Stats: 124.7km, Avg 21.4km/h, Max 58.9km/h, Time 5:49
(keeping it brief as I NEED to go to bed earlier tonight!)
The finger lakes are an area of stunning beauty. Rolling hills moving into foothills of the Adirondacks. Lovely lake vistas. Pastoral farms. Quiet rolling hills. The good thing about touring through them on a bike is that you are slow enough to get lots of time to look around and drink in creation all around you. The bad thing is the hills...
This was old hat to the other riders who went through the rockies, but for us newbies these hills were something very challenging to experience. The real challenge was that these hills just went on for kilometers. I'm not exagerating to say that the hill that exited Ithaca to the south climbed non-stop for over 5km, and I'm estimating conservatively. Pieter was "complaining" about how people who drive cars cannot estimate hills for bike riders. His brother lives in Ithica, and came to see him last night, and told him that it was "all flat" from a certain scenic falls to Ithaca. The actual reality was that stretch was the first really big long hill of the day.
The day continued with ups and downs. Being on sweep meant that I had to serve breakfast, starting at 5:30am with setup, and then moving into cleanup and helping get the gear truck ready. We were excused a bit before the end and I got on the road at 8:30am. Final sweep (the guys who stay behind everyone) finished loading the truck and trailed along even later. I got in to camp around 4pm, which is too late, IMHO, for enough resting. Makes for a long day.
The local CRC, across the street, feasted us for dinner.
And that's all I can do for now, time to get to bed.
7 years ago
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