Day 128 - Plymouth to Middlebury - Two Far 2021 - Sooo... Far

August 14, 2021

Day 128 - Plymouth to Middlebury

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We rode through a very pretty part of northern Indiana today. There are many Amish and Mennonite in this area and their farms are usually very well kept, with well maintained structures and yards full of colorful flowers in the summer.

We are back in Eastern time now, so without setting an alarm, we slept until 8:00. It was around 9:30 when we left and the temperature was in the upper 60's. It remained under 80 all day, with sunshine and bright blues skies - perfect cycling weather.

Riding east in the morning on a wooded road gave us a bright light at the end of the tunnel.

Something we haven't seen this summer - soybean field full of weeds.

Our first stop was in the town of Bremen. Not only was it a very attractive town, but also very friendly. It seemed that almost everyone at the convenience store wanted to chat with us and wish us well.

We've been bragging on the good roads lately, but we had a stretch of rough pavement for several miles today. If you look closely, you will also see an Amish buggy in the distance.

Horses on an Amish farm. The one in the center was heading out to greet us.

We went through the larger town of Nappanee. It was well know in the past for furniture manufacturing. Now it is part of the large RV industry in the area.

After all the old classic vehicles we've seen in museums and posted pictures of on this trip, here's one spotted in the wild. Any of you ever own one of these?

A Chevrolet Corvair convertible. Kerry's uncles owned an auto garage and specialized in Corvair's. HIs cousins all drove them in their teens.

The Nappanee Farmers Market wasn't very busy at lunch time.

This was, I think, a public park in town. These painted apples in the Apple Orchard were along the walking trail

Farther up the trail was the Flower Garden.

A well preserved barn for today's picture. You will never see dilapidated, collapsing buildings on an Amish farm.

We rode past several large pumpkin fields. If you zoom in, a few small pumpkins are slightly visible.

The last town we visited today was Goshen. It is another very pretty place.

Goshen street views

Kerry wanted to show the place to go for "Ink Therapy".

A large Goshen home. Seeing the six mailboxes on the porch, we assumed it was broken up into apartments now.

This one appears to remain a single family home.

In Goshen, we picked up the Pumpkinvine Nature Trail and rode it to Middlebury. We'll ride the rest of it to Shipshewana when we leave here on Monday.

It was listed as having an asphalt surface, but a couple of miles turned out to be unpaved. The surface was fine for us.

Maybe the best encounter of the trip - a Seavo "in the wild". Many Amish use the trail for routine travel as well as recreation. We met two couples on RANS tandems returning from a family visit to Shipshewana. One couple was on a Screamer and the other on a Seavo. We've met several Screamers over the last few years, but this is only the second Seavo we've encountered. We had a very good time talking with the two couples. (Respecting Amish tradition, we got their permission to take a photograph that shows only the bike.)

We're taking a day off tomorow at a Hampton Inn in Middlebury. Maybe we'll get on the bike to see the town and maybe we won't :-)

Today's ride: 49 miles (79 km)
Total: 4,840 miles (7,789 km)

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