building a bicycle-powered ark...

...at least then we'll make it to Vancouver come high water, which seems almost inevitable.

I'm sitting on the third floor of the public library in Lockport, NY. That's right, I said THIRD floor...we've finally arrived in a town large enough to require more than one story to accommodate its stacks. I know, I know, we just came from "Rochester" and RIT, but there's no use in considering a vacant 17,000 student campus, surrounded by strip malls, civilization, especially if they don't let us use their internet. Though Jeff Hering, director of the campus Interfaith Center, was incredibly hospitable to us, providing us with breakfast and dinner and allowing us to use his facilities for group meetings for the two days of our stay.

The rest of our stay in "Rochester" was así así, basically because we were so far removed from the actual city that there was nothing more interesting to see than Wall-E, which was pretty darn amazing, mind you. Almost the entire rest of my family visited me too, and brought some good food!! I think the group has been officially spoiled by all the cookies, cakes, muffins, bagels, bananas, grapes, strawberries, blueberries, and oranges everyone has provided over the past few days. Unfortunately my bloodline does not extend west of the Genesee River, so hopefully other families along the route will be able to pitch in.

We did manage to make it somewhat close to downtown for our build, but I think, after so many small towns, people were really anticipating being in the heart of a city. And guess what we did at the build? Thats right, yard work. I moved some dirt, then some rocks, then some weeds, then mowed some grass, and cleared some brush. All in the name of humanity. Now for some current events:

MILES COMPLETED: ~600

MILES COMPLETED IN RAIN: ~60,000

FUN(!) FACT: In addition to taking its name from the many locks of the Erie Canal located within the city, in 1869, Lockport became the first place to have a functional fire hydrant system. And the first place where I began to feel like I was drowning in my own (completely soaked) shoes.

SONG OF THE DAY: Oh, let's go with "Weather Systems" by Andrew Bird.

Today was one of those days that could not end soon enough. I was a sweep, which meant I had to be at the back of the pack to make sure everyone else got to Lockport intact. This also meant that my day was much, much....much longer than it should have been. We only did about 58 miles today, and most of it was flat, but factor in the following, and you wonder why I didn't throw myself into the canal upon arrival (I mean, I was already wet): sore/tired legs/body, then a stiff headwind, drizzle, then Reed's flat tire #1, then rain, then heavier rain, then downpour, then downpour and stiff headwind, then near hypothermia at lunch, then Reed flat #2, then really tired legs and aching joints, then Reed flat #3 (at which time I found a shard of glass embedded in his tire, and proceeded to patch it with a Clif Bar wrapper). We finally made it to Lockport at 3:30, but 58 miles in 7 hours is not what I'd like to call efficient.

Reed's three flats are by no means a one-day record on this trip. Zack recorded 5 in one day (and 7 in two), but I believe some of those flats were caused by the tube pinching (called a pinch flat), as it was installed incorrectly. All of Reed's flats were caused by puncture, potentially all by a single piece of glass, but we're not totally sure. All I can say is buy Bontrager Race Lite or Continental Gatorskin tires (I'm sure there are better ones, but these have served our trip well, and for a good price).

Well, tomorrow is the 4th, and we have a really short 20 mile ride to Niagara Falls. A lot of people have never been there before, the weather is supposed to be dry and sunny, and we're going to watch the fireworks over the falls, so it should hopefully be a great day of rest before a 90-miler on Saturday.