Day 49: Utica to Sylvan Beach

56km/35m, 3hrs 16mins, 17.3kph/10.7mph, 200m/650ft of climbing.

A short ride today. I have plenty of time. And a dry day, the first for a while.

I decided to abandon the Erie Canal Trail today. It's nice enough, but a bit samey; and in the week or so I have left I want to see as much variety as possible. So at Rome (there's a Troy here too, and an Athens - this Rome looks as if the Visigoths might have left only quite recently) I left the trail and headed north-west to Sylvan Beach. This is a small resort town on the shores of Oneida Lake. The surroundings are quite pretty. I'd say the town was an American version of Whitley Bay but without the drunkenness. Oh, and I passed through Verona and Vienna on the way.

I found myself fantasizing about vegetables today. It's really quite difficult to eat healthily here if you're not in a position to cook for yourself. Outside the big cities fast-food places dominate, or American Diners. And the Diners don't vary much, their menus dominated by eggs, burgers, chicken, steak and muffins, muffins everywhere. Green vegetables are few and far between. And when one does find them, they are invariably overcooked to such a catastrophic extent that they may as well have been used to make soup. The exception is the ubiquitous Caesar salad; they are everywhere too, and I've been resorting to them in the absence of alternatives. I suspect it will be a long time before I have another one (or another burger, or another pizza) once I get home.

Postscript: Today was the occasion of my first-ever "senior's discount". The over 55s get ten percent off in this motel.