Upstate New York Sampler Tandem Ride

 UNYS Ride

The genesis of this trip came from our 2008 trip in Tuscany. This was our first Pennywise trip and I thought that the Pennywise format was a good way to plan, not only for European trips, but also for domestic trips. At our last group dinner in San Leonino our group was talking about good places to ride and someone mentioned the Erie Canal. We agreed but Carolyn mentioned that we should include Silver Lake in our plans; this is where her brother owned a cabin.  This started me thinking about how I could design a ride in the area including Rochester and the Finger Lakes Area.  Over the last few years of planning this became what I call the Upstate New York Sampler (UNYS) ride.

We started on Friday July 12^th driving our Highlander to Delevan to pick up Kathie’s brother’s trailer that we were going to use to pull luggage from point to point. We got in late on Friday and took a cot at my father-in-law, Ray’s home.

July 13, 2013  Getting Started

In the morning we got up and had one of Ray’s hearty breakfasts and I started assembling my tandem that I had partially disassembled to fit in the highlander. I then hooked up the trailer and discovered that the brake lights weren’t working with the Highlander. It took a few hours, a trip to the Tractor and Trailer store, and hard work from my brother-in-law, Ed, but we figured out what was wrong.  Soon we were on our way to pick up Hank and Carolyn to start our trip.

We drove to Silver Lake and found Carolyn’s brothers cabin. There we met some of Carolyn’s distant family members and loaded the trailer with the Hank and Carolyn’s Tandem. We drove to the Country Inn at Mt. Morris, our home for the next two nights. There we met with Ross and Donna the other tandem team that would be joining us on the trip.

After settling in, we had one of our wine and cheese parties. There we caught up and I handed out the queue sheets for the rides. We also talked about the next day of riding through Perry, Castile and Letchworth State Park. We had dinner in Mt. Morris at an Italian restaurant and returned to the country for a good night’s sleep.

July 14, 2013  Letchworth  PICS | MAPS

The next day we got up and had breakfast at the hotel. We got our bikes ready for the trip and were soon starting our first ride. The heat in the parking lot, as we were getting ready, foretold the oppressive temperatures that we were going to encounter on ourtrip.  The ride was mostly uphill for the first 12 miles. The farm land in the area was quite beautiful.

The night before, I realized that I had not planned for a lunch stop for the first ride. We decided to take a small detour into Perry to buy sandwiches that we could eat later for lunch. We were looking for a grocery store but ran into a Subway sandwich shop and made our lunch purchases there. We packed the sandwiches on our bike and headed toward Letchworth State Park. Letchworth is known as the Grand Canyon of the east. The entrance from the south end of the park is a rather dramatic ride as we looked down on the gorge while we rode in. We arrived and found our way to the visitor’s center at the south end of the park.

At the visitor’s center we ran into a bike maker from Alaska who used to build tandems and came over to ask about our bikes. This was the first I’ve visited a "take in carry out" park. This is where they have no garbage cans in the park and expect visitors to take their garbage out with them. I went into the visitor’s center to find a trash bin and was reminded  of this policy. We then found a gorge overlook and had our picnic lunch of Subway sandwiches.

After lunch, we took the road that followed the gorge and stopped at several overlooks. We also stopped at a creek that fed the Genesee River and  it had a scenic waterfall. As we came close to the north end of the park we stopped at the dam overlook where there was an ice cream shop that served Perry’s ice cream. We looked for Perry's ice cream everywhere we went  for the rest of the trip.

We were concerned that we only had one key for the lock to get into the trailer, so we wanted to get it copied. After the ride Kathie and I went into Mt. Morris and Geneseo to find a place to copy the key. We couldn’t find any place that was open and could duplicate the key so we returned to the hotel and picked up the others to take them to the Glen Iris restaurant. The Glen Iris Inn is a hotel and restaurant on the park grounds where to Letchworth family had their estate before donating the land for the park.  The Glen Iris is a well-known restaurant in the Rochester area. It’s a hot spot for prom dates and other special meals. We had a very nice meal there.

July 15, 2013  To  Brockport  PICS | MAPS

Every other day on this tour there is a transfer day. Two things have to happen on a transfer day. One, we must pack our packs and load them on the trailer, and two, we had to split the driving duties between the couples. This day’s ride started in Mt. Morris and ended in Brockport. We had breakfast, got our bikes ready. Hank and Carolyn took the first leg of driving. Ross and Donna and Kathie and I started the first leg that had a bit of climbing to it. Ross and Donna took over the second leg of driving through lunch.

We stopped for lunch in Leroy at the D&R Depot, a converted train station. Lunch was great and Kathie and I picked up the driving duty into Brockport.  While we were walking to the car after lunch an older women saw our tandem and told us how she and her husband owned a tandem. She was very excited to tell us about her bicycle built for two. On the way to Brockport we received a call from Hank and Carolyn that they had found an Ace Hardware that could duplicate our key. We turned around and found the store where they were able to make our backup key.

