Bike Across America – Days 43 and 44

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

Start: Niagara Falls, New York
End: Rochester, New York
Mileage today/cumulative: 87 / 3,186
Elevation Ascended: 1,585′
Weather: Sunny, 66° at start; sunny, 83º at finish
3D Relive Video (approx. 1 minute)

Q: When you’ve spent 42 days cycling across America (and part of Canada), eating in chain restaurants and hotel banquet rooms, where do you go when you get to civilization?

A. A wine bar.

And that’s how we began our 36 hours of freedom from a bike seat – with real food and a bottle of wine to celebrate arriving in Niagara Falls. The next morning, it was back to the glamorous rest day routine: Starbucks and the laundromat before sightseeing. This was our first visit to Niagara Falls, so we spent some time exploring the park and seeing each of the Falls. They’re awesome in the truest sense of the word. Unfortunately, the area around the Falls is touristy and trashy, a textbook case of mankind marring something beautiful in nature. Once we saw the Falls, we were anxious to get back on our bikes and continue eastward.

Today’s ride was pretty uneventful. The weather was nice, even if the air felt thicker than it has been. It was an easy 87 miles without much to write home about. New York State means more cars and more attitude but when we got out in the countryside, things settled down and we cruised along without much bother. The terrain will begin to change later in the week as we near the Vermont border and everyone gets challenged with the three Hs: heat, humidity, and hills. The end is in sight but we have a few more days of cool stuff to see and miles of road to conquer before we can dip our wheels in the Atlantic Ocean. At this time next week, we’ll be back in our house, cuddled up on our couch, reflecting on this great adventure, and thinking about our next one.