It started raining just about the time I had to get rid of another bunch of gaspacho. New England has been in a drought all summer and most of the spring. It picked this weekend to break and I didn't bring any rain gear. I found one of those silver mylar blankets that they put around marathon runners at the end of the race. They really work! And they're water proof.
I don't think anyone planned for the rain. So, of course, there was no shelter outside your own tent. There were some big tents for the kitchen, food service and medics, but the rest was al fresco. So when it started to rain, everyone's oatmeal got wet. Dozens of people in the only shelter they could find: under the back of the semi-trailers. All huddled together in high tech riding gear. Pretty funny.
Since it was raining and there was no cover, everyone wanted to hit the road. Another unfortunate side effect of the Bridgeport rock and bottle throwing the day before was trying to get security set up for the ride out of town. It took hours to get the police in place and ready for the ride. And, since so many people were sagged in the night before, locating bikes took forever as well. When you ride in to camp yourself, you check your own bike into the security area. When you get sagged in, you and your bike arrive at the camp separately. That means you have to go find it then next morning. And there were a lot of them. The queues for the security area, to pick up your bike, were long, long, long. I was standing next to one of the guys who had the bottles thrown at him the day before.
His girlfriend was a nurse, apparently. Her conversation partner on line was also a nurse. She was from "Lon Goyland. and had a Fran Dresher accent. What a conversation that was! I can remember the brand, but the salesman-nurse works for a company that sells a pacemaker/defibrillator thing that's implanted into your shoulder. (From what I could make out, this machine monitors your heart rate and if something that it's monitoring goes below or above a certain number, it lets out a shock.)
Girlfriend-Nurse: "We had some trouble with those."
Salesman-Nurse: "You know why? Because they're so sensitive."
Girlfriend-Nurse: "Oh?"
Salesman-Nurse: "Yeah. If you have it set at 200 and it hits 199, it won't fire. It's that good."
Girlfriend-Nurse: "Oh. It should have."
We finally got going around 8:30. It was awful. The rain was coming down in sheets. It stung. It was cold. It was gloomy. At least there weren't any more big hills. Most of the rest of the way to Manhattan is urban and suburban traffic down US 1. I think there were a lot of people who just decided to chuck it all for the day. I wish I'd brought a rain jacket.
From the looks of the crowd, I wasn't the only who didn't bring rain gear. People were wrapped in those silver blankets (I was one of them). Some had cut the blankets up into some more interesting fashion statements. One of the most interesting was the 'silver sheik' look. Wrap your head in the blanket, leaving just the right length of tail, and then put on your helmet. Very spacy.
The first pitstop was in Norwalk, CT. In a Rite Aid parking lot. A great stroke of luck for both the riders and the store. Rite Aid sold all of their 30 gallon trash can liners. They make a great rain poncho in a pinch. Everyone leaving Rite Aid had rain gear. It must have been a site! Thousands of bicyclists dressed in silver "keep the aliens out of my brain" hats and 30-gallon trash can liners on their way to New York.
Since we'd been in a drought all spring and summer, there was six months of road grime embedded in the highway that all floated up when it started to rain. Brakes on a bicycle work by having two rubber strips squeeze the steel rim of the wheel. They don't work well in the rain. Add to that that it's not just water, it's oil, anti-freeze, tire rubber and other grime, and the brakes don't work at all. And for some reason, New York has this need to put red traffic lights (they are always red) at the bottoms of hills.
There are newfangled pedals now too. My bike has toe clips. The newer clips have fasteners on the bottoms of the shoes that snap onto the pedals. They aren't very functional in the rain. Everyone was having trouble with them getting gooked up with road grime and sand and not snapping into the pedals. Mine worked fine!
Jackie O, still in the pink pill box hat, welcomed everyone to New York from under a bridge in Port Chester, NY. In the rain. If it's not hills, it's rain. You know, it's just that awful rain that stings when it hits you in the face. Every time you stop, you lift your foot up and all the water runs down to your toes and runs out of your shoes. My (and most) bikes have no fenders, so all of that water is carried right up into your face from both your own front wheel and the back wheel of the bike in front of you. I started out the day with dry white socks. There were nearly black with road grime by noon.
