Day 1

Rented a minivan and drove from home in NJ to Albany Intl and rode 57 miles on the Erie Canal Trail through Schenectady, Amsterdam, Canajoharie and to our Campsite at Lock 15 outside Fort Plain. Fort Plain and areas west were devastated by flooding two days before we arrived and we received a lot of conflicting advice regarding the passability of the local roads and the Trail. Bridges out, mudslides, train derailments, the area was a mess. We decided to continue on the trail and we made it to lock 15 without too much trouble but Fort Plain looked like a Tsunami hit it. What a mess.


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Day 2

Broke camp and had breakfast in St Johnsville. Just outside of St Johnsville on the trail we ran into a quagmire of ankle deep sticky mud that stuck to the wheels and got into the brakes and fenders and everywhere. We had to stop and clean the bikes every 100 yards to move them and it was hot and humid and mosquitoes were swarming like crazy. Two exhausting hours later we left the mud behind and were able to clean the bikes off somewhat next to a stream. We made it the rest of the way to our destination just off Lake Oneida. A total of 70 exhausting miles. Little Falls looked nice but we had to pass on through due to the mud delays. Tough day.

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Day 3

65 miles through Syracuse to Weedsport. Overcast all morning it started raining around 11am. The rain got steadily harder until by midafternoon it was a douwnpour. The canal trail is interesting in this area, lots of aqueducts. Didnt see alot of Syracuse due to the heavy rain. We planned to camp outside of Weedsport but took a room at the Best Western instead because the campground was underwater and the rain was showing no signs of abating. Good move. They are extremely bike friendly and the room was huge and comfortable. Two straight days of adversity. We are hoping things get a little easier.

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Day 4

65 miles from Weedsport through Seneca Falls and Geneva and down the west side of Seneca Lake into Watkins Glen. Nice cool overcast morning we made great time into Geneva. Met Richard in Seneca Falls. A Tran-Am veteran, he was riding his motorcycle from New Hampshire to Oregon. Nice guy. We talked with him about biking and life for a while. The sun came out around 11am and the ride down Seneca lake was gorgeous. You are on a ridge with beautiful views of the lake valley the whole way and the ride ends with a great descent into Watkins Glen. We camped at Watkins Glen State Park. Beautiful, quiet campground and the hike through the glen and canyons was amazing. Best day of the trip so far. Things are looking up!

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Day 5

57 miles from Watkins Glen to Owego through Elmira and Waverly with good weather all day. The Catherine Valley Trail is a nice way to climb out of Watkins Glen on a 2% grade through quiet woods.
The ride today wasn't too interesting overall but Qwego is a nice destination. Quaint old town with a Taqueria that has one of the best Burritos I have had east of San Diego.

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Day 6

45 miles from Owego to Windsor through Endicott, Binghamton and Waverly. The ride today picked up literally with some climbing once we left Binghamton. Another nice descent into Windsor and a beautiful 5 mile ride through a valley along the Susquehanna river south of Windsor to our campground. The Pinecrest campground is right on the Susquehanna river and is one of the best looked after cleanest private campgrounds I have stayed at.

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Day 7

48 miles from Windsor to Hancock. Back through the beautiful valley on a gorgeous morning to Windsor. Nice climb out of Windsor to Deposit, a quaint little town on the delaware river where we had an awesome early lunch at a little place called Butterfields run by a couple of guys who fled New York City a while back. Climbed out of Deposit around the Cannonville reservoir and up a few more hills and down a long descent into Hancock NY. Stayed at Smith's Colonial Inn just south of Hancock. Nice clean big rooms we enjoyed our stay there very much. Great weather another beautiful day nice ride.

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Day 8

68 miles Hancock to Port Jervis NY. Hot hilly day. A biggish climb out of Hancock and one giant roller after another down the Delaware River all the way to Port Jervis. Lots of long fast descents, this was a fun fun ride if you like hills up and down. Stopped at the Long Eddy Hotel just off rte 97 in Long Eddy . A real find. If you are going that way it's the best place to stop for a bite to eat and a rest in an area without a lot of services. Friendly locals and great food. Ran into Stuart who was ultralighting around New York State and we rode into Port Jervis with him and caught a New Jersey Transit train to our home town in New Jersey.

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Hawk's Nest Drive coming into Port Jervis. Sweet! There is a Roebling Bridge that links Lackawaxen with Rte. 97 in NY. Back in '01 I did a long weekend of day rides from Eddy Farm Resort in Port Jervis. The last day we rode to Honesdale, PA, into NY and back on Rte. 97 after crossing the river at Lackawaxen.

How was getting your bike on the train as there is no high level platform at Port Jervis that I know of. The last two years I have ridden Port Jervis to Philly. I have rented a car one way because I have been worried about dealing with the train. I have scheduled it out. It's possible to take SEPTA to Trenton and then NJT to Seacucus Jct. to pick up the Port Jervis train and still avoid the bike restrictions.

