rate was during that part of today's ride!

We went through Wilmington, and then we went over Hogback Mountain (another big climb), to finally end up now in Brattleboro.

The ride over Hogback Mountain was neat. It could almost resemble a northern Wisconsin forest road, although I believe we have more deciduous trees, and less conifers, here. The wildflowers at the roadside are neat. There were lots of Indian Paintbrushes, daisies, and wild violets.

I really am tired. I hope I have the energy for tomorrow's 91 miles and similarly impressive mountain road climbs.

We will see!

Regarding the four photos above, the bottom three really belong with yesterday's posting. Two are of the Mohawk river and its associated valley. The bottom photo is that of the "New Helmet Club". In that photo, from left to right, it is me, Craig, Roy, and Bill.

Little Falls, New York to Albany, New York

Today we had a truly great ride. I could not have asked for better weather conditions or a more scenic road. We enjoyed 71 miles of real fun today. It was absolutely great today.

Yesterday was June 21. That is the first official day of Summer and the longest day of the year. This morning then, as we were all eating breakfast, I made it a point to comment upon how obvious it is that the days are now getting so much shorter! I find it sometimes remarkable that precise and astute observations sometimes result in expressions of annoyance instead of appreciation. Oh well. Genius is rarely appreciated in its own time.

Roy is OK. He is profoundly sore. He has three cracked ribs. His right arm, right shoulder, and right hip are just like mine were soon after my fall in St. Joseph, Missouri, that now so long ago. I can feel his pain.

At one point early this morning, while we were still in Little Falls and getting ready to sign out and leave, it spontaneously happened that Roy, Craig, Bill, and I were standing together and talking in the parking lot. We were then casually speaking of bike accidents, and then we somehow came to the mutual awareness that it is the four of us who are the ones who have had mishaps on this trip. Each of the four of us is now sporting a brand new bike helmet, that purchased out of necessity during this trip. With each of us doing neurologically well (at least arguably) due to having trashed a helmet, we decided to call ourselves members of the "New Helmet Club". Someone took a photo of the four of us standing together, all in our new helmets. I feel special, being a member of that exclusive club.

Nice club, of course, but not a club that anyone would want to join!

The weather started out cool, but not cold. It was perfect for biking. As usual, I found myself wearing less clothing than the other cyclists. I just don't need the leg warmers and arm warmers, it seems. The sky was initally clear and sunny, but then it did become partly cloudy. It became warm, but never hot, even as of the time we arrived here in Albany at about 1:00 PM. We had a mildly annoying headwind during the last 20 miles or so, but even that wasn't too bad.

Little Falls, New York, is on the Mohawk River. I am learning that this river is the largest tributary to the Hudson River. It is also now part of the New York State Canal System, the successor to the older Erie Canal. The Mohawk runs pretty much straight east, to enter into the Hudson near Albany. Our trip today was primarily on US route 5, that just north of the Mohawk River and following it very closely. It was beautiful during the whole ride.

I have some really nice photos of the Mohawk River and associated valley. Sadly, I am now creating this blog post at a computer in which I cannot upload those photos. (This place has wireless Internet connectivity, but it doesn't like my Linux-based netbook. I am now therefore using a standard Windows desktop in their "Business Center". This computer does not allow me to enter in my photos from today, unfortunately.)

We left Little Falls this morning on US route 5, and that road initially had quite impressive hills initially, as it ran parallel to the river. This provided a variety of incredible views of the river, some from very high above and some from not far above the river at all. This place really is pretty. I have no difficulty in understanding how the Iroquois must have treasured this area.

Our route today took us through many various smaller towns, and then notably Amsterdam, New York, and then Schenectady, New York, before finally getting us in at Albany. There may be readers of this blog who may be in the process of planning their own future bicycle trip through Schenectady. I urge reconsideration. Don't bike through Schenectady if you can avoid doing so. Really.

Michel's wife is here now! I think that he and she had missed each other greatly, understandibly so, during these past several weeks. She made the 4-hour drive down here today, from their home in Montreal. It was nice to get a chance to meet her. Michel and she are in their own room here now, so I have his and my room entirely to myself. This seems different! With only one bike and one person in the room, it seems really big. He and she will follow the ride on tomorrow (to Brattleboro, Vermont) and Thursday (to Burlington, Massachusetts) in their car. I have the impression that Michel may not ride a whole lot of those next two rides on his bike.

It is truly difficult for my to really comprehend how this wonderful and long adventure is now soon to come to a close. I had been planning on this trip, daydreaming virtually daily, for much of the past year. It is difficult for me to grasp that I am now finally not only actually doing it, but almost fully done! Part of me tells me that it is indeed time to have this trip end, and return back to the so-called real world. The other part of me is already reluctant to think about giving up the routine of biking to a new location each day. I am so happy with how things have gone on this trip. My bike and my body have both held up well, at least if you don't ask for details, even better than I might have expected. I feel that I have had such a great time, and this trip has more than lived up to what I had been hoping for.

