THE END

"It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle."

- Ernest Hemingway, By-Line

"I'll tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than any one thing in the world. I rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a bike. It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammelled womanhood."

- Susan B. Anthony 1896

We've been off the bikes for nine days now, and it's finally sinking in that the trip is over. We're back in Minnesota, trying to adjust to "regular" life! I'm surprised how easy it was to acclimate to riding every day, and how odd it feels to not be doing that anymore. I'm also surprised by how difficult it is for me to "wrap up" the trip in this final blog entry. Without exception, I wrote every other blog entry "on the fly"--- I knew, generally, what I wanted to convey in words, and I spent about 15 minutes per blog entry typing it and posting it. I've thought about this blog entry for a week, and I still am not sure what to say.

Kami has posted the final photos to a couple of web pages, and they are linked in the "links" field---check 'em out!

Our trip took 76 days---we had two substantial breaks, when we stopped midway in Minnesota for 4 nights at home, and when we detoured to Texas after our friend's death and were off the road for almost a week. My little bike computer wasn't necessarily reliable for mileage, but it had over 3000 miles on it. I never changed the calibration when I swapped my tires out from 28s to 32s in Fargo, and I left the computer off a lot of days. We traveled through Washington, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ontario, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. We usually used the Adventure Cycling maps, unless we thought we knew better. We didn't always know better. Each area had its own distinct characteristics---geographically, and in outlook. We enjoyed it all---Kami liked the mountains best, and I liked riding through Canada the most. But, it was all good.

I had traveled through the very first part of Washington before, and I had traveled in the very last part of Maine, but otherwise I had NEVER been to ANY of the places that we rode our bikes through. I had never been on any of those roads, and I had never seen any of those sights. In many ways, that was the best part of the trip for me---not ever knowing what was around the bend (if there was a bend. Which there wasn't for long stretches of Montana and North Dakota!). It was also one of the most challenging parts for me---never knowing what to expect, if there was going to be something to eat, somewhere to sleep, something interesting to learn about. Each afternoon, consistently, we would find ourselves resting by the side of the road and we would look ahead 15 or 20 miles on the map and see the name of a town, like TROY MONTANA, and we would begin talking about what that town might be like based on its population, and the services noted. Would it have a movie theater? A Dairy Queen? A library? A coffeeshop? And then we would ride on in to it and discover what it had to offer.

There are a couple of simple truths that were reinforced by this journey---the first one, for me, was that you cannot do something like this alone. There are so many people who helped me along the way---people who I've known my entire life, like my family, and people who I met for 5 minutes on a roadside. I could have written a separate blog entry, thanking everyone who helped make this dream come true---but I know the music would play me off the stage before I got past my junior high school friends (like Barb, a/k/a Aunt Bean, who made this blog thing work for me). But,I have to put into words the appreciation I have for my dad, who taught me how to ride a bike on a hill in Waco Texas. He wasn't a big believer in training wheels, and he ran alongside me while I screamed at him not to let go. Many days on this trip I felt like he was running alongside me, never letting go. He's the greatest. My mom taught me to give everything I ever did my best shot, and see what happens. She didn't believe in quitting, and neither do I. Both my brothers rode bikes with me, and both my brothers were invaluable on this trip. David encouraged us from the first moment he heard Kami's hare-brained scheme to cross the continent on a bike, and he showed up from the wheel dip on, carrying gear, camping with style and always singing "On the Road to Morocco" in the mornings, yelling "LIVE STRONG!!!" as we wheeled away. Jeff pitched in in the Midwest, when he answered every question I had for him with "Yes, I can do that." We were in such a bind to get to Texas, and he showed us the way. My grandmother made me laugh every time I called her, with an assortment of comments and observations that were always hilarious. I can't imagine traveling without all the support I received from family, friends and strangers. Sometimes people refer to this type of bike travel, where you are carrying all your own gear on the bike as "unsupported". That couldn't be further from the truth in my case. I felt supported the entire way, even when it was just the two of us, on a deserted stretch of highway in North Dakota with 50 pounds of gear strapped to the bike.

