Day 18: Berea, Kentucky

As Johnny would say, I can't WAIT to eat some Kentucky Fried Mario's Pizza. We made it to Kentucky on Monday morning, and it's been treating us real well... here's the skinny.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you want to send stuff, here are some options:

Power Bars

Clif Bars

Trail Mix

Beef Jerky

Cash (small bills)

Cookies

US Gov't Bonds

Homebaked goods (not spinach dip, too soggy)

Bubble gum

Candy bars (for energy?)

Love notes

Day 14 was another long day - the wheels from Fuji arrived and Ian and his staff took a look at them and trued them up (that's shop talk for adjusting all the spokes). We had a giant birthday celebration at Virginia Heights and they sang to yours truly (Ryan) and brought out a killer birthday cake Johnny and Jody from Treehuggers made. It was THE GREATEST. We headed back to Treehugger's, packed up for hours and finally hit the road at 4:30pm just as the rain just started to fall. It was a short but grueling ride out to Cripple Creek Campground, where there was NOTHING awaiting us but a weekend fishing lodge. Ouch. We headed a long ways back to Rural Retreat and met up with Sara, Jonathan's girlfriend. Rural Retreat seemed like a nice place, but really dark. It was late.

Thanks again to all the friends we made in Wytheville - we especially had a good time on Friday, when Jonathan and I made some friends with the summer daycamp kids and played volleyball for a while. One of the guys who ran the program was Gary - we recognized him from a stoplight earlier in the day. While walking around town, he pulled up next to us and the following conversation ensued -

"Riding cross country?"



"Heading west?"



"Bike trouble?"



"Ian working on 'em?"



"You'll be here three days."



The light turned green and he took off waving, amidst the sound of laughter.

At the day camp he proceeded to name precisely how long our trip had taken, that our problem had to do with our wheels and where we started from. Wytheville is a small town.

Johnny made some of the same friends later on at the pool. He and Eric (the guy from Treehuggers I mentioned earlier) headed out there and met some of the same little kids we played volleyball with (again, smnall town). He taught them some fun games and great dives and was offered the position of pool manager which he firmly but gracefully turned down.

Day 15 Sara drove the support vehicle and we rode unloaded. Even without our trailers, it was a rough ride from Rural Retreat to Elk Garden Hostel, run by the United Methodist Church there. Pastor Paul was the coolest, we had the whole run of the church. Sara cooked up Jess Allen's pasta salad recipe (it's ok if you don't know who Jess Allen is, just know she makes a great pasta salad). We slept in the sanctuary, careful to wake up before the parishioners on Sunday morning.

Day 16 we rode out to the Breaks, a state park on the Virginia/Kentucky border. We met a dude named Ralph who has been traveling the country coast to coast for the last couple years. And we thought we were cool. Ralph, Johnny and I attended the country music show, at which we were the only three people not related to someone else in the audience. The rest of the gang hiked around the Breaks. Sara left the next day, and we missed her terribly for a lot of reasons. Sara - you rock!

Day 17 We rode from the Breaks to Buckhorn Lake and then jumped in it. It was simply fantastic. Then we went and grabbed burgers at the local Dairy Bar (a Kentucky thing?) and played with all the little kids - again all related. They let us ride their quad, and Daveyray popped a sweet side wheelie by accident. He also changed his shorts when we got back to the campground. Johnny told the kids to call Daveyray "Doctor" and Jonathan "Shoobeedoo". I need a nickname. We went to sleep during a fearsome lightning storm, which was made even more scary when sleeping in a plastic bag with holes in it. (aka TENT). I got a new speed record - 52mph. We noticed there is a warning on the trailers not to take them above 25mph, but the sticker was upside-down.

Day 18 was today, a double day. We put the ride to Irvine together with the ride to Berea and pumped out a heady 77 miles. The ride was GORGEOUS, and we were spurred on by the promise of Mario's allyoucaneat Pizza Buffet. Jonathan had our first spill of the trip - bloody elbow and knee (awesome gory pictures forthcoming) but the bike and the rest of him were fine. We were all very proud to hang out with such a tough dude - people looked with a lot of respect and just a little curiosity at the bloody guy in spandex. Along the way we met a couple, Matt and Laurie, who are running/biking across the country. We thought we were intense - Matt is running 30+ miles every day while his wife bikes alongside. He pushes a baby carriage full of water and pretzels with socks drying on top (a very familiar sight to a TransAmer). We were VERY excited to cheer them on, and talked to them for a bit. We were slightly embarassed about how long it took to catch them once we saw them, and how we pulled into the gas station while still in sight to drink many bottles of Gatorade. I think they understood.