My friend Barbara gathered a small group for an epic bicycle ride. We were to meet at the Westchester landing of the Mario Cuomo bridge, cross the bridge, pedal up to Haverstraw, then take the ferry across the Hudson river to Ossining and bike back soutbound on the Westchester side. It was supposed to be a 20-21 mile ride. This was Barbara’s second time arranging this trip (last year’s attempt was rained out). But, as adventures sometimes go – you never really know what will happen….
Adventures come in many flavors
If you are a reader of this blog, you know by now that adventures often take planning, and sometimes months of effort. In some case though, opportunities just fall in your lap (you just have to say “yes”). In others, you don’t really know that it’s an adventure until you are doing it. This was a combination of those last two categories.
Background & Conspirators
I have bicycled several times with Barbara, but have not had the opportunity to ride with her husband Barry, whose company I also enjoy greatly. So I readily agreed to join the cool route she identified, and was looking forward towards the scenic view from the ferry ride in the middle.
On this ride we were also joined by Heather and Mark who are practically celebrities, because they have ridden the entire outline of the US on bicycles. Yes, you read that correctly, they have pedaled down the west coast, down the east coast, and west to east twice at the southern border and the north! You can read Mark’s excellent Shifting Gears blog here, but needless to say – they are VERY experienced bicyclists and really nice people.
The Journey Begins
Our trip started off very nicely, 7AM meeting at the parking lot, pedal over the bridge, through Nyack and up to Nyack Beach state park.
From there, we took a very nice gravel ride right on the edge of the Hudson river northward. The breeze felt good coming off the river as we made our way upstream. We made a wrong turn here and there, but the group was enjoyable, the day beautiful and no one really cared.
We even passed a historic site where Benedict Arnold conspired to surrender West Point.
Don’t pay the ferry-man
When we made it to Haverstraw, Heather and Mark continued northward to Bear Mountain, leaving Barbara, Barry and myself to hop onto the ferry. When we got there, no one was at the ticket window, and we soon found out the last ferry was 8:42AM (it was now 9:10AM).
We took a short break while we weighed our options. Should we 1) Rent an uber to go back home? 2) charter the ferryboat anyway to take us across for the princely sum of ~$7,000? 3) find an amateur seaman to take us across in their boat? or 4) Just bicycle back the way we came?
We quickly came to the conclusion that bicycling back was the best approach, and we decided it would be easier to go back on the road – 9W is a mecca for cyclists and it should be a smooth road with wide shoulders.
After climbing several hundred feet to reach 9W, we found that the road was under construction. There was metal plates, a lot of gravel and no shoulder to speak of. After 3 miles or so, we had enough. We looped through the Rockland Lake State park back to the place we made a wrong turn in the morning, and returned the way we came, which was still delightful.
We then crossed the Cuomo bridge for the second time and made it back to our cars. Our trek had reached nearly 30 miles with more than 1,500 feet of vertical. It was a beautiful day, and although our path was not the one we wanted, I really enjoyed everyone’s company.
Barbara – they say third time’s the charm!
