Life On A B-I7

Route

• Amherst, Rest Day

Metrics

• No need for metrics today.

Notes

• Today is “Planning” day.

Thought For The Day

• Your past does not determine your future.

Today is a great day to be off the road and planning the remainder of my ride. There is rain coming down in buckets this morning. if I were riding today, at the very least it would mean a late start. If the weatherman can be trusted, tomorrow and the next day will be good riding days. After that, anybody’s guess.

This is day 80. I’ve been told a young man can do this ride in 80 days or less. (Not around the world, just across the country… This trip is not based on the classic Jules Verne novel, just to be clear.) it looks like I’ll be doing it in about 100 days. I consider that a win.

I’ve already started casually thinking about the next adventure. This sort of thing gets in your blood and it’s difficult to dismiss. I’m looking forward to winter. I’ll be in great shape for the ski season, hopefully the snow will come back this winter.

What is it that makes a person enjoy riding a bicycle across the country? Of course, the answer to that question is different for everyone. For me (I hope without being too cliché) it’s about the open road. It’s also about the accomplishment. And yes, it’s about the work. But to do this day in and day out requires a bit more than just enjoying the freedom and the work. You also have to have a special love for process.

I spent almost 40 years as an IT guy. (That was when humans actually instructed computers what to do…) I guess you could say there was a bit of process involved in that line of work. But I also think it’s built-in to my nature. If it weren’t, I never would have chosen that career path. Like that career path, there is a lot of process involved in cycling across the country. You arrive at your destination, you unpack, you sort, you set up, you eat and then you sleep. In the morning, you do it all over again in reverse. That is essentially your life for 100 days. Is it a good life? Yes.

I have been generally following the ACA route called the “Northern Tier.” From Buffalo, the Northern Tier route goes north to Niagara Falls and then generally northeast along lake Ontario to Ticonderoga, New York. What that route misses is the fact that there is a cycleway, mostly paved, that goes from just north of Amherst, where I am currently, all the way to Albany. There is another cycleway in Albany, that goes north to Ticonderoga. That means the next 400 miles I can do almost entirely on paved cycleway! I’m choosing the cycleway route. I suspect the ACA route was established prior to the advent of New York’s cycleways and hasn’t been updated to reflect that development. Tomorrow I will be starting the next and final stretch of my tour on the Erie Canal Cycleway.

An interesting sidebar to this route change is the fact that I didn’t know about the cycleway from Albany to Ticonderoga until I was told about it by an employee at REI today. I didn’t even know there was an REI in Amherst until last night! I’m glad I went in today!

I laughed when I rode by this car a couple weeks ago. I did a double-take when it passed me on the road a few minutes later!

Itinerary Maps