Pannier People

Day 62 - Hodgenville to Bardstown

42 miles

Today we didn't wake up until after 8.30, since we changed time zone yesterday we put this down to jet lag as it would have been not too bad if we were only about 30 miles to the west. Our bodies just woke up to the sunlight I guess.

Last night was much cooler. I even had to get the sleeping bag out last night. Let me just say that my Thermarest really smells now quite strongly of vinegar and mildew damp.

First thing this morning we went to the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln, he was born two hundred years ago this year. In 1911 they put the hut they thought he was born in into a big memorial building. Except once they built the building they realised that the hut was quite large and wouldn't fit very well. So they shaved 4 feet off the walls of the hut so it would fit neatly. Somewhere in the small print in the visitor centre they also admitted that it might not be the actual hut he was born in either.

We stopped for lunch in Howardstown, which was a petrol station and two liquor stores, it being on the edge of a dry county. From here we figured out a shortcut from the route while sat at their table eating Bologna sandwiches (pronounced baloney) and went down a road to see the trappists.

This was the Gethsemani Monastery for the Trappist monks of Kentucky. They have a very impressive building and have been going since December 21^st 1848. We looked in their gift shop and they had various religious memorabilia, books and produce. They make a very pretty penny selling cheese, fudge and fruitcake by mail order.

We spoke to couple of brothers, one of whom had been there since 1946, he didn't look that old so it must be a stress free living! He was originally from Philadelphia and told us how he used to like cycling and once got his wheel caught in the trolleycar rail and sped down the hill in the train tracks with a trolley car following him trying desparately not to run him over.

It looked like a very peaceful place, and the simple life looked very appealing. If anyone is interested in putting in some money to start a cheese making, cake baking commune with Sarah and I please let us know.

We arrived in Bardstown just after 5pm and tried to find somewhere to buy some foodfor dinner. Fresh produce was off the menu again as we couldn't find a supermarket of any size in the town, although we did see an Arbys, a Domino's, Sonic Burger, McDonalds, a country kitchen and a couple of other places.

In the end we opted for a tinned melange (pork and beans, sweetcorn, peas) with boil in the bag rice. This was an unfortunate choice, the peas were a pretty much brown and the whole lot was unparalleled in blandness, matched only by the green bean and kidney bean tortillas evening from a few weeks back.

We are typing this sat in McDonalds after having a consolation ice cream and listening to country and western music. Have you ever had a McFlurry? They are our new favourite thing. The song on at the moment is about how this guy loves his truck, would take a bullet for his kids, his country or Jesus and would give his last breath to his wife. I kid you not.

We are at the centre of the Bourbon distillation industry. We had wanted to visit a distillery but they were all closed by the time we arrived, and they don't open until after 1pm tomorrow, presumably to give everyone the chance to go to church before they go on the local booze tours.

Tomorrow morning at 10am there is a cowboy Sunday church service in the outdoors at the campsite. Did we mention we were in the bible belt?

Matt

Day 61 - Rough River Dam State Park to Hodgenville

64 miles

We woke up to the sound of rain tapping on the tent. Not to worry, this is a sure sign that it's permissible to not get up just yet. So we didn't. But we couldn't stay inside for long and once we decided to show our faces to the world, the rain stopped.

We crossed into the next timezone this morning, going forward another hour. The scenery was much the same as the last few days, rolling green hills, fields, houses, crossing railroad tracks, and winding roads.
We stopped at a village for lunch where we bought hot pepper cheese and ate it in the store with our bread, and chatted to a few locals. Most gas stations and shops in the countryside have a couple of tables and some chairs and there's always someone sat there to chat to. It's the equivalent to our pubs, I guess, where people congregate to swap local news and socialise. Kentucky being mostly dry though – there aren't any bars.

We arrived in Hodgenville, our destination for the day, at about 5 pm and stopped by at the local library for directions to the city park where we could camp. We pitched our tent next to the baseball field and got chatting a local man with a metal detector who showed us a handful of quarters he'd found that evening.

