Ken's Annual Bike Trip in Ohio

 On Tuesday, June 4th, Ken and his friend Jeff Adamson flew to Cincinnati to start their annual bike adventure.  Some of the others flew in from where they were, and Greg & Patsy Last met us all there at the hotel. They have been touring the southern states and some Atlantic states by car for the previous two months.  The next day We started our adventure: 342 miles across the state of Ohio; from the Ohio River in downtown Cincinnati to the shore of Lake Erie in Cleveland, in 8 days.  The trail we traversed is called the Ohio To Erie Trail (OTET). We averaged 45 miles a day with 56 miles being the most they traveled in a single day.  

We started our trek by dipping our rear tires in the Ohio River in Cincinnati.  At the end we dipped our front tires in Lake Erie.

Day 1:  Cincinnati to Mason, Ohio. This is our group picture just before hopping on our bikes in downtown Cincinnati, to start our ride. Before starting our ride each morning, we always gather for a group prayer and photo. You will see many of our morning group photos below.

Day 2:  Mason to Cedarville.  We were blessed with great weather almost every day.

Day 3:  Cedarville to Columbus, Ohio

Day 4: Columbus to Mt. Vernon.  Just 7 of us rode this year- our smallest group ever.  Left-to-right: Greg Last, Cindy Evans and her brother, Ned, Jeff Adamson, Joyce and Scott Seegmiller, & Ken.  It was a very nice, congenial group. Greg's wife, Patsy, drove our support wagon, carrying our suitcases from hotel to hotel. She was an angel.

This picture shows Patsy Last on the far left.  She drove the support van.  It is SO nice when Patsy does this, so they don't have to pack in panniers and take all of their stuff on their bikes.  Patsy is such a good sport.  She enjoyed doing family history in the hotels while she waited each day.

Each day, periodically throughout the day's ride, we would stop and relax. We would visit together, munch on snacks and drinks, and enjoy the ambiance of the setting. It was delightful.

We are loading the rental bikes to haul them to the trail's starting point. The rental bike shop, West Trails Bicycles, took excellent care of us and provided us with great bikes.

Who is allowed to ride on the trail? I thought these unique traffic signs were interesting and slightly funny.

We rode through Amish country and periodically passed horse-drawn carriages on the trail

Behind me is a replica of a typical canal boat that was used on the Ohio and Erie Canal back in the 1800s. The canal was perhaps the main thoroughfare from Cleveland on the north to the Ohio River on the south back in those days. I suspect that even some of my early church member ancestors used this means of transportation to go from Kirtland to Nauvoo or Missouri.

Behind me is one of the locks on the Ohio and Erie Canal. This lock has been restored to look like it would have in the early 1800s.

A historical marker along the Ohio and Erie Canal Towpath bike trail.

This is the only covered bridge we encountered on this year's ride. It was named "The Bridge of Streams".

On the day we biked through Columbus, Ohio, there was an art festival going on downtown. We stopped there for a potty break. While I was walking through the art booths to the mobile bathroom, I saw this statue on the bridge over the Scioto River. I don't know if it was temporary or permanent, but I certainly thought it was interesting!

The "Heart of Ohio Trail" is one of 12 or so connecting trails in Ohio, that make up the OTET (Ohio To Erie Trail).

One day as we were riding through Amish country, we passed a little outhouse-looking building like this. There were two cute little toddlers standing outside it, and we could see their mom just inside it. I waved at the cute little kids and they shyly returned my wave. That caused their mom to stick her head out of the building to see who they were waving at. As we rode away, Jeff informed me that was the phone booth for the nearby homes because the Amish don't believe in having in-home phones. I found that so interesting, that when we passed another similar building, I just HAD to take this picture.

While riding the trail through the Cuyahoga National Park, this passenger train came steaming by. I couldn't help but take this picture.

As well as deer, squirrels, turtles, and other animals.

Here are a few of the literally hundreds of turtles we saw in the rivers and canal along the bike trail.

This is one of the many Great Blue Herons we saw along the rivers and canal along the bike trail. A couple of those herons were only about 5 feet from us as we rode by. They kept TOTALLY still, causing some of us to not even notice them.

Day 7 Massillon to Akron, Ohio

On the night we stayed in Akron, Ohio, Greg took Jeff and I to the National Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Although I am not currently very active in following any major league sport, I found many men who excelled in the NFL throughout my life highlighted in this museum. This is the bust of one of my favorites-Steve Young.

And this is a replica of another of my favorites--Merlin Olsen.

Day 8: Akron to Cleveland, Ohio (Lake Erie)

Jeff Adamson, Greg Last, and myself, taking a break at a rest stop along the trail in the Cuyahoga National Park.

Dipping their front tires in Lake Erie!  Finish Line!

All 7 finished the trek.  Way to go!!!

After finishing the bike trek, they drove to Kirtland and visited historical sites there.

Upon finishing our ride in Cleveland, we turned our bikes in to the bike shop, and rode in the Last's van to a Red Roof Inn near Kirtland and stayed the night there. That evening we went into Kirtland and explored the grounds around the Kirtland Temple. I think we all enjoyed this activity very much. This is a front view of the temple. Below, you will find several pictures of the temple, each taken from a different perspective.

These stairs up to the second floor were steep, and the steps were rather narrow.

This is the foyer/entry just inside the front of the Kirtland Temple. We are getting instructed by our LDS missionary tour guide. As I exited the temple, I was approached by a young man that I immediately recognized as Nate Waite, a son of our dear friends, Glen and Linda Waite. We had a delightful few minutes together, reconnecting.

This was the upstairs room in which they held the School of the Prophets.

This is a view through all 5 or 6 upstairs rooms of the Kirtland Temple.

This is a window frame created by Brigham Young and his brother, Joseph Young for the temple.

Pictures of the iconic seating and pulpits in the ground level's main assembly room.

I love these paintings.

This is the sweet senior sister missionary that I tell about in the text under the next picture. She had us mesmerized for about an hour.

We sat on the bench in front of the Newell K. Whitney Store for a while. During that time, a sweet senior sister stopped by and chatted with us. She and her husband were in charge of Kirtland's physical facilities. They were going home in another several weeks. She shared many miracles that she and her husband have witnessed while on their mission there. Many of those miracles had to do with switching ownership of the temple and some other properties from the Community of Christ Church to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It provided us a unique and inspiring experience.

John Johnson Farm

*Thanks to Cindy Evans, Joyce Seegmiller and Jeff Adamson for photos.