47 Miles to St. Augustine, FL .....

WOnce again, I carried my rain jacket in my handlebar bag, but didn't need it. It's amazing that we only had one day of rain on the entire trip AND I only had one flat tire. Gotta love those Gator Skins!

The plan today was to leave the hotel in time to ride 41 miles and meet at the St. John's County Fire Station at 10:30. We then had a police escort and rode the remaining 6 miles 2X2 with our slowest riders leading the way to Anastasia State Park where family and friends were waiting. We dipped our front wheels in the Atlantic (I actually ended up with both wheels in-- I hope that's not bad luck -- or that it means I have to do it again). 

My mother was there to cheer me in as were Bob and Lucy Tanner. Dr. Tanner was the reason I moved to Maine because I joined his busy orthodontic practice in 1975 and we practiced together for ~15 years before he retired. He and Lucy winter in Florida and are now on their way back to Maine. They had stopped in St. Augustine to visit Bob's dental school classmate and the timing worked out perfectly for them to be there when I rode in.

Tonight is our final banquet where we say our good-byes and tomorrow I fly home, just in time for the bicycling season in Maine. Hopefully, the warm weather will follow me there.

Am I glad I did it?-- Yes.

Would I do it again? --No. Not the same trip and not for this long. I would maybe do a 2 week trip, but not an almost 2 month trip. Riding coast-to-coast was a "bucket list" item, but nothing that I want to repeat.

Here we are waiting at the hotel for the okay to roll out.

At the Fire Station waiting to ride the last 6 miles with the police escort.

Riding 2X2 behind the police escort.

At Anastasia State Park.

From the left: Lucy Tanner, my mother, me and Bob Tanner.

The three of us (Ellen from Nebraska, me and Twaila from Colorado) were the only ones that rode every mile without taking the SAG wagon at all).

73 Miles to Palatka, FL ......

If you have been following the weather, you saw the flooding in Pensacola, where we were a week ago. I carried my rain jacket with me today--just in case, but again, we got in before the downpour. We have been so lucky with rain because, so far, we've only had one day of it.

I felt good on the whole ride today. It was pretty uneventful. I took a pic from the bridge in Palatka and some pics at a Dairy Queen stop just before the bridge. We actually rode a couple extra miles until we found the DQ. 

It was 90 degrees and extremely humid at noon.

Only one more day to ride to get to the Atlantic Ocean. Sometimes it seems as if the trip has gone fast and at other times it feels as if I've been at it forever. I'm ready to go home, but I'm sure I will miss parts of this routine. I just can't think of what that would be right now.

77 Miles to High Springs, FL ......

Looking at the weather report this morning, it looks as if we have some nasty weather to the west of us that is coming our way. Luckily, most of us finished our ride today before it started to rain. We'll keep our fingers crossed about the next 2 days.

We crossed the Suwanee River today (as in the song "Way Down Upon the Suwanee River ....."). See pics. We also visited the Ichetucknee Springs. The water was clear and it was tempting to go in for a swim. I didn't have a bathing suit and really didn't want to ride 25 more miles with soggy bike shorts, so I just got my legs wet. Even that felt good because it was hot and humid.

I'm posting a pic of Rona and me that was taken a couple of days ago.

54 Miles to Perry, FL ......

As I'm writing this blog, I've got an ice pack on my left knee. It was injured a number of years ago (originally falling off a horse and years later a snowboarding accident) and then I had arthroscopic surgery on it for a torn meniscus about 1.5 years ago. I know it's swollen, but hasn't been too problematic. Only 3 more days of riding and I am intending to ride every inch of the way, so I'll push through. There aren't that many of us who can say we did that, but I'm not sure of the exact number.

I feel as if I'm on the TV show "Survivor" because I've got bug bites, heat rash and have lost some weight that I didn't really need to lose.

Today's ride was short and pretty uneventful. The humidity today was high and the temperature was

in the low 80s. The bugs were an issue when we stopped, so we didn't stay long at the SAG rest stops. I rode with Sandy again because we do well together when the terrain is flat, as it was today.

I'll say a few words about my rest day, yesterday. Being Sunday, four of us decided to attend a church service at a church that was located right next to our hotel. I'm posting a pic of the sign in front of the church. It turned out to be an evangelical service with a lot of singing and the arms in the air and parishioners speaking out, "Praise The Lord", etc. I hung in there for about 45 minutes and then snuck out. I think it lasted a couple of hours....

The four women I had lunch with yesterday are the "foreigners". From the left: Sheila from Scotland, Joyce from England, Helen from British Columbia and Janine from Calgary, Alberta. Joyce is my roommate again tonight. Sheila and Janine paid extra so that they could always have a single room. There are pros and cons to that arrangement. The pros would be having your own space and not putting up with someone's snoring or whatever, but the con would be that you don't get to know some of the women very well, especially if you ride at a different pace.

48 Miles to Crawfordville, FL .....

We were all set to roll out this morning, but our guide had us wait an hour for the fog to lift (pic). Because there was no shoulder on the rode, she was afraid we wouldn't be visible enough to motorists.

Some of us added 11 miles to the ride by taking a side trip to Wakulla Springs State Park. We sat and had a "proper lunch" (as the British ladies say). I didn't go on the boat ride, but several did. I posted a pic of the women with whom I had lunch and of the swimming area there.

We stopped at Walmart on our way to Crawfordville because Woman Tours doesn't provide meals on our days off and there is absolutely nothing within walking distance to our hotel. I sort of have a rule not to get on my bike on my day off.

It was almost 90 degrees at 3:00, but another beautiful day.

54 Miles to Quincy, FL .......

Yay. We're now in Eastern Standard Time. 

My legs felt heavy today when we started our ride (was it because of the humidity, recovering from yesterday's ride or the hills we encountered? Or a combination of the 3?). We did 1309' feet of climbing and here I thought Forida would be flat. I really took my time on the ride because it was relatively short and there's not much going on in Quincy, so no need to rush.

I rode with Gail from Midland, TX. today. She's a retired OB/GYN and has a 24 year old daughter who lives in Los Angeles. Gail's 1st husband is deceased, but she is remarried to Wes, who visited her several times while we were riding through Texas.

I took some pics from a bridge outside Chattahoochee, a town we passed through. We stopped for lunch in Quincy and then were caught in a brief shower on the way to our hotel. It was a nice, relaxing day. 

94 Miles to Marianna, FL .......

Never mind a Margarita party for crossing a state line. I feel as if we should celebrate getting our last 90+ mile day over with. We still have a couple of days of 70+, but if we don't have strong winds or heavy rain, those are manageable.

When we started our ride this morning at 7:15, it was quite foggy, but that burnt off in a couple of hours. Then the temperature rose considerably. Right now, it's ~85 degrees. The heat didn't really bother me. Some women are bothered by the bugs, but they seem to stay away from me.

We rode on US 90 for most of the day. It had a nice, wide shoulder until we got into Marianna where it went from 2 to 4 lanes with no shoulder...... Kinda scary when cars pass so closely.

I took a couple of pics of a river we crossed so you can see how high it is. The street was flooded, so I was glad we were on US 90 which was higher.

At the 60 mile SAG stop, Nancy, our SAG support for today, squirted us with a squirt gun. It felt pretty good.