The second truth that was affirmed for me is that people are good. I tried to convey in this blog some of the examples of human goodness, but I could have written pages and pages each day. People have so much more in common with each other than the issues that divide us--- and what I observed is that people are good at heart, they are interested, encouraging and engaged, and they WANT to help one another. I tried to return the kindness I benefited from along the way---but I often had nothing more than kind words to give back. We gave it everything we had, and tried to leave places better than we found them in some small way. I remember one night in a trailer park where we had pitched our tent. The kids of the trailer park started converging on our campsite to talk about the trip, and before long we had our pump and repair kit out and were working on their bikes to get them back in action. At the time, bike repair skills were what we had to give back.

Often, the first thing that people wanted to know about our trip was "what went wrong". Like, what was the worst part of it, the most difficult stretches, or if we had been scared, or in danger. I always changed it around and answered back about how great the trip was, and how contrary to what we often hear---it's a world full of good news. Beautiful scenery, loving people and lots and lots of humor. I can't describe the relief and relaxation I noted in people when I assured them that we were experiencing the best of human nature along the way. I'm sure they wanted to believe that people are good, and it was a joy to reinforce that to them in every part of the journey. People often expressed their belief that they KNEW people were good in their little town, but they just weren't so sure about the people in the next town or state or country over!

I'll always remember this summer as the season I traveled like a rock star--- anywhere I went with that loaded bike, I drew attention---curiosity, which usually morphed into disbelief and admiration. We learned to expect that any time we stopped, if we stayed anywhere close to the bikes we would end up meeting and greeting the locals and fellow travelers and answering their questions. At first I had a difficult time dealing with the attention, and I took some comments personally about how impossible the journey seemed. I kept up with some of the things people told me, like in Michigan when all the women had the same response to hearing about the trip: "DANG, GIRL!!!" or "NO WAY!", which I always answered, "WAY!" or the tattoo-ed man at an antiques show who walked up very close to us and thrust his fist in the air and shouted "BIKER CHICKS ROCK!!!!". SO, this was the GIDDYUPGIRLZ rock tour---all we needed was a t-shirt with that ubiquitous list of tour dates and arenas on the back: beginning MAY 26: LA CONNER, WA!!! with entries like, JUNE 9: LAKE RIVER RV RESORT, CLARK FORK IDAHO!!! and JUNE 14: AVALANCHE CAMPGROUND, MONTANA!! JUNE 29: DEVIL'S LAKE, ND HELD OVER!!!! and nearly 70 different appearances across the continent. Those rock'n'roll t-shirts would be pink, they would have a little giddyupgirlz logo with a bike wheel, a heart at the hub, wings coming off the upper sides of the wheel and a lasso across the top. Our tour name would be the SUMMER OF LOVE and it was the summer we played to a good hearted audience all the way across North America.

ATLANTIC OCEAN

We rolled up to the Atlantic Ocean yesterday afternoon, as the tide was coming in! It took us 11 weeks to get there, and the end arrived too soon for me. Our ride on Friday, up and over the Kancamagus Highway was great. The grade was not as steep as the elevation charts on my map had led me to believe, it was almost effortless to the top. In fact, we kept up with a crew of road bikers! There was some road construction on the way down, and I was watching the road ahead carefully when I saw a big moose ambling around on the side of the road. I pulled up to watch him, and was amazed by his size and the utter strangeness of his physique. I couldn't count how many cars and trucks roared by while we were standing there---looking at each other across the highway. None of the car people slowed down, none of them even saw this gigantic creature right next to them. At the beginning of the trip, we saw a moose in Washington, also on a long downhill. I like that the two ends of the trip were bookended by these big beasts.

Yesterday, we rode out "loaded" again---Kami's folks are driving north to Bar Harbor, and we were headed South to Portland. They provided excellent support during our time together. Our friend, Julien, met us in STANDISH Maine at a doughnut shop and she not only offered van support, but brought her bike along too. So, the three of us rode the final leg of the journey together, and it couldn't have been sweeter! As the miles ticked off, I could smell the ocean water. Our last shot took us on a beach road, and the surf was finally visible. We took our bikes down to the sand, and I rode mine on the beach a little bit, then dipped the tires. I dug around in my handlebar bag for that Pacific water---I freighted it the ENTIRE WAY for that moment, and was ready to return it to the Atlantic. We all sat on the rocks for a while and let it begin to sink in. We made it.

We're taking the rest of the week off, and will return home next weekend. Kami has a bunch of photos to post to a page, and I'll write one last entry to the blog before signing off. I'll try to sum it all up then---this beautiful land we live in, the goodness in the hearts of the people along the route, and what living on a bike for the summer was like for me. But, for now---I'm headed to the beach for a week. And, yes, we'll be biking!

