Day Three - Fantastically Quiet Day

What a change from the past two days. This morning we awoke to sunny skies after spending the night at the Hotel Utica, which sounds like it was right out of a bad movie. But this was anything but that, in fact it was a beautifully restored hotel from the early 20th century. This was definitely a grand old hotel brought back to life. What's more, our Model A was in the parking lot ready to forge onward to Niagara Falls to meet up with the O'Briens. Nan & I talked over our travel strategy for the day while enjoying our complimentary breakfast (nice touch, thanks Hotel Utica). Then it was time to hit the road, after a quick torque check of the head nuts...which all checked out at 55#.

Through tremendous kindness of our friends Jack & Jo by trailering us out to Utica, we were left with an easy day's drive to reach Lockport, NY where the O'Briens were waiting for us. With a new outlook on our Excellent Adventure we fired up the Model A and headed west. Our strategy (yes we did come up with a plan at breakfast) was to drive at a nice leisurely pace over the "green dot" (scenic) roads.

The drive was very peaceful, quite a change from the last two days, through the rolling hills and farm country of western NY. Traffic was light since it was Sunday and we had no problems negotiating the cities of Syracuse and Rochester. Our route also followed the historic Erie Canal which was an engineering marvel and an economic boom to the whole area at the time.

The other thing we both noticed was the constant wind that came over from Lake Ontario. No wonder this area is blasted by that infamous Lake Effect Snow in the winter.

All this time the Model A was rolling along and hopefully enjoying the ride. I tried to listen for any strange sounds, which was hard because of the wind and I watched the temperature gauge constantly which BTW stayed at 160 degrees all the time except for one large hill when it crept up to 170.

At one time the phone rang and it was Dick O'Brien who said he had some visitors...John & Shirley Jacobson. John was part of the first day engine swap team and they left for Vancouver in their motorhome Saturday about the time we fired up engine #3. It was good to hear from them as they head west. I told Dick at the time the GPS said we would arrive about 3:00 PM and that was just about right. It was SO GOOD to be back with Dick and Barbara. Some nice comfy chairs in the gazebo, a few cold adult beverages and lots of stories made for a wonderful afternoon.

Isn't that what Model A'ing is all about?