Centennial, Wyoming: Wes and I returned to our little cabin
in the mountains of Wyoming. We grin
madly as we get the cabin open, sweeping up the jillions of dead flies,
uncovering the furniture, and getting
the well started again. Wes, whose
emotions are always on his shirt sleeves, stops to jump for joy on occasion. We
bask in the glow of domesticity. We delight in cooking in our kitchen, which we
have completely stocked with food. We enjoy cooking in my own pots and pans, and
setting a candle-lit dinner, while listening to classical guitar of Sharon
Isbin followed by Schubert’s suite for piano and flute.
Little things, like wearing
slippers and a bathrobe, feel utterly delicious. How nice it is to use my electric toothbrush
and waterpik. We both put on clothes
from our drawers. We are glad to get out
of those dratted bike clothes. We show
each other how big our clothes have become.
I gloat, “I need to take in these pants!” Wes pulls his pants’ waistband out several
inches and says, “I gotta put another notch in this belt.” All of this feels so good, but it is tempered
by the recognition that we must maintain what we have learned (and earned) and
not let the lessons and fitness of our journey slip away.
It takes a good while before we can get out of the shadow of
the border. We are following the
Adventure Cycling route, and true to form, the route takes us away from
services and the city, wending around back ways with a complicated set of
turnings. The route is following the
highlands of the Niagara Escarpment, the tall ridge of granite encrusted
limestone that runs all the way from Niagara through the Bruce Peninsula,
forming the backbone of Georgian Bay.
Also true to form, Wes and I miss a critical turn and ride off the 300
foot escarpment. At the bottom, we
realize the error of our ways and are trying to figure out what to do, when we
are joined by a slightly pudgy cyclist who pulls out of a pack of speeding road
bicyclists.
He asks where we are going and if we have secured a place
for the night. We tell him that we are
going to the Erie Canal and we don’t have a place yet. He
says that he would have offered us a place, but he is just 15 miles into a
century ride, but if we want to get to the Erie Canal without the giant climb,
we should take this road then take this alternative route to Lockport. While we are there, we should go see the
locks. They are pretty amazing.
We thank him for his advice, and follow his directions, but
think we won’t go see the locks. We have
seen the locks for the giant ships at Sault Ste. Marie, after all. How interesting could these be? Pretty damn interesting, as it turns
out. Using the route described by our
friendly biker, we returned to the top of the escarpment where the pretty canal
town of Lockport is located. There, we
were astounded to watch boats being lifted up from valley floor to the top of
the escarpment. Through a series of 7 or 8 locks, each raised the boats about
15 feet. No wonder the Erie Canal was
the engineering marvel of the 19th century. It was impressive to watch when the locks
were using electric pumps and hydraulics.
We still can’t understand how they did it in 1825.
After visiting with some former New Yorkers who currently
live in Key West and have ridden their motorcycle up to see family, we make our
way down the toll path. Just as a note,
the range and variety of people who ride motorcycles all over the country is
amazing. This couple was in their late
60’s; he was a former firefighter with slicked-back hair. She used to work for the Catholic Church and
is very religious. I don’t believe I
have ever been blessed with the sign of the cross so many times within a single
conversation.
Riding the Erie Canal toll path is like entering a time
machine. The canal pre-dates almost
everything around it. Its construction
changed both New York and the rest of the country. We stop and read all the information
markers. While I had been given a
rudimentary background on the Erie Canal during my elementary and junior high
schooling, Wes did not. However, we are
both surprised to find out that the Erie Canal is responsible for New York
state being called the Empire State, and New York City becoming the financial
center of the country. “Clinton’s
Ditch”, as it was first called in derision of the governor who championed it,
made boomtowns and millionaires wherever it went. It made cities like Cleveland and Detroit
possible, by bringing people and goods to the whole Great Lakes Basin.
It went through three construction periods, growing ever
larger, wider and deeper, and was still carrying barge traffic until the late
1950’s. Some of the towns have
successfully transformed from shipping to recreation and tourism towns. Some have not. As we bike along the smooth, flat, graveled
surface, I look for buildings and businesses from the 19th
century. There are quite a number of
Federal style buildings (identified by their low second story windows) still being
occupied. There are an even larger
number of stores and shops from the 1890’s, with their characteristic eyebrow
windows and boxy shapes. They bump up
against houses from the 20th century. Occasionally, the Erie Canal passes by an
outbreak of plastic land, that ubiquitous, ugly amalgamation of chain stores
and fast food joints that ring small and large cities and towns alike. We wonder how many of these pressboard and
plastic monstrosities will be useable in 50 years, much less 200 years.
