Day 57. Irving to Lockport, 73 miles

I woke up to a nice dry tent. Can anyone explain dew to me? Like, why it happens some places/times and not others and what the conditions are? It’s beautiful and glistening and all the things I love, but it also makes packing up my tent kinda rough.

I’m heading primarily north today, leaving the lake behind and following first the Niagara River and then the Erie Canal for a while. I’ll split from it around Rochester, I think, when it’s time for me to curve more emphatically north again. I’m going to put the ridiculous and embarrassing confession at the beginning here: I missed the falls. It wasn’t on purpose! And I’ve seen them twice before! I was just so intent on keeping on the trail that I didn’t notice it doesn’t go to them. I’m not following the ACA route here because it goes into Canada, and I’m avoiding border crossings this trip (done a couple on previous Great Lakes tours), and I just plumb missed that it was out of my way, and I’d need to affirmatively route myself there. WHOOPS.

The wind had been predicted out of the west, and they’re usually right about wind, but it felt to me like the dominant wind was from the south as I headed north. I didn’t check—just flag-watched and enjoyed the riding, figuring maybe this was part of the storm system dude had mentioned and that I hadn’t bothered to look into.

I was mostly on road until I got near Buffalo (which I guess is actually my last major city of the trip—sorry I forgot you, Buffalo!), but it was considerate road.

Passing through West Seneca and into Buffalo was predictably depressing, perhaps more so than any city I’ve been through so far. So many grey-faced drug addicts, so much poverty and neglect. Coming to that after riding through Orchard Park, which looked posh and thriving and full of mansions, was jarring. It’s the same familiar pattern, but the grime and abandonment was more pronounced here.

Still, there was a lot of public art, some sanctioned and some not.

Then I was in Buffalo proper, which which had bike lanes galore and more public art.

There were about a dozen iterations of these in different colors, from various birds to plants that grew as you passed each sign, to domestic animals. It was super cool.

And then I was out of Buffalo and on a collaboration of the Empire State Trail and the Erie Canal Heritage Trail! It was mostly continuous and, being, I assume, the beneficiary of two sources of funding, very well-signed and benched. Whenever I got briefly kicked onto the road, it’d be to a marked bike route.

At one point I saw a sign indicating an historical marker, and then a small opening in the bushes lining the canal side of the trail.

Then a few feet later I saw this sign.

So I turned around and disbelievingly ducked through and was standing in a small clearing wondering what the heck I was doing there when I turned around and saw this sign.

I moved along, taking the occasional sit break along the canal.

The sky was moody and overcast much of the day, which was fine because it was very hot again.

I’d been planning to camp near Lockport a few miles off route, but as I got closer I began to yearn for a night of AC. Then I checked the weather and saw it was supposed to rain overnight and into the late morning. I had a short day following and decided it’d be nice to be in a motel if I had to wait out rain, so I got a room at the Lockport Inn & Suites and aimed myself in that direction (still on trail!).

The motel was sprawling and had great statuary, and I went for a walk in the beautiful last light of the evening.

I also encountered what Andrew correctly identified as a vending machine that has given up.

Just as night fell for real, it started to rain, and I tucked myself away in the motel room with the AC cranked up, my cheese and water bottles in the fridge, and all my items charging.