The Friends You Make — Conversations Across America

One of the wonderful aspects of this trip is the opportunity to connect with old friends and make new friends. Today we got to do a little of both. We started the day with Lori and Paul Whitstock and Paul’s brother Robbie, and ended at the farm of Betsy and Rich Sadlon in Cazenovia, New York. Betsy and Rich are the parents of our Pasadena friend, Elizabeth Sadlon, and when we told her our route was going through Central New York she encouraged us to spend a night on her parents’ farm.

We were warmly greeted by Betsy and RIch, and Elizabeth’s sister Pam, when we arrived about 4:00 this afternoon. We enjoyed a wonderful dinner and got to learn a little more about life on a farm, including the production cycle for dairy cows and the agricultural real estate market. I finally nailed down the difference between hay and straw, something I more or less knew, but was unable to explain adequately when Toni and I were discussing it recently.

After photographing and passing by so many barns, it’s nice to linger beside one for the evening.

We spent the day successfully dodging showers, delaying our start in the morning until some had left the Cayuga Lake area and lingering over lunch long enough for another band of showers to pass us by near Courtland, NY. The fear of thunderstorms kept me pretty concentrated on getting the ride done, but I was able to enjoy the rolling farm and forest land of Central New York, which reminded me a little of Wisconsin.

The small villages and their architecture were enough to remind me that I was in the east, not the midwest.

And then there were the barns. As you’ll see below, many seemed oversized, as if they were trying to make it clear that they were part of the Empire State.