There are still three days of riding left, those being Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of this week. The ride on Friday, however, is a short 18-mile run from Burlington, Massachusetts, to the beach (Rivere Beach) in Boston. That being the case, there really are only two true days of riding left. Tomorrow, Wednesday, we go to Vermont. On Thursday, we leave Vermont, clip off the southwest corner of New Hampshire, and end up in Burlington, Massachusetts. These next two days promise to be as scenic as they will be arduous. They will both involve long mileages, and LOTs of climbing. We will contend with a small piece of the northern Berkshire mountains, followed by the Green mountains, and then the White mountains. I am simultaneously eager to see the views of these next two days and anxious about the degree of difficulty. I am reminded by the quite hilly ride Bill and I enjoyed with Bike Virginia two years ago; it does seem that scenic beauty in bicycle trips is inextricably tied to physical difficulty.

More tomorrow!

Syracuse, New York to Little Falls, New York

Today's ride was a very good one. We went 78 miles today, all on a very good road and all in very good weather. There were not much hills. Everyone enjoyed an easy and high speed ride. I made it to Little Falls at well before 1:00 PM, and that was not even with pushing very hard. My average speed was well over 17 mph for the total ride today.

It is funny how 78 miles can now seem like a "rest day".

Early in today's ride we did have a mishap. The ride had been otherwise going so well at the time. I was really enjoying the scenery and all of the other aspects of the ride. I was about to casually mention to Paula how nice the ride was going. We were probably only 20 miles into the ride, when I heard a monosyllabic expletive suddenly behind me. It was Roy, who had been drafting Greg quite closely. Greg had shifted slightly to the left, and Roy may have anticipated that poorly. Anyway, Roy's front wheel developed an inappropriate relationship with Greg's back wheel, leading to Roy's sudden high velocity smack down on the hard pavement. I had looked back in time just to see Roy's final flight into the road. It was so sudden, unexpected, and frightening for all of us.

It was really neat to see how well our group handled this. I was right there at the site, so I quickly got off of my bike and went to Roy. I kept his head and neck stable, while checking on other vital issues. Absolutely everyone else went into a sudden damage control mode as if it had been well practiced. We had riders on both directions on the road, controlling traffic as if they were experienced police officers. (I am certain that none of the automobile operators would have had the nerve to contend with them; the cyclists would have summarily ripped out the lungs of any car driver who did not cooperate with them.) I knew that I could stay with Roy, out there in the middle of the road, and not have to worry about cars at all.

We called 911 and the paramedics came soon. They took Roy away. We have yet to see him back, but we have progress reports that he is OK and will hopefully rejoin us soon.

Tomorrow we go to Albany, New York. This is getting to be very exciting. It is truly difficult to believe. We are so near the end of this long journey. We all have so many mixed feelings and emotions about that realization.

We have a probably 71 mile day tomorrow, that probably rather easy and light. After tomorrow, we will have two really arduous days. On Wednesday we will go from Albany, New York, to Brattleboro, Vermont. On Thursday we will then go from Brattleboro, Vermont to Burlington, Massachusetts. Both Wednesday and Thursday will be long mileage days with LOTS of climbing.

Canandaigua, New York to Syracuse, New York

Today provided for us a very nice ride. Unlike yesterday's adventure, it did not end in a storm. We just had nice weather the whole time. We enjoyed a short ride today, traveling only 68 miles. As was the case yesterday, we again had nice road surfaces and wide shoulders on the road. Not much traffic either, on this Sunday morning's ride.

We left Canandaigua and went east initially on US route 20. During much of the ride, US 20 and US 5 are the same road. This took us eastward largely parallel to, but south of, the New York State Turnpike (I-90). With the Interstate road presumably handling the majority of the traffic, that makes US 20 less traveled and much more pleasant. It was a really nice and scenic ride today. At probably 31 miles into the ride, US 20 and US 5 split up. We stayed with the latter, up until very close to Syracuse.

Syracuse is obviously a quite big city. Our approach, however, was well thought out and planned. We really missed out on a whole lot of ugly urban traffic that you typically see in cities of this size. That was nice.

At just 12 miles into our journey today, soon after leaving Canandaigua, we went through the town of Geneva. That is located at the north end of one of the finger lakes of this region. (Canandaigua is located at the north end of one of the other finger lakes, just to the west of this one.) Our ride through Geneva took us by a huge green park at the edge of that lake. It was early in the morning then. People were out walking arround. It really was nice. We later traveled through Waterloo and Seneca Falls, both also really pretty areas.