Matt called the local sheriff to let him know we were camping in the park. The sheriff told us there was a janitor around who locks up the park every evening and if we saw him to let him know we were there. We looked for him but couldn't see him and after dinner we were keen to go out of the park to get ice cream. We were worried that we'd get left out, but ice cream was worth the risk, so were just very quick. Luckily when we got back the gates were still open!

Hodgenville is famous for being the nearest town to where Abraham Lincoln was born – 200 years ago, in fact, in February 1809. There are a wide assortment of landmarks for Abe fans to visit. Lincoln only spent his early childhood here before his family moved to Indiana and then ultimately to Illinois, but the Kentuckians loudly proclaim their state's place in the making of the great man. Tomorrow we will go and see the hut in which he was born.

Sarah

Day 60 - Sebree to Rough River Dam State Park

72 miles

Today we made a startling realisation. We have been in Kentucky for three days and we have not yet been in a KFC. We had big plans of crossing the border and straightaway ordering a family bucket to get our chops all greasy. The closest we have come so far is looking in a Kentucky tourism brochure and seeing a picture of Colonel Saunders shaking hands with a country and western star from the 1950s. They both hail from this fair commonwealth of Kentucky. We are so far in the back woods we can't even find the state dish.

The bedroom was as dark as a cave when the alarm went off at 6am. It was the type of inky blackness you only get in a windowless room with the door closed. We slept the sleep of the brave on mattresses that had cushioned the buttocks of over 230 cyclists this year. Neither of us rose from our slumber at that ungodly hour any further than was necessary to turn the alarm clock off and re-set it for 7am. I always have a sense of insane bravado whenever it comes to deciding what time to get up in the morning, since I am awake at that moment of course it will be easy to spring out of bed with the lark and skip happily towards our breakfast. Sadly it is never the case.

Sebree (population 1500) does not have a grocery store. Or at least not one that we could find, so we had to stop at the 'Dairy Bar' for some food. Nearly every town of a certain size has one of these things, it is basically a yellow food outlet. You know the kind of place, you can get all the different types of food that are yellow: french fries (we have seen them labelled as freedom fries several times), fried chicken, hamburgers, hash browns, other deep fried delicacies (e,g, Jalapeno Poppers).

I had a sausage patty, egg and cheese sandwich, the bread had been lightly fried. Sarah repasted on a serving of biscuits and gravy. Remember dear reader this is in essence a scone cut in half covered in a white sauce with bacon or sausage bits in it. I think we have started to go native. We have both begun pronouncing water “wodder” as it is just about the only way to get understood. Just wait, we will be tallking like Tony Blackburn by the time we get back.

Incidentally, Brother Bob said last night that we are in the bible belt, and I guess he is an authority on these matters. For the 1500 souls in Sebree, there are 10 churches competing to save them, one of them should open a small grocery shop, they will have them queueing out of the door to get in.

I have said it before but I will say it again, this may be the land of the free, but it is not the land of the green vegetable. At lunchtime in a town called Whiteville, you could procure a medium pizza with any topping and free breadsticks for $5.99 but there were no veges in sight, just another Dairy Hut as the other option. We had a milkshake and then resolved to find something that had either grown in the ground or had hung on a tree. In the end we found a local supermarket and got a tomato, some bread and a meat product that approximated to turkey ham.

We have started to see a new crop plant at the farms, we are assuming it is tobacco as they grow a huge amount of it in Kentucky and Virginia. If anyone can confirm that would be great.

Tonight we are camping right by the dam at Rough River State Park in a camping area ominously called the 'tailwaters'. If the water were to over-top the dam we are in the zone that would be scoured clean of trees, buildings and any sign of human civilisation. Don't worry Mum, if you are reading this we made it out alive. Unless they found our possessions and have returned this laptop to you. In that case, I am leaving everything to the cat and the money is in the bottom of the filing cabinet.

Matt

Day 59 - Marion to Sebree

46 miles

6 am alarm call. Nooooooooooo, aaaaaaggggh! More cycling, not again, let me stay here in this comfy bed, with the remote in my hand and air conditioning purring all around me.

Matt is pleased his thunderstorm prediction came true and I am pleased he demanded we stay in a B&B to save ourselves from a total drenching, but now it is more difficult to get up. I think that if we didn't set an alarm or had to get up we could probably both sleep for 48 hours.

