John's Crazy Bike Rides

I'm active in a bike group which is part of Arlington's 55+ program. I started to have free time during the pandemic, and about the same time grudgingly began to accept that I am in the 55+ age category. I went looking for things to do and found this group, which at the time was barely alive. The previous generation of ride leaders had stepped away and of course the pandemic was a giant monkey wrench. I volunteered to be a ride leader, a process which involved a shocking amount of bureaucracy (background check, resume, application), and for a while, I was the only ride leader! Over time, my friends John and Clare (with whom I went biking in Portugal) pretty much took over leadership of the group, though I'm still part of the leadership group. Clare is very good at the mechanics - getting the ride calendar to the county on time so it can be published in the rec booklet, making sure ride leaders show up, etc. John does the hands-on ride leading, and even organizes alternative plans such as coffee or lunch for bad weather days when rides get cancelled.

John's a really good guy, but not always very detail-oriented. Truth be told, he can be what my grandmother would have called farchadat (פֿאַרטשאַדעט), a Yiddish word meaning confused, clueless, or generally out of it. 

The normal 55+ rides are about 20-25 miles long and generally stay mostly on trails. John decided he wanted, on alternate weeks, to organize a series of more challenging rides of about 40 miles. Let me tell you about a the two longer rides John has hosted so far. Let's start with the first, from Columbia Island Marina to Lake Artemesia in PG County. 

I had an early optometrist appointment that day, so I showed up at the marina just in the nick of time with my eyes still dilated from the eye exam. I was wearing those goofy free sunglasses they give you when you have an eye exam. Actually, the pair they gave me was a little higher quality than the cardboard sunglasses you sometimes get and looked almost like something you might actually wear on purpose. Given that I was joining riders in their 60's, 70's and 80's, no one was phased by my oversized, old-folks style wraparound shades. Even with them everything was kind of bright and blurry.

Groovy post-eye exam shades

Besides not being able to see right, my other problem was that as I pulled my bike out I discovered that one of my tires felt soft - not really flat, but squishy. I didn't have time to change the tube, but decided I would pump it up and see if it held air. Maybe I could get through the ride. I mentioned this issue to John.

Five minutes later we were all gathered near the marina building. I was down on one knee pumping air into my tire when John announced, "it looks like everyone's ready - let's go!" and the group took off. I swear, I think that man never healed from some long-ago head injury. I quickly pumped a little more air into the tire, packed up my pump, and chased after the group - I caught them in the middle of the 14th Street Bridge. It was a sizable group of about a dozen riders, and John rode in his usual style - running red lights or passing through lights that were changing, without thinking about whether the whole group would make it through. I'll add that John hadn't distributed the route, so it was important that the group stay together. Also, he hadn't designated a "sweep" (a person who rides in the back of the group to handle any stragglers or other issues). Since I was already at the rear and generally knew the route (John and I had test ridden it a few weeks earlier), I decided to sweep the ride.

John is also guilty of my least favorite rider leader behavior, which is that when he stops for a break, he waits until the back of the ride catches up and then immediately takes off again. In doing that, the faster, stronger riders get breaks, while the slower riders never get a chance to stop. By the time we got to Bladensburg some of the people in the back were already slowing down (including, inexplicably, one guy on an eBike), and I mentioned to John that he should pause long enough to give the riders at the back a chance to rest as well. From then on, every time we'd stop he'd ask me if they had rested enough - not to be a jerk, but just because he really didn't seem able to gauge the idea of giving the riders in the back a rest break.

We made it to Lake Artemesia without problems and did a quick lap around the lake. My bike tire was still holding air. Here's another thing about John - he likes to go out for lunch at the end of a ride, which means that he doesn't like long rest stops along the way (see the previous paragraph). A lot of ride leaders, having reached the ride's destination, would take a snack and water break before heading back but John just continued on to start the trip back. The folks at the back got slower and slower. Finally, I was tailing a woman who was doing about eight miles per hour. She wasn't struggling or upset; I guess her legs were just getting worn out and she slowed wayyy down. I was glad that I was sweeping, because otherwise she would have been all by herself and would have gotten totally lost - a couple of times I had to correct her when she made wrong turns. 

Anyway, eventually we all made it back as far as the Wharf, where about half the group stopped for lunch at the Falafel, Inc. (I'm ambivalent about this place because of the decor at some of their locations) while the rest continued over the bridge back to our starting place. Overall, a successful ride, but maybe a little much for one of our riders (to her credit, she wrote a very nice email to the county saying she enjoyed the ride and praising John's leadership and my support for her along the way).

Which brings us to John's next long ride, to Lake Needwood in Montgomery County. Unlike the Lake Artemesia ride, John hadn't pre-ridden this one and so all of us were on a journey of exploration. I was actually kind of happy to have a little unknown adventure, as this week I was supposed to have been on my annual week-long kayak camping trip, which is usually a week full of fun unknowns. Unfortunately, this year's trip fizzled when just about everyone dropped out, and once it was down to just the Hungarian and me we decided we didn't have critical mass and cancelled.

