I just wasn’t feeling it today. It wasn’t a bad day. I was rested and felt well physically. The terrain wasn’t very difficult. The weather was nice. I have had a bit of a headwind since north of Albany. It hasn’t been too difficult to pedal against; it just slows me down a bit. Today, it was stronger and occasionally switched to the side to try to knock me off balance. I don’t think that really contributed to my mood, though. The highway I traveled was busier than what I have been on recently, but not bad.
Dear Drivers (June 8)
Dear Drivers,
Don’t hug the white line, even if the person on the bicycle is all the way on the other side of a wide shoulder. If you hug the white line, it looks like you don’t have control of your vehicle or don’t know where you are on the road. It looks like you are not paying attention and might do something rash at any minute. There is no reason to hug the white line. If you feel like you need to hug the white line, you are probably driving too fast to control your car and need to slow down.
Pass if it is safe to do so. Don’t follow slowly for a long distance if there is room to pass. It makes me think you are getting ready to commit some sort of act of road rage.
Soaked to the Bone (June 5)
I knew today would be a short day. Not because I was tired, but because of the weather. It was raining hard when I woke up. I waited it out and ended up on the road at about 10:30 this morning. The rain held off as I road through Albany. The route into downtown Albany followed a bike route that was mostly a multi-use trail. The other people on bicycles waived; the joggers just stared.
Beginning (May 14)
I must have been more nervous than I realized. I did everything the night before, including showering, so all I had to do in the morning was eat breakfast and leave. Still, it took an hour and half to get on the road. I didn’t even make it out of Brooklyn before my bear canister fell off my back rack. I use a bear canister because I’m not quite coordinated enough to hang my food and the northeast has black bears. In past tours, I have put it in one of the rear panniers. I am trying something different this time to save space in the panniers. I have a stuff sack with my sleeping bag and anything related to sleep. The sack and the canister are strapped to the top if the rack. I put the stuff sack next to my seat because I could force it a little under the seat. Then the canister was behind the sack. I kept hearing a little banging with every bump until the canister slipped out from the straps holding everything down. A little rearranging, putting the canister next to the seat and synching up the straps tight into the sack, fixed the problem.
It took about 4 hours to get out of the New York City, which is about what I expected. I took a route that I’ve taken before, crossing the East River by the Queensborough Bridge, then through Central Park, along the Harlem River, into the Bronx and Westchester County. In Westchester, I took the South County Trail and North County Trail. Once I crossed New Croton Reservoir, I headed east to Mountain Lakes Park.
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow
So . . . I leave tomorrow morning. I am not really nervous. I am not really excited either. For some reason, the only thing stuck in my head today is that I plan to do a long ride tomorrow. I have not really thought past that. The problem with starting a tour this early in the season is that I have not had enough time to build up my endurance. That will quickly change in the next few weeks, but tomorrow may be a really long day.
I am mostly packed, except a few things that I need tonight and tomorrow morning.
This morning I had to run a couple of errands. My belt broke last night; I needed another. I have also been looking for new cycling gloves because my old gloves are falling apart. The old pair has crocheted backs. I was looking for something similar, but could not find any. That style must not be popular anymore because nobody seems to carry them. I finally settled on some that have a thin, almost mesh back. They will work fine. They have more padding than my old gloves, which may be a good thing on this trip. The extra padding feels odd, but I will get used to it soon enough.
Delay
For the past couple of weeks, I have been trying to have the chain and cassette on my bicycle replaced. After the first shop told me they had to order the cassette, it would be in in a few days, it didn’t come in and would take another week, I finally found a shop that could have it done before my planned departure date. I also asked them to look at the rear brake, which was giving me trouble. At about 6:30 this evening, the mechanic called to let me know that he thought the brake lever may need to be replaced and it would probably take a day or two to get the part. About an hour and a half later, he called backed and said that the brake lever did not need to be replaced after all and the bike was ready to be picked up.
I rushed over to the shop . . . or rather, I tried to rush over to the shop but New York City Transit had other ideas. I meandered? Moseyed? Moved toward the shop with all the speed of a wounded snail? I finally reached the bike shop about ten minutes before it closed and got my bike.
Pedaling America 