Phoenixville, PA 10/7/2011

Up and out the door in a very cool morning. We had our bill adjusted as the restaurant at the Ramada had been rented out for a fashion show. We were unable to get on as models so had to walk in the dark for dinner. We had a bowl of cereal at Ramada, toasted a bagel to go and grabbed some cream cheese and hit the road, up the hill. We were off our route for a few miles and joined our route coming into Conshohocken, PA, a suburb of Philadelphia. We had so many turns on our route I began to develop an unusual craving for cheese. We made it through the maze, past some very nice homes on Valley Road, Kansas Avenue and Tennis Avenue.

It is horse county, big beautiful homes and past the curiously named Almshouse Road.

We began to get hungry and saw a sign in an industrial area advertising catering, and now open for breakfast, but not a clue as to where they were located. We asked a guy passing by and he gave us the directions, "behind the blue building". We rode behind the blue building and had a nice breakfast and chatted with another couple about our ride and how he ruptured his Achilles tendon. He was moving his children's basket ball net over a soft lawn during the rainy September.

We stopped in REI in Conshocken and Rudy bought new cleats and I replaced my flashing red light which had disappeared off the back of my bike. We were also seeking local knowledge about bike friendly roads to cut some distance off our Adventure Cycling Route which takes us north of Lancaster before heading south into Maryland. We got some tips from Charley, one of the mechanics and some assistance from Holly, both good employees of REI. Shortly after leaving REI we picked up the Schuykill River Trail and road up the trail to the Valley Forge National Historic Park. A beautiful day, lots of people hiking and biking and visiting the various areas in the park. We exited the park and entered Phoenixville looking for a place to stay. Stopped in the first place, a sports bar. A few people were in the parking lot standing around a 1931 Ford, and by their body language they were expecting it to explode. We went into the bar and spoke to the bar tender, a truly grouchy individual. He recommended Prima Motel down the road behind the pizza parlor. We called and Gary said, yeah, we got rooms. As we were leaving one of the guys who had been at the 1931Ford came in to claim his Guinness . The owner had came in the bar looking for a phone book to call a mechanic and the fellow had answered, You found one, and abandoned his Guinness to help the stranded motorist. As he talked to us, with his lady friend in the back ground saying it was time to go, I realized that I had been mistaken when I first observed the people around the Ford in the parking lot. They were not afraid the car was going to explode, they were standing back while their volunteer mechanic was checking out the car and wondering I a sure about his ability. We exited and headed down street, a very unbikefriendly street in search of Prima and discovered every corner had a pizza parlor on it. We found the right one and I walked into the Prima Motel hallway, it could not be classified a lobby, and was immediately reminded of some places in the Tenderloin in San Francisco that rent rooms by the week. The cigarette smell was intense and I backed out and told Rudy, No Way. I called the Majestic Hotel again (I had got an answering machine earlier) and got a nice lady who said they had non smoking room available. We rode down Bridge Street and checked in to a nice room, next door to two other bikers, whom we met later. We did some laundry in the tub and then went down stairs to the very nice Italian restaurant in the basement of the hotel. Many of the patrons were wearing Phllies Jerseys, including a family of four, the children being about 5 and 7 years old and a sweet grandmother type at the next table. A ball game was on in the next room above the guitar player. I asked one of the employees what the inning and the score was and he replied, who cares, it is not the Phillies.

When we checked into the Majestic, Nicole told us we were lucky as tonight was First Friday and things would be happening later. Sure enough, they blocked off two blocks of the street in front of the hotel. There were vendors set up, live music of a variety of types and quality, in several places and fire trucks from four different departments in the middle of the street. I spoke with three of the departments about swapping patches and nothing panned out. They were there to kick off fire prevention week.

We got back to the hotel and chatted with our biking neighbors, John and Wayne, who are doing the same route as we are but a week or two at a time. They started this bit in Poughkeepsie and will end in Richmond. They were traveling much faster than we are and we wished them well and returned to our room. I was to tired to do the blog and went to bed.

51 miles of very pleasant riding.