Kathie and I arrived in Brockport and found the Victorian Inn B&B that was our home for the next two days. We parked the trailer and the car and found our rooms. Soon the other riders arrived and we settled into the rest of the day which included watching the latest action in the Tour de France and some wine and cheese with friends. We later walked to the Stone Yard Bar and Grill for dinner then walked back to the B&B for a nights rest.

July 16, 2013Canal Towns  PICS | MAPS

On our third day we got up to breakfast prepared by the B&B, and got ready for our loop ride. Early on we ran into what I like to call a “Queue Sheet Anomaly”. The first turn on the queue sheet called for a left turn where I knew we needed to make a right. We took the right and stopped for a few minutes to make sure we were on track and continued on our way.

Our first stop was in Albion which is a canal town west of Brockport. I picked what turned out to be the hottest week of the summer to ride so we stopped to investigate the canal in Albion and tried to cool off.  We took in the area and the signs that told some of the history of the area. Soon we were off to our next stop. Along the way we found a small bike store that offered bike repairs and frozen treats. We bought a few popsicles and had a nice conversation with a shop owner and a few of the patrons who were from Florida.

At this point we were with Ross and Donna but Hank and Carolyn had fallen behind and found another Queue Sheet Anomaly.  This was more a problem with the street signs in the area and they ended up taking the canal trail to catch up with us. We all gathered together and continued onto Holey which was the lunch stop on our tour.

In Holey we picked Dave’s Diner for lunch. In the diner we had a great lunch and attracted the attention of many of the patrons.  We had one man come to our table to tell us about his participation in supporting the upcoming FANY ride that was coming through town. This is the 500 miles across New York ride that his volunteer organization was supporting. He was an older gentleman who had recently lost his wife. He was a genuine western New Yorker. Other patrons came to our table and wished us luck in the heat and others told us about the water falls on the edge of town.

We finished lunch and rode to the park in town that had a water falls.  The park and falls were quite scenic.  Soon we were on our way back to Brockport and the B&B where we showered rested, and decided on the Brockport Diner for dinner.  After dinner we went to Abbotts frozen custard for desert. Abbotts is an old favorite from our Rochester days. It was as good as ever.

July 17, 2013 To Pittsford  PICS | MAPS

This day’s ride was a short day that cut across the Rochester area from Brockport to Pittsford, going through several more canal areas on some of the local roads and then finishing the ride on the section of the Erie Canal pathway that is paved. We only divided the Sag duties into two sections this day because there was no good way to divide the sag duties up on the canal trail. Kathie and I rode from Brockport to Gates going along trails that mostly paralleled the canals. This took us through Spencerport which was another great canal town. The closer we got to Gates the more urban the road got. We met Ross and Donna just short of Long Pond Road where they had sagged from Brockport to this point. The paved section of the canal trail started at Long Pond Road.

Ross and Donna spent some time with us then took off to the trail. A little while later Hank and Carolyn passed by and we then drove to Pittsford via the Rochester interstate highway network. We found our way to the Canal Lamp Inn, the B&B that we would be staying at for the next two days. There we called Pat who was the proprietor of the Inn and she said that she would be by in the next 30 minutes to let us in.  Soon our fellow tandem couples showed up off the trail and Pat showed up at the driveway. The inn reminded me a bit of my grandparents’ house in Pennsylvania in size and style. It turned out to be a great place to stay.

Before getting settled we walked across the street and canal to a restaurant in a section of shops on the road along the canal called Schoen Place.  We had lunch at Aladin’s and it was so good we later went there for dinner.  After lunch we stopped at the Towpath Bike store and a Wine Shop that was along the way. We then went back to the Inn to shower and relax. We later went back to Aladin’s for dinner and walked into the center of Pittsford for some frozen Yogurt for desert. Back at the Inn we met another younger couple and their son, Sam, who was a precocious 4 years old. Sam’s parents were from the Thousand Island area and were mixing a business trip with a family vacation. We all fell in love with Sam. 

July 18, 2013  Rochester  PICS | MAPS

On the fifth day we would ride through Henrietta and into the old suburbs of Rochester. This would prove to be a busy day for sightseeing. We started by having breakfast at the Inn.  Laura was our cook and she made a great breakfast for us before we took off. Sam’s family was having breakfast as we were getting ready for our ride.  Sam was very excited about going to the zoo that day.

Soon we were off through Henrietta and stopping at RIT. This was a bit of a self-indulgent walk down memory lane for me, as was much of the day, but I did get to show my guests the campus and some of the outdoor art work around campus.

Next, we traveled up to the Mt. Hope area where we passed the U of R and Strong Memorial Hospital and found our way to Mt. Hope Cemetery. I had never visited the cemetery before but interest was expressed in visiting the graves of Fredrick Douglas and Susan B. Anthony by our group. Mt Hope Cemetery is one of the largest urban cemeteries in the country and was quite interesting to see. It also took a little time to find our way around to get to Ms. Anthony’s grave site.

