Foolish Mansion

• Started at about 9:30. 11 miles so far. Met up with Zac S. again. Good to see a familiar face #
• Looking across the lake at Buffalo NY from Wanaka #
• We have named all of our bikes. PR is White Ninja. JAs is Millennium Falcon. Mamas is Praying Mantis. Mine is ENIAC #
• Riding through a sketchy part of town. Is that pot I smell? #
• Windsurfers! #
• Getting lost in Buffalo. This could get interesting #
• A clean portapotty? Who would have thought? #
• Battleships!!!! #
• Grabbing lunch before crossing into Canada. We have about an hour more of riding left before crossing the bridge. #
• About to Go silent until Saturday we will write about the days you miss and we will upload ribs later. Canada awaits #

 

Buffalo, NY – True to his word, Zach led us into Buffalo and helped cut about 15 miles off or our ride. We approached Buffalo along the Erie Shore, going from picturesque, small town beauty, to rusted, hulking industrial graveyards of dead and dying industries.

 

The small towns were quaint and restful , the houses unassuming and gently aging. Over and behind all other sounds was the soothing susurration of the waves along the shore. This was a welcome difference from the miles of wannabe mansions we had seen both east and west of Cleveland. Lush perennial beds of pink yarrow, evening primrose, roses and purple clematis vines took the place of the professional landscaping we had seen further south. Everything looked wilder and more mysterious, half curtained by untamed trees and shrubs that gave green tinted glimpses of old clapboard and shingle sided houses.

 

Before reaching the industrial area of Buffalo, we passed a long series of marinas. Then we took a wrong turn and arrived at what appeared to be an abandoned part of town. There were few cars in sight and no people, other than the drivers.

 

The street itself was like a canyon, with a street floor and a thin trickle of traffic at the bottom.  The looming canyon walls

were jagged and geometric. Abandoned factories hovered over conveyor belt mechanisms running nowhere, giant pipes connecting nothing and machinery of all description long rusted into stillness. There were dozens of concrete silos, some still looming tall and others collapsing into rubble, their half round interiors gaping open. There was an abandoned milling plant so large that its walls were supported by rusting metal buttresses. Twenty stories in the air its red bricks were turning black with age.

 

Next to the milling plant stood another building of similar proportions. About 15 stories up, the two buildings were joined by a single enclosed cross walk, a hallway hanging in the air, held aloft by a metal exoskeleton. I wondered what it had been for. Why this floor to cross over and no other? How long had it been since anyone had been there? Would it still hold if someone were to use it?

 

As we progressed along this road of regression, we rode more and more slowly, finally coming to a halt at the one, living industry that blocked the end of the road. It was the General Mills plant.

 

The air was full of the scent of milling: grains being crushed into flour, machinery still turning, men still moving about with purpose. There was a high fence and a security guard. This was the destination of the few trucks that had passed us. They were going through the gates and  disappearing into a warren of building as large and mysterious as any we had passed.

 

We looked around for a way forward. Zach pointed to a small iron bridge that crossed over a canal. We looked down and could see the water beneath us as we crossed.

 

On the other side of the bridge, we passed a woman shrouded in a full burka of flowing black cloth. She was out in the heat on a sidewalk, bending over beside a little girl in a stroller. I wondered how long it would be before the little girl with the curly hair would be shrouded, herself, behind a wall of black.

 

We managed to find a path under the freeway and entered a park, once again starving for lack of groceries. Once again, we decided to just purchase a meal. Zack found us a grocery store on his GPS. We crossed back over the freeway on an elevated, fenced, sidewalk, and found a small ethnic store. It had at least twenty kinds of fried pork rinds, two Indian proprietors in an elevated, secured teller area and one tall, ebony Jamaican cook on a platform in the middle of rows of grocery shelves. We made our purchases and carried them back to the park.  There we had a picnic of Jamaican meat patties, cheese balls, chocolate chip cookies and milk.

 

Fortunately, the Peace Bridge, leading to Canada, was very close. We rode to the bridge, eyeing the lanes of trucks waiting to cross over into the United States. They seemed to stretch on forever.

 

We took the pathway for bicycles and pedestrians. Patrick raced ahead with Zach close on his heels. He wanted to beat Jennifer into Canada. I rode and then walked my bike, leaning against the force of the wind off Lake Erie, trying not to look way, way down to the beginning of the Niagara River.

 

The Customs people put us ahead of all the cars. I am glad that I will never see those drivers again. They cannot have been happy.

 

After Customs, we still had two busy highways to cross. The Customs officials went ahead of us, stopping first the cars and then the trucks so that we could all cross safely.

 

We managed to find the bike route and, right away, a bike shop. There we bought chain oil and Zach left to find his lodgings. We rode on, headed for the home of our Canadian hosts.

 

Our ride to Fontville, Canada was eventful only for its length (much longer than anticipated) and the fire we passed along the way. An automobile junkyard had caught fire along just off our route. We talked with the policeman at the road block and he let us through. He also informed us that our destination was about 8 miles further than we had expected. It was getting dark and we were tired and I was crabby. We rode on.

