Seeking the Erie: Day 4
Ted and I are throughly spoiled this morning at the Laura Hubbell B&B as Holly’s breakfast was exceptional. We don’t want to go. But onward to Syracuse 52 miles away we must travel and with full bellies and extra blueberry scones in my saddlebag, we leave on a cloudy morning with a brisk, cooling breeze. […]
Swanky to suffragettes: Day 3
We leave upscale Bushnells’s Basin on a cool and bright morning. The sun is glistening in the sky reflecting off the canal while mallards swim in the water and nest on the shore. We are well aware, however, that this idyllic start will become a hot and sweaty slog in the late afternoon as we […]
Picking a lock: Day 3
I believe that it is better to be lucky than good and lucky is what we are as we spot two boats heading into Lock E30 in Macedon. Locks are used in the Erie Canal, and all others, as a series of water steps letting ships go up or down to different water levels of […]
Farm to city: Day 2
“Ted, we’re not in Medina anymore,” I tell my riding companion as we look to cross a busy highway with cars and trucks whizzing by at high speeds with little regard to our need. We are in the thick of Rochester, which is a far cry from where we were and what we saw just […]
Getting going: Day 1 on the Erie Canal
A gray, cloudy start to our trip punctuated by an ill-timed, flat tire is the only glitch in an otherwise delightful first day of 53 miles on our bikes. Our legs take us from the industrial debris and buildings in Buffalo to corn fields and apple orchards in Medina. The Shoreline Trail in Buffalo takes […]
An incident free day
The day long ride from Connecticut to Buffalo is incident free. Now that sounds good from a safety perspective, but is awfully boring. It is a long gray ride where the sun refuses to show itself under a blanket of clouds, fog, rain and mist. Like many drives on interstate highways in this portion of […]
And now for something completely different. . . .
Starting tomorrow, I will be biking the entire length of the Erie Canal with my buddy Ted. This 400-mile trip will be our fourth long-distance sojourn together. We start from Buffalo tomorrow and with luck, the wind at our backs and minimal mishaps will arrive in Albany on the following Tuesday. I will continue posting […]
Nature ride
I feel fortunate to live where I do in Connecticut near the New York border. If I hop on my bike, which I do often, I can find myself in bucolic North Salem, N.Y., within 10 minutes. Beyond the famous residents such as David Letterman and expansive mansions and horse farms, lies a pristine land […]
To Cincinnati with Brian
It is a beautiful morning to start a bike trip. The weather is clear, the humidity low and temperature moderate. After spending an uneventful evening at the Travelodge, Ted and I went for a short walk to stretch our legs and take in a view of Lake Erie. In the distance, two large freighters steamed […]
A Mighty Wind
One of the unexpected aspects about our stay in the Florida Keys is the wind: It has been fierce. With the exception of a few days, the wind has whipped around our little sand spit of a peninsula constantly. It has averaged around 20 mph with some days the wind clocking in the low 30s. […]