6-6-10 Day 9: Morrisville, NY to Auburn, NY: 54 miles in 5:20 hrs: Rt 20 west the whole day.
These are the kinds of days that are true character builders. My gosh, it had all the makings for a total washout, the kind of day where you want to just stay in bed.
Well, the weather guys were right on with the Sunday forecast out here because the rain came in about 3 AM and just stayed steady until about 7 AM. Funny how in everyday life you tend to overlook something like rain, maybe even shrugging it off as “just a crappy day!” But faced with the likelihood of riding a bike in it for 5 or 6 hours, you, or I should say I, tend to fixate on it. How hard, how cold, how long, how much? Yup, my world today revolved around rain, and this was to be my first day with the full Magilla – yak and panniers for a total of about 75 lbs of gear – and it was shaping up to be the worst day we’ve had since the trip started. And it was!!
So by about 8 AM the rain had tempered down to a drizzle, and I actually started to feel a bit more optimistic about getting the gig going. So I loaded all my gear into the bags in our room, then we ate breakfast and loaded up the van and drove back the 30 miles to my end point in yesterday’s ride. That gnarly westerly headwind had picked up again to the 20+ mph area – but at least the rain had ceased. And the sun actually broke a few times as we put the “train” (bike and yak) together. Bill shuddered a few times as he was holding the whole train up as I fastened up the front panniers. Yea, lots of bloody weight to drag up and down the USA!
And that was it…8 days of hanging together with Judy and Bill, all the riding, the eating, the sightseeing, the fun and the joking around. Over. Now it was just me. Me humoring me, me talking to me, me riding with me. Just me. Had to get it going. No long goodbyes. Gave Judy the kiss and hug, and gave Bill a big bear hug and off I went down the road. Great thing about this trip as opposed to last year’s Trans Can – I would be back home in about a week to regear and then take off again for the longer half of the trip to the West Coast. But it was refreshing to know that I’d see loved ones and friends in just a short week of riding.
So I got it rolling and it was like déjà vu, with that big unwieldy yak kind of rocking back there, the bike feeling like a total tank, and my legs just working HARD against that westerly headwind right from the start. Rolled down the road about 5 minutes and no van, and then finally there they go, by me to the west heading for Syracuse to the I-90 interstate. A brief wave to them and then silence – the the wind just howling away. And then the first climb, 8 min down the road and there it was, so I shifted into the middle ring. No good, too hard. Ok, looks like little cookie. Ok. But had to keep shifting until – yup, you guessed it, down to the easiest gear – the freaking pie plate in the back. Rocking in and out of the saddle from the get-go. Hell, I hadn’t done little ring in Canada until the Canadian Rockies. But here in the Allegheny’s of NY – BANG!
And that puppy took me 20 minutes to climb. But hey, the clouds had parted a bit and the rain jacket I had borrowed off of Bill came off and I was just riding in my short sleeved jersey. Into downtown Morrisville, and then another climb. And then a descent and another climb, and this went on ad infinitum. The climbing was just totally vicious. Then I went through the town of Nelson, and descended into a place called Pompey Hollow, and up ahead with this straight as an arrow climb. Just straight up with no switchbacks. It pretty much took my breath away seeing something so steep and a summit so not even in view.
I was in the little ring from the get-go, totally geared to the minimum, in and out of the saddle. I mean this thing was totally crazy. Again, another 20 minute plus climb. But it false summated several times before giving me my just deserved descent. Then into Cazenovia, and again, just outside of town, another monster climb. But as I was finishing this climb out I saw what looked like a rain front blowing in, almost like a veil of rain just up the road. Nope, it was fog, and at the top I was suddenly in the midst of a total whiteout. Temps dropped a good 15 degrees, so I had to hurriedly put the rain jacket back on. Add to that the maniacal headwind and it was like a meat locker at the top of that mountain.
So I got to the descent of this thing, completely in a whiteout, and started flying down the mountain, and the wind was hammering me, hammering me so much that I just had to put locked arms into the bars to hold the front end straight. And it was just crazy once I got to about 30+ mph, plowing into me like a bloody freight train. Took all my strength to hold my little train in a straight line. So this continued for about 3 more climbs and descents, the whiteout thing. By Navarino the fog lifted, but was replaced by a very cold drizzle amidst a gusting headwind.
By then I was hungry, but I didn’t dare stop for fear of chilling out too much to start again, so I just bucked up and kept it rolling down the road. Figured that I’d have to keep it going sands food for the entire day, with just the water I had in my bottle cages and the few energy bars in my pack. Forget the coke, the sandwiches, the warm soup. Just keep rolling. So that was the plan. And it was there that I decided that my destination would be Auburn – a mere 54-mile day. But at an average speed of 9.6 mph – a long, gnarly day in the saddle.
Made it to Skaneatetes, billed as the Eastern Gateway to the Finger Lakes. And there was the sign: 5 miles to Auburn. What a freaking relief. On my climb out of town I stopped at a pizza parlor to ask if there was a motel in Auburn, just to save myself the freakout factor of getting there and finding it was just a little hamlet. Nope camping areas at all in the entire stretch, and what with the weather, a motel sounded like a good way to warm up. So anyway, guy in pizza shop said I had a great choice of several places. Back on the bike, into the drizzle and continued to climb out of Skaneatetes.
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