Anyway, must not even entertain those thoughts as there are miles to cycle today and they're not going to pedal themselves. Or they could, but that's called a motorbike and we didn't take that option.

We ate our breakfast of pancakes with some other guests who seemed to having a few family troubles. I think Kim, the mother in the group wished she could come cycling with us instead of drive cross country with her son and daughter in law. When we left she came over grabbed our hands and said a prayer for our safe trip, which was unexpected but very kind of her. Meeting them made me feel thankful for the simplicity of our trip and all the good fortune we have experienced. We cycle, we eat, we sleep and we laugh throughout. (Although sometimes we don't laugh. Sometimes we sigh, grunt, swear or stay silent). We don't have many possessions with us, we don't buy much and we're not using too many of the earth's resources day to day. We travel fast enough to cover relatively good distances each day, but slow enough to properly notice our surroundings, the beauty of the countryside and the subtly changing scenery and light. The changing light throughout the day is really special. My favourite time is about 6.30 pm when the sun is low in the sky but not quite down, and a warm orange glow pervades, making everything look so wonderful. This type of light is so rare in London, I marvel at it everyday.

Despite the overnight storm and getting on the road relatively early, it heated up pretty quickly. But cycling is the best way to create your own breeze (also now known as 'CYOB') so we wound our way along western Kentucky's rural roads, passing more green fields, mostly growing corn or soybean, and plenty of white wooden houses set in huge gardens. As we get further east, we've noticed that it's getting more populated, but even so, this is still very rural and there aren't many cars on the road.

We stopped in the small town of Clay for cold drinks and met a couple of westbounders, Matt and Dan from Philadelphia. We were surprised as we hadn't seen any westbounders for ages and assumed that everyone who was heading across had left months ago. We recommended the slushies we had from the drugstore and they recommended staying the night at the First Baptist Church in Sebree. Too late boys, practically everyone we have met since about Idaho has been telling us about the hospitality of Pastor Bob and his wife Violet, in Sebree. Their kindness is legendary on this trail and the saying goes that if you have to stop anywhere, you must stop here.

We arrived in Sebree about 2 pm and saw the church straight away. We were hungry/thirsty though so headed on a bit to the drugstore (which was 100 years old and still kitted out inside with original fittings) and had chocolate malts whilst it rained (like an English drizzle) for half an hour.

We then cycled back up to the church and were met by Pastor Bob who was sitting at a desk outside the front of the church doing his paperwork. He took us around to the area where bikers can stay and invited us to have dinner with the congregation in the evening. Usually he and Violet cook for cyclists in their home, but there are church activities on Wednesdays so he said we could join their weekly bbq with about 40 others too instead. About 180 cyclists have stayed here this year alone and there is a map on the wall with pins showing where everyone is from. There were a few in London but we squeezed ours in too!

 

After burgers, hot dogs and the best chocolate brownies ever (in fact so good, one of my teeth is throbbing) and recalling our route, stories, where we're from, what we do, where we've liked the most, how many miles we do a day etc etcs we have settled in the youth club zone to read Adventure Cycling magazines and inspire ourselves with other trips.

 

 

It's great to meet people like this who are so hospitable, and also to stay where so may of our fellow Transammers have stayed before. In America, cycling really isn't so mainstream as it is in Europe. In fact in some places, it's considered quite alternative, so whilst Pastor Bob gave us some pamphlets to read about the bible, we feel we are part of a movement spreading our own message – 'cycle people, it's brilliant!'

Sarah

Day 58 - Elizabethtown to Marion

22 miles

This was actually a rest day, we are not being really that slack. The B&B was so good we slept like babies all night, and by that I don't mean we cried ourselves to sleep and woke up with poop in our pants.

The B&B really was the lap of luxury and breakfast was as we expected delicious, in fact it was difficult to get ourselves out of the room in good time. Sue the innkeeper was incredibly hospitable and a great cook. For breakfast she made us French toast filled with strawberries and cream cheese, plus thick cut bacon on the side. Are you salivating? You should be, it was so good.

We finally peeled ourselves away from the aircon, the shower, the TV and the internet at about 10.30, which was not ideal because as usual the terrible humidity was really cooking up by then.

