Roadside Attractions

Part of the fun of bike riding or scenic drives are the things you see along the way. On our trip to Lake George we took a side trip to Whitehall NY to see one of the locks on the Erie canal. As a child my parents had actually taken up the Erie canal by boat. It was one of the most memorial trips we had on the boat so I wanted to go back and see one of the locks to see how different it was from what I remembered. 

The lock is close to what I remembered but the town is a lot more run down now. The restaurant/antique shop I remember having the best honey buns in the world is gone. The restaurant/antique shop was memorable also for the fact that the woman running it had some hand painted color slides made for president Lincoln that showed battle scenes from the civil war. I remember she brought us up to the second floor and actually used a projector to show us some of the slides. They were as detailed as and realistic as any Thomas Eakins painting but a lot more vibrant.

On are way back from Whitehall we came across an interesting memorial to a marine sergeant who died in 2017. It was an eagle atop a motorcycle as you can see at the picture at the top of the post. It's a cool memorial. Much better than the usual stone statue or marker and makes an interesting roadside attraction. 

This past Saturday I led a ride from Allentown with the purpose of seeing the new windmill at

Holland farms. It had been under construction for about a year and now that it was finished I wanted to see it.  It was a cold and windy day so we did a 30+ mile no stop ride that came back to Allentown via Rue Road. The windmill can be seen at the bottom of the road. We couldn't get a really good view from the road so we snuck up a dirt driveway into the farm to get a picture. Laura probably got a better picture with her super zoom camera but we did see it. Holland farms actually has a winter festival with an interactive light display including a lit up windmill. I may go check it out some night. 

As the winter approaches I will keep looking out from some sights along the roads to try and make the rides a little more interesting. 

P.S. Martin for reasons only he can justify decided not to make any shifts for the entire ride even though we did go over some hills. He is now known as One Gear Griff