2 Jul: Ron awakened at the perfect time this morning and Cynthia awakened not long afterwards, 5:15. It looks like we are on schedule to get an earlier start so that the sun light from the east will be blinding for a while.
1 Jul: Ron awoke at 3:30 AM to pack up with a plan to leave very early, except we didn’t. It was raining. But, we were rolling out of the hotel parking lot before eight AM for the ride around New York City towards Boston. We made it as far as Brooklyn. Did you know there is a Brooklyn in Connecticut? I didn't. Todays ride was far less stressful than anticipated. We rode from the hotel west on NJ 36 a mile to reach US 130 N for 4 miles then merged with US 1 N for 4 more miles and took a left lane exit onto NJ 18 N for 7 miles to pass Rutgers University, cross the Raritan River and turned L onto River Road for 4 miles, whereupon we joined I-287 N for 50 miles to turn R onto I-87 and continue on I-287 around NYC and across the Tappanzee Bridge (now renamed for Mayor Andrew Como). Then came confusion because my directions said to take exit 9A onto the Huthinson River Parkway, but exit 9A in New York was for US route 9 and in Connecticut after I took a pass on that instruction there were a couple more 9 exits before the Hutchinson River appeared overhead.
