When I woke up today, I noticed that my overall schedule is pretty tight. There is supposed to be a thunderstorm in upstate New York sometime around Monday, which terrifies me, and might mean that I will have to travel less for a day. Thus, I decided to try and push today. I wanted to try it differently than other days, by taking longer breaks, and finishing the bike ride towards sunset. At around the 80km mark, which I hit at around 4:00pm, I decided to go for an even 100km today, and find a farm to camp on.

I drank plenty of water, and used an offensive amount of sunscreen, and it worked! The whole day was hot and sunny, and I have no marks to show for it. I ran out of water on my main watter bottle a few times today, but I never reached less than half a litre on my spare bottle, so my water situation is perfect for now. I also finished my trail-mix, and some bread I had left over from Oakville, and realized I was getting hungry. Luckily, I found a supermarket, and I stocked up on food, including a huge bag of mixed nuts, raisins, etc.. This way, even if I run out of fruits, veggies, and bread, I'll still have pure, uncut calories from the trail-mix.

And now for the part you probably have all been waiting for: the flat tire. I had never gotten a flat tire before, and only had to replace an inner tune once. For those of you reading these posts, you remember that yesterday I complained about a strange feeling in my back wheel? Well, around the 96km mark, I looked down and noticed that the tire was floppier than usual, and indeed, after a firm squeeze, I felt that the wheel needed more than just some TLC. I also decided that this would be enough biking for today.

Anyway, the husband at the farm I'm sleeping on offered to drive me down to WalMart to get a new inner-tube and a patch kit. Boring story short, I now have a new inner tube in my bike, and a patched but functional inner tube in my bike-stuff bag.

This is also the first night I am in my tent. I guess I'll update on it tomorrow! As for now, I'm just super glad that I brought the 2-person tent, because that extra room is great for keeping my bags close by.

Today I biked from Niagara Falls to a small farm somewhere between Medina and Albion, along highwy 31. This ride was about 96km. I was going for 100, but as I mentioned above, it got cut short. Still, this is the longest day I've had so far! You can see the path below:

I started off my ride trying to cross the border as fast as possible, but not before taking a mandatory picture:

The border crossing went smoothly, and the first thing I did was try to get a US SIM card. This is the small digression from the path in the map above. As of today, anyone who wants some ASMR of cars driving by me on the highway can call me at 1-716-239-3850, or just message me and I'll call you. I get free calls to Canada!

... To Lockport, NY!

I very soon figured out why the town was called Lockport:

At Lockport, I was planning to get off the highway, and make a new best friend with the Erie Canal Trail. The trail runs along the entire canal, and was originally used by donkeys to pull boats along the canal.

I saw some goslings. Mama and papa goose hissed at me.

At some point, I realized that I was putting in a lot more effort into peddling, and that I was going really slowly. I correctly attributed that to the stone-dust trail, which was not well-suited for the road tires I had. Thus, I bid farewell to my best-friendn't, and returned to my real BFF, highway 31 (which is also NY bike route 5):

The next station on my path was groceries. That's the tiny little digression on the map, right next to the next goal, which was Medina. No, not where Muhammed is buried. I'm talking about Medina pronounced Medina, not Medina pronounced Medina. Yeah, the guys here actually pronounce it to rhyme with Spadina, Regina, and, for all of you naughty minds, China.

It turns out that this is not an isolated phenomenon here in upstate New York. Some fine researchers have already made some progress in documenting the matter .

In the museum, I rested and let the hottest part of the day go by, as I chatted with the workers there about the local history, and the surrounding towns. I was told that just off the road, there was a tunnel. A tunnel under the Erie canal.

I noped the fuck away, but as I got to the intersection, the ghost of Thorold called me Northwards towards the canal. That's the large change of direction you can see in the map below:

Anyway, I saw the tunnel, and it was super cool!

Here's the view from above. You can see the road coming in from the right, and the Erie canal bike trail beside the water:

This tunnel was leaking...

Anyway, on my way back to the road from the tunnel, I stumbled into my old friend, highway 31, so I continued along it, until my inner-tube popped. I decided to stay the night in my tent on someone's yard, and started knicking on doors. No one was home, but eventually, I noticed Rhonda participating in the upstate New York most popular pasttime. She was mowing her lawn.

I asked her for some water, and to stay the night on their yard, and she agreed. I set out to start repairing the tire, but noticed that my new inner-tube was too big. Rhonda's husband, Jeff, helped me out a lot by driving me over to Albion to pick up a new inner-tube and a patch kit.

Here's some pictures of repairing the tire. IDK why this would interest anyone other than myself in about 50 years:

I then set up my tent, and Rhonda gave me some blankets, which I didn't think I'd need, but that I ended up needing, because while it was super warm during the day, it was super cold during the night.

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