Day 25
Cleveland, OH (off route) to Ashtabula, OH (ish) – back on route

I got up early to trot down the street to this market a few people had told me about and said it was super cool, Westside Market. So…I would say if I lived near there, I’d probably go there BUT on a trip like mine, it wasn’t super awesome. It had a lot of fresh food, fresh meats, etc. but since I can’t take those kinds of things with me, I was only able to get a coffee and a chocolate chip cookie. But…since I love chocolate chip cookies, it wasn’t all bad. I kind of had a long day ahead of me so I packed up and was out of the hostel by about 7:30/8.

Wind, wind, wind is a good way to describe the ride today. Seems to be a trend on my entire tour. I thought of Max and thought he must be loving today, headwind for me means tailwind for him, he was probably flying!!! Once I hit Cleveland I was technically on the Adventure Cycling’s Northern Tier Route, an official bike route but could have fooled me by the roads. These were super chunked up and busy roads I was riding on. People driving close. Welcome back to reality, back to civilization. Goodbye peaceful country roads and country people! This day felt like I just kept pedaling into the wind. Bundled up in most of the clothing in my possession, I slowly made my way towards camp. I finally was so spent, I decided I had to take a break and pulled off to rest, grab some food and warm up indoors. This break ended up being a blessing because when I got back on my bike, the wind had…poof! Disappeared! Gone! I went from pedaling around 8 MPH with all my mite to pedaling closer to 16 MPH with all my mite. Double time! I rolled into a campground just outside Ashtabula, Village Greens (named after the golf course adjacent to the campground). This place was weird. I felt like I was in a twilight zone. Place was packed full of RV’s and trailer campers. I checked in, paid $22 for the night and made my way to my assigned campground. Took me a while to realize ¾ of the camp had trailers but there wasn’t a soul in the campground except the host. He later came by with his golf cart and it turned out most folks leave their trailers there year round and pay rent but only come there during the summer for vacation. Probably at least 50 trailers parked but the campground was vacant. It was kind of creepy feeling, not going to lie. I took a shower then confidently zipped myself into the security of my paper thin, nearly translucent tent. Ah…safe! (Or something)