Anyway, we headed north from Pierce Mill in DC. Not as many people showed up this time: it was down to just the 55+ ride leaders (John, Clare, Gordon, Roy, and me) plus a couple of additional stalwarts. The beginning of the ride was easy - trails we've ridden many times before. But then it got rougher. Not crazy, but bumpy, skinny trails which wound through a bunch of Montgomery County community parks - not exactly the promised bucolic scenery. When we were still about seven miles from Lake Needham one of our riders decided he had had enough of having his bones rattled by the root heaves and turned back (this was the same guy who disappeared from one of my earlier trips - at least this time he told us he was going to turn back!). The rest of us soldiered on, switching back and forth multiple times between Beach Drive (smooth pavement, but lots of cars and no shoulder or bike lane) and the trail (bumpy, bumpy, bumpy). 

Noy again ...

Early in the trip, our first planned break, at a playground known as Candy Cane City, was thwarted because the park was fenced off for construction, and a few times we had to stop and figure out where we were going or correct for wrong turns because the trail system was confusing. When we hit yet another closed trail somewhere in Rockville, we decided to abandon our goal of reaching Lake Needwood and instead head to nearby coffee shop for a break (when Clare is along on rides, John is more inclined to take breaks). The trail took us to close to the shopping center where the coffee shop is located, but there was no bike-friendly way to cover the last 1/2 mile or so. We just gritted our teeth and rode our bikes on the 40 MPH, multi-lane road, hoping that we wouldn't be run down by traffic.  Even worse was riding the same stretch on the way back. It didn't make sense to cross the road and ride with traffic, as with multiple lanes of traffic we wouldn't have been able to get back to the correct side of the road to catch the trail. So, instead we waited for a break in the oncoming cars and then rode the wrong direction down a 40 MPH road for a half mile to get back to the bike trail. Again, we lucked out and no one ran us down.

The ride home was less eventful. We were retracing our steps and so didn't have to stop quite so much to figure out where we were going, and we rode on the road a bunch to avoid the worst sections of the trail. This route probably won't stay in our repertoire, but trying new things is always good. Best of all, no one was whiny or complainy about the suboptimal ride - even the guy who turned back just went off and did it without making a fuss about it. Alright, we weren't far from home - but it was a nice exploration of new places with a good group with a mindset for adventure.

Bike Refurbishment

Would you like to read a bunch of nerdy stuff about how I've been tinkering with my bicycles? Of course you would.

I have two bicycles (not counting the cheapo mountain bike gathering dust in the shed). Both are titanium framed bikes from Lynskey, a boutique manufacturer in Tennessee (a state which apparently exports high end bicycles in addition to country music, hydropower, and yokels). 

In 2015 I was first getting back into cycling, and I discovered that choosing a bike had become very complicated, in that since the last time I had paid attention there had developed many specialized types of bikes from which to choose - racing, touring, cyclocross, gravel, adventure, etc. I didn't know what to buy. I reached out to my friend Cyndi, who I know from the kayak world, but who is also bike obsessed. She advised me to just buy something, anything, since - as with kayaks - the only way to figure out what really suits you is to get out there and get experience. She pointed out that we'd each been through many kayaks (at least eight over the years in my case), and that I'd likewise probably buy and sell a bunch of bikes before I figured out what was right for me. So I went on Craigslist and got what turned out to be an excellent deal on a five year old Cyclocross (CX) bike - good for general riding and commuting. I later added the other bike, which is more designed for comfortable distance road riding.

Well, the CX bike is now sixteen years old and the road bike is eight years old. They've both been ridden a lot. I had the opportunity to get a free bike fitting, which is where an expert on bike fit adjusts your seat position, etc., and recommends tweaks - different length cranks, handlebar height, etc. - to fit the bike perfectly to you. The reason I got a free fit was that it was from bike mechanic friend who had just trained in bike fitting - it was like getting a free checkup at the dental school, with less risk of disaster. Anyway, the bike fitter gave my CX bike a once over and said everything was worn out on it: it needed a new chain, chainrings (the front gears), cassette (the rear gears), and wheels. We hatched a plan to combine parts from both bikes to rejuvenate the original cyclocross bike, and that I'd then sell the carcass of the distance riding bike (titanium frames have resale value).

The CX bike got the handlebars and derailleurs from the road bike, plus a new cassette and chainrings, upgrading it from a 20 speed (2x10) to 22 speed (2x11) along the way. I bought new cranks better matched to my leg length (per the bike fitting), and the bike also got some deferred maintenance done including all new cables, brake pads, and bar tape. Oh, and I also put on a more padded seat.

The CX bike also got the wheels from the road bike, but that didn't last long. I decided I wanted outfit it with wide tires (that's the trend these days) and so bought new tires and entirely new wheels to go with them, since the existing wheel rims would have been too narrow for the new extra wide tires. 

New wheels: If you look closely, the little nipples where the spokes attach to the rim are red, matching the black and red theme of the bike. Even the valve stem cap is red.

The new wheels, being black with red accents, look totally cool on the already black and red-themed bike. I mounted the wide 40mm tires, put them on the bike, and adjusted the brakes for the wider rims. The frame is not really designed for tires that big, and so making it all work involved one little hack, using some thin bungie cord to hold the rear brake cable out of the way to keep it from rubbing against the tire. Bike complete, and awesome!

The orange bungies hold the brake cable up off the wheel. Cheesy, but effective.

