Gig Harbor Washington to Bar Harbor Maine 2001

We were up by 6 and almost out by 7. I headed back for the Erie Canal trail for the last few miles before it ended. With all the bunnies and chipmunks scurrying out of my way and all the birds singing, I felt like I was in a Disney movie. I left before Mike, but when I left the trail and joined his road, I saw that it had taken me 3 more miles than it would have taken him to get to the same spot. That meant that he was already ahead of me and I wouldn't see him till camp.

Disney world

I like following the Adventure Cycling maps. I like riding the backroads, even if they are longer and steeper, just to get away from traffic. Riding around the Great Lakes is a lot like riding around Puget Sound. Lots of country punctuated by historic and/or charming and/or touristy villages. Pultneyville was beautiful with huge old victorian homes and great pastries in the grocery/bait/gas station (the only store in town). Sodus Point was a touristy little spit where I mailed home the last surplus maps and junk. There was some sort of ride going on and about 400 bikes with spandex and maybe a water bottle were flitting around like mosquitos. I passed several with my home in tow.

It was already 72 degrees when we left at 7am. By 11 I watched the temperature climb to the high 80's. Someone had warned us about "an ozone situation". I'm not sure what that means, but I put sunblock on 3 times and I could still feel my flesh searing in the sun. The humidity was also unbearable and I looked for any excuse to escape. I stopped at the Hardware Cafe in Fair Haven. There was no a/c and I was pouring sweat. I downed some slightly cool "iced" tea, then had some excellent gazpacho, first time I was ever hot enough to enjoy cold soup. I followed that with a fruit plate with a big pile of cottage cheese. Perfect riding food on a hellish day.

I hid in a grocery store next. I was standing under the a/c vent in the foyer and a woman told me to check out the cold beer area. I obeyed. There was a huge walk-in cooler. I almost stayed long enough to be uncomfortably cold. Bought some more fruit and cold water to fill by camelback. Kept me from boiling over for a couple hours.

It was already cooling down slightly by 2:30, down to 91 on the backroads, 93 on main roads, and I was content with falling over on shady lawns. After riding a completely flat canal path yesterday and several relatively flat states and provinces, today's hills were a shock to the knees and generated a lot of internal heat. I'd lay in lawns eating fruit or cookies and drinking water until a breeze felt cool on my sweat-soaked body. Then I'd get up and do it again.

Well, this Selkirk campground is much nicer than the Selkirk campground in Ontario. It's got a real beach on Lake Ontario, for one thing. I attacked the shower as soon as I hit camp but it was really hot and unadjustable. We walked down to the beach before it closed (?) and jumped in the small allowable swim area. We didn't even care about all the algae floating around, it was cool - almost cold. I swear the water boiled a little when I submerged my burnt skin. This park is also better because the woman yelling at her children bellows instead of shrieking. Much easier to take. Lake Ontario beans and rice leave a lot to be desired though. All the camp store had was 5 minute rice and cans of chili. We supplemented it with V8 and tuna and at least got filled.

Another good thing about riding the Adventure Cycling route is knowing exactly how many miles are left. 585. Seems like we could do that tomorrow. Unfortunately, today's hills were just the beginning of at least 400 miles of serious climbing. We're still shooting for August 1st. We'll see if our knees hold out.

The last we heard from the kids, they were in Niagara Falls taking a day off. That put them about 150 miles behind us. They were reevaluating options and will probably ride straight to Garcia's house in DC. It was tough to ride together, given our waking schedules, but I miss them. They sure put some interesting twists on the days.