Day 2 Phelps, NY to Eagle Point, NY

After a pretty good night’s sleep, I woke up to the pitter patter of rain falling onto our tent. Usually the sound of rain when you’re safe and cosy is a relaxing one however, when you need to pack away a soggy tent and all your other gear, it loses it’s charm. I decided there was nothing I could do about it so stayed in bed reading for as long as my bladder would allow me to. Eventually I trapsed over to the bathroom block in the drizzly weather hoping that it would soon clear up. Cheerful Valley camp wasn’t looking as cheerful as the previous day.

After packing up what we could inside the tent, we trudged up to the campsite office in the hopes of getting a coffee and to check the weather using the wifi. Unfortunately there was no coffee although there was wifi… but the weather was looking rather bleak for the rest of the day. With no expected breaks in the rain and on a bit of a tight schedule, we decided to just suck it up and get on with it. Luckily for us we were camped under a large willow tree which offered us a little refuge from the rain, it also offered a perfect place for mosquitos to swarm and feast on two flustered brits.

Finally packed away, we put on our waterproofs and entered the nearest Tim Hortons into Google Maps. I don’t care how much of an experienced rider you are, riding in the rain is poop. Thankfully we were riding out of the rain so managed to stay relatively dry.

There is nothing better than that first sip of coffee in the morning. That sentence alone will tell you how much I rely on coffee to get me going. There should be a rule that my brain cannot be expected to run at its regular capacity until I’ve had my coffee fix.

Speaking of coffee, I have signed up to a website that enables readers to buy me a coffee should they wish to. Of course no pressure, this is a free blog that I enjoy writing as a hobby and that’s not changing, however if you are enjoying it and wanted to show your appreciation, you can do so by clicking here and buying me a coffee. You can even write me a nice little message on the cup if you wish to.

After warming up, drying up, caffeining up (yes that is now a word) and advacado-on-toasting up (also now a word) it was time to hit the road for our next stop, Cross Island Chapel.

Cross Island Chapel is the worlds smallest church on record. It was built in 1989 and has a capacity for roughly 3-5 people, just enough for a happy couple, someone to officiate the wedding and a witness or two. Floating in the middle of a pond, the only way to access the chapel is by boat.

After being away from my homeland for a year and two months now, I am still not used to seeing turtles and will keep squealing every time I spot one or 6 on a log.

Our next stop was to get to route 66 – mini route 66 that is!

This route 66 is a lot quicker to tour and I did the whole thing with a freshly made lemonade in hand. These replicas were built by John Van Buiten and his friend Richard Koert. It took them 14 years to complete and was built mostly from scrap wood and garage sale finds. Each building is 96 square feet as anything reaching 100 would need a building permit.

After finishing our lemonades, we hit the road for the final time that day to find a campsite. Unfortunately the first one we found was closed for the day and this is when we learned an important lesson for our trip. Unlike motels, campsites usually shut their offices at around 6 or 7pm. As unseasoned campers this wasn’t obvious to us, in hindsight it sort of makes sense now. We had messed up here because it was currently 6:30pm and really didn’t want to stay in a motel so early on in the trip.

Luckily we met a really nice guy from Boston who told us about Eagle point campsite which would probably be open. Thankfully, it was!

When we arrived at the campsite a man came out from the house across from the office to check us in. He had actually finished his shift and had gone home for the day but spotted our bikes and came to help. He was kind enough to check us in and show us our campsite which we were very appreciative for as time was getting on and our bellys were rumbling.

As we started to disassemble the bikes, he returned to let us know the log man was coming for deliveries if we needed any firewood. Then as if on que, the log man arrived.

I flagged him down and bought some wood from log man and his wife, log woman. She asked me a few questions about Ukraine and told me she had a friend from there which was nice but kind of random. She then asked about Ukrainian food and I realised, she thought I was Ukrainian. I am European so I suppose I look Ukrainian, however my accent is very, undoubtedly British. We had a good laugh together when I corrected her and let her know where I’m actually from. The couple were so nice and friendly I ended up buying two bundles from them which I immediately regretted. Only because we were going out for dinner and it was already getting late so there was now a lot of wood to burn through. Being generous can get you into a pickle sometimes.

To save on fuel, we rode Mitch’s bike with me on the back to the Sticks and Stones restaurant. It was a really strange feeling being on the back of the bike after riding my own for the whole day. I kept bumping my helmet into Mitch’s to the point where it definitely was not funny anymore. I used to be so well behaved on the back but it now appears I’ve lost my passenger etiquette.

When we got back to the campsite we burned though our extensive pile of firewood and used the wifi to plan the next day. Unfortunately we were due even more rain that night which would continue into the morning. After getting so stressed that morning over the rain, I decided to just let it go and enjoy the sounds of the rain when it came.

As soon as I was horizontal in my sleeping bag, I was dead to the world. That was until I was awoken by a loud crack of lightening and followed by of course, rain. I listened to it falling heavy against the tent and thought to myself, “you know what, this is relaxing, I’m not going to stress one bit, this is great.” Meanwhile, our poor gloves were getting soaked through a crack in the tent to the point it looked like I’d just pulled them out of the water – oops.

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