On Thursday, we rode from Cortland to Utica. It poured overnight and was raining hard when our alarm went off. We packed up inside the tent and were able to load the van and pack the tent during a lull in the rain. But the rain started up again by the time I was ready to go.

A number of people decided to leave the ride at this point. I really don’t understand this; do people think it never rains in NY? To accommodate them, Karen arranged for a bus to take them ($100/person) to Saratoga Springs where they had left their cars. Some people were close enough to home that they called a friend or family member for a ride home.

But, after riding in the rain to start on Thursday morning, the rain stopped, and it turned out to be a nice day. Friday, although quite humid, was also a pretty good day for riding. The forecasts of three days of rain that spooked everybody never materialized!

There were several options on the cue sheet. One was a “flat cut” to avoid a “roller coaster” section. I took this (it’s not called a short cut because it added several miles). Another was a short cut to skip Sky Line Drive and avoid the climb up to it. I took Sky  Line Drive and had to walk part of the hill to get there (the second hill I walked on Thursday). So, I followed the cue sheet with these options and wound up with 81.7 miles and 3899 feet of climb.

The full resolution of the Sky Line Drive panorama (below) is here.