We knew every mile ridden today was one closer to a day off the bikes. Chris's knee was holding up well, while the only real elevation gain/loss came in Chattahoochee, Florida. Just a few miles from the Florida/Georgia border, we smelled the fires for the first time when we stopped for lunch in town. The road shoulders played nice and stayed fat the entire day.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/15/national/main2803447.shtml
Note the average speed of over 15 mph. We know it sounds tame, but the record for the RAAM (Race Across America) is 15.40 mph set in 1986 by Pete Penseyres. Every year a new crop of riders try to break it. It still stands. He did it on virtually no sleep, and who knows what he ate back in 1986. Were Powerbars around then? Check him out - he's quite the dude:
http://www.ultracycling.com/about/hof_ppenseyres.html
We passed through so many little towns with great names:
Argyle
Ponce De Leon
Bonifay
Chipley
Cottondale
Marianna
Sneads
Gretna
The last 28-mile stretch between Gretna and Quincy went fast and furious. I think I may have dropped down onto my aero bars once or twice. We again turned south out of downtown Quincy toward Interstate 10 to find the Holiday Inn Express. We arrived mid afternoon. Chris went to check in and it turns out we made a reservation at the hotel next door, that use to be the Holiday Inn, but in the time between us making the reservation and arriving today, the Holiday Inn built a new property, sold the older one where we were suppose to be, next door. It did not make perfect sense to us either. The important issue is that they honored our rate, which for some crazy reason went up in the interim.
The older hotel, now new to us, still worked out great. It was a fine home for two nights and one full day of rest. It was isolated from restaurants however. The Domino's Pizza delivery menu got dog-eared and very familiar, with this the only day in my life when I've eaten Domino's Pizza twice within 8 hours. We did the usual catch up; laundry, supplies, bike fiddling, TV watching. We even took a decent walk down a side country road for a few miles.
The motel also offered a continental breakfast. We dropped in on our rest day around 8:30 am for food. A young family with five kids fueled up for the trip down to Disney World or some similar attraction in southern Florida. It reminded me of the times we went to Disneyland as kids. Some formula they have there, printing money.
over and out
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