kristingbridges
44 Miles from Utica to Canajoharie
67 Miles from Utica to Amsterdam
The title I wanted to use for this blog would have lost me my “all audiences” rating. Just remember as you read, I saved a baby bird today – A. BABY. BIRD!
We started out pretty well. It was going to be about 44 miles to that unpronounceable town. When Brian was making the reservations, he said we could get a 3 star rated motel there, or go like 60 miles in a day to get to Amsterdam. I laughed. That’s crazy talk. 3 stars is my limit, but that’s better than dreaming we could ever go over 60 miles in one day, especially on day 7 of a 9 day trip. (That’s called “foreshadowing” 😉 )
After a few miles on a decent trail, we got to a nice little stop that had a bike repair station, so we stopped and checked our tire pressure and I used the tools to try to sort out the maddening “tick, tick” my crank/pedal was making. It worked for about a half a mile. There was a map that even showed the rest of the trip was on an off-road trail, not on-road. It was a lying, liar sign. (more foreshadowing) Then we got to the Ilion marina and the only thing I still needed was there, a very nice bathroom. We were good to go until lunch!
Lunch was on the canal at a lock again. There was a Dunkin Donuts just down the road and right on our way from the hotel last night. We each got donuts and then sandwiches for lunch. It was good that we had a better lunch than our usual tortilla and peanut butter lunch (yep, more foreshadowing). Then things took a bit of a turn. We got to a crossover on the trail, no big deal. Except it said that section was temporarily closed. There wasn’t a “detour” sign per se. But there was a sign for the trail on a neighborhood road. There really wasn’t any traffic to speak of, but then, of course, since we were no longer on a bike trail, there was a grade. Brian’s cyclometer warned him of how steep it was, but he knew I wouldn’t want to know. It topped out at 11.7% grade and I did fine. The trail signs (and Dan Henrys) kept us on a road for probably 10 miles, some of which was through neighborhoods that I kept expecting to hear banjos in and we hit at least one more 8% grade. Then all of the sudden, there was the trail directly to the left of the road we were on.
Brian literally lifted our bikes, bags included, over a guardrail to get onto the trail, only to find that there was an opening and crossover just around the corner. Back to happy times on a paved bike trail. Smooth sailing! Brian even spotted a fox crossing in front of us – a first!
By about 10 miles from our planned stop for the night, my body, especially my seat, was putting up a massive protest. I tried a Honey Stinger with caffeine. It may have helped a little, but I was really on the struggle bus. Then I passed something on the side of the trail. It was a very little, barely fledged bird. I think it was a sparrow, but my mom will probably correct me with the photo. 😉 It really blended in with the trail color and was in serious danger of being hit. There was actually quite a bit of traffic on the trail here. I stopped, scooped it up, Brian got a picture, and then I found a stump at the base of a tree that it likely fell from and put it there. It was well protected by the underbrush next to the trail. I’m concerned that I wasn’t getting screamed at or dive-bombed by a parent, but I gave it its best chance to survive that I could. As I pulled away, it fluffed its wings and chirped for a parent.
I felt GREAT after that. Karma should be smiling on me, right? When we got into the town for our stop, there was a festival going on. Very quaint, small town stuff. We had to walk our bikes on the sidewalk through the main street because it was so busy. Then I saw where we were headed, up a hill. Of course. But really it wasn’t too bad, just a single-digit climb up and over a bridge, then we had to take a right, down the hill. Then, ugh, up a 12% grade to the motel. We made it just fine, though. As we were starting to park our bikes, I was checking out the place. It looked like more of a 1 star rating than 3. Then the manager/proprietor, something, came out. “No rooms!” “Oh, that’s fine, we have a reservation.” Long story, short. She made all sorts of excuses that had something to do with water issues. But there were clearly many decent-looking cars there, so she had let other people take our room. We’re guessing she was getting more money than our Hotel.com good deal we got. I suspected she would have suddenly figured it out if we tried to offer her money.
Brian and I pulled out our phones. There was literally nothing available nearby. Festival in town. There was Amsterdam that we were planning to pass through on the way to Schenectady tomorrow, but that was 20+ miles from where we were. We left the sleazy motel and headed to the Walgreens back up the road we had passed. I went in and got some big bottles of water and a bottle of chocolate milk for Brian. He made a reservation at The Castle B&B in Amsterdam. It was pricey, but at this point, I didn’t care. He got the last available room and it was confirmed.
We walked our bikes back through the festival, found the continuation of the trail and set off. The surface was actually paved the whole way. It was amazing. My body had found a second wind. Brian was feeling good, too. We averaged faster that 23 miles than we had all day, maybe all week. Nothing hurt. It doesn’t make sense. It’s the amazing human body and the brain-body connection. We went 50% farther than we had planned and completed more miles than we ever have in a day. At 62 miles, we quickly high-fived for completing a “metric century” which is what cyclists call 100 km in a day. Neither of us have done 100 miles in a day, but this was my 3rd metric century and Brian has done 4. Still, since we had to keep going to 67 miles, it was the longest ride ever for either of us.
Then we saw it, clearly something that looked like a castle. Up. A. Hill. Because that’s ALWAYS how it is for us. The road up to the hotel wasn’t extreme. But the driveway? That was 18%. Did I mention we had just gone 67 miles? I wasn’t about to stop. Down into granny gear, and for the first time ever, I used the slalom approach, pedaling up as much as I could, crossing sideways to the other side and up again. It worked! We reached our destination and it is AMAZING!
Brian has been on the phone with hotels.com and we are not only getting a refund, but a voucher for the difference. That motel we had booked was $59 per night. Let’s just say this one isn’t nearly that cheap. They let us eat in the restaurant even though by the time we got showers, it was close to their posted closing time and it was awesome.
Somehow, I think Karma is paying out even though it didn’t feel like it at the time. I hope that baby bird found its mama and is safe and warm tonight.