The thing about traveling on Amtrak is the train is often late. By a lot. When your train is scheduled to get in at 3:00 AM, that is really not a problem, though. :-) As I explained to the porter and the conductor every time they apologized for the delay. "Not a problem, really!"
I kept waking up in the middle of the night and realizing the train wasn't moving, which made me happy. More sleep for me! We got in at 6:30, which meant we could get breakfast on the train. When you eat on the train, you share a booth with other passengers. For breakfast we got to chat with a nice older African-American woman to told us about ChemTrails.
Here is Max with Lake Erie in the background in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame parking lot. Which is across the street from the train station.
Our ride for the day is on the beautiful and historic Ohio and Erie Canal towpath, all day, except at the beginning in Cleveland where they haven't actually finished building the bike trail yet. See it under construction behind Max there, with the Cuyahoga river behind it, not on fire. The Cleveland portion of the route is industrial wasteland, which sets Max, nature boy, to ranting. I explained to him how much nicer it is now that the river doesn't catch on fire any more.
The canal towpath is really nice, it's all flat obviously, except for a brutal climb in Akron, which is at the divide between Lake Erie and the Ohio River. The canal used to go all the way to Portsmouth. The surface is typically crushed stone, it's in great shape the whole way. It's comparable to the Pennsylvania part of the North Central Rail Trail, including the railroad tracks next to it, where the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad runs excursion trains. They let you bring your bike on the excursion train, you can take the train out and ride your bike back. Most of this route is in Cuyahoga Valley National Park. It's very scenic, lots of wildlife and birds.
It was very hot at the end of the day, near 90, which we dealt with by having smoothies. This is the Cherry Valley Creamery in Canal Fulton. Yum.
Canal Fulton is a historic canal town all preserved. Only 10 miles to go!
Here we are at the end of a long 70 mile day, that ended hot. We got in to the Hampton Inn in Massillon, Ohio around 3:30. The Hampton Inn is the only lodging anywhere near here. The lobby is on the third level of the parking garage, the bottom level is the local bus depot and packed full of bums. I don't know what the Hampton Inn folks are thinking here.
Dinner was awesome, across the street at "Kozmo's". That mac and cheese has chunks of lobster in it. Good electrolyte replenishment too.
Lunch was at Luckity's Inn, on the south side of Akron, which is a regular family diner.
1 comment:
Lol @ chemtrails
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