Special Report: GOBA 2022 Day 5 Wapakoneta to Troy, Ohio Part 2 of 2

Wednesday, June 22, 2023. Great Ohio Bicycle Adventure.

Troy City Park. The steady stream of cyclists was arriving, grabbing their bags and looking for suitable sites to put their tent for the next 3 nights. I found a spot between the GOBA information desk and the luggage truck. Suzi and Joshlyn set up their tent just in front of me. Giving thought to what Saturday would look like having to drag my bags back to the truck and so far this week haven’t seen any outside help with carrying the bags in the morning.

I have already made the decision not to ride tomorrow and will do laundry and see the town. Everyone else I knew was planning on riding. So that leaves me to my own devices.

There were no shuttle busses into town and it was mentioned it was a short half-mile walk. There was a food truck by the GOBA information table when I arrived but it was gone. There was a band in town and they were going to be there. Got in my shower and dallied back to my tent.

Picnic pavilions were scattered about the park and each had an AC outlet. The one closest to me was in use charging a group of batteries for eBikes and in the spare outlets, phones were being charged. The owner of the bike batteries issued this stern warning, “GOBA in the future better be aware and provide us with adequate outlets for our batteries.” That remains to be seen. I mentioned making sure he noted that on the survey which will be out later this year.

I haven’t eaten anything since the cheeseburger and fries for lunch in Piqua and decided on going into town to see what was available. It was a good time to stretch these wary legs.

Adam Street Bridge led us to the heart of downtown.

A very clean town and appeared ready to accept the GOBA riders.

The Courthouse seemed to be the center of attention in Troy.

Here was something quaint and unusual. There are 6 pianos in the downtown area and all are playable. Each one was painted to a different theme.

But the music I heard was not from the pianos but from a rock and roll band on the next street.

The only brew available was at this site and everyone needed to be a wristband to purchase the beer.

I settled for the Blackberry Prairie Wheat and wasn’t dissatisfied.

A couple of food trucks were on the street behind me and offered more carnival fast food. I only have myself to blame for not doing a thorough search of food establishments. I completely missed a Chinese buffet a couple of streets down the road.

Got a brat and sat down. I was about to lunge into that sandwich when Vicki showed up. A few moments later Jan who was staying at the indoor camping at the Presbyterian Church a mile away from our campground showed up and with her a group of riders she made arrangements to ride with tomorrow. I still planned on visiting the wonderful world of the laundromat. Got a coupon for free drying for GOBA riders. How could I say no to that!

As the band made an announcement they were playing some 200 gigs this summer and after they began to repeat some of the numbers played earlier, Vicki and I decided to leave and walk back to our tents in the campground.

The show back at camp seemed to be the sunset. A fair amount of people were standing and admiring the view.

Back at my tent, I captured their silhouettes against the evening sky.

More…

I still had some power left in my power pack and recharged my phone. I noticed the AC power adapter to charge my electronics was insufficient, I’ll buy a better one in town tomorrow. Looking forward to real breakfast tomorrow morning.

Well, I hear the bugler blowing Taps as he has been each night of GOBA and that was a nice touch to a full day. Till tomorrow.