Days 5 and 6

Day 5 was my first “off” day in that I stayed in the same hotel room for two nights in a row. I did laundry, boxed up stuff to mail home, did some shopping and still managed to add two parks and two states to the list. You would think I could get a blog post in, but it wasn’t to be. I fell asleep before I was able to turn on the computer and this morning I wanted to get a very early start because I had what I perceived to be a difficult day in front of me.

I was on the bike at 5:30. I forget that the further north we go the earlier it gets light outside. When I wake up at home at 5:30 it is completely dark, but today it was fully daylight. After getting out of the Washington, DC area I passed through Baltimore, then Philadelphia with few problems. My thoughts were to get to the New York City area in the middle of the day when the traffic was not so bad. That time apparently does not exist. Additionally, I had the opportunity to participate in what must be the single biggest traffic engineering debacle ever created by man. About five miles before the George Washington Bridge traffic slowed to a virtual crawl. After thirty minutes of starting and stopping I reached the root of the problem. As opposed to a fifty car pile up or the collapse of the bridge itself, the whole mess was caused by the State of New York wishing to extract eight dollars or more from each and every driver for the privilege of sitting through this mess to begin with. The traffic went from four lanes to 15 or so lanes to go through the booths. The interesting part was after getting through the booths. The traffic then went back down into four lanes and the process was a complete free for all. Imagine riding a motorcycle into this frenzy and trying to compete with a hundred or so eighteen wheelers. While I did not have size in my favor during this process I did have stealth. To add insult to injury, right after getting through this ordeal and while negotiating a series of turns, exits and entrances, my GPS unit experienced the electronic equivalent of a “brain fart”. It thought it was in Harlem then in Manhattan then in La La Land. Finally it exited from its fugue just in time to get me back on the right path.

The rest of the day was uneventful and the weather, once again, was spectacular. It was actually cool enough that I added a layer for warmth.

Of course, when I went to the parks on day five I left my camera in my room but you can see that I now have a traveling companion.