After I left Albany I made about twenty miles and started to look for a place to stay. I made a stop to talk to a fellow mowing the lawn of an Episcopalian church and asked him for directions to any nearby campsites. He looked me over and offered to let me sleep in the churchyard. Turned out he was the reverend. The flattest and most private place to put down the tent was right behind the building, so I didn’t sleep exactly in a cemetery that night, just alongside one.

I delayed rising Sunday morning, because at 4:56, I remember because a loud blast of thunder woke me up, the deluge started again. I was just able to get my bike under the shelter of the bathhouse before it started coming down, but it kept me from getting the extra-early start I had hoped for, and I didn't get into Hartford until just after 3:00.

Boston is a beautiful city, when its not raining and threatening tornadoes. Susann, Marco, Lorena, and I spent the afternoon walking around the city, seeing some sites and visiting some shops. The next day they had a surprise for me, tickets to the Warped Tour down south in Mansfield, near Foxboro. They made the mistake of making me the mapkeeper; maybe they thought, since I'm American and all, and while getting down there wasn't too much of a problem (we only got lost twice), getting home in the monsoon that ensued at the end of the concert was a different story.

I almost forgot about this, but I was interviewed for a newspaper article a couple weeks ago in Warren, PA. The info is mostly accurate, although I'm not carrying 250 lbs of gear, but myself, my bike, and my gear weighs around 250 total pounds. I was planning to head east at this point in the trip, but instead went north to New York the next day. If you want to read the article, here's the link:

http://www.timesobserver.com/page/content.detail/id/503383.html