C&O canal

When I left back in July I could not wait to get past the canal and to get to some place new. I’m back on the canal now, and oddly enough instead of feeling bored with it, the familiarity is exciting. Somehow knowing what’s around the next corner does not seem mundane anymore. Every landmark brings a flood of memories and a smile.

I stopped at grocery store on my way out of Cumberland. I needed to resupply but only for two days. I was going to splurge and get a steak and a pint of oysters. I was going to celebrate riding 3500 miles. Actually that was just an excuse to have steak and fried oysters for dinner.. Haha. In the grocery store frugality won though. A little 8 oz thing of oysters was $11 dollars. Then looking at the steaks I noticed pork loins on sale for 5.99. So pork loin and twice reduced baguette bread is dinner tonight. I did spend too much on some really good cheese. $8 dollars for six ounces of Manchego. I love cheese especially the hard cheeses that doesn’t need refrigerated.

I dumped out my kitchen pannier looking for some seasoning for the loin. I found salt, pepper a couple packets of mustard a few cloves of garlic some Texas pete hot sauce two packets of sugar and some soy sauce. I brought a 2 cups of water to a boil and added a bullion cube and all the stuff I just mentioned. I simmered that a while then brushed it on the loin as it was cooking. I had sliced it in half inch slices so it could cook in a frying pan. Up until my first bite I had regretted not buying a steak. However after the first piece, it was so delicious I wished I had a way to remember the recipe!

I returned the rental car around 10 am. The Hertz place was outside of town about 3 miles but along the Great Allegany Passage. After dropping the car off I headed uphill on a side street to get on the GAP and ride that into Cumberland. About a half mile from Cumberland a man wearing a backpack stopped me to talk. He started off by saying Cumberland was an aweful town and very unfriendly to travelers. He suggested that I pass it by. I love Cumberland and defended it the best I could with out being argumentive. I’ll be the first to admit Cumberland is a bit rough around the edges but every person I’ve ever met there was friendly,nice and helpful. The man said he was homeless. He was dressed pretty decent clean clothes, clean shaven. He asked how long I had been homeless and living on the road. I replied I had been out since July 28th. I wondered how rough I looked. He went on to say that he couldn’t even get somebody to buy him a breakfast sandwich at McDonald’s that morning and he stood there for an hour. I still had a few snack bars from the warm shower host back in New Bedford. I gave him a few and wished him luck.

Shortly after that encounter I was at the grocery store. I had bought what I needed and was packing up. I had even bought ice. I was surprised how warm it was here. 76 degrees at noon. As I was putting my groceries away a man in his early twenties stopped to chat. “Headed south,are you”? he asked. ” yes , I sure am”. I replied. He said,”I’m envious of you living your dream living on the road. I quickly said it is my dream but I’m not homeless. After talking to the other guy I wasn’t sure how rough I looked. Joel said he had walked there from Michigan 4 years ago. He had walked to this same grocery store to resupply and met the love of his life and got married. By this point I had had enough of society and just kind of brushed him off as a nutcase and went about packing. Joel took the hint and walked away. A minute later a very attractive business like young lady walked up and tried to hand me money. I said thank you but im not destitute, I choose to travel this way. She laid a 20 dollar sheetz card a handful of change and two one dollar bills on my bike pannier. She said, me and Joel want you to have that. We’re sorry thats all we have. I was still trying wrap my head around all this when Joel showed up pushing a shopping cart with there 2 year old daughter in it. He smiled a huge smile and pointed at the lady and said she is the reason I stopped walking we got married 3 months after we met. This is our daughter. I thanked them profusely and shook there hands. I felt really bad for thinking Joel was a nutcase. His story is actually pretty incredible. Him and his wife seem very happy. Joel, I wish you, your wife, and your daughter the very best! Thank you for the random kindness.

As I rode away I wondered why my experience in Cumberland was so much different then the guy I had met earlier. An incident that happened way back in Xenia, Ohio kept coming to mind. It was early on a Sunday morning and I was rolling past a big parking area. There were a few cars and a couple RVs and one lavender mini bus with flowers and peace signs spray painted on the sides in the parking lot. It had stormed in the night and there were big puddles and downed small branches everywhere. I was weaving around puddles and branches when I heard someone yelling excuses me sir, stop! Mister wait! Stop sir! So I stopped, I figured trying to avoid a puddle something had fallen off my bike. A woman in a chartreuse toga complete with a rope belt ran up to me and said… ” your aura is so beautiful the kindness of the universe surrounds you, I felt you needed to know that. Unsure of what to say I mumbled a thanks and rode on. I certainly get shown more then my share of kindness. Maybe she was on to something.