Bellows Falls, Vermont

 My route north to the Carnegie in Franklin took me through Concord, the third state capital of these travels, less than ten miles from where I spent the night in my tent. It was another morning of cold, just twenty-five degrees, cold enough to turn my chocolate milk into a slushy drink, but the sun was shining, the road was flat, there was no wind nor traffic on this Sunday morning, so my heart was light and bright.  I’d had a fine campsite on a thick mattress of leaves and pine needles with a minimal obstacle course of limbs and  fallen trees to wade through from the road.

The towering, domed capital building was right on highway three passing through the middle of Concord, following the Merrimack River.  A plaque stated it was completed in 1819 and is the oldest capital in the US in which the legislature still meets in its original chambers.

Highway three took me within a mile of Franklin, just a little ways to the east.  A tributary of the Merrimack, the Winnipesaukee, wound through Franklin right past the Carnegie.  As so often happens, that first glimpse of the unmistakable Carnegie from a block or two away gave me an instant jolt of pleasure and was equally impressive as gazing at it head-on.  And as with a good many of the Carnegies, its majesty was no less impressive than the ostentatious capital building twenty miles south.

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My flat start to the day was broken by an unexpected several mile climb in the middle of my next forty-two mile leg northwest to Lebanon on the border with Vermont.  The temperature dropped as I climbed to just above freezing.  Patches of unmelted snow from several days before lined the road confirming the cold.  The forecast was for the coldest night of the year, twenty-one degrees, and possibly into the teens.  Lebanon was a large enough city to have a handful of hotels to choose from, thanks as well to its proximity to Hanover and Dartmouth seven miles north.  If need be I could bundle up and survive the cold, but I’d gladly avail myself of a hotel on this night.

If not for that long climb I would have reached Lebanon just ust before dark, but now I knew I  would fall fifteen or twenty minutes short.  I thought I was saved from biking in the dark when I passed a two-storied ten-unit motel masquerading as a B&B eight miles before Lebanon several miles past the descent from the summit.  I had to brake and circle back to it. As I pulled into the parking lot a SUV pulled in just after me.  An older lady opened the door and asked if I was all right having seen me turn around and knowing full well that no one in their right mind would be bicycling, let alone touring, in such conditions.

I said I was just looking for a place to stay this night and asked if she was the proprietor of the B&B.  She was.  Then came the the all-important question, “How much do your rooms go for.”  

“$199 plus tax,” was the answer.  

This was the off-season and there were just a couple of cars in the parking lot.  “I’ve been camping,” I replied, “but tonight is going to be a little too cold for that.  Would you take $100 if I didn’t use the bed and put down my sleeping pad and bag?”  

“We don’t do that,” she replied.  

A few miles further with dark further descending I came upon a campground full of RVs.  A campground with a heated rest room and perhaps a common room would suffice.  Unfortunately a sign on the office of the proprietor’s house read “Closed for the season.” All those RVs were parked for the winter.  I could see someone inside, so asked if I could just pitch my tent.  He was no less accommodating than the B&B woman, telling me it was just four miles to Lebanon where I could find a motel.

Though it was nearly dark I was heading west into a sky with a slight tint of blue giving me the illusion that there was still some light to bike by, though there wasn’t other than the passing headlights and occasional street light.  Fortunately the traffic was light and I had an adequate shoulder with a white line to help guide me.  There were no cheap motels on the outskirts, so I had to continue over to Vermont and the Hotel Coolidge in White River Junction.  It was a classic old urban hotel with rooms down long hallways like a college dorm.

I leaned my bike up against the window, but before I could pass through the double doors the desk clerk greeted me most hospitably saying it would be best to bring my bike right in.  He said he had an economy room for $99 which he could reduce to $79 with an AARP discount. I’d at last met a benevolent soul.  The room came with a $4.50 voucher for breakfast at an adjoining restaurant.  That wasn’t such a bargain, as it had a limited menu, mostly deluxe smoothies that went for $9.50.  I didn’t learn that until the next morning when it opened at seven. If I’d known I would have gotten a little earlier start.

The day otherwise got off to a great start with being able to see Lebanon’s first-rate Carnegie in the light of day after having only glimpsed its shadowy majesty in the dark the night before.  It had an addition tacked to its back referred to as a “wing” and bearing the name of a governor.  

It was hilly-going the next twenty-two mikes to fhe next Carnegie in Claremont.  Having been denied an anticipated breakfast I stopped at a McDonalds for the McGriddle special, two sausage sandwiches with thick hot cakes forming the bread—920 calories for three dollars.  A sign said, “Sorry, lobby is closed.”  There was a line of eight or nine cars for the drive-up window so I went over to the nearby KFC/Taco Bell for some breakfast burritos, except the Taco Bell had withdrawn from its partnership with KFC and left town. I couldn’t spare the time for a sit-down meal at a restaurant, so just made do with my chocolate milk and cereal.

The Carnegie was only slightly less majestic than its counterpart in Lebanon and had a  much smaller seamless addition from 1923, twenty years after the library had opened and hadn’t needed another since.  A bearded older guy librarian wearing a mask pointed out a couple of framed photos of the interior of the library from its early years.  It hadn’t changed much other than the addition of computers and DVDs on the shelves.  

With Claremont I completed all the Carnegies in another state and two hours later I completed Vermont with the Carnegie in Rockingham. Unlike most, It’s addition was to its side, slightly undermining the majesty of the original.  At least one could still enter up the steps as it was from the beginning.

Finishing off two states on the same day was a first.  That’s twenty-two done.  Many of the others, such as California and Arizona and Nebraska and Florida and Georgia I have nearly completed.  A ride up the coast starting in Orlando would make quick work of Florida, Georgia, the Carolina’s, Virginia, Rhode Island and Maryland.  Another ride starting in Denver would finish off Nebraska, the Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington and the three in Northern California I have yet to get to.  Before long the US portion of the project will be complete.   Then I can swing through Australia and New Zealand for a bunch more.