But once you start tinkering, it's hard to stop. Now, having ridden the upgraded bike for a bit, I think I'm going to hit a little bit of "undo" on a couple of the changes. First of all, I can't get comfortable on the new seat no matter what I do to adjust the angle and position. It pokes me in what I'll call a sensitive spot and a day of riding on it makes me pretty sore. I think I'll go back to my previous seat. Hopefully REI will take the new one back - though I would understand completely if they told me to go pound sand because my bony, hard to fit butt is not their problem.

Also, the 40mm tires are bouncy and fun, but slow. Plus, I really don't like relying on the bungie hack for something as important as brakes. I'm going to go back to 35mm tires, which is what I had on the bike before.

All told, I probably spent about $800 on this refurb, most of which I expect to recoup from selling the other frame. A bunch of that was for the new wheels (which it turns out I didn't need since I'm going back to narrower tires), but, I don't regret it - they're new, they're spinny, and they look nice. Eight hundred dollars might seem like a lot of money, but it gives me a like-new bike, and a bike like mine would cost about $5,000 new these days. And the irony is that Cyndi was wrong: I've owned this bike for ten years, and I'm still happy riding it.

As to the leftover road bike frame, I had a brief delusion of rebuilding it into an eBike. As is happens, one day while getting ice cream in Del Rey, I bumped into a guy who was riding a Lynskey (unusual enough, since it's an uncommon brand), which he had converted to a mid-drive eBike. It was cool, and I immediately fell in love with the idea of creating a titanium frame, custom eBike, all for a third the price of buying an eBike new, since I already had a frame and wheels. However, once I spent some time researching what it would take, I realized I'd be taking on a complicated project. I mean, I could easily handle it if all went well, but creating a Frankenstein eBike had lots of opportunity for complications. I'm back to the idea of selling the frame, which will refill my wallet and open a bike parking space for some possible TBD future purchase.

Current state of affairs: the refurbished bike on the bottom, and the road bike carcass up top

They call it "Toronno"

[Read about the first part of this trip here.]

Americans know that Canadians talk funny. On the fifth day of our trip I started the day with a run along the falls (drier than my previous day's walk, thanks to less wind), then we headed out towards Toronto, and in the car we practiced saying "tuh-RON-nuh" rather than "tuh-RON-toe", since that is the way the locals say it. 

Along the way we stopped in Niagara-on-the-Lake, a quaint 19th century town with cute shops and restaurants - think Old Town Alexandria, but a little more spread out. The area around Niagara-on-the-Lake is well known for its wineries, but we didn't visit any, as I long ago learned not to take Valerie, who isn't a wine drinker, wine-tasting (that's a story in itself). Instead, we had a good time browsing the shops in town. I even bought a cool shirt - the kind of thing I'd wear to a gig We had a lovely lunch, then got back into the car to continue on to tuh-RON-nuh.

Our son David's partner's parents are Torontonians (yes, this is the right term - I looked it up). They met us for dinner at a hip, upscale restaurant in the downtown TIFF Lightbox building, home to the Toronto International Film Festival. Don't tell anyone, but I thought the food was just OK. The appetizer and dessert were quite good, but the main course was lackluster - a very fishy-tasting Canadian trout on a few pearls of couscous. Valerie felt the same way about her dinner. The company, though, was wonderful, and we lingered so long we basically closed the place down. This is only the second time we'd met Doug and Kate, but we share a bond via our children and have really hit it off.

The next morning Valerie figured out the Toronto mass transit system, which can involve hopping between subways and streetcars, and went with Kate to explore another art museum. Of course, the day also included shopping for craft supplies (Kate is an accomplished artist and was understanding of Valerie's arts & crafts shopping). While they did that, I hopped bikeshare bikes to several places around the city. First, because my main destination wasn't open yet, I previewed the Distillery District, which we'd be visiting together the next day, then I headed to the waterfront where I rented a kayak and paddled out to the Toronto Islands, a small set of barrier islands just off of the city. The good news is that their kayaks were better than the typical rental boats, but they put me in a Tsunami 145, which is meant for big boys - you could have fit two of me in it. Unable to brace very well inside this bathtub of a boat, I wound up relying on the rudder to steer. Still, I had a good time paddling my way across a busy waterway watching ferries and water taxies heading to and from the islands and planes taking off from Toronto's downtown airport (which seemed to service mostly smaller, regional propeller planes and general aviation). Unfortunately, in my haste to get underway I had forgotten to take my water bottle out of my backpack before sticking it into the hatch, so I had no access to water to drink. It was a hot day and I headed back when I started to get parched, which meant I wound up being out a little short of my allotted two hours of rental time. I'll note that with this outing I added Lake Ontario to my list of Great Lakes paddled (still to do: Lakes Michigan and Erie).

Bikeshare bikes and bike lanes (Toronto has good cycling infrastructure!)

