Day 71: Ignalina to Moletai - Racpat Scandinavia and the Baltics 2024 - CycleBlaze

September 10, 2024

Day 71: Ignalina to Moletai

Rolling Road

“It feels like we are at home out on a day ride,” Rachel says about the beginning of the ride, then continues “or maybe it’s just because we can see more landscapes rather than trees lining the road.” Patrick has noted also that the forests now have a variety of hardwood trees that also changes the views.

A typical start to the day with breakfast in the room, we head out through town on route 114. At first the road is with gentle rolling ups and downs, the type of roads we like. We get glimpses of the surrounding land and farms. 

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We take a rest stop at a gasoline station at about 17kms
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Linden trees line the road
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Since the border in Egipt Latvia and the Lutheran Church, we are seeing more influence of Catholicism.
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At 25km until 40km, the rolling gets more serious and the road surface has many patches. The road goes through the “Labanoro Regioninis Parkas” and we get glimpses of lakes. Traffic has been decent, more large trucks than we expected and sometimes nice stretches with no traffic.

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Patrick thinks the deer looks like it's dancing
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Bill ShaneyfeltParasol! I remember it from my time in Germany '76-'78 when a German I worked with taught me many edibles.

He liked to tell about a guy who asked "What mushrooms can you eat?" to which he replied - "Oh, you can eat ALL mushrooms.... some only ONCE! He also said, "If in doubt, don't!"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macrolepiota_procera
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2 months ago
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After 40km the gentle rolling ups and downs return and the road surface improves. We are making ok time until about 5km out there is a sign with a big red circle around a bicycle… a “No Bicycles” sign. To the left of the road is a bike path, this slows us down as the surface is terrible.

No bikes on the road....
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Mike AylingIf it was prohibitive would it not have a line through it?
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2 months ago
....here's a bike path with an awful surface for you instead.
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When we get to town Patrick says, “we’ll pass a church and looking for “Senoji uzeiga”. It’s 12:30 when we park our bikes at the hotel. We had not yet been sent the codes, so Patrick calls the number posted, and soon we are unloading our bikes carrying gear to the room.

A very nice room! For $60 and the associated restaurant, busy at lunchtime, looks great for tonight’s dinner. 

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Today's ride: 57 km (35 miles)
Total: 3,607 km (2,240 miles)

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Rich FrasierI’m loving the pen and ink drawings!
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2 months ago
Rachel and Patrick HugensThank you Rich, it's been a fun exercise of learning
Rachel
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2 months ago