I may do the Bon Ton Roulet in a few weeks. Did it back in '06. Stayed in Dundee one night and rode up the west side of the lake to Geneva and then back down the east side to Watkins Glen. The west side was really nice. Looks like south the Dundee you get even better views. We camped at a school in town, so it wasn't that nice. But I did take a walk up the stairs by the water. Very cool. Also swam in trhe pool, which I think is in the park.

Yeah that last descent into Port Jervis is nice. Good views and a nice curvy drop all the way down into town. There are a couple of pics of the roebling bridge on that last link in the original post.

No problem at all with the trains. Unloaded the bikes and stood them up and carried them up the stairs one at a time one hand on the stem and one hand on the down tube. The conductor was very accommodating and even helped us get our stuff off at our stop. New Jersey Transit has become much more bike friendly in the last year or so although they still have peak time restrictions.

Yes below Dundee on the western side of route 14 and into Watkins Glen is beautiful. The sun was out up on the ridge and there were severe thunderstorms passing through the valley right over Watkins Glen and the Lake. Quite a sight and when we hiked into the glen the canyon was overflowing with water. A nice show all around.

We rode up the hill and camped in the state park campground. It was very nice, clean and quiet with showers and rest rooms and there was hiking access to the glen from there.

Funny I should read this right now. I'm in Oneida at the McDonalds right now. Just came from Saratoga Springs this morning along Rt 5/5S thanks to the train derailment. Was the derailment due to the flooding? I remember as I went through Fort Plain that I saw a road sign that said Last Day For Debris Pick Up July 8.' Right before that I heard someone running a ?generator?...I'm guessing it was a water pump and then right after the sign people had stuff laid out all over the place by the curb and I heard another pump running and realized I was looking at flood damage. The roads looked fine. As I got just west of Utica Rt 5 was shut down down and I knew by the way the signs were put up it had to be thanks to flooding. I rode through the sign and a short distance later I came to the bridge over the brook and was shocked at how high the water was. It was over the top of the bridge but all it would take for it to be running down the road again would be maybe .5 inch of rain. I had just ridden through sprinkles right before getting to the closed stretch of Rt 5. Right after that the skies cleared out and I could tell it probably won't rain again today. The air cleared up WAY too much. Radar wants to suggest it as well but the regular movement of cells sure has changed since yesterday/even this AM.

Curious, what day did you leave. You was out for 8 days and the flooding had already occurred??? I was seeing on the news this AM about the flooding around Hermiker and was figuring it was this past weekend...not early to mid week last week.

We left on the June 28th and the storms that caused the original flooding were on the 27th. It rained again hard all day on July 1st and later in the week when I was farther south I saw radar that showed more rain and storms up that way so I am not surprised that it was still flooding. I don't know why the train derailed but I heard it was a godawful mess so I guess they still don't have that cleaned up either.

Did you take the ECT from Fort Plains to Little Falls? It was a muddy quagmire there when we went through on the 29th. Took us two hours to push our bikes less than a mile through sticky ankle deep mud.

Where you headed from there?

June was a record month for rainfall here. The ground is saturated and every thunderstorm is causing additional flooding. We had a couple staying with us from Toronto last week whose sailboat is trapped on the canal due to the flooding. The week before that we rescued a couple from a soggy campground who were riding a tandem from Plymouth MA to Tonawanda (NY) ,they had been soaked by rain for two days straight and were on the verge of giving up ( I think they finally did).

The section of the ECT from Fort Plain to Little Falls is frequently damaged from floods. The alternative is Route 5 S which between Fort Plain and Little Falls has the only two significant hills on the whole 365 mile long route. But it is quite scenic offering a panoramic view of the Mohawk Valley .

The train derailment was caused by two trains hitting each other.

I saw online the same, two trains going the opposite direction on side by side tracks somehow came together. I thought I heard it was on the engine came to rest on NY5 and tore up the road pretty bad. I know when I stopped in Fonda two days ago I saw a CSX worker walking into the gas station where I stopped to ask information about why the road was closed. I pretty much stick to highway riding. I don't mess much with trails at all. Given the situation right now I'm glad for that. The trails up this way have to be pretty much trashed. I know I just missed getting dumped on late this afternoon by the back side of this darn lingering storm system. It poured like I haven't seen it pour in ages around 6PM here in Fredonia. Headed off to NW Ohio, hopefully by Saturday...now, originally was hoping to be there by Friday night but I don't think that is going to happen now thanks to the wind I got hit with today. When you wake up around 3AM and hear the wind blowing...that isn't a good thing...at least not if you riding a bike all day long trying to make big miles.