Toronto as seen from a kayak

Exploring within the Toronto Islands

After kayaking I hopped another bikeshare bike back to the hotel (I would have taken a taxi or streetcar but I was dripping wet) and had just about enough time to shower and change before heading out by bike again to meet Valerie, Doug, and Kate at The Rex, a downtown jazz club. We were there for the club's early show, which featured a group of young musicians playing trad jazz, led by "Trombone Charlotte", a vocalist and trombone player who was very talented musically as well as being a very engaging performer. Even non-jazz-fan Valerie enjoyed the show. I'm happy to report that the club, a suitably divey jazz bar, was nearly full, even for a 5 PM show featuring young local talent. I ordered dinner there, a tofu sandwich which turned out to be just that - a slab of tofu on a bun. Somehow, it was actually pretty tasty. After the show Doug and Kate pointed us in the right direction, and thanks ton Valerie's knowledge of the mass transit system we made it home to our hotel with no issues.

Charlotte McAfee-Brunner and her band at The Rex

Saturday morning we walked over to the St. Lawrence Market, a bustling traditional food hall marketplace. DC doesn't really have anything equivalent - I guess Eastern Market would be the closest thing, but St. Lawrence is much bigger and has a broader variety of groceries, prepared food, restaurants, kitchen items, and so on. We love that sort of place, and had a really good time there. There was a store with bulk food where I bought soy nuts (crunchy roasted soy beans - for a while these were a health food staple, but they've kind of disappeared in the U.S.), while Valerie bought a variety of chocolates. 

Then we went over to the Distillery District, a collection of buildings which had started life as the Gooderham and Worts Distillery, but which now is a trendy SoHo-like collection of shops - looking back, it's funny how much of our trip was spent at places which could be described as "19th century something-or-other now transformed into 21st century coolness". As mentioned above I had been unimpressed when I visited the place the previous day, but it turns out it's much more alive on a Saturday afternoon than Friday morning. There was a band playing in a big courtyard outfitted with inflatable sofas. The shops were humming. Valerie got some top-notch ice cream (I was still recovering my my Sweet Jesus treat in Niagara, but I took a taste of hers) and I had so enjoyed the curried vegetable tart I had gotten a bakery the previous day that I got the same thing again.   

Checking out the band at the Distillery District

After a quick nap back at the hotel (hey, we're old), we caught some good Thai food for dinner then took the subway to the streetcar to the ferry which took us out to the Toronto Islands, where were catching a Grateful Dead tribute band at the marina bar. I didn't know exactly how to get to the bar from the ferry terminal, but fortunately Deadheads are easy to spot and we befriended a tie-dye wearing guy named Joe, who showed us the way. The band was pretty good, and the vibe was excellent. Marina bar with a view across to the Toronto skyline. Warm summer evening (but not DC hot!). A big crowd of people, all digging the music. Joe introduced us around a little (people tend to know one another in Deadhead communities), plus I chatted with some other people (Canadians are friendly).

Let me tell you something I heard from a lot of people in Canada, including otherwise mellow Deadheads - they're really pissed at the U.S. Trump's annexing Canada/51st state schtick has been very poorly received by Canadians, and multiple people told me they're avoiding travel to the U.S., and boycotting American products. More than one suggested we escape America and come live in Canada. Of course, Canada isn't perfect either.

Ferry - that's Joe dead center wearing the hippie hat

Cherry Garcia Band (start of the show - later on it got much more crowded!)

City view from the marina

We had discovered on our way to the islands that the ferry schedule was pretty loose - the 7:40 ferry didn't depart until around 8 PM. One the way back, after comically stumbling from the marina to the ferry terminal in complete darkness, we arrived early for the 10:20 ferry, but it turned out there was a 10 PM ferry which wasn't even listed on the schedule. We walked right on, then took a taxi from the ferry terminal back to our hotel.  

By our last full day we were tired of touring and decided to take it easy. I ate breakfast and worked out on an elliptical machine, then when Valerie woke up I went down with her and ate breakfast for a second time, and we played a few hands of canasta in the breakfast room. When we finally got moving we didn't go far, just directly across the street to the Allan Gardens Conservatory, yet another 19th century building housing an indoor botanical garden. I wasn't expecting much but the place turned out to be lovely, well kept, well landscaped, and stuffed with all kinds of pretty plants. We also returned to St. Lawrence market to pick up flowers to bring to our dinner engagement. While we were there we also bought more soy nuts and chocolates, since we liked them so much and they were a good deal.

Allan Gardens

Central hall of Allan Gardens

At Allan Gardens

That evening Doug and Kate had us over for dinner. They live in a residential neighborhood of the city about five miles (oops, 8 km) outside of downtown. That's pretty analogous to where we live (about 6 miles from downtown), though their neighborhood is a little more urban. It feels kind of like my first neighborhood in Brooklyn, with brick houses packed close together, separated by impractically narrow driveways. Actually, their house reminds me a lot of my friend Asapearl's house - similar layout, and likewise decorated with an artist's eye for style.

With Kate and Doug

We had a lovely evening together. Then, in the morning Valerie and I headed out for the long drive home. We crossed the border without incident, and a mere 10 hours later we were home!

A Ghost Stole My Money - Buffalo and Niagara Falls

Back in college, Valerie accompanied a friend who was going to Buffalo to visit her grandparents for a weekend. Buffalo, in case you don't know, is very close to Niagara Falls. Valerie really wanted to see the falls, but the friend's grandfather wouldn't let them borrow the car. Ever since that weekend, Valerie has been fixated on visiting Niagara Falls - it was on her bucket list years before she knew she had one, and it has become something of a running joke within our family (the rest of us have been to the falls at one time or another). 