After about 10 miles we arrived at Cave In Rock, the home of Cave In Rock State Park. Predictably enough there is a big cave in a rock wall down on the banks of the Ohio River.

We got a couple of interesting photos as there was a big crack in the ceiling that let the light in. Originally the cave was used by the native American hunter gatherers, and there were 10,000 year old remains found there when it was first discovers. It was wonderful and cool in the cave, but we couldn't stay there all day, so we had to be off.

 

We caught a ferry over the Ohio River and into our ninth state, Kentucky. We immediately saw signs indicating this was Amish territory. We were hoping that the Amish were going to be a bit better than the cigar chomping, mobile toting Mennonites we came across in Missouri, but other than the signs and one man in braces in a hat, we saw no Am-sign.

 

Arriving at our 22 mile destination at 3pm was slightly later than expected. There was a storm forecast so we checked into another B&B. We're sitting pretty in the room now watching the DIY network and 'When Animals Strike' while a big electrical storm rages outside, so I make that $50 well spent!

We had dinner in an 90 year old diner that used to be the local drugstore, which was pretty cool. One of the porcelain doorknobs on the medicine drawers said 'opium', and the waitress said they used to sell cocaine too. Surprising because she didn't seem the type.

Matt

Day 57 - Ferne Clyffe to Elizabethtown

50 miles

Last night is officially in my top five surrealist experiences thank you to our racoon visitors throughout the WHOLE night. My overriding memory of the episode will be Matt leaping out of the tent with his sleeping bag liner around him like a loincloth, shining a torch in the bushes and shouting at the top of his voice 'I can see his little racooney face staring at me!' and then about two hours later – 'That's it. I'm pepper spraying a racoon!'. The whole experience was made that bit more farcical because of the unbelievably unbearable humidity adding to our discomfort. We both burst into fits of laughter randomly throughout the night because it was so funny. (By the way, so you get an idea of my surreal experiennce league table, this is up there with the time Matt rapped 'Ice Ice Baby' to an audience of fifty Vietnamese, up a mountain, on our honeymoon, while I beatboxed the tune for him. Actually that was still more surreal).

So as a result of having very little sleep we moved slowly this morning and didn't leave the park til 10 am. The weather was nicely warmed up by then and not that much of a breeze to go with it. But the roads were quiet and nicely rolling with only a few steepies thrown in. We stopped at a gas station in Eddyville to get a cold soda and a snack and sat with some locals who were discussing a friend who'd had a bad accident where a pipe had gone through his neck but he'd survived.

We only did 50 miles today, it was an enjoyable mileage though, the scenery was all rural still, some farms or neat white houses dotted around, all very green. We had a couple of chasey dogs, but they were harmless. In one garden we saw deer taking shade under a tree, but as soon as they saw us they ran off into the woods. Deer are the one animal that we would like to see more of, but they flee as soon as they see us. Definitely not the chasing variety.

We arrived in Elizabethtown about 4pm. We knew from our map that there was no camping option here but that there was a B&B. Oh what a shame! We find it immediately as Elizabethtown or 'E-town' as the locals call it is very small. And we are so happy to be staying in such a lovely place.

The River Rose Inn is all home comforts and wonderful personal service. Sue and Bruce, the owners have a hot tub in the garden which overlooks the Ohio River, so that was our first port of call. This is so luxurious compared to our tent! We ate at a basic floating restaurant on the river and had locally caught catfish which was delicious.

We've just finished the evening chatting on the veranda to another couple from St Louis, Missouri who have come down here for a few days break from the city. He was stationed in Cambridgeshire in US airbase in the 1970s, as well as in Germany for some time too. We've met quite a few US military veterans who spent time in Europe whilst they served and all love to tell us how much they liked it and want to go back.

Tomorrow we cross the river and head into our penultimate state – Kentucky!

Sarah

Day 56 - Chester to Ferne Clyffe state park

66 miles

So we were camping this morning outside the Eagles clubhouse in Chester. Despite their crazy promises that it would be going on all night the music didn't go on for too long. After we snuck off to bed, we spent a couple of hours listening to two different types of music which was slightly annoying, but we drifted off to sleep soon enough.

