Day 52 – July 25 – Bowling Green, OH to Huron, OH – 78 Miles

It was cool and clear this morning.  The drier cool air had contributed to a very restful sleep.  I don’t think we have awaken to a cooler morning since somewhere in Montana.  There was a fog resting just above the surface of the campground lake.  Once the sun was above the horizon the fog disappeared and it aided in drying out our dew soaked tents.

Dylan, Joe and I got our start around 8:30.  Our campground was a couple miles south of Bowling Green, so we had to go back into town to rejoin the route.  The Slippery Elm rail trail was just east of the campground and led us back into the city.

Our goal for the day was just east of Huron, OH.  This would put us in a good position for making our way through Cleveland on Thursday.  Cleveland is the biggest city through which our route takes us.  We will follow US 6 along the Lake Erie shoreline from Huron, through the heart of Cleveland all the way to Buffalo, NY.  Our route today would take us through a series of small towns.  In Pemberville, OH we stopped for coffee and muffins.  As we were finishing another customer asked about our trip. During our conversation, he asked if we had time to see the local opera house which had recently been restored.  Mr. Jim Fields had been involved with the restoration of the Pemberville Opera House.   It was originally built in 1915 and is incorporated into the second floor of the city hall building.  We were in no big rush so we decided to take a tour.

By 11:30 we had made it to Gibsonburg, OH and decided the city park would be a good location for lunch.  In Fremont we got onto the North Coast Inland rail trail for the 9 miles to Clyde, OH.  We were making decent time.  South of Fremont we encounter a westbound rider. Flavia was from Boston and was riding to Seattle before she started graduate studies and the University of Washington.  She had started her ride near Bar Harbor, and was in her 16^th day on the road.  When she mentioned that it suddenly hit me that our journey was nearing the last stages.  She also reminded us of the challenges we had before reaching the coast.  Like Dick Upchurch, the other westbound rider from yesterday mentioned, the mountains of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine will be a challenge.  We shared our tips for her trip west.

Before going our separate ways, Dylan gave Flavia a “Traveling Power Bar.”  This particular Power Bar has been on the road, more or less, since 1994.  It had been given to Dylan, by a couple in Cambridge, IL who had hosted him overnight.  The couple were also touring cyclist and had received the bar a couple years earlier from another bicycle tourist they had met on the road.  The bar has been transferred from one cross-country cyclist to another like this, since 1994.  Each person who is given the bar logs their name and trip information on an index card and places the card in the Ziploc baggie with the Power Bar along with the instructions to “…not eat the bar.”

Throughout Ohio we have been blessed with low traffic roads with good surfaces.  The low traffic part changed immediately upon entering Huron, OH.  In Huron we got on US 6 for the last 5 miles to our campground.  We immediately felt the rush of what it will be like for the few days as we make our way along Lake Erie towards Buffalo.  It will be urban riding with urban traffic.

For now we are at the Firefly Camp Resort on the Lake Erie Shore.  We got in a swim before dinner this evening.  Tomorrow, Cleveland in on the agenda.