Just finished lunch at Captain Benders Tavern and spoke with our trail friends who own a landscaping business in Ohio. They clued us in on what routes not to take so that we could avoid any extra hills during our tour of Antietam. Our goal is to see as much as we can while avoiding […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Civil War, Part 2: The Trail to Sharpsburg
Back on our bikes, the trail picks up the features that we have become familiar with. Turtles sunning themselves, in the bright light. Deer running in the canal and crossing the path to get down to the river. Baked ruts of mud requiring care as we roll by. The ride can be difficult to dress […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Civil War, Part 1: Cushwa’s
After breakfast at the Desert Rose Cafe in Williamsport, a tiny quaint town with well-kept buildings, we were fueled for the day ahead not that we thought it would be a strenuous one. After all, we were told it would be 27 miles from Williamsport to Shepherdstown. And it was along the trail. How tough […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Respite From Mud, Mostly
After a fabulous breakfast (that will be discussed in a different post) we and the rest of the bikers staying at the Town Hill B&B got loaded up in the shuttle van and driven back to the trail, which was 6 miles away. A few of the group (not us) thought it might be fun […]
Lovely Views
One of the unexpected pleasures of our trip was staying at the Town Hill Hotel B&B. It is an historic hotel nestled on a ridge in western Maryland that overlooks three states and seven counties. Our host, Dave, pointed out to us where we came from and a notch cut out of a mountain that […]
Mud Machines
We find a campsite with picnic tables at Bonds Landing in the Green Ridge State Forest to rest and have a nice lunch after bouncing in a van for the last 40 minutes or so. In this section of the park, there is a couple of hundred yard expanse between the canal and river so […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Mud, Falls, Locks and Diversions
The night we finished the GAP Trail we slept well and and in the morning were looking forward to attacking the C&O Canal towpath. Built in the early 1800s and used for nearly a century, the C&O was the lifeline of communities from Cumberland to Washington D.C. transporting farm and finished goods as well as […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Getting to Zero, Part 3
We have arrived at the Continental Divide and through dumb luck, a lone biker named Joe agreed to take our picture forcing Ted to abandon his efforts at setting up a selfie stick. As he said smiling, “It’s all downhill from here,” we too smiled realizing that our long uphill slog was over. We have […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Getting to Zero, Part 2
After we left the Pinkerton tunnel the rain started in earnest and a combination of intensity and lack of leaf cover required us to get on our rain jackets. Even though the temperature was in the 60s, neither of us were chilled and we continued our journey. It’s a different experience bicycling in the rain. […]
Le Tour de Geezers: Getting to Zero, Part 1
We made it! Yesterday around 5:30 pm under cloudy skies we pulled into Cumberland, MD, and found the origination point of the GAP. It felt great to have finished today’s 61-mile leg and the entire 150-mile length of the trail sans major (or even minor) mishaps. We knew we were going to get wet when […]