More heat, more humidity, we both got very sweaty, yada yada. We tried and failed to supersize our drinks, 44oz of diet Pepsi was a little bit too much.

Two interesting things happened today. We saw an old Indian mound the kind of many in Southern Illinois. There are thousands of them over this hilly countryside, built by the hunter gatherers who lived here over the past few thousand years. No-one knows what they were for.

The other point of note for today actually happened in the dead of night after we had gone to bed at the Ferne Clyffe State Park. The raccoon visitation...

The night was stifling and we had just started to drift off trying to ignore that all our bedding was damp with sweat. Suddenly Sarah said 'what was that?' and I became aware of what sounded like a drunken farmhand stumbling over the guy ropes outside the tent. Moments later we could hear one of our plastic food bags making its way over the grass. Raccoons. We hadn't come across any live ones yet, but a couple we met a few days ago warned us they were around more in the Eastern states.

So we raised hell and I was sent outside dressed in my cotton sleeping bag as a loincloth to pick it up. In the darkness I saw a pair of glowing orange eyes across the field, just sitting there, watching. Our blueberries and bananas were well handled by raccoony hands, but safe. I came back to the tent and we moved our bags inside the fly sheet.

But this was not the end.

Next after we had drifted off again we heard the distinctive sound of velcro opening. The raccoons were going into our handlebar bags. Up we jumped once again. And by this time the little mammals were gone before we looked. However, we kept a lookout as they were stumbling around outside. It is funny, you would think that the raccoon would move stealthily through the woods, but no.

Moments later a little raccoon arm stretched out under the tent outer, and reached over the panniers, trying to pull them out of the tent. They are so used to human bags that they know how to undo fasteners, straps and buckles. I tried shining the torch at him/her and shouting, but it had absolutely no fear and just kept going. By now his little raccoony head was in too. All this was happening around 3 feet from our heads..

He was quite an attractive little fella, but he did look like a potentially mean looking badger size creature, and the story of the man attacked in his own garage by a badger a few years ago weighed heavily in my mind. What I am building up to is that I basically hosed the raccoon down with our pepper/CS gas mix spray. I don't think I got a direct hit, but he definitely thought again about coming back. The CS made it a bit difficult to breathe in the tent for a couple of minutes, but it was worth it to score one point for mankind against the fearless beasts.

After a few minutes he did come back. So we did it again and he ran off. That was it. They were hanging around all night, but we slept like sweaty babies after that.

Day 55 - Farmington to Chester

47 miles

We said goodbye to Captain Tom and the other firemen at 7am this morning having had an excellent night's sleep in the mobile command unit. They'd had five callouts during the night but we hadn't heard the sirens at all!

They recommended getting breakfast at the local Town and Country grocery store which has a cafe, and as expected it was a proper fireman's breakfast including the most wonderful crispy bacon you could hope for, plus that regular American staple biscuits (scones) and gravy.

We also took Captain Tom's advice on the route to Chester. Our maps advise going past the wineries, but he recommended we go via another road which had a good shoulder on which to cycle. We'd heard the wineries in this region are really good. It would have been good to sample the local produce, but it would have been about 8 am when we went through!

It was unexpectedly a little hilly today, nothing major but I thought it was going to be flatter. Going up one roller we came across another Tom, this time a cyclist. He didn't have panniers so we knew he wasn't a Transammer, and we stopped and said hello and then caught up with him at the gas station further on down the road. He was cycling with a friend Diane and his wife Gladys was in the support car. We stopped and chatted for a while with about various long distance routes in this part of the country and other neighbouring states. They have all been keen cyclists for many years and could tell us a thing or two about cycle touring. I love Diane's cycling jersey from a southern Missouri ride. Tom's expecting a postcard from us when we get home so he knows we made it back! Tom, Gladys and Diane – it was great to meet you on Saturday morning and cool down over a soda.

After a few more rollers, cycling suddenly went very flat, very quickly. Have we just popped back into central Kansas as if by teleport? No, we hit the Mississippi river plain, and rode through corn fields all the way to the actual river. This feels very significant as the Mississippi provides a clear boundary between the east of the country and the routes out west.