VERMONT

We made it through Vermont and are spending the night in New Hampshire. We should make Maine tomorrow, and if we get a big enough foothold, we'll get to the Atlantic before sunset on Saturday. We are feeling ambivalent, and a little sad about the trip ending---I'm so tired, I am barely functioning. But, I'm having such a nice time, I don't want it to end so soon.

We made it to the PENGUIN movie as planned, in MIDDLEBURY. Under "ordinary circumstances", we would have found the documentary heart-warming and dear. However, our perspective is definitely slanted by our summer adventure, and when we learned that the penguins only needed to "march" 70 miles and it took them an ENTIRE WEEK to do it, we weren't very sympathetic to their plight. When the narrator, Morgan Freeman, spoke in a hushed voice about the "bad weather" the penguins were facing, we HARUMPHED at the birds. There we were, two adults sitting in the rear of the theater heckling a nature film! Those birds should try doing that on a BICYCLE! I did feel a teensy bit stirred when Morgan Freeman mentioned that the male penguins hadn't eaten in 4 months. After all, I can barely go 4 hours without eating, and I'm sure they were getting a little hungry. But even that sympathy was dampened by the fact that I had dropped all my junior mints on the floor during the previews. Plus the theater was so NON ANTARCTICA. It wasn't air conditioned.

Vermont was wonderful to us---it is definitely the best smelling state I've ridden through. The mountains are fierce, but rideable, and the scenery is of the knock-your-socks-off variety. We sat outside the general store in So. Stafford for a long time this morning, chatting with the locals. Then, at lunch we ran into some cyclists who have been married 54 years! We talked to them about the trip, and met their son who was traveling along and offering car support to them. When the gentleman heard how far we've ridden, he asked if we had gotten out of an insane asylum. But, before he left, he insisted on "touching" us. He was in awe. They recommended a nice ride, with a good blueberry patch on the roadside. I had the BEST GRILLED CHEESE sandwich EVER at Isabel's Cafe in Thetford Center. Vermont has excellent cheese!

I have been having a string of bad luck at the libraries lately---they've been closed on the days I've been in town, or had limited hours. For the first time on the ENTIRE trip, I found a library that did NOT have internet access. In Bethel, VT---and the librarian seemed uninterested in acquiring it. Today; however, my luck changed in the very small community of Piermont, where the librarian opened the library early. She welcomed us in, booted up a laptop and provided a fan. I sat with her for a long time talking about books---particularly about the challenges I've had in reading on this trip. She let me "check out" a book from her basket for an indefinite period of time, and I'll be returning it from Minnesota. Her library is immaculate, and she was interesting and encouraging. Every town would be fortunate to have a place like the Piermont Library.

My iPod continues to provide all the entertainment I need to get over the mountains and beyond. At different times, I've cued up different artists/playlists and genres. In the mountains, I always listen to rock and roll, and Kami says that she can tell when I've got a good song going, because I shoot up and over. In Canada, I listened to the Canadian girls from my collection: Sarah McLaughlin, Alanis Morrisette, kd lang, the incomparable Joni Mitchell and more. For some reason, I listened to Sinatra across the plains, and Carole King on some flats. I'll always remember a morning in Montana when it was so cold I was playing the James Taylor Christmas album! I brought along a splitter and extra headphones, and sometimes when we were camping, Kami and I both listened to interview programs that I had downloaded from NPR. I have not run out of battery charge ever, although I've come close. I'm an expert now on where to jack power, and have even been known to unplug Coke machines on remote stretches of road and sit beside my iPod while it powered up again! If only I could power up myself with such ease.

We'll ride the Kancamagus (I think I've got that spelled right now) Highway tomorrow, up and over our final mountain pass of the trip. I may not get another internet opportunity before we reach the ocean, but will update the site as soon as we get those tires wet again. The Atlantic or bust!

ANTARCTICA

At last! We are in the perfect town at the perfect time! Here in Middlebury VT, the library is next door to the movie theater, and the theater is showing MARCH OF THE PENGUINS. The library is open til 8pm on Tuesdays, and I get to sit here in the coolness for another 15 minutes before the feature presentation. I've been wanting to see the "penguin movie" for weeks now. For one thing, it looks sweet. For another thing, it looks really, really cold. Like just WATCHING the movie will induce climactic changes similar to Antarctica! I think today was the hottest day we've cycled---it was just brutal.

