Day 6, 73 miles, Mon Aug 30,2010

(My odometer: 73.9 miles, 14.6 mph, 5h 1m 30s, max speed 25.2 mph)
Warsaw, NC to Whiteville, NC

Up at 5:20, 6:00 continental breakfast at hotel, 7:00 load luggage, 7:10 on the road. Today’s forecast was mostly sunny skies with temps in the low 90's.

Actually, the alarm clock didn't go off at 5:00 as Steve always sets it for. I woke up at 5:20 and we scurried to do what we needed to do and we did stuff in plenty of time to stay on schedule for departure. It was almost cold this morning but as usual the sun came out and the temp rose into the 80's by late morning. Cycling was very pleasant as we rolled along at 15 - 16mph. When we stopped for any reason, it "seemed" like the temp went up to 100F. The roads were mostly long, straight with very little traffic. The houses and trailers we passed seemed abandoned (many were) as we rarely saw anybody.

I really like and enjoy my fellow cyclists. I'd like to single out Mary Kay, who is funny and a bundle of energy. She has a personality that makes a long day of cycling a real fun experience. Those of you that know me know how much I enjoy gardening. So when I came upon the workers that were harvesting "something" that turned out to be sweet potatoes, I was excited. This was the high point of the day for me. It was really cool. They were moving very fast filling up their buckets and almost running back to put them in the truck. I grow potatoes but it’s been a long time since I grew sweets. After SAG 2 , Mike, Leslie, Mary Kay and I cruised along to finish the last 10 miles of the day. We connected with Ken and stopped for a ice cream before checking into our hotel.

I checked in at the Best Western and then went to Mike's drive train clinic (chain and gears), an opportunity to learn various efficient ways to clean and lube the drive trains of our bikes. It was helpful for me and I plan to use some of the things I learned. I then came back to my room, cleaned up and worked on today's journal.

Tomorrow is forecast to be a beautiful day in the 90's and a short 55 mile ride to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

(Click on the images below for a larger view of each photo.)

Continental breakfast at hotel	Loading luggage	Turkey time
Harvesting sweet potatoes	Harvesting sweet potatoes	Harvesting sweet potatoes
Beautiful spuds	Small Fire Ant hotel	SAG 1 JB, Leslie, Mary Kay, Carl, Shane
Thought for the day	Nice sign	Happy guy on a blue bull
Mike doing a drive train seminar