 

Our Canadian host, Evan, was concerned at our failure to arrive and came to meet us along the way. He could not put us and our bikes and gear in his car, but he told us, “There is an end. You are almost there.”  He drove ahead, promising to meet us at the corner.

 

We took one last, wrong turn, and lost Evan. We called his wife, Suzette, however, and she directed us to the correct route. Finally, long after dark, we arrived. At what must have been about eleven, we sat down for a very late dinner of homemade chili. Joseph (age 20) had a beer (the drinking age in Canada is 19) and I felt like having one myself. It had been a long day.

 

The kids pitched the tents in the back yard and I took advantage of a fold out sofa bed. I slept the sleep of the dead.

 

• Back on the road. A little chilly this morning. Wearing my sweatshirt for the first time. Had a big breakfast. Ready for a long day #
• At 1 this morning our tent was ripped from the sand luckily PR and I were in it to weigh it down. #
• Met a family who is headed to Pittsburg from maine. #
• The only time I like rolling hills is when they are covered in seemingly endless vineyards. Thank you Penn #
• Stopping at a winery to fill our camelbaks. I LIKE this idea lol #
• Goodbye Penn! Hello New York #
• Hanging out with a cyclist from Oregon. #
• He left the pacific coast on May first. Wow. He is just a little faster than us #
• Found a way to attach the GPS to my bike. Now I don’t have to almost crash every time I check it. #
• The roads in New York are the best I have ever ridden on. 15 miles in and we have yet to hit a pot hole. #
• We have been in New York all afternoon and we have yet to get o a small town to eat. We are in the middle of nowhere. #
• Just met a couple yo has put over 10000 miles on their two person bike in the last 6 years! And people say that we are crazy. LOL #
• Just saw a sea plane fly over #
• Finally, a town with a place to eat. #
• PR Just got his leg stuck in his front tire. Tore it up pretty badly. #
• Just ate lunch if you can call it that. Cuban food is awesome! #
• Random scum! I really wanted to be hit in my face? I’m glad you do not know how to measure the trajectory of a 40 mph taco. #
• Just got to camp. It was supposed to be 64 miles today. We are now in Angola state park. We rode 73.3 miles. I am sooo saddle sore.

 

Irving, NY - After leaving Sara’s Campground, we made a mad two day dash to get to Canada by Thursday night. On Wednesday we rode over 73 miles and on Thursday we rode about 65 miles. Most of these rides were through Erie wine country in Pennsylvania and New York.

 

There are two problems associated with wine country. First, vines grow best on hills, and hills tend to up. Secondly, wine country is sparsely populated and this means few places to shop or eat. There are restaurants aplenty for wealthy goat cheese eating gourmands but there is very little in the way of grocery stores or even fast food restaurants.

 

I can understand why having a McDonalds across from a winery would be both incongruous and unprofitable, but we couldn’t even find corner gas stations. We rode and rode and rode on stomachs that seemed to get more hollow with each mile.

 

On Wednesday, our first day of riding in such a sparsely populated area, we arrived at Lake Erie State Park (on-map) and paused for a thirty minute break. I was so tired that I fell asleep right there in the grass under the pine trees beside the park entrance. After our rest, we rode on.

 

At four-thirty, we finally rode into a town, Silver Creek, NY. We stopped at the first restaurant we came to. It was a little hole in the wall Cuban place called “Sabor Latino”. The food was fantastic. We had Rellenos con Papas, balls of mashed potatoes that had been battered and fried. When we bit into them the center was full of hot, spicy meat. We also had fried sweet potato pies with a meat center, fried corn meal rolls with a cheese filling and three kinds of pastries, one with a jelly filling in a flaky crust and two kinds of rolls, one with cream cheese and one with custard. Since this was our lunch and dinner, we did not stint ourselves.

 

To drink we tried three kinds of drinks: coconut soda, malt soda and some delicious coke that I had never seen before.

 

I have this habit of ordering the most bizarre foods, trying all of them, and then giving the ones I don’t want to the kids. This is what happened with the Cuban drinks. No one would touch the malt soda. Unfortunately, the kids are onto my little habit, and they grabbed the coke, which was the best choice, before I could claim it. I was stuck with the coconut soda, which could have been.

 

After a real meal, we rode on to Evangola State Park (on map). This park is also in New York, and it is also on the lake. We had learned our lesson at Sara’s Campground, and did not camp directly on the shore. (At Sarah’s, the wind had brought Joseph and Patrick’s tent down around their ears during the night. It had howled around our tent and rocked it back and forth all night.)

 

At Evangola, we ran into Zac, our riding buddy from Chicago. The kids were thrilled to see him. He promised to show us all a shortcut to and through Buffalo, New York, on the following day. At this point, a short cut sounded like a gift from God. I was worn out from all the riding and just wanted to get to Canada for a day of rest.