On Mon, 09 Nov 2015 18:01:22 +0700, John B.
wrote:
Riding in Bangkok one can get along perfectly well without either food
or water as nearly every gasoline pump has a 7-11 or another shop as
part of the complex. I don't usually use them as I prefer to carry my
own supplies and stop where there is a shady area to rest, but it is
nice to know that they are there in an emergency.
In other areas it isn't as handy as the service stations are further
apart and "country gas stations" may not have a 7-11.
I don't think I ever stopped at a gas station when I lived in New York
State -- not on the bike. (I avoided the sort of road that had gas
stations as much as possible, and I lived where the shortest route to
a destination was seldom along a main road.) There was a convenience
chain called Stewart's Shops that were good rest stops, and every one
had an outdoor faucet for re-filling one's bottles. I recall having
one of my bottles filled with hot cocoa in a Stewart's near the Albany
city limits one frigid day. When the Mohawk-Hudson Wheelmen wanted to
print a packet of their ride maps, Stewart's agreed to pay for the
printing and cartography in exchange for having the locations of their
stores marked on the maps. *That* was a really good deal!
Around here, I don't recall being in a gas station that didn't at
least sell hot coffee, if you don't count Country Mark. Once when I
stopped for a slice of pizza at the Marathon in Larwill, I saw the
attendant rolling out pizza dough. The Marathon in Leesburg has
anonymous fried things in an infra-red display case. I thought I was
pointing at potato wedges, but it turned out to be miniature tacos.
The gas station near Atwood didn't have anything as good as my
emergency bars, but I bought a bottle of juice. (Great ride,
disappointing destination; Atwood turned out to be one of those towns
that is no longer around.)
It's getting hard to distinguish among gas stations, convenience
stores, and groceries: gas stations have expanded their
candy-and-aspirin offerings into full-scale convenients, and groceries
increasingly have gas pumps.
--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/