Saratoga Lake Loop

Holly needed help with a few things at her house, so I built a route starting from there that would give me a longer day than I've been having so far this year. From Burnt Hills, I headed toward the south end of Saratoga Lake, using all lightly travelled back roads. The road around the south/east/north side of the lake is a different story. At one point, I saw a pickup with yellow flashers pass me, and as it did, I noted the emblem "Certified Escort Vehicle" on its door. Uh-oh, I know what that means. Looked in my rearview mirror and saw a double-wide prefab home coming towards me. With nowhere to go on my side of the road, I bailed out to the left shoulder and waited until it passed and traffic sorted out before continuing. The rest of the ride around the east side of the lake was pleasant and summer-like, with the usual camps and lake views. When I got to Saratoga Springs, I decided to head in past the race track and the beautiful part of town it's located in. Had to stop for an official "horse crossing" at one point, then continued on downtown. Construction on US9 forced me to detour via NY50 instead, so I turned off 50 onto "Avenue of the Pines" and cut through Saratoga Spa State Park in search of a rest stop, which I found. Came out on US9 on the other side of the park, headed south, and noticed the smell of barbecue on the wind - yummm. PJ's Bar-B-Q has been open for over 25 years, and serves a variety of tasty barbecued foods. I had a pulled pork sandwich on Texas toast and some lemonade, then continued on my way. Next came Ballston Spa, after a short trip on more back roads. From there, I headed west on NY67, and was beginning to tire. Dreams of hitting 50 miles today were fading fast, but the odometer read 41.7 when I got back to Holly's house. Actual saddle time was just under 3 hours, for the usual 14.1 mph average, but the elapsed time was more like 4 hours. Pleasant ride with lots of variety.