Georgia---"Two little mice fell in a bucket of cream. The first mouse quickly gave up and drowned. The second mouse wouldn't quit. He struggled so hard that eventually he churned that cream into butter and crawled out. Gentlemen, as of this moment, I am that second mouse."

Today would have been Bill's and my 39th wedding anniversary. He died a year and a half ago of cancer. I doubt I could have talked him into coming on this trip, but he would have been my biggest cheerleader. He would have looked for each day's blog post and answered each day's phone call from me with "Hey, good lookin'...how's it goin'?". I miss him so. And even though there was a lot of activity today...the day was full of good...the thought that was foremost in my mind was, "Today would have been our 39th anniversary."

We left Laura Walker State Park a little late. We were chatting with Dawn, one of the volunteers at the park, about cycling. She has a friend in Denver who mountain bikes and has done a cross country trip. We were also waiting for the campground host to show up so we could pay him for our campsite. All of that done, Karen and I headed east on Highway 82 towards Hoboken. Our route today took us northeast and MapMyRide has the elevation gain at 889'. There was a little wind out of the SE which helped us along every time the road turned north. Georgia was pretty to ride through...gentleman farms on large lots with flourishing gardens.



We were making good time. The road surfaces were good, for the most part, and my knees and feet had recovered from yesterday's doldrums. At 25 miles into our ride, I got a text from Laura...she had landed at the airport in Savannah. Today marked another "changing of the guard". Liz was heading to Massachusetts, and an art workshop at her alma mater Holyoke. Bye, Liz...we'll miss your sweet face. Laura was flying in and would be with me and Karen for the duration of the trip.





The route ended in Fort Stewart...now, I had never ridden on a military base before, so I hadn't given much thought to security issues. We had to go through a checkpoint, and though they wanted ID, mine was in the truck. The guard let me pass anyway. Hmmm...makes me a little nervous. I like military base riding. All of the roads were clear of debris, the surfaces were smooth, and two trucks honked encouragement while a third gave me a fist pump from a very tattooed arm.


Stats for the day were 100.1 miles, an average of 14.6, and elevation gain of 290'.

Our Warm Showers host had other obligations, so we moved to "plan B". Karen called a campground that was fairly close to the WS host and got us a campsite. I won't have to reroute tomorrow's ride, and we should get to Givhan's Ferry State Park by 7 p.m. Not bad...not bad at all.


maybe you can't...because you won't...