We are clean, fed and ready for the movie. Tomorrow we PROMISE we are getting up early to tackle a steep climb to BREADLOAF, then up and through the Middlebury gap, before shooting down the other side. Then, we have a series of passes to climb, with the steepest being the Kankamangus. No, make that Kangamankus. No. Maybe it's Kangamangus. I don't know what it is. BUT, I know it's steep.

We had a big climb today, with a lengthy downhill into Ticonderoga. I fulfilled my mini-goal to "ride my age", with a little bit to spare. I don't think I'll be able to keep this up for many more years, though. 44mph on a bike is fast enough for me. For now. Every year, on my birthday, I choose something "new" to learn in that year. Nothing too daunting---nothing like the dreams of yore when I thought I might learn a language, even English. This year I wanted to learn to either a) whistle that really shrill whistle that attracts cabs in NYC, with fingers in the mouth, or b) learn to score a baseball game. So far, I haven't found anyone who can whistle that way to teach me, and I haven't had a chance to work on a baseball scorecard. I've still got 7 months to learn one of those things, and I'm thinking ahead. More from over the pass.

TICONDEROGA

We're on the road, in Vermont. NOT quite to Middlebury yet---the CORNWALL FREE LIBRARY was too inviting to me, it's so blasted hot outside. The first town we hit this morning after the aptly named PARADOX, NEW YORK was TICONDEROGA. As soon as I found out that Ticonderoga was on our route, I began fantasizing about visiting the Ticonderoga Pencil Factory. Ticonderoga No. 2 pencils have always been my favorite pencil, and I couldn't WAIT to see how they are made! Are they made in big long 12 foot pencil lengths, then cut down to size? How do they get the lead in there, is it a molten hot liquid that's pressurized into a drilled opening? How do they differentiate between the No. 2, the No. 2.5, etc.? I could just imagine seeing those pencils coming off the line, getting those perfect pink erasers applied before the stamp of TICONDEROGA NO 2 got embedded and the pencils rolled off to be sharpened and used. So, breathlessly I arrived at the Ticonderoga Library this morning and inquired about the pencils. The librarian never even looked up, just stated "Ticonderoga pencils aren't made here. Ticonderoga pencils have never been made here. They get the graphite here, but the pencils are made elsewhere..." I feebly asked, "Where?" and she speculated that it might be Long Island. Phooey!

But, don't despair. Ticonderoga is the home to HISTORIC FORT TICONDEROGA, which we visited. It was said to be the "key to the continent" and many battles were waged to control the waterway which lead into Canada and the U.S. Guess what? It's shaped like a star, made out of stone, has a bunch of little holes cut out with guns pointed out. Marching grounds littered with assorted abandoned artillery. A moat. Quel Surprise! I looked at the exhibits about Ethan Allen (not the furniture) and Benedict Arnold (not the omelet) and Kami surveyed the perimeter.

Next stop Middlebury!

TIRE BOOT

It's been one of those days for the Giddyup Girlz---full of the unexpected, good and not-so-much-so. We spent the night last night at a basic little motel on Long Lake, NY and threw a few horseshoes before calling it a night. They had a shuffleboard court, too, but I don't understand that game well enough to even fake it. This morning I got up and bathed and was enjoying the 5 minutes of the day when I don't smell like a goat, when I realized that my rear wheel was flat again. I changed it in no time, washed some of the grease off my hands, and we hit the road. Rear wheels are only a little more annoying to change because of the grease and the chain. First stop, the post office, which was closed. Second stop, the gas station to top off the air in the tire. We were feeling so high---for one thing, we were getting an early start. For us. It wasn't 10 yet, which was an improvement to one of the days last week when we started riding after 1pm. Sometimes it just takes a little while to find your mojo!

