FLCC> Seneca Lake Ride Notes: the view from behind

[John Dennis]

Hi All, 

 

Some folks are prone to zipping along at the crest of the lead pack and a
few of us even manage to drop off the back of the slower group again and
again.   

 

The Seneca Lake ride is an 85-mile, four-county romp going Schuyler, Yates,
Ontario, Seneca and then back to Schuyler.

 

There was a great turn-out yesterday. The skies were absolutely cloudless
and the temps were pushing 80 as we rolled out of Watkins Glen.  With
apologies for misspellings and omissions, here’s my listing of those
present. The Elmira contingent included Bill and Lula Lodico, Teri Barnic,
John  Fessenden, Bill Fischer, Brian Klotz from Painted Post, and Bob
Nunnick.  It was great to see Teri back after seven weeks.  The Ithaca
contingent included six who traveled over in Chris Koukourtis’s biodiesel
van: Chris, Gary Hodges, Jack Loveless, Matt Horak, and Ben Gray, and me.
Others from the Ithaca area included Ritchie Berg, Emmanuel Cisteros, Alex
Deymin, Vanessa McCaffrey, Misty McPhee, Evan Palmer-Young (who rode over!),
Levi Reed, Tom Sage (Cortland), Ruth Sherman, Don Smith, and Don Tenkate.
Others included Paul Dimmick from Lodi, Tony Katyana (Towanda, Pa), Scott
Zimmerman (also PA?), Doug Carlson, Cliff Hood(sp?), Mark, and Tom.       

 

According to Gary, the lead group leaving Geneva was a five-some: Doug, Ben,
Matt, Brian, and Emmanuel. We’ll just have to guess about their average
speed, but having ridden with Ben, I’m sure it was fast.  The next group on
the southward leg was the two Dons, Gary, Vanessa, Evan, Teri, and Mark
(blue jersey, from Corning).  Evan, just to make sure he was totally pumped
up for  his organic chemistry exam today, also rode back to Ithaca.  Perhaps
we will have to give him the moniker, Stewart Jr. 

 

With 19 wineries on the west side of Seneca Lake and 13 on the East,
producers and their clientele now make up the most visible part of the
Seneca Lake economy. The stunning view of the lake from the Rte 14 at
Glenora Winery could almost pass for the view of Lac Leman at Nyon,
Switzerland.  Except that it is greener and less congested, less manicured,
less European, and, of course, less expensive.  Neither the Amish nor the
Mennonite communities that farm large areas of farmland on the west side of
the lake seem to grow grapes, preferring cabbage, soybeans, winter wheat,
and lots of corn. Never mind that wine is a part of daily life in New
Testament narratives.  The white farmhouses, clothes lines mounted on
spindled pulleys, bicycles leaning against sheds, and the occasional
one-room schoolhouse, remind one that two very different ways of life can be
juxtaposed without much interaction.  I wanted to contact the Oak Grove
Woodworking shop, but their hours are M-F and there was no telephone number
in evidence.  

 

As usual, the very magnificence of the red sandstone church in Bellona in
itself makes the trip worthwhile.  OK, the Smith Opera House at 82 Seneca
St. in Geneva is a grander and finer piece of work, but the church in
Bellona is “still in its native element”  and what is architecture without
its proper context?   I took a brief leave of the moderates’ luncheon at the
Parker to check on the Halsey Building (completely renovated, but in a
low-budget, modicum of functionality sort of way), the Art Deco
crescent-shaped gas station (still teetering on the brink of demolition),
and the Arthur Dove Building (the entire east wall has collapsed, but it is
being rebuilt by its new owner, a woman who resides in England).

 

Rounding the north end of the lake after our leisurely lunch we discovered a
headwind from the SE, passed the Rose Mansion, and no sooner were we
underway heading south on route 125 when I spotted that the Mike Weaver
Drain Tile Museum located at the John Johnson House was open for the first
time in 15 years.  Alas, not even the professor of history (Cliff?) in our
group was inclined to join me, so I got a tour on my own.  The Johnson
family, wealthy immigrants from Scotland, started “Viewfields” with 112
acres and expanded to 320.  Eventually Johnson had 72 miles of tile laid in
his fields which apparently contained a multiplicity of springs. The three
daughters sent to boarding school in Canandaigua never married, but one
daughter married Robert Swan of neighboring Rose Hill Farm, at one time the
pre-eminent farm in the state. My favorite tile in the museum collection,
which includes tiles from Mesopotamia, is one with an arrowhead embedded in
the clay. 

 

I then hustled south in the 20-22 mph range, savoring the pungent odors of
rotting cyanobacteria lying on the sunny east shore, and finally catching
sight of my group as I was most of the way up the hill leading into Willard.
But then I stopped to fill my fecklessly small camelback.  I could see my
group waiting at the intersection of the two roads that border the Willard
Drug Treatment Center, which is itself surrounded by a high fence topped
with multiple waves of shiny concertina wire.  Not wanting to keep my group
waiting a second more, I impulsively decided to “take the hypotenuse” over
to south-bound Rte 132.  Assuming that the bullet-pocking in the asphalt
ring-road just outside the concertina-wire topped fence was a harmless
by-product of one of those late-nite rituals of guards trying to fight off
boredom on a slow night, I was riding across a rough grassy patch and only
yards from reaching the “patrol path” when my rear wheel locked up with an
ominous alacrity.  I dismounted in full-view of at least one (imagined?)
watchtower and was dismayed to find that my entire rear derailleur had
severed itself from the frame and taken up residence in my rear wheel.
Maybe Mavic bladed spokes are sharp enough to cut metal!  Teeth were also
broken from my two new derailleur chain cogs.  I hastily stripped off the
defunct derailleur, leaving it like a miniature IED at the base of a nearby
telephone pole, only to discover that my bike was NOT rideable with so much
loose chain.  I was stripping out 12 chain links, when a patrol vehicle
pulled along side on the patrol path, “Are you OK?” asked a concerned
officer of the facility.   I explained I was dealing with a minor
mechanical. 

 

With my shortened chain mounted on the middle chain ring and mid-way up the
rear cassette, I found I had only one gear.  There was not enough play to
allow the front derailleur to function.  I called ahead to Gary to inform
him not to wait for me at Watkins Glen.  I rode to Ovid where there is a
traffic light, hitched a ride to Mecklenberg, and then rode the rest of the
way to Ithaca feeling terribly neglectful of my companions but also
pondering some of the surreal work that some are involved in.  Did you know,
for example, that a female guinea pig, after being bred by several males,
can actually then choose which male’s sperm will fertilizer her egg?    Or
that it may be possible to detect IEDs using a laser beam? 

 

Ride safe,  John


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