The Wings of Empire

There's a cool summer holiday vibe in some of the small towns along the shores of the Great Lakes. This is prime time for this area — school's out, the weather is ideal, and everywhere is lush and green. Everyone seems to be in a relaxed and happy mood. Florida and southern California might have their great winters but there's nothing like summer in the northeast. I see cars passing me with licence plates from Georgia and Arizona, refugees from the southern heat.

I had a bit more of Cleveland's urban sprawl to deal with in the morning but it gave me a chance to shop for some things I needed. My old safety glasses which I had bought in Alaska a few years ago decided to snap in two — I guess it just had enough of my face — so I ducked into a Lowes hardware store to buy another one. I also found some running shorts and shirts that I like to use for cycling on sale which will save me from doing laundry on the tail end of my journey :)

In little villages like Geneva-on-the-Lake, dives selling local fare like fried Lake Erie Perch were mostly manned by students, with tip jars labelled "college fund". Towards the day before leaving Ohio, I fell in the spell of a drive-in that looked like of of those quintessential must-stops. Patrons were lining up for shredded turkey sandwiches and root beer on tap, and that was too much for me to pass off!

I could have eaten a few of these shredded turkey sandwiches!

Made it past the state border at the end of the day, where the road suddenly widened with luxurious newly paved shoulders at the start of Pennsylvania Bike Route Z which runs along its short lakefront territory towards New York state. I was lucky to get the last room in a cheap motel which was the only accommodation for miles.

The following day was a ride along Pennsylvania's "pigtail" (I made that up since it's not really a panhandle, I believe it's actually referred to as the Erie Triangle) and into Erie PA. The city has a neat layout of park squares strung along a broad avenue, the middle one being the city's main plaza. I made an effort to make a small detour into the waterfront beneath its signature viewing tower but there was not much happening there.

Too bad I wasn't hungry yet! Interesting food truck parked in Erie's town plaza with a serious smoker in the back.

Continuing on, I finally I get a respite from the monotony of cornfields as I entered the wine producing region. Almost contiguous with the Niagara region this area gets similar weather. Neat rows of vineyards line the highway, the globes of ripening fruit practically within my reach ( I actually picked one but it was still hard and sour). I stopped at two wineries, one on the Pennsylvania side and the other in New York (well, I had to compare!), and went for some reasonably affordable wine tastings. The first one offered 4 samples for $3, the second was $4 to taste all their 12 wines plus a few palate cleansers to munch on. I must admit I was a bit tipsy after that, luckily there was a good shoulder on NY bike route 517 and a nice tailwind which made getting to Lake Erie State Park effortless (or was it the wine?)

I got to taste all these for $4

The best was the frozen wine sherbet they gave at the end

The ride the next morning offered rare views of the lake, as the route mostly runs inland. I saw a sign for Graycliff, one of Frank Lloyd Wright's signature buildings, but unfortunately when I got there I had missed the last tour of the day by 20 minutes. A few years ago I had made a trip to Buffalo with some friends to see the Martin House, and Graycliff being the Martins' summer home would have been the complement to that experience. Something else to  leave for the future! They were kind enough to let me take a few pictures of the exterior, though.

Having been to Buffalo a few times, I decided to skip the messy urban core and cut across its eastern suburbs. A combination of consulting Google maps and my GPS put me on a convoluted route to avoid the busiest roads. I ended the day by checking into a motel near Buffalo's airport, and a dinner that included the requisite regional staples: Buffalo Wings and Beef-on-Weck

If anyone wants a giant concrete waitress for a lawn ornament, I know where to find one

Buffalo skyline

Beef-on-Weck is rare roast beef on a salty seasoned bun, I got it with some hot Buffalo wings

The Patriots and Heroes Park is one of the weirdest collections of memorials I have ever seen.

It's a bittersweet feeling when you reach that point in a long journey when the focus suddenly becomes about going home. While I reached that tipping point a few days ago, getting to Buffalo and upstate New York meant entering into familiar territory for me, and few things would be new.

A few years ago I travelled across the historic Erie Canal from Buffalo to Albany on a folding bike towing a kayak. It was nostalgic to ride up to Lockport and bike along a bit of the towpaths again. To most Americans this waterway is a forgotten icon, but it was once a key that opened up the expansion and development of the United States, and the emergence of the "Empire State". Past the old lift bridges which are the most interesting features on this part of the canal, I switched back to the faster paved road following NY Bike Route 5 so that I could aim to get to Rochester for the day.

Lockport Locks

"Low bridge, everybody down!"

Riding the old Erie Canal towpaths 

The Rochester skyline

It's bad timing to come into a big city on the weekend, most of the accommodations are booked solid and they tend to jack up the price of a room to a premium. I couldn't find any place to stay when I got to the western end of Rochester so I kept on riding through some pretty sketchy looking neighbourhoods until I got past the densest part of the urban area. I was preparing myself to find some bushes behind which to pitch a tent in the fading dusk when I came upon a decent cheap motel. Amazing how things just sometimes work out!

New York, where they have the chutzpah to tell you to eat sheet