I met my friends in Elmore, Ohio yesterday. They are biking this week with 3,000 other participants--doing GOBA. I had never heard about GOBA before--and this is the 21st annual.

GOBA riders bike a different route every year, averaging about 50 miles a day, with one or two break days that offer other activities.

This year's tour started in Norwalk, where they loaded their camping equipment onto 4 semis. They had their morning snack in Bellville, lunch with Elvis entertainment and a tour of President Hayes museum in Fremont, an afternoon snack somewhere and ended at the high school in Elmore. (Where in the world is Elmore? you say--I bought that t shirt) It was amazing to see the tent city set up at the high school. Lots of families, lots of tandem bikes. Where do you buy a tandem for 5?--I saw several of the bikes that held more than 2 riders.

Yesterday was an optional ride day and several activities were available to the riders. They had jazzercise and a 5k race, the arboretum, a bus to the Put-in Bay ferry..... there is a ton of planning for this event.

I was up at Lake Erie at Catawba, so I drove down, picked up my friend---the other 3 decided to bike that day and meet us in Port Clinton, about 25 miles away.

We met at Dock's Beach Bar in Port Clinton, had walleye sandwiches on the deck--beautiful sunny day. For a couple of weeks, Lake Erie is hit with the mayflies/Canadian soldiers(do they call these American soldiers in Canada?)--and they are here, they hatch from the lake and swarm--they are really bad at night. They look like huge mosquitoes, they don't bite, but they are on everything. Everyone is using leaf blowers and brooms to brush them off the decks, posts, buildings, etc. By 4th of July, they will be gone.

We then loaded all the bikes on my car and headed to Catawba, driving along the lake. We walk down to the pebble beach, some bike down the Cliff Rd., some of us walk down along the Cliffs, stop for ice cream.

After a break and a clean up, we head over to Mon Ami Winery for their fabulous weekday happy hour. If you haven't been to Mon Ami in a few years, they have remodeled and have a fabulous outdoor patio. I love that place. They also have wonderful food, (great pizza too --one of those wood burning pizza ovens)but we were satisfied with our appetizers.

I drove them back to Elmore, they were continuing on to Bowling Green today with a lunch stop in Perrysburg + AM and PM snacks. The "Hot Flashes" who were going to be serving the AM snack stopped by the campground and passed out some flyers. There was a band playing last night, some movies, lots of fun. I am still amazed that they get 3,000 people to do this. They all don't look like they are in the greatest of shape--It's not a bunch of racing bikers. (It's 85 degrees today with rain forecast on Thurs.)

They camp tonight somewhere in Bowling Green, tomorrow night and Thurs. in Defiance, Friday in Fostoria and then back to Norwalk. Just thought I would share this Ohio adventure. I was pretty impressed.