This year Valerie and I are each taking big trips separately - me to Asia, Valerie on a cruise - but we did want to do some sort of vacation together as well, so we decided to fulfil Valerie's bucket list item of seeing Niagara Falls, which we would combine with visiting friends in Toronto.

Our first stop along the way was the AKG art museum in Buffalo. We rejiggered our trip at the last minute when we realized that our original itinerary had us visiting the museum on a Tuesday, when it's closed, and so made it to Buffalo mid-day Monday instead and spent a very pleasant afternoon at what turned out to be a very nice museum.

I don't want to brag, but along the way I was Guest of the Day at the Altoona Hampton Inn

Viewing the work of artist Yayoi Kusama

Dorky stuff at the museum

For our overnight in Buffalo I booked a room at the interesting looking Hotel Richardson, in a repurposed grand 19th century building located on 40 acres of parkland designed by the classic landscape designers Olmstead and Vaux (who designed NY's Central Park, and more importantly, Brooklyn's Prospect Park). What the hotel's website doesn't mention is the original use of the building - it was built in the 1890's to house the Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane. Yes, we were staying in a Victorian era insane asylum. Cue the Scooby Doo gang, because the place had to be haunted!

The hotel was equal parts elegant and creepy. The place abounded with gorgeous wood accents. The hallways were enormous, and our room had what must have been a 20 foot high ceiling, but the place was creaky and nearly deserted (it's located near a college*, and July is definitely slow season for college towns). 

In the morning when I was getting dressed I discovered that all my cash was gone from my wallet. Nothing else was missing - credit cards, etc. were all there. The wallet had never been out of our possession. But my money was gone. The rational explanation for this was that the previous night I somehow dropped my money when paying for dinner - but that's something which has never happened before, and I didn't even pay for the dinner with cash. I think it was a paranormal event and that a ghost stole my cash. Creepy. I would say the Richardson is in close competition with the Luddington in Escanaba, MI, for the distinction of being the spookiest hotel in which I've stayed. 

The Richardson Hotel

Richardson Hotel interior

Our very tall room at The Richardson - what poor souls occupied this room in the past?

After recovering from our paranormal event, we grabbed a quick breakfast at Starbucks and headed to the New York side of Niagara Falls. I'd heard again and again that the NY side isn't worth visiting: that the view is sub-par, and the place is run down; however, it turns out that nothing could be further from the truth. One accesses the falls via what turns out to be a lovely state park. Yes, you don't get the grand view there, but the location provides some great up-close views of the falls in a very pretty setting. Valerie and I enjoyed walking around all the major vistas in the park before hopping onto the tourist shuttle which took us back to our car.

A first view of the falls, from New York

Street piano in Niagara Falls, NY

From there we drove across into Canada, where we headed for our hotel, which was decidedly less haunted than the Richardson, but had a little history of its own - Marilyn Monroe filmed a movie there back in the 1953. I had reserved a room with a view of the falls, and the view did not disappoint.

View from our hotel room

After a quick nap (hey, we're old) we headed out to dinner at a Japanese restaurant, along the way stumbling upon the city's tacky downtown. I had time and again heard that the American side was tacky and run down, while the Canadian side was SO MUCH nicer. Well, it turns out rather than being elegant and upscale, the Canadian side is home to a Vegas-y carnival sideshow downtown filled with mini-golf, a wax museum, go-karts, fast food, souvenir shops, and every sort of cheesy boardwalk entertainment imaginable. On my previous visit I had stayed way down at the end of the falls area and hadn't come this far into the city, and it was a real surprise to discover the bustling, cheesy main drag. 

The "elegance" of Niagara Falls, Canada

There's a fireworks show at the falls every night

We were determined to maximize our visit to the falls. By this point we had seen them from New York, from Canada, from our hotel room, from the waterfront, and lit up at night by fireworks. The morning brought a real highlight - the classic Niagara Falls boat ride (popularly known as the "Maid of the Mist", though it has a different name on the Canadian side). As cliche as the boat ride is, it turns out to be very cool to get up close to the falls and experience their power. And you get very wet. Fortunately the boat dock was walking distance from our hotel, so after our boat ride we ducked back into the hotel to change clothes. This was actually my third set of clothes for the day, since earlier I had taken a walk past the falls. The wind was blowing towards the shore and so I had gotten pretty wet.

Morning walk - if you look closely you'll see I'm pretty wet

The mistiness of the falls area means lots of rainbows (that's the Marriott all the way on the left)

Boat ride pix

In the afternoon we wandered around the tacky downtown, browsing in the souvenir stores and getting ice cream from a shop called "Sweet Jesus". I'm surprised that humorless Christians haven't forced this place to change its name - Canada must be more laid back about this sort of thing than America. 

Sweet Jesus ice cream

We also added to our falls viewing by riding the big ferris wheel. 

Valerie on the wheel

The Niagara Wheel

Walking around the town, it was amazing to see how many of the tourists were Indian, Islamic, and Mennonite. There were even some Hasidic Jews. I don't know why. Maybe nature is an acceptable vacation destination for even the most religious folks, or maybe they're the only ones left who don't think Niagara Falls is uncool. 