So, on those good feelings that the sun was shining, the tires had air and we had a short mileage day in the mountains, we pulled into a diner and I decided it was a perfect day for pancakes. That was a mistake. When we left the diner, my rear tire was flat again. This time I was a little aggravated, and I gave everything a really close inspection, remembering all the things that have happened to all my friends' wheels over the years---from rim tape troubles, to spokes popping the wheel---rubs/rips/tears/ and all the rest. I zeroed in on a sidewall gash, and was glad to have brought some tire boot on the trip. "Where is the tire boot?", Kami asked as I was dumping my repair kit on the hot asphalt. "It's in the same place *your* spare tire is.....in our panniers in the trunk of a rented Taurus which was last seen driving to Vermont with your parents behind the wheel....". About this time, the aforementioned pancakes began rearranging themselves into a medicine ball-like object in my stomach. At least it cast some shade. Now, tire boot is not that big of a deal. A mechanic named Pete once told us that you could use a PowerBar wrapper or a dollar bill if you needed to. He also told me that if I got a puncture and didn't have a spare or a patch kit, I could cut the tire, knot it and ride it on in like that. "It'll be a bumpy ride, fer sure, but you'll make it!". SO, I remembered what my friend and mechanic Mike said about Duct tape---blog readers might remember the mantra with the naughty word that rhymes with "duck", and I got out the tape and booted it that way. So, we're off. The sun had taken up its usual noon time position and hammered us as climbed and descended the Adirondack Mountains. THIS time I got up to a NEW high speed which was almost but not quite equal to my age---and I had a "close encounter of the car kind", but one that I foresaw and avoided. The teenaged driver didn't come out of the situation as well as I did, according to Kami who rode up on the aftermath of the near-accident. I scared the driver pretty bad, as she realized what almost happened.

We got to spend a lot of time today with our Maine cross country cycling family of Andrew, Shirley and Noah. Noah, 14, is a kick in the pants---he is rougher on his bike than I am on mine, and today he was working on a broken spoke nipple. He's worn that thing out, and is such a good sport about it. He's the only cross country cyclist I've met this year who has carried the new Harry Potter book AND LEGOS. He rocks!!! They had a "mail pick up" of general delivery that was sent to them in North Hudson, and being the generous family that they are, they wanted to share their chocolate covered espresso beans and treats they had just received themselves with us. There's a special kind of friendship amongst those of us who've been on the road this summer---there's nothing I wouldn't do to help these people. I would give them anything they needed--- from a squished peanut butter sandwich to tire boot to my bicycle if they wanted it. And, I know they would do the same for me.

We are in Schroon Lake for the evening, coasting into MIDDLEBURY VT tomorrow. There's a movie theater in this town, but the feature has sunk to a new depth: THE SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS. Man, I could make a movie about some traveling pants. But, I'm not sure anyone would be any more interested in it than I am in the one that's showing!

TEXAS

Well, yesterday we did something we didn't know could be done! We rode our bikes to TEXAS. We rode our bikes right up to the TEXAS line, then we rode all the way across TEXAS and could have done it repeatedly but were on our way to MEXICO and had to keep going. Who knew there was a TEXAS, NY, or a MEXICO, NY? TEXAS is very small, on Lake Ontario and there isn't even a GAS STATION in Texas! We stopped down the road at a small bar for diet cokes, and the requisite teasing from the bartender and one customer. Even I can't believe how many bars I've been in this summer---for breakfast, lunch, dinner and afternoon snacks, too. AND, we're never alone in there, either!

I have 27 gears on my bike, and on this trip, I'm usually hanging out in about 8 of them---the middles of the middle and small chain ring. I save the other 19 gears for "special occasions" like yesterday, when the conditions were just perfect to hop into the big ring for long portions of downhills with the wind at our back, and then the granny gear for all the uphills. It was a beautiful riding day---certainly still hot, but not quite as oppressive as it has been the rest of the week. Of all the riding, with lots of chances to go downhill in the mountains---I was surprised that I logged my highest speed yesterday. I don't even know where it was that I was clipping along near 40 mph, but it happened somewhere in this hilly and gorgeous section of New York.

Sometimes, during the past week, I am amazed at how I can be speaking English and the New Yorkers are speaking English, yet we can't seem to understand each other. We need an interpreter! And, Kami told me repeatedly in Canada that the Canadians couldn't understand me, and didn't know my colloquialisms---like the day a man told me that we might not be able to get through a "closed road", but since we were on bicycles, it was a possibility. I told him thanks, and that we'd "give it a shot". He didn't seem to get that.

