Day 46 Falling down

Cold blows the wind off Lake Eire, Gary from Pittsburg, an elderly fellow guest at the motel told me that it was much warmer inland. He liked people watching, a beneficial quality in later years when participation declines, and was here for 3 weeks, he came back often. I packed and debated my route, my dilemmas interrupted by a message from Adam, a good friend from NYC, saying that he’d be at his place in PA in this week. A place not far from the line of least distance and least mechanical peril between my location and the packing crate that awaits.

Actuarial calculations on mechanical mortality aside, the map kept calling me to Niagara Falls and despite Gary’s advice I headed up the lake road to that tourist Mecca.

Not on any plan this diversion appealed to my sense of geological drama, why not go see where Lake Eire spills, when the hydro-electric plant permits, into Lake Ontario? They regulate the flow to please the tourists and the power companies, stealing some of the romance but none of the spectacle, but “Hell yeah!” we were at the border with Canada and so what if we did have to pay $10 to park and that the best views are probably from the Canadian side to which the falls face.

The torrents erode the rock at a rate matched by the rain on the cavernous pot-holes in the poorly maintained roads. She crashed into one, spotted to late to swerve, with such violence that I feared a wheel rim might have cracked (something that negligent North London borough councils have wrought upon me before), I still haven’t dared look.

I’d taken the freeway option through Buffalo, buffeted by icy winds and massive trucks through derelict steel mills and grain silos like cathedrals from a giant alien civilisation. We retreated on Route 5, a much calmer option, she liked our steady progress the oil loss is messy but manageable but the wheel bounce at 40mph is still a bit scary, and began the search for bed and beer.

The ‘Rodeway Inn’ at Lakeville NY offered both having an empty bar at the end of an empty restaurant and I didn’t have remaining strength to find a more local option (not 100 yards away across the road), they closed as I left.