Anyway, in the evening we ate dinner at a diner-style restaurant which had a patio with a view of the falls, then after a brief hiccup when the hotel's fire alarm went off and we had to evacuate, we watched the fireworks from our room.

In the morning we would be heading out, bound for Toronto.

Continue reading here.

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*The Richardson Hotel is located right near Buffalo State University, which Valerie insists is the same school as SUNY Buffalo, despite the schools having separate web sites and being listed as separate institutions on the SUNY web site. 

CPA Belle Isle Camping Trip

 I haven't been on a CPA multi-day trip in a while. There aren't that many trips anymore, and they always seem to fall at times when I'm already committed. Well, I finally made it to a trip. Ralph and Sophie planned at trip which involved three nights camping at Belle Isle State Park on the Rappahannock River in Virginia, then another three nights about twenty miles up the Rappahannock at Naylor's Beach Campground. My plan was to join them for the weekday part at Belle Isle, but I would be heading home when they moved to Naylor's

Tuesday
The sites at Belle Isle have electricity, and believe me, I took full advantage. I have a brand new cooler-sized car refrigerator which I was able to plug in it the campsite. As it happened, the freezer at the camp store was broken and so people who were relying on coolers to keep their perishables cold had to leave the campground to replenish their ice supply - but no matter to me, I had a fridge! I also brought a string of Christmas lights to illuminate my campsite in the evening, an electric fan for my tent, and a folding electric kettle, which made breakfasts a snap. And since we're on the subject of camp amenities, I brought along a tri-fold mattress to sleep on. This is basically a three inch thick twin-sized mattress which folds in thirds. It's definitely not something you bring if you're at all squeezed for space (it's maybe 30 x 30 x 9" when folded), but I had room in the car for it, so I brought it. It was easy to set up (just unfold it) and mighty comfy to sleep on. More and more of my camping trips seem to lean towards "glamping" - I guess that's what happens as you get older.

My awesome little fridge (stinky neoprene boots for scale)

Campsite illuminated at night

Folding kettle

On the first day we all arrived at different times, so there was no group paddle. Ralph had, however, provided suggestions for local paddles. After taking a call at the launch about an upcoming gig (playing at Grateful Dead Night at the Bowie Baysox!), I explored the local creek and poked out into the river a little bit, paddling a little under five miles in all. A couple of people had launched earlier and explored further - out into the river and up the adjacent Lancaster Creek, but I didn't feel like paddling that far.

En route to the park I had stopped for lunch at Chipotle, but I only ate half my burrito bowl. The leftovers, which I of course had stored in my adorbale mini-fridge, served as the core of my dinner.   

In the evening some of us gathered around a campfire at Sophie and Jessica's campsite. Yes, in June in Virginia it was cool enough in the evening to have a campfire. It was really pretty perfect weather. It was at the campfire that I first met Peter, who turned out to be a memorable dude.

The morning of the second day I ran into Peter in the bathhouse. I wasn't sure it was him since I had only seen him in the dark, but also I may have had trouble recognizing him since I was distracted by the fact that he was naked from the waist down. I guess he hadn't counted on the possibility of someone else walking into the bathhouse while he was in there (or he didn't care) but there he was brushing his teeth at the sink, dressed in a blue t-shirt, bright yellow Crocs, and nothing else. If you put a sailor hat on him he would have been a dead ringer for Donald Duck. To Peter's credit, once I arrived he grabbed his pants and disappeared into a stall to get dressed. 

Welcome to the campground bathhouse!

Wednesday

We all met bright and early at Windmill Point on Fleet's Island. This is a really nice, recently developed launch. According to Ralph, until recently it was basically a dirt road which ended at the water, but the county has developed it as a recreational facility with a sandy swimming beach (which also serves as the car-top launch), lovely bathroom, and plentiful parking. Sweet.

One of the paddlers in the group discovered that she had left her PFD and skirt back in camp, which was about 40 minutes away. Ralph was ready to bend the rules and let her paddle without a PFD, which is mind-blowing if you are familiar with the safety-obsessed culture of CPA; however, another member of the group saved the day by running home (just ten minutes away) to grab her a PFD, which turned out to be one of those big orange Type II's you see on ferry boats - an appropriate paddler "cone of shame".

Oh, and Donald Duck showed up, wearing a keffiyeh wrapped around his head and face for sun protection. Now, go back a couple of years, say, to October 6th, 2023, and I really wouldn't have batted an eye over someone showing up with Arab headgear for a paddle - I mean, heck, people in the Middle East do know a thing or two about covering up to be sun-safe. However, in the years since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023, the keffiyeh has been transformed into a pro-Palestinian (ok) / anti-Israel (bad) / pro-Hamas (pretty damn bad) and even antisemitic (really, really bad) political symbol. College kids who couldn't find Ramallah on a map drape themselves in keffiyehs to symbolize their support for the destruction of the Jewish homeland and its people. Now, in Donald Duck's defense, his keffiyeh was red and white, which is usually Jordanian rather than the black and white typically associated with Palestinians, and a look at his Facebook page shows no antizionist content whatsoever. In addition, he seems to be involved in re-enactments of 19th century European battles from the era when soldiers wore giant hats and plumes into battle, so I think for him wearing it was mostly a dress-up thing. But it bugged me to look at it every day. And the red keffiyeh clashed with his yellow Crocs. But at least he was wearing pants. 

