Day 14 - Aug 19 The Split & Journey through New England

This morning was fairly quiet as the bikes were being packed for the ride to Lincoln, Maine. It's been known for nearly a year that when we got Plattsburgh, NY I would be leaving the group ride to go to the Albany airport to catch a flight to Milwaukee, WI for a wedding. Torrey did say good bye, but there was no "Good Morning" from Alan and Tim just looked at me and said "You're irritating me". It was a bit awkward as I watched them pull out of the drive way at 8am headed for the ferry to Vermont.  They had about 365 miles (east) ahead of them.  I had about 160 miles (south) to catch my flight.

Lake Champlain was crossed by using the Cumberland Head - Grand Isle Ferry.  By 8:23, they had successfully made the crossing. 

 In Vermont they picked up Hwy 2 and as we had become accustomed to, the scenery was great.  The weather was also suitable for riding.  It seemed the evasion of the rain clouds that had been on our tails was a success.  Shannon noted she was surprised to pass a Turtle crossing sign.  No turtle sightings were made.

As Hwy 2 neared Barre, VT the road was engulfed in fog.  A stop was made at Wilkins HD.

As they were departing Barre, Shannon snapped a pic of a cool granite sculpture. And they rolled on into Lancaster for lunch.

 

While lunching at the Irish Pub, there was one of those "small world" experiences when the waitress explained that she knew a PA that works at PMC in Pocatello. They had gone to college together.  When I found out they chose an Irish Pub for lunch I had to laugh for I thought for sure they would have stopped at McDonald's in my absence.  It turns out that Tim LOVES McDonald's at it's often his first choice when discussions of meals pops up.  Following lunch, it was a brief ride on Hwy 2 before the Maine state line was in sight.

Hwy 2 through Skowhegan and into Newport where the route took them north on 95, through Bangor and into Lincoln for the two nights.

Total miles today: 352.8;
Time to travel that distance: 11 hours
Cumulative miles: 5550.8
Tomorrow: Ride to the top

Addendum: I stopped into the Plattsburgh HD store before I left town. My ride was an easy jaunt down US87 and despite being an interstate - it was still quite a scenic ride. I did stop in Lake George, a busy little tourist town, that reminded me of Jackson Hole, WY. While there I happened upon McDermott's HD unexpectedly. At the airport, I had a brief argument with a parking garage machine that insisted that I "Take a ticket" while simultaneously refusing to print a ticket and raise the gate for me to pass.  My flights were uneventful and I reached Milwaukee with out incident.