Day 38 - June 19, 2006
Marysville, OH to Wooster, OH
98.0 miles-official miles
6:13 bike time, 16.3 average
5,300 feet of climbing
2 Days to Erie!!!!!!!!
Today was a great day of biking. It rained last night, so the streets were wet when we started. That meant carrying a rain jacket and other gear to ensure that it wouldn’t rain. That always works. This was the second day in a row we have had favorable winds. They were from the WSW and we are heading northeast, so the winds were our friend. Today we followed up yesterday’s century with another century and capped it off with the last 25 miles having some steep Pittsburgh-type climbs. I really enjoyed the climbing, as my legs were strong today. Also, for the second day in a row, I haven’t had the severe back pain that I experienced in the early morning. Tomorrow is another long 90+ mile day, but the countdown to Erie and the family is now down to 2 days.
We biked through a lot of neat little towns. About 12 miles outside of Wooster in a town called Funk I stopped in a small store to get some water and a caffeine infusion. They had a pot bellied stove and an old wooden sliding ladder used to restock the shelves. I don’t know that I am old enough to remember any of that. I was going to borrow the sign coming into town. I would have then presented the sign to our friends Tom and Carolyn Funk. But, I didn’t have the right tools to remove the sign (temporarily) and I had no place to store the sign. If I put it on the front of the bike, I guess people would just have thought I had a bad day on the hills.
Also the Knox County paper interviewed us for a story. In a town of its size size, hopefully we are the lead story. The editor of the paper interviewed us. She was also the photographer and proofreader. She was very nice and was interested in us. My only regret is that too often when we have a long day, we don’t have a lot of time to stop and explore these little towns. Back to back centuries tend to take the wind out of the sails of exploration. It’s hard to stop and relax at the 55 mile point when you have 45 more to go. As you get closer, you get more anxious to get to the hotel. A conundrum I’d say.
I left my water bottles at the 2nd SAG stop which was about 25 miles from the end. It was very hot and I knew we had some monster hills to climb. I first realized that they were missing on the second steep hill after the rest stop. Nothing brings on a thirst like not having water. I was biking the last 25 miles solo, so I had to scavenge up some water. I caught up with Bob Grasa and he was kind enough to give me one of his water bottles. Dave K and Jim Morris also offered me a water bottle. It was very hot by this time and I needed to get in so I could recuperate. My contingency plan was to see if I could annunciate some amicable Amish for some appetizing agua.
I took some photos today of some nice farm scenery. I’m sorry that yesterday was so long and hard, that I didn’t post any pictures of significance. Today the pictures are also of no significance, but at least I stopped and took some.
Tomorrow brings more climbing, but not the 5,000 plus feet that we did today. In all we climbed about 5,300 feet today. Legs don’t fail me now! I need you for another few days till the rest day.
Signing off……..
