Day 50: Ringing Rocks Family Campground, PA

The weather continues to not cooperate.  It was windy and in the 40s when we got up today, and it is due to be colder tomorrow morning.  At the end of Alea's 49 mile ride it was still only in the mid-50s, though the sun had started to be out most of the time.

A few of our camping neighbors who had booked through today had bugged out yesterday, probably due to the rain.  With the weather so cold, we decided to move across the road to one of the abandoned vacated sites with power, so that we could recharge the battery and electronics.  We also turned on the electric mattress pad so that Lana could stay warm.

Pat joined us for breakfast, and we stoked up the last of the firewood from her cabin, as well as whatever downed wood we could scavenge behind our campsite.  We made another frittata: this time it was bacon, eggs, onion, various peppers, carrots and cheddar cheese.

Once the fire was burnt down to just embers, we decided it was time to once again hit the road.  We made the hour long drive into Conshohocken, to allow Alea to pick up from where I had last ridden.

The first part of the route had literally dozens of turns, mainly to navigate through the many tiny towns along our route to the Delaware River.  Alea once again faced a bridge closing, and with the cold weather we opted to drive her around it, rather than looking for an alternative cycling route.

We crossed into New Jersey at Lambertville, which Pat had said was worth exploring.  Unfortunately, several thousand people seem to have been given the same advice, with there being a miles-long stretch of cars there attempting to cross the 15 mph bridge into Pennsylvania.

Saxtonville (NJ) tavern.  Note the colonial-era satellite dish on the roof.  ;-)

The end of Alea's 49 miles included some pretty vicious headwinds for several miles at a time, including a particularly difficult final two mile stretch into Milford, NJ.

In Milford, while Alea put her bike in the back, I went across the street to buy some wine.  A Wikipedia article about Liquor Laws in the United States confirmed that buying wine will not be as simple as walking into a grocery store for many, many states to come.  And it seems that the laws of PA and NJ are some of the most obtuse, with some New England states being very close behind.  So when an opportunity presents itself along our route, it is best to take advantage of it, rather than trying to search high and low once we finally run dry.

Alea coast to a stop in Milford, NJ.

Of course, Alea was tired and grumpy after her long, cold, windy ride.  She had pretty much gotten her gear stowed away by the time I returned from the store, so I waited for her in the cab of the van.  She soon closed the rear van doors and (since I had been parked illegally for at least 20 minutes) we got quickly got underway.  About a mile out of town she says "I didn't put the front wheel in the van!"

Alea's taco-ed wheel.

So we immediately returned to town, where we found the wheel taco-ed and the tube blown.  We are hopeful that the tire was not damaged, though we won't know for certain until we mount it on a new rim.  If for some reason we can't find a new rim right away (which shouldn't be a problem), then we'll share my front wheel until we can do so.

To continue our recent string of bad luck, the check engine light has once again come on.  We aren't too thrilled about that, as the likely cause is the gas tank repair wasn't done correctly.  I envision a Ford dealer on our route telling us that we'll need to take it back to Conshohocken to get them to fix their mistake, but we are crossing our fingers that doesn't happen.

So we've camped about 4 miles from Milford, NJ, at Ringing Rocks Family Campground ($38, power, water, and 270+ channels of cable TV).  As private campgrounds go, it's one of the better ones that we've stayed at.  Plus they have a laundromat, so that we can get caught up on that chore.

If the rain holds off we'll have salmon teriyaki stir fry for dinner, using some red salmon we bought at an Aldi a while back.