Day 40 Corning to Lake Cazenovia

… and a day of rest to follow

This was a day that we were all dreading. We follow the weather very closely as you can probably imagine as we will spend eight hours outdoors on a usual day. Today there was a good chance of rain the entire day, for a 100 miles. A common cycling mantra is: “don’t start a ride in the rain”. Alas not an option for this intrepid crew.

The launch period was interesting. At least when it came to choice of weather apparel. Lynn (from NC) looked like he was decked out to fight a fire while Brent had on short bike pants. Brent did of course have the luxury of jumping in the van occasionally as he is guiding. For the first time in my life I put on Gortex pants over my bike shorts.And was happy about it.
On the plus side the weather settled into the low 60s and the wind was moderate at its worst. It all depends on your point of view of course. Greg of Alabama had few good remarks regarding the weather. I on the other hand was pleasantly surprised and by the end and was down to shirt sleeves.

The ride it self was certainly top 10 if not top 5. We touched two of the Finger Lakes: Lake Seneca at Watkins Glen and familiar Cuyaga Lake at my daughter’s alma mater (Cornell University) at Ithaca. The areas in between were a blend of deciduous forest, well kept farms and dairies, and of course the lakes. Ian, our English ambassador, remarked the area was very similar to the Lake District in his lovely country. Of note Watkins Glenn of race track fame has crosswalks that are checkered like a racing finish flag.

I received a special treat when I arrived in Ithaca. I was already feeling my mood swing to the positive side as I cycled through the familiar streets and stopped to photo from one of the bridges crossing the town’s famous gorges. My daughter called. It seemed that my wife, the stalker, let Taylor know my location. When I answered the call, she sang the Cornell Fight Song to me. We laughed and compared notes for a bit. Me in my rain suit and she thousands of miles away were very close in that moment. Not too much later I passed Susan’s, aka the stalker’s, favorite restaurant in town. That definitely required an photo and a phone call.

The rain had abated a bit and I shed the noisy rain pants and, as we do, pedaled up and out of Ithaca. I began passing more of the crew, catching up with some of them and leaving others in their own personal reverie. Dan, who is is a very accomplished rider, grew up in this area. His family still owns a dairy processing business and has ten stores in the area. He is one of nine children and elected not to stay with the family business but was a wealth of information regarding milk processing and the area in general. We picked up several others and after cresting one of the last hills, found Sue on the side of the road with a flat tire. She was about to call for a rescue but with so much knowledge in our group we assured her that we would get her back on the road in no time. As I was the first to arrive, I was the hands on guy but had plenty of advice from the others. Sue was on her way!

Dinner before a rest day is always a hosted (TrekTravel buys the first round of drinks) relaxed affair. The pressure was off and no one worried about the weather or the hills to come. The rest day is tomorrow, a Monday. Our finish is Saturday. This is very hard to believe. What a great experience this has been. Also Dan’s sister joined us and provided their brand of delicious chocolate milk for our our late lunch. A shout out to Megan for our post ride prosciutto and cheese grilled sandwiches with tomato soup! We postponed lunch to the very end to avoid eating on the roadside in the rain. Our other gifts were insulated mugs from Dan’s family dairy stores. Free refills every Tuesday! Rest day tomorrow!