What’s with all the bike leaning hoopla you ask? I really don’t know, but there’s online communities upon online communities dedicated to it. Look it up. It’ll blow your mind like the JB’s. I’d hope primarily it started with my situation. I have a 100 lb loaded bicycle and no kick stand. A standard kickstand wouldn’t even work. I’ve always just leaned the bike, and I look for a place to lean it when I’m stopping to take a break. So fuck kickstands. Not having a kickstand is like “Chicano” – it’s a state of mind. And the lean is just the manifestation of that state of mind. Get some. Or don’t. Whatever.
A couple miles north and I reconnect with the Towpath trail south of Akron, high ground compared to the towns below. It winds and turns and drops me right into downtown Akron, which is incredibly quiet. I jump on one last trail for the day and head toward Kent, my third and final detour awaiting me. Yet another flooded out trail, so I have to backtrack a bit and negotiate all of the rush hour traffic – fun! No need for the moving goalposts technique today, I’m so busy just rerouting some way and some how, that I don’t need much motivation behind that. 
I meet Doug and Jena, a super cool couple of bike touring musicians who live on the outskirts of town. They’re letting me stay in their guest bedroom and Doug asks if I’d wanna go out for dinner with a bunch of friends (some also bicyclists) he regularly meets up. He tells me there no wrong answer. I agree to join, I make some new friends and I feast on a giant beef short rib that in retrospect, I should have taken a photo of to demonstrate how massive this thing is – or was! Needless to say, food coma sets in hard after that and once back at Doug and Jena’s, I sleep like I’m dead.
Within a mile of Al’s crib the Alum Creek path picks up. Like motherfuckin’ Tonto, I jump on it and I’m immediately back in the sugar hill trail glory. It’s a superb morning windiness with “trail closed due to high water” signs to ignore and big ass puddles to splash through. I cross the same creek over no less than 10 times on small bridges, weaving my way north along Ohio’s capital city and then through its northeastern suburbs. It’s fantastic to be able to avoid all the flying monkey crap a ride in and out of a city normally comes with. For real though, I’ve had monkeys throw shit at me in both Nepal and Myanmar – it’s not fun. I think about investigating other metropolitan areas in North American that can provide ease of entrance and exit via bicycle facilities. Boards of tourism and state departments of transportation are you listening yet? Let’s assume not. It’s hard to hear when your head is up your own ass (or someone else’s).
Back here in the Buckeye State, I bust out 50 traffic free miles before I even drink coffee. By 1pm I’m at the Mount Vernon station stop, eating trail mix, enjoying free filtered water and restrooms and sipping on the nearby gas station’s “Colombian blend”. It’s pretty solid actually and these trails are the 🐝 🦵🏽. I get an occasional shower, but nothing soaking. A simple sign puts me in the pocket. There’s lots of fog and mist and animals along the Heart of Ohio Trail; Mother Nature is going hard as fuck all day. Birds of every single color of the rainbow shooting left to right and right to left as I speed along at 17mph. I almost hit no less than two dozen chipmunks, but I’m still being shutout, they really know how to turn and then turn back on a dime! 
The storms and flooding are predicted to continue the next few nights, so I’ve preplanned my stop to be a small town called Glenmont Ohio, where I got me a little hike and bike hostel I found online. As I arrive to the trail terminus, there’s a DIY bike help kit and a some pretty ballsy cock hanging out at the covered picnic area. Glenmont you are one wild place and I haven’t even hit your highly reviewed singular establishment, the Glenmont Tavern.
Famished, I opt for the non-fried food go-to at every dive bar across the country: a steak sandwich and/or “spicy” pickled eggs. In this case, both. Not bad as far as middle of nowhere suppers go. I even enter $1 into their queen of hearts game of chance. I put my name and number on a ticket and pick #8. Oddly, there’s no cell phone service here, so if I win later tonight, I won’t even know until I’m long gone. Doesn’t matter, the staff and patrons here are super awesome and I’m loving the backcountry happenings occurring all around me. When it couldn’t get any better, I settle up and walk out, ready to head down to the hostel, and I’m stopped in my tracks making the bestest of best friends with a one-eyed cat sitting on the bench out front of the tavern. This little guy stole my heart was super snuggly and so I sat and petted him for quite a while. The guy working in the store next door didn’t know the story of how he lost his eye, but I like to think it was doing something awesome, like winning an underground feline fight club match (rule number one is: you don’t purr about fight club). 
Hoping for a Tail Wind 