Day 7

Kingston, ON to Woodsville, NY (81.5km)

We are fully committed to this ride.  Today we crossed the border.  I always felt that when we crossed the border, we would have passed the point of no return.  After all, while in Ontario, we could always have taken the train from where ever we were, back to our car (or close to it).  We are now in New York State, not so very far from home, but somehow it feels like a foreign country.

Good Bye Canada, Kingston's Waterfront

We put about 80 km on the bikes today, a little longer than the last couple of days.  Hills on this side of the border are a little more serious than on the north side and I will confess I ended up walking up one of them.  We were grateful Southwick State Park had a spot for us.  Set up camp, a walk on the beach, read a book, made supper and crashed for the night.

Each day has its highlight and for some people the highlight was sharing a ferry ride with Don Cherry—you know the guy, he has something to do with hockey.  Some were excited, to me, he was one of the reasons the line at Timmy’s was too slow and I didn’t get my morning tea before the ferry left.

Each day also has a lesson.  Today’s lesson is vital for survival.  After you’ve peed by a tree, make sure there is no long grass stuck in your bicycle shorts.  At first I was sure I’d squatted on something that was causing some irritation.  Then I felt some funny lumps.  I spent the entire day picking bits of grass out of my shorts.  If you were travelling on the Seaway Trail, yesterday, and saw a woman with her hand down her shorts, she wasn’t crazy.  It was me trying to remove the last of the bale of hay from my sensitive skin!

J.