The bridge was pretty skinny so I couldn't stop and get a picture of the river as traffic was very heavy but here it is from the other side.

 

Now we are in Illinois – our eighth state. I've been to Illinois before, albeit only up in Chicago but this is very different down in the south, much is rural farmland and we've just read some hills are called 'Little Ozarks'. In fact most of Illinois is completely flat, except for the tiny bit which we are travelling through! The hills better be little, that's all I say, as I was thinking the next hills were the big beasts of Appalachia.

As soon as as we crossed into the state, we came into the town of Chester, population about 5000, which is a teeming metropolis by Transamerica standards. Chester is famous as being the home of Popeye, or rather the home of his creator Elzie Crsler Segar who started out as a newspaper cartoonist. Popeye, along with Olive, Brutus et al can be seen in many murals all over town. Segar based his character on a real person, one Frank 'Rocky' Fieg el, who is mostly described as 'a local scrapper'.

 

 

 

Other cyclists have recommended that we stay with the 'Fraternity of the Eagles' whilst we're in Chester. The Eagles are a nationwide fundraising/social organisation, I guess a bit like the Lions. They have a centre here with a bar and grassy area outside where we can pitch our tent, and showers which we can use, and as has become customery all for no charge.

Tonight they have two functions going on here, a 21^st party outside and a poker run inside in memory of a local man who died in a motorcycle accident. They all seem like a very respectable bunch of retirees right now, but apparently Eagles know how to party, so who knows what might happen later.

As we set up the tent, we noticed we found a hitchiker from Missouri who must have been inside one of our panniers for about 48 hours (because we didn't use the tent last night). Not sure whether we should be declaring him to the Illinois authorities as some kind of illegal contraband but we just set him free.

Sarah

Day 54 - Centerville to Farmington

50 miles

It is with some excitement that I can reveal that I am writing these words from the driving seat of a Fire Department Mobile Command Unit. I never had the childhood dream of becoming a fireman (I was an astronaut type of boy), but I have to admit this is pretty cool.

We heard from a few other cyclists on the way across that there is this fire station in Farmington Missouri where you can camp out or stay in their fire station. This is one of the places that it seemed we couldn't miss. We turned up at around 4pm, and there was no-one there. They were out. Was it a 'job'? I have seen London's Burning. No, it was because the chief was around so they were hiding. In a Dunkin Donuts I imagine, or is that the cops. Anyway they are a great bunch of guys, and showed us around. We got some great pics.

But hang on, back to the travelogue. This morning we bade farewell to Daniel – the 120 mile superhero – in his quest to catch up with Carl, who we think is around 150 miles ahead of him. Carl is doing 90 mile days, so Daniel has got some serious work ahead of him.

Today we did the final set of hills of the Ozarks. There was some quite steep climbing but to be honest apart from a couple of bottom cog gutbusters it wasn't too bad, and even they were pretty short. The Ozarks never really materialised in the way that we had both feared. I think that we had built it all up for ourselves over the Kansas plains about how tough it was going to be. Sarah says I am not allowed to say I thought it was really easy. Anyway the real tough job starts in eastern Kentucky when we hit Appalachia where they have really steep hills like the Ozarks, but which are seriously long. And they have the dogs that chase you.

We have had a few dogs chase us so far, which is a nice warm up. There seem to be three main kinds:

1. The interceptor – no barking, very fast running, often from the other side of a large field, normally some kind of whippet or hound. Basically looking for a chase

2. Sound and fury – a very small dog yapping its little heart out.. Ignore

3. Ankle biter – actually risks doggie life and limb by dashing out in the street to try to bite you. Or do they? We have tried slowing down and I think they don't actually intend to savage you. In fact they look a bit confused if they manage to get up close. This will require some courage when we start hitting the Pit Bulls, Rottweillers etc in bandit country.

