The Airline Trail

The "Queen Stage" of the bike trip was arguably Day 5.  The plan was to ride about 55 miles, mostly on the dirt Airline Trail, which follows a section of the path of the old direct rail route from New York to Boston, the Airline Railway.  I wasn't quite sure how this part of the route was going to go, particularly for the kiddo because

1) It was longer than the other days and we would have accumulated fatigue in our legs.  40-ish miles a day really isn't much, until you start carrying luggage!

2) We would now have deviated from the East Coast Greenway, and thus be on a weird Anna-route rather than a more sanctioned normal route. (I'm sure this is my version of my mom's tendency to follow little gray dotted lines on the map...)

3) It was dirt.  Hope there is no torrential rain.

4) It wasn't clear whether the northernmost section of trail would be passable, as the trail development was still a work in progress.  I found some accounts of people riding it on bike forums, generally suggesting that one might prefer a mountain bike.  Being optimistic, I decided that we weren't wimps and that loaded touring bikes with wide tires would be fine.  (I was, however, prepared to swap bikes with Nim for this bit if her narrower tires proved to be a problem.)

After 35 or so miles of that trail, it looked like it might connect to the SNETT, or Southern New England Trunkline Trail, for which I could find even less information about riding conditions.  Like pretty much zilch beyond the fact that the trail existed, bikes were allowed, but the surface might suck on a road bike.  It went through the woods in the right direction, so I put it on the route.

Of course Chad and I were looking forward to this part of the trip -- the unknowns and relative wildness appealed to us.

 We started the day with a wee challenge finding our way onto the trail, as the connection from the road we took from the B&B to the trail was a little bit overgrown.  This leads to the teen being suspicious of our judgment.

However, it didn't take long for things to open up a bit, 

and soon we were riding on a perfectly respectable trail beelining northeast across the state.

We did encounter the occasional obstacle, but by and large this section was easy riding.

Random glamour shot of Chad's bike.  Can you tell how it was standing up?  Clearly it is a sentient cartoon bike.

The kiddo was still somewhat suspicious of riding through the endless woods, but the adults were quite happy.  We were also most impressed with her handling of the bike with skinny tires on the trail surface, which was ever-so-slowly degrading in quality the further we went.  At this point we had moved out of the improved packed crushed gravel surface section to dirt with ever-increasing numbers of rocks poking up through it

insterspersed with occasional more overgrown spots.

Eventually, we popped out in a town and followed roads for a mile or two, based on talking to another cyclist who corroborated my vague knowledge that the piece of the trail through town was so close to the river that it was a mud bog.  It was lunchtime anyway, so a stop in town was a good idea.

Bike shop in town with good window art.  No, kid, we will not provide this service for you.

We did find ourselves back on the trail in relatively short order, and rode right past the tri-state marker -- the point where Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island intersect.

At this point, the trail changed from being the Airline Trail to the SNETT, necessitating a quick map check.  I did have paper maps for the trip (and generally prefer them), but also had made myself an offline route on the phone, which was often a quicker way to tell the kid with confidence how many miles it would be to the next potential ice cream stop.

Thoughts of ice cream made the kid happy, even in the face of a trail surface that now started to contain large sand pits in between the bits with rocks poking up.  Or maybe she was just laughing at me saying SNETT over and over again.  SNETT, SNETT, SNETT.  SSSSSSNNNNNNETTTTTTT!

Distraction from sand.

And I suppose there were the few sections that were just old railroad ballast.  Blargh.  Thoughts of ice cream propelled us forward.

Turtle crossing!  

One of the things that was nice about being off in the woods was that there was a bit of wildlife, shown in Nim's doodle for the day.

 Bicycle crossing.

Somewhere in here, we were attacked by caterpillars falling from the trees.  At one point I had one dangling from the visor on my helmet in front of my right eye for a couple of miles.  I sort of wondered how long he could hold one with his little hind feet, but eventually took pity on him and stopped to escort him onto a more stable surface.

At about 40 miles, we finished our dirt adventure and headed into town to find the promised ice cream, which fueled us for the remaining 15 miles of rolling micro-hills.  (Imagining what the teen thought of rolling micro-hills after 40 miles of dirt is best left as an exercise for the reader.)  Still, it was a successful day's riding, and by far the most interesting riding of the trip.  And there was ice cream.

More Rail-Trail Fun

After looking at dinosaur tracks, we continued northeast across the state.

What are we waiting for?

The Rocky Hill/Glastonbury ferry over the Connecticut River, of course.  I ran across a reference to this ferry as the site of the oldest continuously operating ferry service in the county (there's been a ferry here since 1655!), and then realized that I had already planned our route to go over it without realizing.  It's clearly the most bike-friendly crossing of the river for miles, and well worth the $2 fee.