After finishing our visit to the cemetery we continued into the old suburbs of Rochester where we passed the apartment that I lived in while I was dating Kathie. We then traveled down to Park Avenue were we stopped a Hogan’s Hideaway for lunch. When I lived in the neighborhood 30+ years ago Hogan’s was a small bar and grill behind a grocery store. Since then they expanded into the grocery store and became a more of a café / restaurant.

Lunch was great and we then moved onto East Avenue where we stopped to visit the George Eastman house. This was George Eastman’s House while he ran the Eastman Kodak Company until his death. They have also added a gallery or photography in the back of the house. We spent several hours going through the house which was an impressive mansion, learning about George’s life and taking in the photographs exhibited in the gallery.

After touring we rode down Winton Avenue to the Canal Trail and back to Pittsford.  In Pittsford we went on a search for the Pittsford Dairy where we told they had great ice cream. After a few missteps we found the dairy and greatly enjoyed our treat!

After showers Donna and Carolyn decided not to have dinner, so Kathie, Hank, Ross and I had a nice dinner at Olives in Schoen Place.

July 19 2013 To  Penn Yan  PICS | MAPS

On the sixth day we got up and had another of Laura’s excellent breakfasts then packed up for another transfer day. While we were getting ready we stopped in to say good-bye to Sam and his family who were having breakfast after us. Today’s ride took us to Penn Yan which is on the northern end of Keuka Lake, one of my favorite finger lakes. This day was another extremely hot day and the un-shaded farm land and hills would prove to be a challenge. Ross and Donna took the first SAG. We met them down the road where we rested and waited for Hank and Carolyn to catch up. Hank and Carolyn did the second round of sag and drove ahead of us to find a lunch place in Canandaigua. When we caught up with them they found a place to stop but the group decided to go further into town. We ended up at a Wegman’s. For those of you who are not living in the Northeast, Wegman’s is a grocery store chain that originated in Rochester and has always been at the cutting edge of what grocery store offer in selection, services and quality. These are huge stores that also have a food court offering. We stopped there and took part in their food court.

After lunch Donna and Ross and Kathie and I back tracked a bit through Canandaigua to see the northern shore of Lake Canandaigua. After our sightseeing detour we were back on the road. Near the end of the second SAG segment, Kathie saw a wallet on the side of the road that had money hanging out of it. She told me about it and we returned to wallet. There we looked into it and found a driver’s license that belonged to someone that lived on the road that we were on.  We took the wallet with us and watched for that address numbers as we traveled. We were biking away from the address but were only a short distance to where we would start our SAG duties. So we moved ahead and when we took over the driving duties we made a u-turn and found the address. The location was a farm house. On the front yard of the farm house was a sign proclaiming, “As ye' sow, so shall ye’ reap”. We pulled into the driveway and a boy that must have been in his early teens came out of the barn. I asked him if he knew who the license belonged to. We looked at the license and in a farm drawl said “That’s my big brother”. I asked him if he would deliver the wallet to his brother and said yes. I thanked him and we were on our way driving to Penn Yan. 

We arrive at the Best Western in Penn Yan and checked in, unloaded luggage and waited for the other to arrive. After showers we got together for some wine and cheese and decided to go to the Keuka restaurant for dinner. This was one of our least favorite meals of the trip. The food was not well prepared and the place was very noisy. We walked back to the hotel and rested for our last day of cycling for the trip.

July  20,  2013  Keuka Lake  PICS | MAPS

On the last day of riding we woke up to find much cooler temperatures and a bit of morning rain. Also we had managed to pick the weekend of the local Multiple Sclerosis Bike ride. So while having breakfast we watched hundreds of cyclist pass the hotel in the rain. Luckily for us the rain stopped before we got started and we were on our way to Hammondsport. The other good news was the rain brought a break to the heat. The trip south, to Hammondsport, was on rolling roads with beautiful lake views.

Our first stop was at the Glenn Curtiss Museum.  Glenn Curtiss was a bicycle shop owner who expanded his interest into motorcycles and airplanes. His expertise in making light motors made him a major player in early aviation. He was also the first person to make a 1 kilometer flight.

While waiting for Hank and Carolyn to arrive we were talking to the receptionist at the museum. She asked where we were from. We told her the DC area and then we talked about the other couple with us who had started their trip in San Diego and bicycled all the way east. This happened several times durring our trip. We always ended up stealing Hank and Carolyn’s thunder.

After visiting the museum, we went into town to find lunch. On the way we ran into a local church barbeque which was agreeable to all. While there we got to meet the volunteers from the church while having a great meal. After lunch we continued to the beach in Hammondsport where they were having a classic boat show on the water. The collection of boats was fascinating and the tents on shore had vendors and displays that were interesting.

We finished our trip back to Penn Yan and got ready for dinner. For our last dinner of the ride we drove back to Hammondsport (by car) and had dinner at Bully Hill Winery high up the hill from the lake valley. There we got great views of Keuka Lake, a great dinner and one last fun dinner with friends.

July  21, 2013 Returning Home

On the next morning we had breakfast, loaded to car and trailer and took our guests back to their stating locations. We then returned to trailer to Ed, said our goodbyes and drove back home.  Another fun tandem trip behind us!