Start:  Yellow Springs, OH

Finish: Columbus, OH

Weather:  90 degrees, sunny

Miles:  59

Distance to date: 2044

I rolled over 2,000 miles today, as I continued to tour along bike path heaven.  My sweet little motel in Yellow Springs had breakfast baskets, so I wolfed down
bananas, crumb cakes and orange juice and hit the trails in the early morning
sunlight.  It was a dozen miles or so to
Cedarville, a tidy little town that seemed the antithesis of Yellow Springs, with a Christian College in lieu of Antioch.

The Ohio to Erie bike trail system through Ohio is about 80% complete, and the portion towards Columbus went even further than my map indicated, but eventually the good thing ended, though construction on the next phase was evident.  I met a great pair of volunteers along the path who were cleaning debris and cutting up fallen limbs along the trail.  One had made a 3,500
miles trek from Seattle to DC about ten years ago, the other is about to embark on an 11 state journey with his bike hooked to his car, which he rides on completed rail trails.  No sooner did I get off the trail than I ran into another local cyclist who was rich in stories
from the trail.  Ohioans love their bikes!

I hopped on US 40, the National Road, and even that had a bike lane right into Columbus.  I found a very serviceable hotel and was settled by 1 pm.

I had a fascinating tour this afternoon.  Ken Stevens, a local radio newscaster in Columbus (he is my brother-in-law’s brother) has been following this blog and when he realized I was coming through Columbus, asked me if I would do a radio interview with him.  Ken picked me up, took me to the Clear Channel studios in Columbus, and gave me a terrific tour of how radio works today, which like everything else involves more and more technology with fewer and fewer staff.  He interviewed me for a feature spot that may air tomorrow or Saturday.  It was great to see Ken after too many years, and fun to be interviewed.

Afterwards Ken took me on a quick tour around Ohio State University campus, which is as enormous as I expected, and through the main downtown areas.  Most striking is that the Ohio Statehouse, a well-proportioned Greek Revival building, has a flat roofed drum instead of the more traditional dome capping the building.  It is quite handsome once you get used to the dome one expects being absent.

My thanks for the volunteers of the Ohio to Erie Bike Trail System