We've been trying to go to the movies for several weeks now. The small downtown theater is alive and well, but we have crossed over into FANTASTIC FOUR territory, and that film has a stranglehold on these markets. When we first were given the FANTASTIC FOUR option, in Michigan, Kami blurted out, "I'D RATHER SEE MADAGASCAR!!" Now she tells me. There are a lot of films out that I'd like to see, but I think we'll be waiting til Minnesota to catch them now. Meanwhile, I think about movie sets as we ride along. I've been reminded of movies in several spots along the way, and when it doesn't come to me immediately, I spend a lot of time looking around and trying to think of which film could have been made in a particular spot. For example, in Washington, I always thought of CITY OF ANGELS---the one where Meg Ryan was a brain surgeon (heh heh) and she wiped out on her bike with a logging truck. It was nice to not think about that after we rode with so many logging trucks. Then, there was a little DELIVERANCE section of Washington, some DANCING WITH WOLVES in North Dakota, and FIELD OF DREAMS in the Midwest, and a couple of horror shows along the way. I think this part of the ADIRONDACKS looks like a camping movie I saw, with grownups in a canoe. And maybe DIRTY DANCING, although that might have been the CATSKILLS.

But I digress. It's hot and getting hotter---so we're off towards OLD FORGE tonight, then we'll hit the really mountainous terrain. Maybe steeper than the initial mountain ranges, but not quite as long in the climbing.

THE OASIS

Greetings from SODUS POINT NY, a small village that rests on a point of real estate jutting into Lake Ontario. We had a pleasant ride into ROCHESTER yesterday, and met up with the final two cross-country cyclists whom we had heard of but not seen before. They are a father/son duo, Robert and Justin---and couldn't be nicer guys. We have been leapfrogging each other since Washington, and we took a lead when we ferried across Lake Michigan--- but they caught us after hearing about us throughout Michigan and Ontario. We exchanged some thoughts about the route and scenery, then continued along the canal. The Erie Canal is over 350 miles long! No wonder we've ridden beside it for so long.

The local paper, THE ROCHESTER DEMOCRAT AND CHRONICLE had a banner headline today warning of the impending hot weather. It was forecast to be a "scorcher", the "hottest day of the year" and by golly it was. We've had some sweltering sauna-like weather this week, and today it turned downright nasty. We were okay and partially shaded while we were on the infernal *alleged* bike path, but we finally diverted off of it when Kami flatted out her rear wheel on the rough surface. At PALMYRA, we pulled off and studied one of the homes that had been a "station" of the Underground Railway---there's a lot of history in Palmyra. We took a break to eat lunch and swap out Kami's tube, and by the time we got out of town and back on the road, it felt like our tires and the road were melting. With each wheel rotation, we could hear a "glitch" sound, as if we were stuck on fly paper. It was hot, it was humid, and it was hilly. I was feeling nauseous, but listening to my iPod as my eyes drifted longingly off the road to the houses with pools in the back yards---I wanted to get in one so bad!

After climbing a long hill, I stopped and crossed the road to sit under a large shade tree and drink some gatorade. I saw a woman up at the house, which was set off from the road, and I went up to ask her if it was okay if we rested under her tree. Annette rushed over, and asked if she could please get us some ice, some water, anything? And we declined. I think we must have looked pretty wasted, because she then said, "Why don't you take a dip in my pool and cool off?" and I said, "Where's your pool?" and she took me behind the house and there it was: nirvana! A big, sparkling blue oasis with a shooting fountain in the center! I ripped off my shoes and socks and shirt and jumped in, and Kami was just a beat behind me. Annette went inside to get us big mugs of iced tea, and after we cooled off in her pool, we sat on her patio and told her about the trip while finding out about her family, and her life in Marion, NY. She joins the league of angels who have given us just what we wanted just when we needed it. It was a perfect afternoon---we haven't had such an exquisite turn of events in a while now, and we left her yard feeling so refreshed.

The next stop for us was the Putneyville Pickle Market where I had the most delicious homemade "cherry pocket" and Kami had a Ben and Jerry's ice cream bar. Another 10 miles, and we made it to Sodus Point.

In another development, Kami's parents Jim and Jo have joined us for the New York leg of the trip---they have a car and they carried all our gear today. It's been a long time since we've ridden without all the "stuff"---and while it was a huge relief, it also left us looking like imposters when we told folks we were riding cross country. We have about 5 days left in NY, and then it should be a quick zip across VT, NH and Maine. Maybe 9 or 10 days left in this odyssey, depending on whether or not we take a rest day and the conditions along the way. We have some steep mountains to cross, but we can almost feel the ocean. I've still got that little vial of Pacific water in my handlebar bag, and I'm itching to deposit it in the Atlantic! I've been thinking a lot about the totality of the trip---all the miles, the people along the way, the sights and sounds and smells, the best moments and all the rest of the moments, too. It's something else.