Day 6 Brookville, PA to Poland, OH

27 July Wednesday Week 1

Tooling through Western PA

Today’s cycling weather was perfect.  Mid 80’s with no humidity and clear skies.  Our goal was to reach Ohio and leave hilly Pennsylvania behind.  A beautiful state but nothing but one hill after another. If you like hills you will love PA! With bikes running a 70+ pound load we lost our love of the hills on the third day.

We all woke with tender contact points.  The palms being the worst for Ken and Tim. Our experience has told us day 4 and 5 are the worst. You need to get your body in the rhythm of turning out 100 miles a day.  By day 10 normally you are in that rhythm.  That makes days one through 9 just a bit tough..

Around 11AM while slowly climbing a hill (as opposed to climbing it FAST..) Ken’s cycling shoe pushed his fender into the front wheel. (wobbling..?)  The fender folded, hitting the barely rotating front tire causing it to stop rotate entirely!  Guess what happened next?

The front wheel stopped and over goes the bicycle.  crash.  It was a slow speed event but any fall stinks.

Tim and Joe came to his aid and quickly and assessed his bike was ok without any damage.  After they were both sure the bike was intact they asked Ken if he was all right. He said he was OK. Does it seem a little odd they were more concerned with the bike then Ken. Well it is not odd. Any rider will tell you, “you can ride a bike with some road rash but not with a broken wheel”. 

To ad insult to injury a little while later climbing another hill a bee stung Ken in the leg.

The crew was still feeling the disappointment of not having a good dinner on Tuesday night.  We do not mind giving up the energy to push those overstuffed bikes up and down the mountains but at least feed us when the day is over. Feeding time is a significant part of the reward for putting in the miles and to get cheated of it hurt. The missed meal was made up for tonight though.  We had a delicious pasta dinner at a local restaurant followed by some homemade ice cream. Yummy.  Food is important!

The climbing should start to slow down as we work our way through Ohio on our way to Michigan.

There was another odd sighting by one of the riders.  It was not big foot this time.

104 Miles

7808 Feet of Climbing

Temperature 75-85 degrees