Day 84, Troutville to Raphine, VA

Miles – 59

Miles From Start/To Finish – 3,963/201

Ave Riding Speed – 3-29 mph

Hours Start to Finish – 7

Weather – Cloudy and 81

5:30am, rise and shine. I made a coffee run for Kim and I and we got to our morning routine. I ran down for a quick hot breakfast at the hotel breakfast nook and Kim had a bowl of cereal with the fixn’s from the morning before. We made it out the front door at 7:30am. The temperature was about 70 degrees, humid and the smokey damp haze was playing peekaboo with the mountains around us.

We packed our rain jacket on the outside of our saddlebags as the rain with thunderstorm weather forecast percentages were up there for the entire day. As we pedaled away from the hotel, we could feel a few raindrops against our faces. Throughout the ride today we intermittently felt a few droplets catching up with us, but the pavement was dry the whole day.

Today we continued northeast touring federal Hwy 11/Lee Hwy, and a few side roads, which has been running parallel to Interstate 81. Most of our route today was along the TransAmerica Trail. We tried to stick to the main roads, with more traffic and intermittent and narrow shoulders, while the TransAm went up and out of the hills around us for a more scenic, steeper climbing and less traffic, roads.

We ran into our first bicyclists since Sonora, KY, 10 days ago. We were on the side of the highway, trying to blend into the roadside scenery, if you know what I mean, and two ladies rode up behind us. We met Terri and Susan. They lived in the area and were out for a long ride. It sounded like Terri has done quite a bit of the adventure riding and Susan was a chiropractor. Kim handed them our card and talked through lobular breast cancer and our fundraiser for the LBCA. We chatted for 5-10 minutes and the ladies moved out in front of us. Nice ladies and easy to talk with.

Kim’s bike is sounding a little clunky in the from sprocket or derailer so I’m going to take it outside yet this evening and see if I can pinpoint the issue and search for a bike shop in Charlottesville tomorrow.

We hit our destination of the Comfort Inn, in Raphine, at 2:30pm. There was a restaurant within a half-mile walk, but we really weren’t in the mood for the hike. We settled on an early dinner at the only closer option, Wendy’s, about a block down the street. The only fast food we’ve had in the last 3 months was Burger King yesterday. It was a nice change of pace. I’ve been tempted on multiple occasions to do McDonald’s, but stayed strong.

After dinner we’ve been catching up on e-mails and phone calls.  Tomorrow is a new day and we’re working hard to stay in the zone and routine. This is how routine I’ve gotten and it reminds me of my athletic days long ago; I put the same sock on the same foot in the same order, just to make sure we continue having good days. I’m sure it doesn’t really matter…but you never know!