City parks make good places to eat lunch.  We had the second halves of our giant sandwiches from yesterday, along with more cookies.

Bored kid waiting for Dad to get something from the bike shop.

More rail-trail fun for us, this time on the dirt Hop River State Park Trail.  We were still on the East Coast Greenway route at this point, and this piece of it was just a delight.   Good surface, no traffic, through lush green woods -- what's not to like?

One minor hiccup to the day was that it was Sunday, and every time I looked up a nearby ice cream place and found something promising, it turned out to be closed.  We persevered, and near the end of the day found "The Farmer's Cow Calfe and Creamery"  (No, that wasn't a typo.  Ugh.)  The ice cream was cold and yummy and most appreciated.

In case you want a better view of the cow mural:

After reinflating ourselves with ice cream, naturally we had to play with their photo board. (Every vacation has one of these somewhere in it...)

Chad made us moo

so I made him moo too.

Nim eventually got fed up with us being silly

but restored her mood by plugging into the wi-fi at the B&B we stayed at.

Newhaven to Rocky Hill: In Search of More Dinosaurs

I know most people going to the East Coast don't think of dinosaurs, but my eye landed on a place called Dinosaur State Park on the map when I was figuring out our route.  Apparently, conditions in Connecticut were just right for the preservation of dinosaur tracks and bones in the early Jurassic; people had been finding bones and tracks in the area as far back as the early 1800's.

Therefore, we must go.  Two dinosaur days in a row!

To get up to the park from New Haven, we followed the Farmington Canal Heritage trail north out of town.  This route follows a former canal line that because part of the New Haven Northampton rail line, and is now a gentle paved rail-trail that cuts north across the state as part of the East Coast Greenway.  We followed it for miles and miles and miles -- a welcome change from the more traffic-infested road sections we had previously been on.

I found myself taking pictures over my shoulder to assess the mental state of the kid as the day progressed.  She liked the rail-trail.

Checking the map.  (Not that we needed it today.)

Wait, you're riding off the trail!  Clearly time for a snack.

Chad adjusted his light during snack time.  This is one of the mere three mechanical adjustments needed over the whole trip (not counting the three flats).

Energy restored!

We admired many old brick buildings lining the old rail route.

 Eventually, we left the trail for scenic country roads that cut over towards Rocky Hill and the dinosaur park.

As we entered the town of New Britain, we happened across the Nutmeg State Championship bike race.  All we were doing was riding along, looking for a snack, and heard the distinctive sound of a big peloton whooshing by in the park next to the road.  Naturally, we stopped to spectate for a few minutes.

I located an Italian deli nearby, where we got giant sandwiches and a big box of cookies that were, for once, as delicious as they were pretty.

Eventually we made it to our hotel for the night.  Kid is still smiling.

Even though we were only about a mile from the dinosaur park, it was getting late in the afternoon, so we opted to chill out, get dinner, and enjoy the hot tub, planning to hit the park first thing in the morning when it opened.

Dinner was soulless hotel food, but we did get ice cream.

Next morning brought dino tracks!  Lots of dino tracks.  The building is built right over the site, though apparently there are a lot more outside the building that have been reburied to protect them.

Nim's souvenir was a little tiny pterodon, which she then had to take for a little hike through the woods.  Apparently one does not outgrow these things :)

Bridgeport to Newhaven: In Search of Dinosaurs

Our second day was by far the easiest riding of the trip -- we only had 25 flat miles along the coast.  I planned this one to be short on purpose, as (1) we weren't sure if the first day riding the loaded bikes as a group was going to be a shock to the system and (2) I wanted to have lots of time to visit the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History.  Because, well, dinosaurs...

A few of the days sights included picturesque bridges,

and very flat beaches

with a wee library.

We eventually made it to the dinosaur museum and admired the bones, including a brontosaurus with the wrong head on it

some scary leaping critters with large claws that hunted in packs

and other fine monsters.

We spent so long wandering through the various rooms of interesting things that we had to beg the woman closing up the gift shop to re-open for two minutes so that Chad could buy a copy of the postcard of the big mural in the dinosaur hall that he remembers fondly as a kid to send to his mom. (We got a copy for us too.)

Newhaven, being a college town, had no shortage of interesting dinner options.  On our walk back through Yale from the museum to the hotel, we found a most excellent modern fusion noodle soup place, where we laughed silently at the earnest hip young waiter who thought he had to explain the types of soup to us because we had never been to *that* particular restaurant before.  Bay Area denizens already know what ramen and pho are, of course :)

Nim enjoyed her dinner, through teen-like complaints of "this ramen isn't authentic" (it was a modern take on ramen, and was delicious).  

Noodle snob or not, the kiddo was inspired to produce a fine sketch in their comment book as Chad and I finished our drinks (Thai-style bubble tea spiked with cognac, and extra gingery Moscow Mule....mmmm...)