Northern Exposure

If you want to find a great bike trail in Lebanon NH you park for free in the lot behind City Hall and look down towards the last row of cars and you'll see this unpretentious sign. It is in many ways a tribute in itself to the tireless work of the Friend of Northern volunteers and their chairman Dick MacKay.  It is a work in perpetual progress and stands as a tribute to all who serve their communities with such energy and enthusiasm. 

The road bed sliced through forest and field, over streams and gullies.

There is a variety of surfaces, hybrid tires are best.

Water is everywhere. In ponds...

...lakes...

...and spillways that powered textile and other manufacturing plants.

This abandoned textile mill reminds us that U.S. consumers failed to obey the singers' plea to "Look for the Union Label."

Spotted nearby: Building. Red. Big. Really big.

Clearly, Jerry Thibodeau is a candidate out standing in his field.

One short section of the trail is plagued with sink holes. This one was over 5 feet deep. A helpful neighbor marked it by inserting this tree branch.

It was great to see so many users enjoying the Northern today.  BikerBuck encourages everyone to consider cycling as a relaxing and rewarding way to get to know your community better while enjoying your personal outdoors.

Up in the Air

Those inclined to take the air in Vermont expect a lovely Inn, wonderful food and an attentive owner/manager. All of this is to be found at the Echo Lake Inn in Ludlow.

So here's the story... yesterday afternoon I was pau with my NY ride and racing to get cleaned up and out of the Courtyard Buffalo by my extended check-out time.  I hastily dug out my VT notes and realized that I had changed my original ride plan in favor of the intriguing Ludlow/Reading Loop that I had discovered on line. But I had no where to stay. 

Try wait! I re-read the details of the Loop and discovered that the start/end location is "right across the road from the Echo Lake Inn." So I quickly phoned the Inn, spoke to the owner and he booked me in a deluxe room at the standard room price. When I told him that I would arrive at about 10pm, he said that was passed his bedtime, but he'd leave an envelope pinned to the front door with my name on it and the key inside.

Indeed the drive was lengthy but when I arrived at 10pm the envelope awaited and I settled in quickly. Nice. Old. Sloping floors. Just what I imagined it would be.  Supper was a chicken wrap and Pepsi that I had picked up at a gas station a couple of hours earlier. It was the perfect one-handed meal as I prepared my Erie Canal blog entry well in to the night.

The next morning was delightful. Sunny, chilly, wonderful breakfast with lots of conversation with the other guest (many of whom were cyclists).  I decided to scout the ride route by car before riding it. That decision turned stressful as the written directions had a couple of errors in them, such as the wrong road number on one key stretch. As a result,  I returned to the Inn after nearly two hours of fruitless scouting and was not at all sure I wanted to do the route.

Five minutes later, Lawrence the Innkeeper had me all straightened out with corrected route info. and oh, by the way, said I could keep the room as late as I needed it. No extra charge.

I told you all of that so I could tell you this: It was a fantastic 33 mile loop ride that was slightly downhill for the first 22 miles and culminated in an eighteen hundred foot climb followed by a steep downhill thrill ride that ended right at my Inn.  Here are some scenes along the route.

The early miles took BB past classic New England style homes like this one with slate siding.

Cemeteries often portray key elements of a community. This place honors their veterans.

The grave of a 10 month old named Lavinus.

Crops send a message of well being.

This hill reminds me that there is a regional ski center nearby.

It wouldn't be Vermont without a covered bridge!

Weird sensation when you ride a bike through here.

The road sign states: Howard Hill Rd.  Could Marian the Librarian be close by?

After a leisurely departure I drove to my next state, New Hampshire. The drive took all of 40 minutes. Staying tonight in Hanover, looking forward to my 4th ride in 5 day.

New York's Neighbors and Pals

 

Erie Canal Song

Low Bridge, Everybody Down

(Written by: Thomas Allen in 1905)

I've got a mule, and her name is Sal,

Fif-teen miles on the Er-ie canal,

She's a good ol' worker and a good ol' pal,

Fifteen miles on the Er-ie can-al,

We've hauled some barges in our day,

Filled with lum-ber coal and hay,

And ev'ry inch of the way we know

From Al-ba-ny to Buff-a-lo OH

Chorus

Low bridge ev'-ry bod-y down,

Low bridge for we're com-in to a town,

And you al-ways know your neighbor,

You'll always know your pal,

If you've ev-er navigated on the Er-ie can-al

Listen to full version: http://www.eriecanalvillage.net/pages/song.html

I remember singing this folksong in 5th grade and wondering exactly what it would be like to take a cruise down the Erie Canal. So when it was time to pick a ride in New York state, there was no other place I'd rather be. It's been a long time coming, but now I've had my Erie moment. Mind you, my "cruise" was of the wheeled variety, but a journey to remember none the less.

Elegant homes border the canal.

What a glorious day for a cruise.

Apples to Apples

This device must be what they use to control the volume of water flowing in the canal. Like a giant  Guillotine, this gate drops down to serve as a "valve."

 

What does a young man do while having his car repaired in Lockport NY? Why, he just hauls out his bike and takes a little cruise down the Erie Canal. This fellow's name is Nick. He and his brother rode about 300 miles of the canal last summer, and they plan to do more segments in the future.

