Day 22..."slowly I turned...step by step"

Day 22, July 1st...the highlight of the day was a stop at Niagara Falls, so I offer two distractions
The Three Stooges 'Niagara Falls Skit' [ Slowly I Turned ] and the theme from Hitchcock' Vertigo, which takes place in Niagara Falls. [ Vertigo Theme ]

This morning I awoke a little later than usual.  I was awfully tired yesterday. So I was on the road by 8:30.  An hour later I rolled up to the PX at Ft. Drum, NY.  Ft. Drum is the home of the famous 10th Mountain Division.  The installation didn't seem to be as large as Ft. Bragg, but the soldiers at Drum show the same hardened dedication to duty that I've seen from all our military as I've traveled about.  I stopped for a few minutes and watched a group work their way through an obstacle course you could see from the road.  Today they call it a confidence course... but I saw an awful lot of obstacles being negotiated.  It was in the mid to high 80s with about 80% humidity and nobody was slacking.  These guys looked tough.

Leaving Ft. Drum I once again turned to the non-interstate roads and rolled my way towards Lake Ontario.  I was pleasantly surprised to see Amish buggies on the road.  The horses didn't seem to mind vehicles whizzing past in both directions and kept up an uninterrupted trot for their drivers.

a 1 horsepower rig

this one had 2 horsepower

Near Oswego, on the shore of Lake Ontario, I saw a paved road that I thought would lead closer to the lake.  It was labeled as '9 Mile Island'.  After a couple of miles I came to this sign...

and I thought to myself, "Hmmm.  Would a meltdown at a place near 9 Mile Island be three times as bad as a meltdown at 3 Mile Island?". Since I didn't have a prearranged authorization to go any further I turned aside and skedaddled to put distance between myself and the nuclear power plant.

that little sign warned that 'Deadly Force' can be used on trespassers

Lake Ontario was beautiful and an altogether impressive body of water.  Just as impressive are the large number of storage facilities and maintenance facilities for boats of all sizes.  This was my first glimpse of a 'Great lake' and I must admit to being impressed.  But this isn't the biggest.  As a matter of fact, according to the internet it is the 5th largest and has over 7,000 square miles of surface.  Dang.

 

 

All too soon I had to leave the lake and hit the road for Niagara Falls, the next stop on my way west.  It wasn't really on the way, but to be that close and not stop in to see something like the falls would be a crime.  On the way I was buffeted by winds that must have come from Texas.  It was a steady 20+ mph wind from my left front quarter and it would surge and ebb depending on the opening in the trees so it was a constant fight to keep the bike where I wanted it.  When I passed a truck the roiling air in the truck's wake would shake me like a terrier shakes a rat.  And when I met a truck it would slap me with a shock that would make the bike shudder and on occasion slapped my head (with its heavy helmet) pretty violently.  Winds are not your friend on a motorcycle.  Well, unless it's a direct tail wind in which case I can live with it.

The falls are everything I had been lead to believe.  I only got to see them from the American side, but with the prevailing wind I managed to get both US and Canadian spray blown on me.  The guide said that they have a pretty steady strong wind at the falls... but I didn't see the trees growing sideways like back home in Texas (see post 2, I believe).  I did, however, lose my cap once so I ended up just carrying it.