Lunch was in Glen Island Park. It was probably a nice place if it hadn't been raining. Since everyone left that morning at more or less the same time (except those looking for the sagged bikes) everyone arrived at lunch at more or less the same time. Which meant that there were really long lines this time. Still, though, I got in pretty early, so even though I had to queue for quite a while, it wasn't as bad as it was later. The ride organizers told everyone to hang around the lunch area as long as possible so you didn't arrive in Manhattan too early and have to wait around there. Pah! I'd rather hang around Manhattan. So, eat and run. Or ride. The rain had pretty much stopped after lunch. There was still a lot of water on the road, but at least it wasn't coming down any more. And it was warming up, finally.
Walkmans aren't allowed on the ride. In fact, in Massachusetts, they're illegal to wear when riding a bike. But some people can't be without their music. I passed one woman on an uphill (!) on the way into the Bronx. She had a radio/tape player strapped to her handlebars. And a determined look on her face. I asked her "how are you doing?" She said, "Not too well, my knee hurts like hell and I can't change stations."
There are a few cars in Manhattan that got a quick lesson in how to share the road. If you have several thousand bicycles coming down the road behind and around you, you don't turn in front of them. Not and remain undented.
The final leg. was down the Riverside Drive in Manhattan. I have no idea how we got from the Bronx into Manhattan. I don't remember crossing any bridge. According to the map, we crossed at the Broadway Bridge. The river must be very narrow there. I saw some buildings across the river and, thinking that I was in they were Manhattan, I stopped to take a picture. It turns out that we'd been in Manhattan for miles. I was looking at New Jersey. I didn't realize I was in Manhattan until I saw the Chrysler Building off to my left a while later. Down 11th Ave and into the Village.
Rounding the corner there was a banner, a crowd, some cheering and the end. Just like that. Boom. It's over. Wham. Finish. But I have to say, it really does bring you to tears. The physical and emotional exhaustion reached its peak right under that banner. All I wanted to do was collapse yet I was ready to turn around and ride all the way back to Boston. (Well, almost.)
Closing ceremonies were scheduled for 4 o'clock and I had arrived at the end somewhere around 1:30. Of course, the ceremonies were going to be late because of the weather and the number of people being sagged in, so there was plenty of time to kill. It went fast.
If I had known there was a way to skip the closing ceremonies, I would have done it. I don't really think the ceremony was for the riders, it was for the media and the speechmakers. Standing there on a windy pier in wet clothes is something I'd rather skip. It wasn't very well organized either. There was supposed to be a ceremonial procession for the cameras that was botched. The first 200 riders in were supposed to cross the street, ride up the pier and wave. Well, we crossed the street, but the person pointing us where to go got confused. She waved us out onto the wrong pier. It was lined with garbage trucks. She kept yelling "Keep going, keep going." The pier ended. It was a short pier. "Oh, sorry, wrong pier."
Back to the line up. Got it right this time. Ride up to the stage, dismount, listen to a speech. Oops. The camera didn't get it right. Everybody back, let's try it again. We need Team Tanqueray in front. (Tanqueray was the main sponsor of the ride and anyone involved in any way with Tanqueray was part of Team Tanqueray and got a special jersey.) So, back to the beginning, line up again, turn around and try it again. Back onto the pier with Team Tanqueray in front this time. Then came the procession of the rest of the riders. Some New York Radio DJ SCREAMING at the top of his lungs that the riders ARE STILL COMING IN!!! Standing, waiting, being yelled over. Don't get me wrong, it was nice I suppose. People were spraying water from their water bottles and throwning elftover Power Bars and Granola Bars. It was well orchestrated to tug at the heartstrings, but at the same time, we had just ridden 65 miles in a downpour and all I wanted was a bath.
As soon as I found out I could, I ducked out of the closing ceremonies. There were 1500 bicycles that had to be shipped back to Boston and the lines to check them into the shipper I knew was going to be long. The shipper was right behind the closing ceremony stage so I made a beeline. Next, find the shuttle bus to the hotel. Next, check in to the hotel. I bought the package deal for the ride, and I have to say that that was done very nicely. Shuttle right from the closing ceremony right to the hotel. Special check in at the hotel and the bags were already in the room. Great! Bath! Ahhhhhh.
The Palladium is a dance club. It's the place they had Club MTV with Downtown Julie Brown. They had a private party for the riders from 9 to 11 that night with free Tanqueray. Then they opened the club to the public. Nice place. I felt good after cleaning up and I made it all the way to 1 o'clock before I had to call it quits.
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