Morning broke bright and sunny - the house was quiet, so I grabbed the computer and my GPS and sat in their back yard on an adirondack chair and programmed the next few days ride - looked like the day was promising to be a pretty nice one. In Pic #01, you can see a telescope they leave pointing at a family of nesting Bald Eagles on the river - the family returns every year and they can watch the progress of the baby eagles til they leave the nest.

Pic #02 shows their hot tub on the back porch - now ordinarily I wouldn't have taken that picture but it has a lot of sentimental value - this is the same tub he brought to Yellowstone with him 23 years earlier, and we had some good times in that tub. Keep in mind we were at a small Park Hospital - the ratio of nurses to us guys was pretty favorable - that's all I plan to say on that subject. Just like a bike ride - what happens in the Hot Tub - STAYS in the hot tub. Pics #03-05 are various "Nice effin house" pictures followed by #06, us on the back porch with from-scratch pancakes and real maple syrup, fruit coffee OJ and catching up on the kids lives. Always good to rehash the good times with old friends.

#07 is my buddy, Jeff, dreaming about the day Susan allows him to buy a Harley... everyplace I go I leave in my wake guys wanting a bike and wives wishing I'd stop egging them on!

In nothing short of perfect weather, after giving Susan a ride around the "Tour de Gill", Kim and I say our goodbyes and thank whatever gods were responsible for the weather change. Pointing west, we carve our way through some quaint little towns to the southern border of Vermont, and stop in Jacksonville, Vermont's General Store (Pics #11 & 12). Grabbed some Root Beer (It was still early!) and Cracker Jacks and grabbed a seat on the stone wall overlooking a clear stream running through this little town (#13).

 
We ran into Highway 9 running west into New York and found it to be one of the nicer roads we've been on - weaving through Americana a'la Vermont, and offering up a few Taverns along the way (wasn't THAT early) - particularly a lil Irish pub in Bennington, just before the NY state line. There was a jumble of small roads we travelled (thanks to the GPS) and ran into Saratoga Lake on the east side, and found The Bayshore Tavern near the north end of the lake. Had what they called Italian Wedding Soup (man was it good!), a burger and a Guinness. Nice place - really friendly staff and a cute barmaid, too. Life is good.

Crossing through one of the few large towns on this trip - we went through Saratoga Springs and ran Hwy 9N up to Lake George where we entered the Adirondacks and started looking for some old friends from a past ride a few years ago, Rick and Kendra. Rick and I rode together in '02 on my West Virginia trip. As crowded as Lake George is - a little Myrtle Beach, we still had no trouble bumping into them at Duffy's Tavern on the main road through town. Pics #15-17 are of the southern tip of Lake George as we walked around looking for a cold beer along the waterfront... Found one.

I got no pics of them this night, nor took any others, but we rode out of town to dinner, and grabbed a cheap motel (cheap in Lake George is around $80) and sat on the front porch of the room in those plastic white chairs while catching up. The girls hit the sack early and after an hour bullshitting decided we were chumps for letting them sleep while we were outside shooting the crap. See ya in the morning!