GOBA
Yesterday ended the 26th annual Great Ohio Bicycle Adventure (GOBA), a week-long tour by bicycle of small-town Ohio. This year, my third year riding GOBA, we visited Mansfield, Orrville (home of Smuckers), Coschocton, Mount Vernon, Bucyrus (invented to be a contraction of beautiful and Cyrus, alluding to Persia, and back to Mansfield. This year Ann and I camped every night with a group of crazy people, one of whom I know from dog training. They are great fun and we both appreciated not having to choose a campsite, since the group was already set up most days by the time we finished riding (they are a bit faster than us). Also, the group has done so many GOBAs, they seem to know all the campsites.
A few of my favorite GOBA moments:
Standing in line in the bathroom on day 6 at the AM snack stop, there were two little girls in line in front of me. The smaller one turned and gave me this big-eyed look as she tried not to move at all. Her very talkative older sister informed me that the little one is 4 years old and has had to pee since just a few minutes out of camp (probably about 45 minutes ago, if I estimate their speed correctly) but her big sister told her to go to sleep in the bike trailer, because sleeping always helps if you have to pee. I asked the little one if she was enjoying GOBA and she just gave me her big-eyed look, while her sister told me it was the little one's first GOBA (but clearly not the older sister, who was probably about 8 or 9). Every question I asked the little one earned me that earnest big-eyed look and utter silence, clearly communicating to me that every ounce of her entire being was concentrated on not peeing, while her older sister unconcernedly chatted on. The whole line was in stitches over the two.
In Bucyrus, I admired a beautiful old brick house, with a great balcony over the front entrance and really intricate white-painted woodwork. The guy sitting on the front porch then offered me a tour of the Fienning house, as he called it, which was built around the time of the Civil War. Inside was exquisite original wood work, with hanging leafy boughs on the stair posts. The light fixtures were obviously not original, being electric, but were clearly antique. On either side of the fireplace, which boasted green glazed rectangular tiles, were electric candle fixtures set in delicate metalwork sconces. The basement (yes, I went into the basement of a complete stranger) had three parts, one with a brick floor, the second with a floor of large flat square stones, and the third was a bomb shelter. The older parts of the basement even had built-in cabinetry and windows in the walls between sections. The man clearly knew so much about the history of the house, supplying Ann and me with the dates of each change and addition. The boys in camp were a little incredulous that I would go into a stranger's basement but the man was a good soul and so proud of his house, his family history, and his country (the last part of our tour included his Vietnam veteran's flag).
Also in Bucyrus, I worked on a jigsaw puzzle at the public library with a pre-teen boy in companionable silence. Other than my offer to move over and let him join me, we never said a work to each other, just sat side by side and occasionally supplied each other with relevant pieces. He was working on the frame and I was working on the roof of a well that was in the middle of the puzzle. It was very relaxing.
On the first optional day, riding somewhere near Coschocton, I passed not one but two Amish buggies. I do not get to do much passing on my bicycle so that was tremendously exciting. Several farms we rode past, the Amish children were assembled at the end of their driveways, watching the cyclists and waving to us. The hills were a bit killer that day, especially combined with heat, humidity, and a headwind. There was one hill where the headwind was so bad that I was losing speed going down the hill. I admit that part of why I love the hilly rides is because we get a lot of practice climbing hills here in Marietta and so I am consequently one of the faster riders when we go uphill.
I also really enjoyed the food on this GOBA. I think Ann and I ate outside of camp more than in past years. Mount Vernon has a very nice Mexican restaurant and the best Indian restaurant in all of Ohio (at least, that's what Ann and I think). The chili chicken dish was unlike any other Indian dish I have enjoyed and the lamb in whatever that dish was just melted on your tongue. In Bucyrus, we had black raspberry and blue raspberry twist soft serve ice cream that I almost think would be worth the three hour drive to have again. Also in Bucyrus, the Baptist church served breakfast "brat-rittos" which contained egg, locally made bratwurst ("the best wurst"), salsa and cheese that were the perfect start to a day of biking. Breakfast the one day in Mount Vernon was a bacon maple cream stick made by a local bakery. I cannot even begin to explain how perfectly delicious that doughnut was, except to point out that it had bacon crumbled on top of maple frosting made from real maple syrup and was filled with a cream that clearly came from a real cow.
