Day 49 Little Falls, NY to Latham, NY  78 miles and 2307 feet of climb

 We headed out of Little Falls and again rode along the historic Erie Canal.
It was hot and humid again today but the scenery and beautiful riding more than made up for it.

Along the way, we stopped and had homemade ice cream and donuts being sold by 2 young Amish girls on the side of the road. You can't see it, but their horse is grazing in the woods beyond the wagon.

Tonight an old friend of mine from high school, Jack Himmelsbach arrived at the hotel. I had not seen or communicated with Jack in over 40 years until he emailed me a few weeks ago. Tomorrow Jack will ride 1/2 way with us to Brattleboro. He is a retired Vermont state cop and has lived in Vermont for many years. It was great catching up with him last night and sharing how each of our lives has progressed over the previous 4 decades. Tomorrow I'm not sure how much talking we'll be able to do as we have lots of climbing in store. On those days typically, I'm too out of breath to communicate much, and I concentrate on just getting up the hill. 

Only 3 days to go until we reach Portsmouth. Yesterday at the route wrap Jim the tour director mentioned that one thing they do on the next to last night (this coming Monday) is to ask everyone to stand up and talk about their impressions of the trip and what it meant to them. I'm not sure I'll be able to get through something like that, I'll get too emotional.