Day 53 Rhinebeck to Holmes

Very familiar trails today heading south toward our endpoint at Bridgeport, CT where we ride a car ferry back to Long Island. 61 miles mostly on paved and some unpaved bike trails with pretty scenery and only a couple pop up rain showers.

Delicious muffins and smoothies in New Paltz - maybe the best of the trip! And a really delicious warm olives, cucumber salads and personal pizzas for dinner in Poughkeepsie- turns out It was restaurant team Puppy went to last year during our upstate August event.

Strange feeling to be finishing. Part of me is so ready to be home with my family, my own house, my own bed, home cooked food - and part of me is grooved now to a weird routine of sleep, rise early ride, eat, organize, repeat. Will I miss the road? In a way, maybe. It’s been a quest with a far off end point. Lots of determination has brought us almost to that end point! Hard to put in words how this feels.

So, today it’s off to Bridgeport mostly on roads. 48 miles followed by a 3:45 ferry. We’ll hopefully be in our own beds tonight! Rest day tomorrow, then one last celebratory bike ride from the ferry to the Atlantic Ocean in Smith Point to dip our front bike tires 56 days after we performed the rear wheel dipping in the Pacific in Seaside, Oregon. Lots of our friends will join us for Sunday including some sight impaired riders on tandems, some media and even a police escort!

Puppy Ride Long Island has raised more than $76,000 so far on this specific campaign. I’m so grateful for our friends, family and corporate contributors and I am hoping we’ll raise quite a bit more before we conclude this event. Time to make the coffee and kick off day 54! Cheers!