I had a flat tire at probably just 10 to 15 miles before arriving here in Syracuse. It has been quite a while since I have had one, so I suppose that I was due for this. (Craig had two flats yesterday, when he and I were riding together then.) I was riding alone at the time. I went through the usual routine of removing the old tube, putting a new one in, and inflating it with my sometimes-tempermental CO2 inflator. Inspecting the tire, I never saw any "culprit" piece of metal or glass to explain the event. I did take note of lots of small lacerations in the tire however, those small but deep. This tire has served me well on lots of pretty challenging surfaces, so I decided to replace it. That was my extra minor project to which I attended when I got here to Syracuse. Now I am, once again, ready for tomorrow.

Tomorrow, Monday, we will go to Little Falls, New York.

Hamburg, New York to Canandaigua, New York

Today held for us, as promised, a very difficult day. Still, it was fun. We had 94 miles to travel, with lots and lots of steep hills. The alleged total climbing today was just under 6,000 feet. I do believe that it was indeed at least that much. Michel has a Garmin bike computer (model 705) which enables him to see road elevation. He tells me that we were often at 11% uphill grade today!

I rode virtually the whole day with Craig. We had a really nice time. He and I proved to be pretty equal in speed and stamina, it seemed. We were in the middle of the pack, sometimes near the front, for virtually all of the day. We had a really nice ride, and we enjoyed each other's company the whole time.

The road quality was excellent, with a wide and smooth shoulder all day long. Nice! There was a mild wind behind us, at least most of the time. Also nice! The sky was sunny (up until the last 20 to 30 minutes, that is). Craig and I were making good time, averaging over 16 mph even despite the hills.

With the sunny skies however, it did get pretty hot. I didn't take my Camelback today, so I was just drinking out of the standard bottles on my bike. I probably wasn't drinking enough, I suppose. Whatever.

Our second SAG was at 68 miles into today's ride, and it was in a city called Avon. There is a bank in downtown Avon, with the rather standard sign in front displaying the time and temperature. It was just after Noon then, and the temp was 87 degrees. It was really hot.

It was honestly difficult to drink enough fluids, in order to keep up with that heat and the associated level of exertion.

As the photo above demonstrates, we hit 3,000 miles today! I am pretty proud of that. Since leaving the beach in Los Angeles on the morning of May 9, we have now traveled over 3,000 miles! We hit the 3,000 mile mark at 51 miles into today's ride. Cool!

Craig and I got to probably within 6 to 8 miles of our destination today, here in Canandaigua, by probably 2:00 PM or so. All of a sudden, the weather turned to crap. Serious crap. Scattered thunderstorms had been the prediction for the early evening today, and we had been aware of that. The storms came early unfortunately. In literally only minutes, we went from a few random raindrops to a horendous downpour! Those last 6 to 8 miles were miserable and also a bit frightening.

I normally wouldn't care much about getting a bit wet on the bike. This downpour however managed to effectively fully disable my brakes. With the still hilly road, and now more traffic, entering into the city of Canandaigua without any brakes seemed almost to border on being a bad idea. There was a powerful and gusty wind coming from the right, tending to blow us into the traffic to our left. Indeed, there were times when the wind was so threatening, with also such poor visibility, that we just stopped our bikes on the road shoulder; getting rained on while standing still seemed safer than getting similarly rained on while being pushed leftward into the traffic.

When we finally arrived at our destination, miserably cold and wet, the storm took notice of our success and it immediately stopped! That seemed so unfair! Mother Nature is not only a bitch sometimes, but she also has a really annoying sense of humor. Oh well. Gotta deal with her, like it or not.

Tomorrow's ride is a shorter one. We go to Syracuse tomorrow. I will be happy to have a lighter day tomorrow, as I really am very tired.

Thinking of Syracuse, I am reminded of a quite different bike trip, that of roughly four decades ago now. Bill, Brent, Doug Anderson, and I collaborated on that trip, and I know that we all remember the nativity of that expedition at the Syracuse airport then. What an experience that was!

It is a statement of the obvious that this bike adventure is soon to come to an end. I have all of the expected mixed feelings about that. Among other things, I do wonder if I will remember what I am supposed to do, when I finally return to work. I am certain that I will need to re-learn a whole lot. Hopefully I will be up to the challenge.

As I think now of returning next week to La Crosse, I find myself wondering how all is going there. I have no doubt that all is running smoothly despite my prolonged absence of these past several weeks. If memory serves, Julie should be near her due date for her baby. I really hope that all is well with her and Mike. Having a baby may be more frightening than riding a bike without brakes into a hilly city during a thunderstorm.

More tomorrow!

