Travel Reference
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example—signs for local political candidates were everywhere, stabbed into front lawns,
signifying the fall election season. Interestingly, in what I assume is part of red state
America, I saw no banners or bumper stickers for any of the Republican presidential
hopefuls.
In the blustery, rainy weather that beset the region for about ten days, leaves and
twigs and split-open buckeyes were all over the pavement. (Smashed on the ground—as
a Michigan Wolverine, I have to say that's how I like my buckeyes.) All the ball fields
and basketball courts were empty. I was riding largely during school hours; I saw almost
no children.
I enjoyed myself, mostly, though I was wet a good deal of the time, and cold occasion-
ally, too. A couple of days, the temperature barely made it out of the forties. The riding
days were relatively short; my average mileage has dipped a bit lately. That's another
thing that's different from 1993. On my last trip, I picked up the pace as I got closer to
home, eager to have achieved completion and triumph. Oddly enough, it turned out I
was a little bit sad when I did, in fact, finish, and maybe that's why the same sense of
urgency to get to the end of the road hasn't taken hold of me this time. Perhaps I'm old
enough now to recognize the end of an adventure for what it is: one less adventure ahead
of me.
Thursday, October 6, West Homestead, Pennsylvania
Several days ago, a reader tipped me off to the Great Allegheny Passage, a.k.a. GAP, a
bike trail on a former railroad bed that heads southeast from Pittsburgh for about one
hundred and forty miles to Cumberland, Maryland, supposedly passing through lovely
woods and skirting western Pennsylvania's relentless hills. It's off the direct path to New
York—pretty much out of the way, actually—but it solves the problem of where to ride
with Jan. I've been worried about how much she can handle on a fold-up bicycle—or
how much the fold-up bicycle can handle with her on it—and I think (I hope) three days
on flat ground of less than fifty miles a day should be okay. That still sounds like a lot, I
know, for someone who hasn't been riding all day every day this summer, but we had at
least one fifty-mile day in Provence in May, with persistent winds and plenty of climb-
ing, and she finished with energy to spare.
I got here yesterday, to Pittsburgh and a little beyond, on one of the first sunny af-
ternoons I've had in weeks. West Homestead is southeast of the city, a former home to
brickworks and other manufacturers and businesses in the orbit of the steel industry.
Now it seems to be reinventing itself as a suburb. The Marriott Courtyard, where I'm
staying, is on the south bank of the Monongahela River, within the limits of a vast, just-
