Day 98- Vermont

This morning, I am excited. It is going to be a big day for me on a lot of different levels.

This excitement is even more enhanced because the weather continued to be superb. Sunny and no wind again. And my tent was only slightly wet from the morning dew.

I had 16 miles to ride to the town of Ticonderoga, NY. It was a hilly ride and I had not eaten ANYTHING in the morning at all. My body was craving some food all morning but I soldiered on regardless. It was only 16 miles after all.

Getting to town, I found the Tourist Information Center to get some questions answered. I was interested if the old Fort Ticonderoga from the Revolutionary War was still intact and nearby. It was.

I went by the fort but did not go in. It was fairly expensive, but more importantly needed most of an entire day to see.

So after going by the fort, I needed to take a ferry across Lake Champlain to the other side of the lake.

The ferry was small and was just a short 5 minute trip.

Just like the last ferry trip I took from Mackinac Island, I was the only passenger on board. I asked the boat captain if I could pilot the boat explaining that I was qualified by prior experience, but they were having none of it this time. So I just sat back and enjoyed the short trip across the lake.

One reason that I declined to actually go into Fort Ticonderoga was that I was anxious to get to…..

Vermont! Lake Champlain is the border between New York and Vermont.

Vermont is a new state for me. By that, I mean that it is new for the trip, but also that I had never been to Vermont ever before.

Next, it was to ride to Middlebury, VT. Middlebury is a classic New England town full of old English style architecture and history. I arrived early in the afternoon so I could explore a bit. First was a visit to the local bike shop to check and top off my tire air pressure. Next was to ride the “Covered Bridges” alternate route to see Covered Bridges of course. The guys at the bike shop informed me that the Covered Bridge on this route had burned down a couple years ago, but there was another bridge that was close to town to see.

There are covered bridges around the country, but they are classic New England landmarks.

By then, it was getting late enough that I could begin to wind down. I still wanted to ride about 5 more miles and camp in East Middlebury, but I wanted to visit the 2 Brothers Taphouse. There I had a few beers (which seems to be a theme for the ride) and have some dinner too.

About 6:00 I decided to head for East Middlebury. Double checking my directions, it turned out that the campground was about 5 miles out of town leaving me with about 10 miles to cover. At that point I decided to reconcider this decision and consider just staying in Middlebury. The main campground in Middlebury was also several miles out of town and not really an ideal situation so I settled for plan C! There was another option to stay at the Swift House Inn B & B which also offered camping (like the Blue Mountain Lake Inn did). It was right in town so very convenient. I called ahead to verify that I could camp there and they said it was fine.

When I got there, the staff person informed me that the owner of the Swift House was offering me a room instead of camping. This sounded like a good deal for me, a no brainer even so I jumped at the offer. I asked how much I still owed for the night and was told that the room was comped. WHAT! That was not right. It turned out the owner, Dan was a cycle tourist and did this occasionally when there was room at the Inn.

The Swift House Inn is without a doubt the nicest place I have ever stayed at in my life. I am still not sure how this really happened to me but it is just another example of the goodness in people that I have come across. Talking to Dan, he said that he wanted to pay back the kindness that was offered to him when he toured the country. I told him that I felt the same and that I owed the universe a lot of payback now too. Dan apologized ( with a laugh) for making my debt now even greater.