Q about lost comms on weird clearance

I normally fly out of Rochester NY, which is towered and class C. And 99%
of the time my clearance route is "Vectors as filed". But yesterday I had
to stop off at Batavia to pick up something, and then continue on to
Goderich Ontario. Since it's just easier to be on an IFR flight plan when
crossing the border, I filed from Batavia (Genesee County). When I called
on the RCO to pick up my clearance, instead of what I expected, I got
"Cleared to Geneseo VOR, via direct, climb to 4,000 expect 6,000 one zero
minutes after departure". There was something in there about getting my
filed route later, but I didn't catch the exact wording. The controller
helpfully explained later that they do it that way to head you back
towards their airspace so they can get you radar identified before sending
you towards Buffalo, since Batavia is almost right on the border between
Rochester and Buffalo's airspace. And sure enough, as soon as I got to
pattern altitude and called Rochester, he asked me to ident, and when I
did he gave me the clearance to Goderich "As filed", so it's not like I
went well out of my way.

I think if I ever do that again, and it's good VFR conditions, I'll file
from Buffalo VOR and pick up my clearance in the air on the way there.

But I'm curious about what would have happened if I'd lost contact on the
way to GEE and it had been real IFR. Geneseo VOR was my clearance limit,
so what would I do if I couldn't go back to Rochester VFR? Assume I would
have got my further clearance at GEE, so after I got there squawk 7600 and
head off to Goderich? Hope that my transponder was still working and head
back to Rochester to do the ILS?

--
Paul Tomblin http://xcski.com/blogs/pt/
"I love the smell of burning components in the morning.
Smells like victory." (The ******* Operator From Hell)