Anyway, Fleet's Island (named after 17th century English settler Henry Fleet) sits just at the mouth of the Rappahannock. Our paddle took us up the outside of the island, which meant that we were paddling in the Chesapeake Bay. Windmill Point is at the bottom of the island and we paddled all the way around the top, where we took a lunch break at Cedars Beach. We could have continued and circumnavigated the island, but those who have done it said the inside of the island is hot and boring, so we made our way through some marshland at the top of the island and scooched our kayaks back onto the Rappahannock via a shallow cut which wasn't quite deep enough to float the kayaks. I was close enough to being afloat to be able to slide my kayak along by pushing my hands along the bottom; some of the group, that is, those endowed with heavier butts, had to get out of their boats to make it through. Once back on the river we retraced our steps to the launch, at which point some of us (including me) got off the water, while others got some extra mileage in exploring a little bit beyond the launch before heading in. I paddled about 8-9 miles.

Paddling around Fleet's Island

Scooching across from the marsh into the river

Lunch break (check out keffiyeh boy ibn the middle)

After the paddle there was a plan for the group to go out for an early dinner (4:30ish!) at a restaurant in White Stone called The Sand Piper. Based on a combination of health and religious-driven dietary restrictions, I don't do well at seafood restaurants, as I don't eat shellfish, beef, or pork. Typically, such restaurants have one or two dishes with either fin fish or chicken, but such dishes usually tend to be pretty sad. I mean, virtually no one goes to a seafood restaurant to eat chicken, so whatever chicken breast they have is some antique, freezer-burned thing they'll defrost for the rare non-seafood eater who comes in. I decided to skip the group dinner and head back to camp, where I enjoyed the home-made low sodium minestrone and fresh roll I had brought from home. There wasn't much hanging around that night, but that was OK - I read my book and had a beer at my campsite.

Sand Piper menu with all the things I can't eat crossed out

Thursday

Thursday's forecast called for high winds, so we headed for the relatively protected waters of the upper Great Wicomico River, launching from Cooper's Wharf. This isn't one of Ralph's favorite paddles, given the the Great Wicomico is entirely developed, that is, the shoreline is dotted with houses, but it made for a safe paddle on a blustery day. And blustery it was. We headed downriver first, with the wind at our backs. That meant we had to be careful, since the return trip was going to be more of a slog than the outbound leg.

The trip was uneventful We paddled down as far as the big Rt. 200 bridge over the river. Sophie and Jessica continued on to try and find a launch they thought existed somewhere near the bridge (they found it!) while the rest of us turned back. The paddle back wasn't as bad as I thought it might be -  keeping to the river's south shore gave us some protection from the south-westerly wind, though we did hit spots where we got blown about by the gusts.

Taking aa break from the wind in a cove

Given that the shoreline was all private land, our only choice for a lunch break was to paddle back to our launch point and take a break there. After lunch a few of us explored in the opposite, up-river direction for an hour or so. This section of the river turned out to be more remote and pretty, but it didn't go on very far. I paddled a total of 11 miles.

My plan had been to camp Thursday night at Belle Isle and to head home in the morning when the group broke camp. A forecast of rain overnight made me change my plans, as there was really no point in camping in the rain just to go home the next morning with wet gear, so I broke camp and headed home Thursday night.

The group had a scheduled potluck Thursday night, and I felt very antisocial when I stopped by to say goodbye. The previous night I had blown off dinner at the seafood shack, and here I was snubbing the potluck. Oh, well.

It had been a long time since I'd done a trip like this and it felt good to get out paddling in pretty places three days in a row, and to sleep in a tent on some lovely, not to hot or humid nights.

Also note that Thursday was the 27th anniversary of the day I bought my first kayak!

PoG Staggers to Life

 My great-grandfather was said to have a particular knack for getting into and out of businesses at the wrong time. For example, shortly after the turn of the 20th Century he moved his family to New York City where he bought a pushcart rental business. In the late 19th Century, the streets of New York teemed with pushcarts from which vendors sold food, clothes, and other merchandise. Akin to food trucks today, it was a way for people with little investment capital (typically immigrants) to get a retail business started. My great-grandfather's business was a step up the food chain. Rather than selling stuff from a cart, he rented carts to the pushcart vendors, which was a pretty good deal in that he got to profit without having to handle inventory and spend all day hawking merchandise. The problem was that by the time he bought that business, New Yorkers were getting tired of the congestion and mess caused by endless swarms of pushcarts,. Responding to citizen pressure, in 1906 the city cracked down and put stricter regulations in place, leading to a shift away from pushcarts and into indoor, flea-market-like markets (I imagine whomever sold the business to my great-grandfather had seen this shift coming). I picture the demand for pushcarts dropping off day by day, with rentals slowing to a trickle, until one day no renters showed up at all, and there was my Grandpa Ike, left sitting all alone in his warehouse full of pushcarts.

Which is how I've been feeling about the Pirates of Georgetown (PoG) lately. I started paddling with the group right when it formed during the waning years of the Clinton presidency (!), and in those early years attendance was quite robust; on any given week it wasn't unusual for the group to draw a dozen or more paddlers. When we were forced to decamp from Georgetown to our present digs at Columbia Island the group lost some energy, and then the pandemic took a further toll. Last year I lost my two co-leaders to illness, and attendance dropped to where the group would be maybe three people.

