146 To Lake Placid and beyond

Monday 22nd April 2013   Miles Today 184 Total 815

Delights of the Rip Van Winkle Motel.

Overnight the toilet started to back up so in the morning I popped over to reception to tell them with the hope that they would let us use the room next door if possible. I kinda got my wish, the receptionist/owner disappeared for a minute and came back with this.......and a set of keys.

Would you trust this man to do your plumbing ?

I sorted the problem in a minute but it did make me laugh. The simplest solutions are always the best.

We popped into a diner next door for a spot of breakfast and then set off for Lake Placid, a ski resort where the 1936 and 1980 winter Olympics were held. Despite the weather overnight being even colder and well below freezing, the wind had dropped and the sun was shining and the day was shaping up to be a lot warmer than yesterday.  Heated jackets were not deployed.

There were waterfalls and fast flowing rivers everywhere

One of the ski resorts in the area. Clearly, it has snowed fairly recently.

Lake Placid was a bit disappointing. Basically it is a ski resort, that charges ski resort prices. It was just like any other small town on the long winding road through the Adironach mountains. Despite that it was a very picturesque ride and with the warmer weather, it was bliss.
Hard to believe that within these waters, (according to Hollywood) lives Giant Anaconda, Killer Croc and some kind of mutant shark.!!!!

The riding was joy. Empty, dry tarmac.

The lakes were only just thawing and ice was everywhere.

Parked next to one of the many lakes in the area.

We'd stopped here so Ray could play with another one of his toys, the  GoPro camera.  I wandered about this area which had been a pumping station.  There was a WW11 memorial and an area teaming with wildlife.  Whilst Ray tinkered, he didn't even notice I was missing for about an hour.
So off we set again and having passed about 10 petrol stations, without stopping, Ray told me we were on reserve.  Garmin told us we had a long way to go until the next petrol station and so when informed of this latest calamity, I just accepted it as part of the adventure and looked forward to pushing the heavy beast the last 3 miles, I was quite happy to  push the bike too. Ray decided to panic for both of us, so I was very happy to see the petrol station, eventually.
We were heading for Watertown and on reaching there, with very tired and saddle sore bottoms, we found a hotel, and settled down for the night