A few of my favorite GOBA moments:
Standing in line in the bathroom on day 6 at the AM snack stop, there were two little girls in line in front of me. The smaller one turned and gave me this big-eyed look as she tried not to move at all. Her very talkative older sister informed me that the little one is 4 years old and has had to pee since just a few minutes out of camp (probably about 45 minutes ago, if I estimate their speed correctly) but her big sister told her to go to sleep in the bike trailer, because sleeping always helps if you have to pee. I asked the little one if she was enjoying GOBA and she just gave me her big-eyed look, while her sister told me it was the little one's first GOBA (but clearly not the older sister, who was probably about 8 or 9). Every question I asked the little one earned me that earnest big-eyed look and utter silence, clearly communicating to me that every ounce of her entire being was concentrated on not peeing, while her older sister unconcernedly chatted on. The whole line was in stitches over the two.
In Bucyrus, I admired a beautiful old brick house, with a great balcony over the front entrance and really intricate white-painted woodwork. The guy sitting on the front porch then offered me a tour of the Fienning house, as he called it, which was built around the time of the Civil War. Inside was exquisite original wood work, with hanging leafy boughs on the stair posts. The light fixtures were obviously not original, being electric, but were clearly antique. On either side of the fireplace, which boasted green glazed rectangular tiles, were electric candle fixtures set in delicate metalwork sconces. The basement (yes, I went into the basement of a complete stranger) had three parts, one with a brick floor, the second with a floor of large flat square stones, and the third was a bomb shelter. The older parts of the basement even had built-in cabinetry and windows in the walls between sections. The man clearly knew so much about the history of the house, supplying Ann and me with the dates of each change and addition. The boys in camp were a little incredulous that I would go into a stranger's basement but the man was a good soul and so proud of his house, his family history, and his country (the last part of our tour included his Vietnam veteran's flag).
Also in Bucyrus, I worked on a jigsaw puzzle at the public library with a pre-teen boy in companionable silence. Other than my offer to move over and let him join me, we never said a work to each other, just sat side by side and occasionally supplied each other with relevant pieces. He was working on the frame and I was working on the roof of a well that was in the middle of the puzzle. It was very relaxing.
On the first optional day, riding somewhere near Coschocton, I passed not one but two Amish buggies. I do not get to do much passing on my bicycle so that was tremendously exciting. Several farms we rode past, the Amish children were assembled at the end of their driveways, watching the cyclists and waving to us. The hills were a bit killer that day, especially combined with heat, humidity, and a headwind. There was one hill where the headwind was so bad that I was losing speed going down the hill. I admit that part of why I love the hilly rides is because we get a lot of practice climbing hills here in Marietta and so I am consequently one of the faster riders when we go uphill.
I also really enjoyed the food on this GOBA. I think Ann and I ate outside of camp more than in past years. Mount Vernon has a very nice Mexican restaurant and the best Indian restaurant in all of Ohio (at least, that's what Ann and I think). The chili chicken dish was unlike any other Indian dish I have enjoyed and the lamb in whatever that dish was just melted on your tongue. In Bucyrus, we had black raspberry and blue raspberry twist soft serve ice cream that I almost think would be worth the three hour drive to have again. Also in Bucyrus, the Baptist church served breakfast "brat-rittos" which contained egg, locally made bratwurst ("the best wurst"), salsa and cheese that were the perfect start to a day of biking. Breakfast the one day in Mount Vernon was a bacon maple cream stick made by a local bakery. I cannot even begin to explain how perfectly delicious that doughnut was, except to point out that it had bacon crumbled on top of maple frosting made from real maple syrup and was filled with a cream that clearly came from a real cow.