PoG in a busier era (2002) - check out Nelson and Caroline, Yvonne, Cyndi, David M., James, as well as Barb, designer of the CPA logo

This year we got off to a very slow start. First of all, we've lost the natural feeder or SK102. Our weekly paddles have historically started up the week after the big SK102 training weekend in the spring, and we've usually picked up some enthusiastic new paddlers from that event. However, last year SK102 didn't happen, and this year it was changed to a one day event in June. 

Then, the weather didn't cooperate. Our first Thursday was a chilly evening in May, and only one person showed up. Interestingly, when I asked him what was new he told me that he had gotten married four days earlier. OK, PoG is fun, but it's not what I'd choose for my honeymoon (it turns out that the new wife is a teacher, and they'd be taking their honeymoon after the end of the school year - a scheduling constraint I know well). Following that we had a rainout week. Then there were a couple more unseasonably cool weeks where either one or two people showed up. 

So I was quite happy this past Thursday when I actually got six people out on the water! All of the people who had trickled in over the preceding weeks (Hunter, David, Jeff), an old-timer who still shows up when he's in town (Al), and me. Oh, and Rob even showed up! He's recovered from what kept him off the water last year but his time is now swallowed up by a packed travel schedule. This was his one week in town until late July. Fingers crossed that these people keep coming back. Plus, by happenstance I ran into Steve J. at a restaurant the other day and encouraged him to come out too - so maybe we're back in business. 

Needless to say, as soon as I get some momentum going I'm going to have to pause for a week, as I'll be off at Ralph's Rappahannock camper (where I expect to have the opportunity to cajole another of our former regulars, Karen, into showing up), and it remains to be seen what restrictions lie ahead as we get close to July 4th. My understanding is that they'll be anchoring barges in the river for the planned massive fireworks show planned for the 4th and that there'll be restrictions on river traffic around the holiday weekend, but no specifics have been published so far. I hope that doesn't mean more weeks of coancellations.

In any case, I'm happy that people are returning and I'll be thrilled if I can get routinely get even 3-4 paddlers (including me). If I do the group might even resume hanging around for chatting and beverages after paddling.

Special note to CPA Leadership: Ignore that "3-4 people" remark. For the purposes of computing our piracy stipend, our attendance averages 10 people per week 😉. 

PG paddlers pass the Lincoln Memorial this past Thursday

I Lost a Cyclist!

My mother was born in the U.S., but as the first American-born child in a recently-arrived immigrant family living in a Jewish immigrant neighborhood, her first language was not English, but Yiddish, and that's the language which she used when speaking to her siblings and to my grandmother, even into adulthood. Growing up in a Yiddish-speaking family, I learned a lot of Yiddish phrases, such as "alter kocher", which translates pretty closely to "old fart". Which brings me to last week's bike ride. I lead rides for the bike group within Arlington's 55+ program. While the group is officially called the "Tour de Friends", if you follow me on Strava, you'll see the entries for those rides titled as "AK Ride", "AK" being an abbreviation for the aforementioned Yiddish phrase. The participants in theTour de Friends rides are generally well on the "+" side of 55, and so it was a matter of some concern when one of my riders disappeared in the middle of a ride. Not that I wouldn't have been concerned if a younger rider had gone missing, but there's a wide range of harm which could befall someone who is, well, 55+++.

It was a cool, drizzly morning and I was pleasantly surprised to see about ten people waiting when I showed up at our meeting place of Barcroft Community Center. The rain was supposed to be stopping shortly, and while I had a few cancellations, there were more stalwarts than I had expected. We did give the rain a little time to dissipate, and by the time we started riding it was just misting, but the trails were definitely wet.

We headed down the Four Mile Run Trail to the Potomac, then south down the Mount Vernon Trail. At the top of Old Town I decided to stop and wait for the whole group because there was an unexpected trail detour. The group caught up, including my sweep, but we were short one rider. We tried calling him, and on the first time the phone was answered, but there was no one on the other end of the line. We tried texting, but no response. At this point I started to imagine that my missing rider had slid out on a rain-slicked section of trail and was lying in a ditch by the side of the trail somewhere, injured and barely able to get to his phone. The only consolation was that he hadn't been the last rider in the group and no one had spotted him as they rode. We had a planned stop under the Wilson Bridge just on the other side of Old Town. I conferred with my other trip leaders and we decided to continue on to that point and see if he'd show up there.

We got to the Wilson Bridge and, well, no missing rider. By this point the rain had stopped, but it was still a wet, grey sort of day, so a few participants were more than willing to turn back and retrace our steps, looking for our missing rider along the way. I continued leading the remainder of the group south, though we too turned around a little short of our original planned destination of River Farm.

Fortunately, the story has a happy ending. When my group met up at Peet's Coffee in Shirlington with the folks who had turned back early, they reported that they had finally been successful in contacting our missing person. He hadn't dressed for the inclement weather, was getting cold, and just decided to turn around and head home without telling anyone. So, I was able to close that Missing Person case, and I didn't have to report anything back to the county Recreation Department. Whew! 

So please, dear reader, if you ever decide to leave a group trip early, please let someone know!