This was the highlight of the day...the tour at the museum.  Carl  Burgwardt, the owner of the Bicycle Mausoleum and the largest private collection in the world, was a terrific host as usual and led an informative and thorough tour of the facility to include time to browse the gift shopping area.  I think everyone enjoyed hearing Carl talk about how the bicycle got started and how it served as an influence in developing the automobile, the airplane, modern paved roads and even changed women's fashions in the 1890s.  Countless inventions that were originally developed for the bicycle were later used in the development of the first automobile...ball bearings, rack and pinion steering, differential drives, band brakes, and wire spoked wheels all were bicycle parts before the automobile was even thought of.  The assembly line process was also developed to mass produce bicycles right after someone thought of interchangeable parts (another great idea spawned by the makers of bicycles).  Early bicycles were all built separately and no two bikes had the same parts (and I thought Campy was hard to work on).  The first airplanes were built by the Wright brothers in the back yard of a bicycle shop and efforts of the League of American Wheelmen in the late 19th century paved the way for better roads and for organizations like AAA who provide travelers' aids.¹  Listening to Mr Burgwardt is like listening to the history channel talk about bikes.  There's probably little he doesn't know about our silly machine and he dedicates his life sharing his knowledge with the public.  Thanks Carl for another great visit.

After the fun time of hearing the history of our sport, it was time to get back to our task at hand...riding to Canandaigua.  After leaving the museum, most folks rode at a moderate pace savoring the cool morning before the heat of the afternoon and the pesky headwinds that flared up after noon.  The countryside was pleasant and overall the roads were good with wide shoulders. We passed through several small and very old towns today to include:  Leroy, Caledonia, Avon, Lima, and Bloomfield.  Many of these towns have been around since the mid to late 1700s and everywhere you look you'll see plaques that tell of colonial times and famous people to include Ben Franklin, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton.  Other places of note we'll go through tomorrow include Geneva; Seneca Falls, the birthplace of women's rights; and Waterloo which is the birthplace of Memorial Day. 

Due to the late schedule, we had to get creative with the support in the afternoon.  Most everyone stopped someplace to eat along the way while a few pressed on.  I rode after the tour and pushed to get to the second SAG so Barb could take the luggage in.  I got a good dose of "butt woopin" by pushing into the headwind with the humidity as high as it was.  By the time I got there to relieve Barb, I was about ready to get off that two wheeled torture thing.  By then there were only about 6 riders behind so it didn't take long to clean up and get rolling when the mechanic's van got to me.  From there Karen and I followed the back end to town finishing about 5:45...long hot day, but worth the time to see the museum...hopefully we won't suffer for today's long day tomorrow.

The riders are beginning to love the New York roads.  Our route followed route 20 and 5 most of the way and they both have great shoulders and plenty of hills...that was until about 4 miles from the motel.  We still had the hills, but starting there they had skinned the entire road and shoulder to repave soon.  The result was a late day bone jarring arrival that put an exclamation mark on the entire day.  I was sorry to see the riders have to deal with that after such a hard day in the saddle, but that's why New York has such good roads...they repair them regularly.

I'm a happy camper tonight...our motel has OLN and I can watch the Tour!  Got to go to dinner and rap then I'm going to lounge and watch the pros do the climbing.  Hope you'll join us again tomorrow...it's a shorter day, but I'm sure it will have some exciting times.  See you then.