Monday, August 4, 2008

Bikes, Alpacas, and Crow

We awoke on Sunday morning to a cloudy rainy day-what's up with that? The weather people were forecasting that Sunday was going to be the gem of the weekend!

We ate our delicious breakfast at a casual pace. Jim tried the French Toast and I went with the Buckwheat Pancakes. Once again, it was all tasty. Did you know that Penn Yan, NY is the Buckwheat Capital of the world? One of the innkeepers told us that when she was describing our breakfast options. Now you've learned something!

We read the Sunday paper, chatted with some of the other folks at the inn, who were very sympathtic to our desire to ride. We made an alternative plan of driving to Watkins Glen to do some hiking, figuring we'd rather hike than bike in the rain. We took our time getting ready to leave and figured we'd take our bikes in case the weather improved. Well, as we were packing up the car, Jim decreed that the rain had stopped for the day and we really should ride to Geneva as we had planned. I was a bit skeptical as the threatening clouds still loomed overhead, but, whatever! And Jim ended up being right! We rode 40 miles over about 4 hours and only got about 10 sprinkles on us! We had a great tail wind to Geneva, and then had to really work to get back to Canandaigua. One of the highlights on our return ride was finding an alpaca farm! As we were pedaling down a hill, I was in my full-tuck position, trying to gain every advantage against the wind, when Jim yelled, "Alpacas on the right!" I quickly looked up away from the road and saw a hillside full of alpacas at the Oh My! Alpaca Farm. Of course, I hit the brakes, turned around and took a photo. The farm sign said By Appointment Only or else it might have been fun to go up and try to a get some answers to the questions we were asking each other. 


We thoroughly enjoyed the Sheryl Crow concert, even though the D & C reporter stated in his review, that he thought she could have given more, whatever that means. Crow had us all up and dancing and singing along by the end of the concert and I heard no negative comments from anyone as we headed to our car at the end of the show. 


So, we had a great weekend in Canandaigua. Jim had to be back at work by 10 this morning and it was such a beautiful day (finally) that I decided to ride my bike back home. It ended up being a 43 mile ride, 28 of it on the Canal Trail. Here is a photo I took shortly after I got on the Trail near Macedon at Lock 30. 



Tomorrow and Wednesday will be very busy day as I leave for Women's Weekend on Thursday and will go right to my Hudson River Valley bike ride right from camp. 

Hope all is well.

1 comment:

Yo said...

wow! good trip! a bike, a concert, alpacas! good u have a great day, good the rain finally stoped, although i like rain (but i've never seen too much rain, in my city its like a few drops). Now that i think about it... i do have seen some rain! in Tarapoto (PerĂº), but i was just a kid, i really dont remember that much, only that i thought it was the shower of the house... hahaha.
saludos