DAY 5 - GOOD-BYE NEW YORK

I woke up at the Cole's and was greeted by Tim and a delicious bowl of oats and organic fruits and yogert.  After breakfast I thanked them and headed out, back down the coast.

I started to notice a trend that would haunt me for the next few days while riding along Lake Erie... south-western headwind!  While I enjoyed the view of the lake and all the little parks on route 5, I enjoyed some shelter from the wind down on route 20, so I found myself spending more and more time away from the coast.

Late in the morning I figured I should stop and see about where I would be spending the night, and using the warmshowers app on my phone, found Jim and Renie Blanchard in Erie, PA.  They are a couple of retired school teachers and as I found out have toured the Great Allegheny Passage twice.  I called Jim and he was more than happy to host me, and told me since Erie's streets were a little crazy that I should call him when I got to Erie and he would pick me up.

About half way to Erie I crossed the NY-PA border.  This was a small but big step I felt, I'm finally out of NY, this trip is really happening, I'm really going to be on the bike for the summer, I really am this crazy!

When I rolled into Erie, I stopped to see where I was and call Jim, but a man named Jack on a mountain bike saw me and stopped to chat me up and offered to guide me to Jim's place.  I accepted and he lead me down the "safer" streets.  We stopped off at his place on the way, where he showed me a bunch of his bikes, gave me a drink, and offered to fix anything on my bike that may be broken.  I did take him up on his offer for free chain lube as my chain was still pretty grimy from the canal trail. 

Eventually we got under way again and he lead me a short distance to Jim and Renie's house.  They greeted me and let me shower, showed me the guest room, and fed me!  As we were talking I found out that their daughter was spending the summer in Ithaca and she was going to college at ESF, the same place my brother went, and that she was coming home that night!

We all ended up hanging out, I was able to fix a problem on Renie's laptop (and "earned my keep") and we watched Nik Wallenda walk across Niagra Falls on TV then I updated the last few days on this blog and headed to sleep.

Start: Dunkirk, NY
End: Erie, PA
Distance: 51.64 miles