However, mostly it passes through quiet countryside, with
the occasional village thrown in. The
first we visit is a town called Medina, where we have made last minute
arrangements to stay at the Garden Bed and Breakfast. After making arrangements with the bored
proprietress, who hands us off to her sunburned and chatty husband, Wes and I
ride into town for dinner. The road to
town passes by one gigantic mansion after another, with a very few derelict
wrecks thrown in. The downtown has been
restored and has both cute shops and functioning businesses in its 1890
storefronts. The town in just in the
midst of restoring its massive 1906 opera house, which has sat empty for more
than 50 years. It is the last big piece
of real estate sitting empty in the downtown area. When we mention how impressed we were by the
town and the efforts with the opera house, we get the first and only smile from
our landlady, who sits on the board for the opera house restoration.
The next morning, I sleep in while Wes goes downstairs and
has a meager breakfast with the hosts.
He asks about the many signs we have seen along the roads, including one
on their drive, which says “Repeal New York SAFE act.” When he does, the proprietress jumps up from
the table and stomps from the room from the room saying, “Let’s not get into
THAT!” We find out later that there is
big controversy about the gun registration law recently passed by the New York
legislature. Apparently, this is yet
another example of what one fellow tell us is “legislation being forced down
the throats of real New Yorkers by arrogant New York City and Long Island
snobs.” Resentment against downstate
money and power is a constant, palpable theme in our interactions with upstate
New Yorkers. Many people said they
wished that New York City would just secede from New York State. I wonder if they would miss the city’s tax
revenues.
The canal is a man-made river. The trees are just beginning
to turn color, and the water is slow moving and as reflective as a lake. Often
it is high above the surrounding landscape, more like an aqueduct than anything
else. Natural rivers actually pass beneath
it. Even so, it has become a haven for
all sorts of birds. The second day of
our ride along the Erie Canal, we spook eight great blue herons, who wait until
we are practically alongside their perch, before they grumpily and majestically
remove themselves to the other side of the canal. We laugh at a braggart osprey, who after
plunging down and successfully catching a wriggling fish, screams happily up
and down the water before flying to its hidden nest. He seemed to be saying, “Look! Look! I caught
a big one! A big one, I tell ya!”
After the commercial bustle of Medina, the next community we
visit is Albion. Our tires are taking a
beating on the gravel path and need air.
I need more supplies to deal with the never ending pain and abrasion in
my netherparts. Albion has a finer
collection of 1890’s brick storefronts than Medina. The workmanship is better; the buildings are
larger. There is a sweep and presence to
its canal side business district unseen in either Lockport or Medina. However, that is where the similarity
ends. Most of the buildings are
empty. If they are being used, it is
with marginal businesses like thrift shops.
There is a large social service presence with signs telling people where
they can food or energy assistance. We
see a young mom, with a bad and grown out blonde dye job, pushing a stroller to
an aid agency. She is having a raucous
verbal confrontation with a tattooed, baggy pants young man whom we assume is
the father of the silent, big eyed toddler.
I find a car repair garage in a former livery barn. Inside, a young man is covered in grease,
working on a beater pick-up truck, while a grizzled old man with a patchy beard
peers into the open hood and tells of the truck’s many problems. They are unaware of me. Finally, I say, “Excuse me, could I trouble
you for some air?” Startled, they both
turn to look at me and they are even more startled. I suspect middle aged female bicycle tourists
are not common in these parts. Actually,
I suspect tourists are not common in these parts. They recover themselves, and after wiping his
hands, the young man fills all my tires with air. We visit a bit, then I ask if there is drug
store around here. They puzzle for a
minute, then remember, “There’s a Rite-Aid up on the highway about mile and
half from here. If you go up the hill
over there, you’ll find it.” As I get
ready to leave, the older man calls after me.
“Make sure you don’t leave your bike unlocked when you go in the store,
it’ll be stole for sure.”
When I tell Wes about the location of the drug store, he
says, “Let’s just get out of here.” Our
creeped-out feeling was confirmed when we were making our way back to the canal
path when two young men, sporting what looks like gang colors, flounce up to
us, and grant us no room on the sidewalk to pass them. We have to step into the street to get by. After passing us, the more burly of the pair,
goes out into the middle of the street and starts yelling something we can’t
make out. It is clear he is intoxicated. From the second floor of a building we
thought was unoccupied, another young man wearing a bandana head-wrap, pulls
aside a board from the window, and yells back.
We think the street yeller might be making arrangements to pick up or
get drugs later. As we return to the
canal, we see a derelict 19th century mansion just above the toll
path. A group of about 6 young men, both
African American and European-American, are sitting on the steps, passing a
pipe. We wave. One fellow waves back. We are glad to get out of there.
The contrast of this
impoverished community with its active drug presence with the next town was
quite stark. Brockport has embraced its
tourist and recreation present and is full of brewpubs, eateries, bookshops and
the like. Medina, Albion, and Brockport
are only about 15 miles apart from each other.
We wonder about the civic culture in each town that has led them to
their current state.
The next day is
also a study in contrasts as we traverse Rochester and its environs. But that is a story for the next post.
Posted from Centennial, Wyoming
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