Day 15 - Rest Day
Rest Day—Down time for sore muscles
A recap of the week’s favorite highlights:
Imagine attending a dinner at the American Legion in Sumter, SC. You're there with 10 graduates from the class of 1975 crowded around the one guy who has cell phone signal enough to stream the game. Navy gets the late touchdown and gambles for the two-point conversion. There will be no tie tonight. Navy wins. Everyone. Is. Losing. Their. Minds. That is the bond shared by our common Naval Academy experience. Four years by the Bay is a snapshot in span of time, but one that forged lifelong friendships and made us into the people we are. To the classmates, the families, the friends who have cheered us on our way, supported our ride, and donated to our causes—you are with us every inch of the way.
We set up operations in Cary, NC for our final rest day on the trek to Annapolis. It feels strange to spend more than one night in the same hotel since we are always on the bounce. We are somewhat slavish to routine and today that routine is off kilter without a ride to provide structure.
Sleeping in. Yes, it’s great to go to bed without an alarm set except that we are programmed for early mornings and up at the usual time regardless.
Breakfast. This drives the morning. Hotels offer breakfast—if they offer breakfast—between 0600 and 0900. It’s a different hotel every morning, but the same meal every day: powered scrambled eggs, biscuits, maybe two flavors of yogurt, and of course the infamous waffle iron. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good waffle, and on a normal overnight stay between points A and B, it does the trick. Imagine our surprise in Southern Pines when we discovered a pancake maker instead of a waffle iron. This was the height of semi-luxury.
Laundry. Hampton Inn, Best Western, Days Inn, and the mom & pop off-chain places have yet to join the 21st century as nearly all laundry machines require quarters. After three or four days of riding in the grit, wind, and lots of rain, clean clothes become a luxury, but this week was especially hard on clothing. We descend like locusts on the hotel front desk only to discover they have no quarters. They also have no change machines. Apparently, these laundry facilities see infrequent use. In Sumter, not only did the hotel lack quarters but the adjacent businesses didn’t not even have cash registers. Try sorting this out in the pouring rain. One work around was to use a credit card at a vending machine, allow it to charge two dollars for a purchase of $1.75 and receive a quarter in change. Doing the math for a $2.50 load of laundry equals a lot of Cheetos.
Showers. More than any other factor, this is the real winning lottery number. What is the shower like? Is there a water flow restrictor? Does it have pressure? Do we have hot water? This seems like a silly concern, but we ran out of hot water at one of our stays. Between repeated applications of Chamois Butter and sunscreen you feel like a basted Thanksgiving turkey by the time you get to your hotel room. No Navy showers for these Navy guys, shipboard water restrictions do not apply.
Aside from the basics of living, on rest days we are on our own for meals. What’s within walking distance? What’s further out requiring an Uber? Do I need to perform bike maintenance or cleaning (the answer to this is always YES). Is there some place nearby to get a massage? Our week of duking it out with the nor’easter revealed some clothing deficiencies which might require shopping for warmer gear. The morning temps since the storm passed hover in the low 50s. Even with the sun, that gets a little chilly for the start of the ride. This is “tweener weather” in that it’s between hot and cold. Nothing is just right.
Somewhere in the middle of this idle time, thoughts turn toward tomorrow’s ride. The routes are available on ridewithgps.com or Garmin Connect, depending on preference. Planning for the ride means getting intel—in this case, the weather forecast—because that drives clothing, packing, etc. In-ride storage space requires forethought; cargo capacity is limited to what fits in pockets and what makes sense to carry. We do not have a lot of room for “just in case” items. Weather checking means evaluating the forecast at the start and end of each ride and interpolating the points in between. Sometimes we get it right and sometimes we swear at the forecasters.
Each day is its own adventure and riding is awesome. The world is a different place seen from a bicycle. Sometimes that’s a great thing to enjoy and absorb, other times you want to pedal a little faster to get to the next sight a little sooner. Four-hundred and one miles separate us from the finish line at Lejeune Hall. At this stage it is not so much a matter of mile remaining, hills left to climb, or hotel stays, but a question of how many waffles are left. See you in Annapolis!