Erie, Pennsylvania to Hamburg, New York

What a great ride today gave us! We went 78 miles and it was virtually all along the Lake Erie coastline. It was beautiful. We had perfect weather today. The sky was sunny, but it was never really hot. Great road quality, with a nicely wide shoulder, and effectively no wind. Traffic was unimpressive.

What else is there to life?

I am, once again, now in new state also. As the photos above help to confirm, I am now beyond Pennsylvania and in the state of New York! Neat!

As something rather unusual and entirely unexpected, we had a police escort out of town today! I am honestly not really sure quite how that happened, but it was really nice. As we were getting ready to leave our location in downtown Erie this morning, two motorcycle police officers just showed up! They waited until we were all ready and together, and then they took us out of town with lights and occasional sirens. What was neat about that was never stopping, or even slowing, at the numerous signal lights in the downtown area. We blew out of town effortlessly and very fast. The police departed us at the city limits, that after probably 5 miles. Weird, but kind of nice!

Virtually the entire ride today was along highway 5. We were on that road even before we were outside of the Erie city limits. That road runs northeast, and it basically follows the Lake Erie coastline, not far inland at all. As I was riding along today, I could look to my left and at least intermittently see nice glimpses of the lake. It really was nice. This was a really nice ride today.

I was correct in my expectation that we would see even more vineyards than we did two days ago, then approaching Erie. Indeed, there were huge vineyards on both sides of the road, virtually all day long. New York state must really produce a lot of wine. The bottom of the three photos above shows the view looking leftward (northwesterly) from highway 5. There is the edge of a large vineyard in that picture, as well as the look at the more distant Lake Erie. Pretty!

The prediction had been for a nice wind today, 5 to 10 mph, directly from the southwest. That would have been absolutely perfect, but it didn't really happen. I am not so sure that we had much of any wind at all. Even without the expected favorable wind however, this was a fast ride. The road was hilly, but only mildly so. My average speed today ended up at 16.4 mph, which isn't bad considering that the wind really wasn't a boost, after all. I arrived here in Hamburg at just after 1:00 PM today.

I am pretty well settled in already now, in Hamburg. My bike is well cleaned off, with a lightly oiled chain and other moving parts. My riding clothes are washed, and now drying in the sun. I am a bit hungry and thirsty, but those are easily solvable problems.

Tomorrow's ride will be difficult. Some rides are difficult due to hills and the associated climbing. Other rides are difficult just due to the distance involved. Tomorrow's ride will be difficult due to both. We go to Canandaigua, New York, tomorrow. That will be a long ride, at 94 miles totally, and it will also involve almost 6,000 feet of climbing.

Oh well! That's what I signed up for!

Niles, Ohio to Eire, Pennsylvania -- photos

These are all photos that I tried to upload with yesterday's post. The Internet connection quality here is very poor, with such impaired signal strength that I was unable to post these photos yesterday. I have, just this afternoon, found a more secure wireless Internet connection, so these pictures are now available.

The photo second from the top really is me. I know that I am not well defined on that picture. That picture was taken by Sam, and he was then unable/disinterested in the use of the zoom feature on my camera's lens.

I neglected to mention yesterday that the move into Pennsylvania then brought with it a new roadside botanical! We now see grapes as well as the earlier corn, soy beans, and ubiquitous day lilies. It is neat to see the vineyards now. I bet that there will even be more, as we move tomorrow into New York.

Today has been a very nice rest day in Erie. I went to a local laundromat earlier this morning. It was neat to see that it was all members of our group who were there then. Indeed, if it was not for our bicycle trip, I suspect that the laundromat would have done poorly today. All of my clothes are now clean and my bags are re-packed and ready for the last week of the trip.

Today we were rejoined by both Sandy and Craig. I am glad to see them both. Craig had to drop out, as of St. Joseph, Missouri, due to illness. He looks great now, and I am so glad that he is back.

A small subgroup of us rented a car today, and drove to Niagara Falls. I think that Doug Squires rented the car, and he was joined by Stuart, Stuart's wife Sandy, and a few others. I know that they had fun. I really did not want to go. I wanted to just relax here.

Last night, as on all of our rest days, the meal was on our own and not provided by the tour group. We might have been expected to go out all on our various separate ways, but we all ended up eating together. That just sort of occurred spontaneously. We really are a family now, after these six weeks, or so, of togetherness. We all just gravitated to the same local Erie restaurant together last night, and we had a truly great time. It really will be difficult to say goodbye to all of these friends, in only 7 or 8 days from now.

I had a great time today relaxing in Erie. After doing my laundry, I walked the ten blocks to the warf at the edge of the lake. I went to a maritime museum there. It mainly featured Oliver H. Perry, and his pivotal role in the War of 1812. There was some other stuff there also. Nice museum.

On to New York tomorrow! From what I can see on the forecasts, we should have good weather.