108 Mile Trip to Newport, VT

Newport to Troy

I woke up the next morning well-rested. I had "Bad Blood" stuck in my head because somebody I know and love had attended a Taylor Swift concert the night before and I woke up to a bunch of texts and pictures from that concert. I was ready to explore Newport!

Newport was a beautiful city! One of the first things I did was of course check out Goodrich Memorial Library. The librarian told me that I had to be sure to "look in every room," which I did. It was a beautiful small library, with plenty of comfy sitting areas. I was completely charmed.

I knew that I had to get ready to start riding south again, but before I left Newport, I ate breakfast at this diner called the Brown Cow. It may have been the most purely American diner experience I've ever had in my life. The waitress was a middle-aged woman who called everybody "honey," everyone eating there was a local that worked in construction - I was basically in an episode of Twin Peaks (though I didn't have myself a damn fine cup of coffee). I ate some blueberry pancakes that were out of this world, and after that, I headed back onto the open road. I knew that the route back was mostly on Vermont Route 100, which meant I would have to contend with cars for a good portion of the trip.

Leaving Newport was mostly a pleasant ride, and once I got to the junction with Vermont Route 100, I started going down a long line of increasingly dramatic hills. This was exhilirating and extremely fun. I imagine that I probably got up to about 40mph, but I'm silly and don't have a speedometer on my bike so I can't tell you for sure. After the road leveled out, it was a bit stressful being on the shoulder next to cars, but the section to Troy was fairly empty. Troy itself was a very small town, and I couldn't shake the thought that Vermont has both a town named Troy and a town named Bolton. We are certainly a state that likes to keep our head in the game. Maybe I should ride from Troy to Bolton and call it the "You're Crazy, Wildcat" bike ride. Putting that on my list.

This was the hardest section of the trip. I was on Vermont Route 100, which was becoming increasingly busy with cars, which meant I had to stay far over on the shoulder for the entirety of the ride. In addition to this, I was facing serious headwinds throughout this section, which meant I was unable to coast or pick up any speed at all. It was definitly grueling. Luckily, there were highlights, like coming across a random monastery! The bells of the monastery were ringing when I passed, which seemed fortuitously lucky. I didn't hear any singing or chanting, but I did stop and eat a bit on the grass outside the monastery and tried to soak in some holy vibes.

The mountains during this section all had plenty of windmills, which made perfect sense to me, given how windy it was. I called this part of the ride the "valley of the wind" in retrospect, though I unfortunately did not meet Nausicaa. I did, however, eventually make it to Johnson.

Once I got to Johnson, I was luckily able to get back on a rail trail! Part of the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail runs from Johnson to Jeffersonville, and as soon as I had the opportunity to get out of the way of cars, I took it. Johnson also has one of the very few Mormon churches in Vermont, so I had to take a picture. For those of you who have never been to Utah, every Mormon church looks exactly the same, both inside and out, and they are literally everywhere in Utah. There is one in Johnson too!

The rail trail from Johnson was lovely, but it was starting to rain. I had planned to catch a bus from Jeffersonville back to Burlington, but alas, I checked the bus times and learned that the bus wasn't running on Saturday! I quickly looked up how long it would take me to bike from Jeffersonville to Essex or somewhere I could catch a bus, but I was definitely worried about the rain. I figured that this may be the time to phone a friend, so I called my friend Rachel who answered the phone and agreed to come save my life by picking me up in Jeffersonville. To be very clear, I want to announce to everybody reading this that my friends Rachel, Emily, and Mae came and saved me when I was stuck in the rain in Jeffersonville. The woman near Newport was right - somebody did end up doing something kind for me!

Before my friends arrived in Jeffersonville, I had my final biking meal at a restaurant called My Favorite Things. They made me a fried burrito, which is a very nostalgic food for me. I sat in the restaurant and felt the aches in my legs, but I also felt the overwhelming sense of accomplishment that can only come when you've just biked more than 100 miles. Well, it probably comes with other things too, but in this case, it came because I biked 108 miles. I had done it!