Before leaving on October 13th, with Pete at his studio

In the morning, Pete and Sarah made apple pancakes for breakfast, which were delicious.  We only had to ride 37 miles to Norwalk, so we got off to a late start (around noon).  After packing up and saying our goodbyes, we were off for day four.  Phil had spent a fair amount of time figuring out how to get Garmin to tell us our route, which facilitated our navigation considerably.

We stopped once for lunch, at a sandwich shop in Stratford called Roly Poly.  The roads were pleasant aside from a bumpy stretch through Bridgeport.  Having Garmin know the route and tell us where to turn was a huge time saver.  Still, we didn’t arrive at our host’s house in Norwalk until just after 5pm.  Michael is also a triathlete and plans to go on a cycling tour himself next spring, riding out to his daughter’s graduation in California.  We relaxed in his living room, drinking Sam Adams Octoberfest and talking about bicycling, while he prepared dinner.  Since we’re expecting rain tomorrow, we’re hoping to get an early morning start in our ride to New York City.

Phil and Bobbie were kind enough to let us stay as long as we needed before heading off, while they went to work in the morning.  We had a good breakfast and ended up leaving around 9:30.  This was going to be a short day, only 41 miles.

Our first stop was the Connecticut School of Broadcasting, which we passed by before deciding to go in and see if they wanted to interview us.  After a brief interview with Art, the director, we were on our way again.  The course brought us through some scenic bike trails, and right by an aromatic barbecue place, which drew us in for a late lunch.  This day was cooler than the first two, and it started to rain a bit for the last 10 miles of our ride into New Haven.

We arrived at Pete’s apartment in the late afternoon.  Pete is a sculpture grad student at Yale, and he showed us his studio behind his apartment, where we could keep our bikes.  He had some very interesting projects going on in the studio.  Pete shares a spacious 4-bedroom apartment with Thomas, another sculpture grad student, and Sarah and Daria, architecture grad students.  Sarah is actually from Rhode Island, and Daria went to Brown, so we were familiar with the same places.  Pete found all of these connections fascinating.  While Pete was in class, Phil and I went to a Thai restaurant for dinner and Starbucks to take advantage of their free wifi.  Afterwards, we shared some good conversation and Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream with Pete, Sarah and Thomas.

This morning I awoke with numb arms, having slept on them.  During breakfast (Tina and Greg made blueberry pancakes), I embarrassingly drank a sip of maple syrup that had been placed in front of me in a mug before realizing it wasn’t coffee.  The day was off to an interesting start.

Morning of October 11th before leaving Tina and Greg's house

Greg and Gioia snapped some photos of us before we left Mansfield.  We were only 6 or 7 miles from the UCONN Dairy Bar, so our first stop was to get ice-cream.  Twelve miles later, we broke for lunch at Nature’s Grocer in Tolland.  This is a great natural foods store, where I must return some day (and of course stop at the dairy bar while in the area).  After lunch, we rode to Hartford and stopped at a park and caught up on missed phone calls while waiting for Phil, our Warm Showers host for the evening, to get home from work.  Somewhere along the last mile to the house, another cyclist, Bill, started riding and chatting with us.

Sitting on a bench in a park in Hartford

Phil was very generous when we arrived at his beautiful home in West Hartford.  He cooked a wonderful dinner while we showered, and he even drove us to the nearby Best Buy so we could buy a netbook.  Now we can finally work on getting the website filled with content, upload photos and videos, and, most importantly, figure out how to get maps for Garmin.  When we arrived back at the house, we met Phil’s wife, Bobbie, who had just started a new job.  The two of them had used Warm Showers once previously when riding a tandem bicycle in Rhode Island, and they are excellent hosts.  Already, I am definitely eating better than I ever have when I lived alone in Providence.  Both Phil and I hope that we can someday be as hospitable to other travelers in the future.

Phil and I had decided it would be a good idea to meet at a local coffee shop for an hour or so before leaving to let friends and family say goodbye one last time and ride the first few miles with us for as far as they wish.  We had a good turn-out for the send-off gathering.  After eating and making sure the bikes were all packed properly, Phil and I took off, escorted by Phil’s parents and Dick, Cameron and Adam from US Open Cycling Foundation.  It was sad to say goodbye to everyone, and I will miss the people more than anything.

We started down the West Bay Washington Secondary bike path towards Coventry and stopped for ice-cream near the end.  When we finally turned off the greenway, it was just me and Phil.  We had begun the first day of a very long journey.

The day was predominantly uneventful, aside from a pit stop at a biker bar/pizza restaurant just over the Connecticut state line, where the owner hooked us up with ice water and the regulars had plenty of questions and advice for us.  There were a few bike paths that existed in Google maps but not on the roads, so we ran into a few dead ends and climbed a few unnecessary hills.  As we neared the home where we were staying that night, the roads grew even hillier.

Tina and Greg live in Mansfield with their 5 year old daughter, Gioia.  They were kind enough to host us for our first night on the road.  They shared their delicious dinner with us, including homemade wine, homemade bread, and homemade strawberry ice-cream!  We are both very grateful for their generosity in hosting us.