Speaking of canal wheelmen, here are brothers Alan and Steve from Chicago. They dedicate a week each year to riding from Chicago to New York City in segments. This year they'll log a couple of hundred more miles of bike packing to the Big Apple.

So, what about that "low bridge" thing in the song? How do they handle that it today's world of fancy yachts and such on the Canal? Check out how they do it in Medina.

Going up....

up....

and all the way up...

...so that our friends on Tumbleweed can enjoy their day on the canal...

...along with the skipper of Old Glory, who seems to be having a nice day to himself...

...along with some other sailors...

...and a few dry-landers like BikerBuck.

 Lockport NY has established itself as the headquarters of today's Erie Canal buffs. There is a well run Canal Information Center open daily to answer questions and tell the story of the canal.  I became fascinated with the economics of the Canal when Mr. Nick and I listened to Bill Bryson's At Home: A Short History of Private Life during our Western Union segment of the 50-50 back in May of last year. If you plan to visit the canal I would suggest that a little historical brush up in advance will magnify your Erie experience.

After a quick clean up and checkout of the Courtyard in Buffalo, BikerBuck blasted off on a 7-hour drive to Ludlow VT and the delightful Echo Lake Inn. Stay tuned.

You Gotta Have Hart

 The village of Rothbury, Michigan on the state's western border with Lake Michigan is a quintessential middle America slice of life that refreshes the imagination and soothes the spirit. In nearby Montague MI Rick Zwern and Karen Huffman have built a unique home atop a serious sand dune overlooking the sandy beach and endless vista of the Lake. 

BikerBuck was thrilled to pay them a visit and even more delighted when they up and decided to ride along for the MI 50k.  Rick and Karen went so far as to pick the route and to test ride it in advance.

and the route they picked....

... was perfect.  Starting from Rothbury, we did an out-and-back to the town of Hart along the rail trail, gliding through a cross section of mid west life that is both timeless and timely. 

The town of Hart is a place of simple pleasures. Small and friendly, a case study in civic pride. With a centerpiece little lake to which the center of town is anchored. Chief among the park's features is a touching tribute to Hart's veterans. A vintage jet trainer is the physical icon that compliments the tapestry of paving stones with the names and dates of service for Hart's veterans, several noted as KIA.  What strikes this visitor is the number of veterans who came from this one small place.  It reminded BB of the monuments in tiny English villages that memorialized scores of young men who fought in WWI from those communities. It doesn't seem mathematically possible for such places to produce so many young service men.

And not to be upstaged by the jet, the ground warriors' memento is inspiring as well.

We think that when news of the Hawaii biking trio got around the rose lei was hurriedly prepared  to make us feel at home. Mind you, the roses are silk...but so was the chocolate shake.

After the ride each of us saddled up for new destinations. Rick and Karen to different mainland appointments and BB to play tourist a little further east of MI. But that's a different story...      

  BUT... I will tell you that I spent the next night snug as a bug in my Town&Country mini-van. It was late, I was on my way to Niagara Falls but not yet to the Canada border,  and saw the KOA sign. No big deal. Great night's sleep. And a welcomed chuckle as I departed the campground...

Read carefully.

 

Gone Fishin'

In late July, BikerBuck and his pal John flew from Campbell River B.C. across Vancouver Island to Kyuquot Beach House for some classic West Coast fishing.

John Frishholz is a long time Quadra Island resident and an avid fisherman. He introduced BB to salmon fishing in B.C. 22 years ago and is a regular annual guest at Mike and Lynn Barker's Kyuquot Beach House on the wild and wonderful west coast of Vancouver Island, just south of the Brooks Peninsula. This year was BB's fourth visit to Kyuquot with John.

We spent two days apiece aboard First Nations guides Archie and Wayne (above) Vincent's comfortable and speedy boats. The weather was chilly and mild, sea conditions nearly perfect for our 6 to 12-hour days afloat.

Spring Salmon - AKA Chinooks - are the sportiest and most popular catch. Each angler is limited to 2 per day, 4 in possession. John and I limited out with eight Springs, averaging about 20 lbs. each.

Halibut is the other big prize. The limit is two small (under 12 lbs. or so) and two large (big as you can land.) Again we limited out with a total of about 160 pounds of Hali. The smallest fish you see here is a  sole. First time we got one. We also caught well over a dozen Coho salmon, only 2 of which were hatchery-raised keepers. We released all of the wild ones.

Now here's something you don't see every day. I mentioned the flight to Kyuquot from Campbell River...it's a thrilling 50 minute ride in a DHC-3 Otter that features a spirited climb to 6,100 feet, threading between 7,000 peaks that look close enough to touch, and a delicate landing in shallow water tucked nicely beneath a 500 foot ceiling of thick clouds. Obviously we made it in safely.

Four days later the Otter arrived with a new load of 10 anglers and lots of gear in the same plane that we would be departing in after lunch. Except....while taxiing in to the lodge the pilot ran over a buoy that he could not see due to the blind spot beneath the engine cowling and pontoon struts. Wham! Propellor blade tips all perfectly bent, resembling snow skis. Our hosts quickly ordered up a replacement plane and we returned safely to Campbell River about an hour late.

As BB writes this entry, 5 days after the incident, the plane is still docked at the Beach House awaiting not just a new prop, but also the inevitable inspection of the turbo engine which would have been severely shocked by the collision.  As the old Navy saying goes, "a collision at sea can ruin your whole day."  Fortunately there were no injuries.