Day 45 - Monday, June 26, 2006
Syracuse, NY to Little Falls, NY
77.6 miles-official miles
Today was a beautiful day, just a beautiful &*^&*&* day. And now you have a sentence where you can use beautiful twice. It rained all day. I mean all day. Never stopped. I have ridden for five hours in the rain in the past, but I guess seven is a new record for me. It’s like getting beat with a bag of nickels. After a while you don’t even notice, because you are numb, but the dents from the nickels remain. What the heck would possess a bunch of men plus two woman to bike all day in the rain. Testosterone perhaps or maybe the male ego. Anyway, it would make an interesting study for any amateur psychologist.
I rode with Bill today and we had four flat tires between us. When the pavement is wet, your tire tends to allow glass, etc. to stick to the tires which then allows it to penetrate the tire, whereas normally this would be spun off of the tire. Now it is a lot of fun to change a gritty grimy tire in the rain and to try and not get any of the grit into the inside of the tire after changing it. When I opened my bike bag to get my tube and tools, it was full of water. I knew it wasn’t waterproof, but apparently the bottom of the bag with a plastic lining is. So it had about a half inch of water in it. Then my finger froze to the CO2 cartridge. Other than that, the tire change went perfectly.
Actually, today wasn’t as bad as I make it out to be. After a while you get so wet that as long as you keep pedaling, you stay warm. It was a little like being a child again, something that I am somewhat of an expert on. Its just that children eventually get tired and are smart enough to come out of the rain.
We did take a slight detour today. We realized we had taken a wrong turn when we saw Jed coming at us from the other direction. Jed tends to get lost a lot. A local gave us alternate directions to get back on track. We were a little miffed at Jed for not telling us that we had taken a wrong turn. However, our two mile detour turned into an eight mile detour for Jed, so what can you say to that. People try to be EFI, remember the every fine inch. Well, Jed is trying to be TFI-he is biking the total mileage, just not across the country.
After our ride I cleaned up. There was enough grit in the bathtub to grow tomatoes. I took my laundry across the street and then went to go eat. We tried five different cafes, but all had for sale signs on them. We finally selected the one that was open, the East End Steakhouse. When she asked for our drink orders, I ordered a LaBatts beer and a large chocolate milk. She asked “are you sure about that honey?”
Actually, I know why I biked today. One of my sponsors, John S. tied his contribution to me biking the miles. Well, John today, you got your money’s worth. Film at eleven. No sane person would have gone out in today’s weather.
Tomorrow it is supposed to rain yet again. And the next day. Hopefully, it won’t rain all day tomorrow. I am starting to come down with a sore throat and a slight fever, and don’t want to fight the rain as well.
Our hotel this evening isn’t too bad. The only problem is that it almost recreates a scene out of the Blues Brothers. A train comes by about every twenty minutes. That would be great, but it is about 50 yards away from the hotel. Such is life.
We have only 3 more biking days till we finish. Tomorrow we head to Albany, NY and the next day to Brattleboro, VT. So until tomorrow……
Signing off………….
