Our heat wave continues, so we set our alarm for 05:30 to let us get an early start. We want to get in all the miles we can before the heat gets bad. Nature did not cooperate, however, and delivered a major thunderstorm that delayed our departure by 45 minutes.
At any rate, after breakfast at Timmy's (Horton, we are in Canada after all), we rode down to the Rainbow Bridge, and crossed back into the good old US of A.
View from the Rainbow Bridge crossing back into the US.Our route was on US Bike Route 5 for the first part of our day until, after about 27 miles, we got to Lockport on the Erie Canal, where we had a very nice second breakfast. Here we got on the Erie Canal tow path, and rode the next 12 miles into Middleport. The tow path parallels the canal. It is the path that the animals (donkeys? oxen? Don't know) that pulled the barges on the canal used. It is now surfaced with packed limestone, which is not a bad surface for us, but does slow us down by 1-2 mph.
Erie Canal.
Margaret's view.
There was a race of some kind also being run on the tow path this morning, some runners doing over 25 to 60 miles. I honestly don't know how they can run in this heat and not get dehydrated. Some carry a couple tiny water bottles. We went through over 5 liters of water each in 3 and a half hours today.
The last twelve miles to Medina were on NY 31E.The road had good pavement, little traffic, and no real hills. Life can be good.
We are in a motel tonight; we still have some beer we bought in Canada. Margaret had an inspiration and ordered delivery pizza. Tomorrow we ride 45 to 50 miles into Rochester.
2 comments:
I remember when Niagara Falls Canada was not much more than a sleepy backwater with the attractions on Clifton Hill. THen the casinos came in and everything went nuts. The American side used to have some pretty neat attractions. but with the new gambling on the C-side, everything on the NY side went caput except the falls access points. Hope you enjoyed anyway and safe travels.
Actually, I think it was most likely mules that pulled the boats on the Erie Canal. They are larger than donkeys (and so can do more work) and usually much sturdier than horses as well as being temperamentally more suited for hard work esp. for their size (not as large as draft horses.) Mules did a lot of work back in the day.
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