Honeymoon in Burlington

Everytime we take a trip somewhere, anywhere, Hubby refers to it as a 'honeymoon'. And inasmuch as we have only been married for five months, I guess he isn't far off. So this last weekend, our honeymoon was spent in Burlington, exploring the bike paths; to be more exact, the Champlain Bikeway and the various islands in the area. We decided to only take our road bikes, which we should have known was a mistake!

The trip up was uneventful, with Hubby sitting shotgun and reading maps as we meandered up the State. We made one side trip on the way up, to the floating bridge, where I drove the car back and forth across the bridge while Hubby snapped pictures. When he was a kid, he has a memory of the family going across the bridge, towing a trailer, I think, and his mother going nuts because the water was coming way up the side of the car. It really is a floating bridge and your wheels sink into the water as you cross. Kind of cool, I thought.

So after that, we went to Burlington, checked into our hotel, and went to bed early so that we could be out the door early. Good intentions.....We finally parked at Airport Park around 9sih, unloaded our bikes and Hubby proceeded to rip out the stem from his tube as he was trying to fill it. Oops. But off we were, down the bike path, exploring our little hearts out on our road bikes. The first leg, however, was mostly dirt, being out onto the causeway. The interesting portion of the ride came mid-causeway, when we realized that there was a big section of causeway that was not going to be completed so that the boats could go through. Instead, they have set up a bike ferry, taking people back and forth. It really was a neat experience, although if you were in a hurry or on a training ride, this would not be the way to go.

We stopped for lunch in South Hero, sitting at a table near the water. As we were seated and eating, two couples asked if they could share our table. No problem. They were a bit loud, but what the heck. So I am happily munching my sandwich and potato chips (sneaking a taste of the carmel nut cake when I thought Hubby wasn't looking) when an interesting conversation breaks out between one of the couples. Now let me preface this by saying that I am quite sure that they knew we were both bikers, albeit we could be or strangely dressed tourists who like to wear bike helmets while we drive.

Woman: You know [insert name of person here]? Do you know that she comes home from work and goes biking!
Man: Huh.
Woman: She doesn't even like to cook or anything!
Man: Doesn't like to cook? (as if he was completely thrown by the idea that someone, somewhere, doesn't like to cook.) Woman: That's right! [insert pause for effect]"but she always was weird. Kind of strange, you know?

At that point, we were finished with lunch and left shortly thereafter. And then Hubby turns to me and says "Wow, that woman could have been talking about you. Except that you do like to cook." Hmm. She was always a little weird = Me. And this is from MY HUSBAND. I was thinking about pushing him into the lake, but realized that he was paying for the hotel. So I nixed that idea.

We continued on our ride, and at one point, Joe mentioned that we should see when the bike ferry closes down, so that we can make it back in time. It would only add about another 15 miles to the ride, but given the fact that we had already ridden over 75 miles at that point, I didn't want to think about it. It closed at 6 p.m., and we had about 1 1/2 hours to get back, so we should be fine. Then there were those two wrong turns we took. Oops. In the last section before the ferry, I think that we ran two small children and an older woman on a recumbant bike off the road, but hey, I NEEDED to get to that ferry. We made it with 15 minutes to spare. Whew. And to add to the interesting nature of the ride, as we are riding back across the causeway, we see two bikes lying by the side, with no one to be seen. Curious as we are, we glance around to see if maybe they are fishing, or watching the water.....uh, no, they were buck NEKKID down on one of the rocks. A guy and a girl. BUCK NEKKID. And, um.....well......checking each other for ticks, I guess. And families walk by there.

So that was our 85 mile adventure for the day!

The next day, we kicked ourselves because we didn't bring our mountain bikes with us. And there was Catamount, with all the bike trails, just up the road. Oh, well. We walked around a bit, then headed home.

Nothing like a bike honeymoon to keep things alive!