Today was a pretty short day so we took the opportunity to take in some tourist sites. Elephant Rock State Park was pretty cool, a series of massive boulders sat on the ground. The rock itself is over a billion years old and has been slowly eroded away from cubic granite to the shape it is now by freeze/thaw erosion and water percolating through the soil. This stuff is incredibly hard, so the amount of time that must have taken is beyond comprehension. We also took in what Sarah described as the sort of museum that I most like, the Fort Davidson interpretive centre. This deals with the civil war Battle of Pilot Knob, a defence in the last year of the war of a small earthen fort by 1000 Union troops against over 12,000 Confederate raiders.

A few people have mentioned my beard in emails and comments. It is nearly ready. Sarah says I look like I am in the Gingahedeen. I was thinking of shaving my head, but by the time we go home this may cause some problems at Customs, as shaven head and long beard has been cornered by a quite specific social and political world view.

 

Matt

Day 53 - Eminence to Centerville

41 miles

We hadn't planned to do such a short day but we found out early on that our intended destination for the night – Johnson Shut Ins State Park – no longer allowed camping, so we revised our plans on route and decided to stay in Centerville. The distances between camp spots in this area are big so there aren't so many options, and because we put in some big distances in the West we are at least two days ahead of our schedule so didn't want to get even further ahead. We feel a bit slack doing only 40 today but at least it gives us time to enjoy the area we are travelling through.

Also we weren't that feeble because today's riding took in some serious steep climbs, probably our steepest of the trip so far – in the lowest gears possible where you hope you make it because there ain't anything lower! There is something comical about some of these hills, or at least I think you have to laugh in order to do them. You ride up a really steep hill, then as soon as you get to the top you see another right ahead, and another one, and another one – all laid out like an undulating piece of grey ribbon in front of you. Some of the grades are between 12-15% whereas even in the Rockies I think the maximum was about 7%. When we started out today at 7.30 am it was misty and we put our dayglo jackets on so drivers could see us, but we were so hot very quickly because it was such hard work. We constantly have to make sure we are replenishing our bodies with enough salt and electrolytes because we sweat so much. I'm sure you wanted to know that!

We both agreed though that we actually felt good climbing these hills, they have been in our mind's eye for so long it's good to know what they're about. It's certainly true that mental preparation is the key – if you prepare for the worst, you won't be let down! Also we don't have the elevation profile on the back of our Adventure Cycling Assoc. map for this section, because ours is not the latest version, and I think not being able to obsessively scrutinize it in this area helps, because you don't know that there is a whopper of a climb ahead so when you get to it, you just do it. To get an idea of what the elevation map looks like though just picture the profile of a very long comb with an assortment of very long teeth. It's pretty laughable when you see it!

We stocked up on food for dinner in the little town of Ellington and then arrived in Centerville at 1pm. We called in at the sheriff's office to ask where we could camp and he told us that we could pitch our tent right in the grass courtyard outside the town hall after 4pm. To kill some time we cycled a short way out of town to where the West Fork Black River crosses the road and had a splash in the cool water. It was perfect.

In the evening another cyclist rode into town – Daniel from Virginia. In fact he rode up to us asking if we are Matt and Sarah, as he'd met another cyclist on ahead who knew we weren't far behind. The network of Transamerica cyclists who all know each other is incredible, like a spider's web.

Daniel had done 125 miles in one day. Now we felt really slack! But he is trying to catch up with his buddy Carl who is on ahead, they are both going in the opposite direction to us. We met Carl this morning at our campsite so passed on his whereabouts to Daniel, who'd had to head back home for a few days hence his delay.

We've all just had milkshakes in a very quintessential diner and chatted about the character, quirks and customs of life in rural America. Some American cyclists we meet are often keen to know our honest opinion about what we think of the places we are travelling through.

The ones who are from the big smoke often tell us: 'not all America is like this you know!'. And feel relieved when we tell them we have been to big cities too like San Fran and NY so have a balanced view. But we like these smaller places and don't have any criticisms at all. They may be a bit hicksville, but life is just as busy here, and people also have time to talk and a smile to go with it.

Sarah

Ps – Dan has asked whether we feel brawny or scrawny. Personally I don't think I feel either, but it's fair to say we are both feeling very healthy. In fact if either of our GPs are reading, take note that when in a drugstore last week there was a heart rate and blood pressure monitor to use. We both checked ourselves and both of had pulses of 10 bpm less than usual. Take that, blood pressure!