September 14, 2023
Bonus Lake(s) Day
Hammondsport to a loop around Waneta and Lamoka Lakes and back to Hammondsport
We arose to a crisp morning with almost clear skies and mist rising from the surface of Keuka Lake. It was considerably colder-49 at 7am. The high today was forecast to be in the low 60’s, mostly cloudy but minimal chance of rain. Sounded like premium riding weather to us.
During breakfast it did cloud up and began to look a bit threatening so we all took some level of rain gear along. I am finding that the weather here is much more changeable that in Napa.
Today I rode without technology. Jim’s Wahoo Roam v. 1 started acting up in Rochester when it refused to load the route maps. My v. 2 did it fine so we swapped since Jim is our route master. Then his v. 1 started doing other weird things, like chirping at odd times, flashing lights and becoming non- responsive and refusing to charge. I have fiddled with it and up until today I could get it to record the basic stuff (speed, mile, time, etc.) but this am it was apparent that it managed to completely discharge overnight until it only had a 1% charge. So today, no computer for me. As it turned out, I think I enjoyed the ride more this way.
Off we rode down into town, across the bottom of Keuka lake and then headed north on the east side highway. We then turned off and headed up a highway that climbed up the east side ridge. It was a long climb of about 2.6 miles with gradients of 4 to 11%, according to Amber and Jim, (because I didn’t have technology this ride.) But you know what? Not knowing the grade allows me to just climb thinking about how I felt and not worrying about the gradient-it was very freeing. And although we hit the climb cold, all of us were very warmed up by the top.
After some rolling flat terrain on top of the ridge, and some nice views of Keuka Lake, we descended down very steeply to the valley containing our target lakes, Waneta and Lamoka.
We rode a relaxed clockwise loop around the two lakes. The road was recently paved and maintained and there was almost no traffic. The cloud action continued to be beautiful and it did not rain on us for yet another day (we feel very blessed.) The temperature was high 50’s to low 60’s and the road undulated enough to make it interesting but not enough to make it hard. These two lakes are not as densely or commercially developed as the others we have seen, and are mostly surrounded by small farms and vacation properties. We rode through a few small towns with some amenities but the area was generally quite rural.
We found a lunch stop called Kozy Korner at about 21 miles and fueled up for the climb out of the valley and over the ridge back to Hammondsport.
At the end of the loop, we returned back the way we came but the climb out was steeper on this side. Amber recorded a sustained 13% for a portion of it. I recorded it as “ damn steep” but we all made it. The last few miles were down the hill that we climbed out of Hammondsport this morning.
Tonight is our last night here and tomorrow we head for Geneva.
If you would like to experience some of today’s ride along with us, click here:
Today's ride: 33 miles (53 km)
Total: 192 miles (309 km)
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