Woke up at 5am this morning….perfect timing. We were able to pack and use the restrooms before the ACA group woke up around 5:30. Weather today is supposed to be sunny and high of 83….at the end of the day, I can verify the weather was perfect once again for riding.
As we were waiting for day break and getting ready to roll, I watched the ACA group members literally roll their suitcases of stuff out to load in the vans and support trailers…looked like they were going to check baggage at an airport vs doing a bike tour. As nice as it would be to climb these mountains without 40 or so pounds of gear loaded on my bike, that’s just not for me. But I wish them the best of luck.
About 5 miles out this morning Rob and I were riding together and saw a spike buck run across the road in front of us….was a perfect morning….cool mountain air and a bit foggy.
We were talking about the deer and Rob was riding just behind me and this dog took off after us….the dog was on him quick, but it was a little short fat dog so couldn’t run too fast. We escaped no problem. That was the first dog chase today of many—so many, I lost count.
Yesterday was coal truck day—as soon as we crossed the KY State line coal trucks were up and down the roads in both directions. You could hear them coming from a mile away in the mountains…they seemed to be very aware though and gave us plenty of room on the road. Yesterday there were also a lot of dogs, but they were mostly in pens or chained up—seemed to be mainly hunting dogs. Today there were dozens of dogs, but they were running free and liked chasing people on bicycles.
It was a really cool mountain morning as we started out and Rob was getting cold so he stopped to put on his ear muffs…I rode on and was making a mental note about the second strategy for handling dogs—ride just in front since it seems the dog will usually take the one in the back. About that time another—bigger dog came out of nowhere after me….fortunately I had some good speed and was able to out run him…about 5 miles into the ride and already two dog chases.
I was loving the cool morning and riding with my sleeveless crash-test-dummy cycling shirt on and halfway unzipped. Before I knew it, Rob was coming up behind me again and I didn’t recognize him—he had put on so many clothes he looked like Kenny from SouthPark…see the photo of him behind me on the bike 🙂
About 20 miles into the ride this morning we passed our Hazard branch campus and I stopped for a photo by the sign and sent to some Galen colleagues. We stopped across the street for breakfast….country ham, eggs, biscuits and gravy.
Again, I’ve lost track of the number of dog chases today, but remember one in particular. Just outside Buckhorn, Steven and I were a couple hundred yards behind Rob. He was up over a little hill so we couldn’t see him, but we heard some loud vicious barking and Rob hollering — go home, go home, stop, go away…and a few other choice words 🙂
Steven looked at me and said, oh no, that’s a mean one….I just said yep!
Well, when we got there this big, mean looking junkyard dog comes after us…we’re going up hill so can’t out run him, so we’re both shouting at him and he is growling, baking and snarling. He comes for me first and I just look him in the eyes and go into a “red tie” type mode with yelling at him—some of my colleagues at work will know the red tie reference 🙂 That seemed to work and he broke off from me, but Stephen was just behind me. This is one of those dogs that you can tell he is just plain mean. Then he zero’s in on Stephen and I hear a Big Bang behind me and I thought he had bitten Steven. And he did try, but but luckily he missed Stephens leg and bit his rear pannier—there is a picture of the bite mark on Stephens pannier below. At this point we all decided, ok, we’ve had our obligatory Eastern KY dog experience everyone talks about, so enough, PLEASE. But, no, still more to come it seemed every few miles.
We stopped at a little market in Buckhorn around noon for lunch and we all had bologna and tomato sandwiches. Stephen saw me eat one the other day and wanted to try it—his first bologna sandwich—not sure about Rob. Only 19 miles to our destination so even with some big climbs ahead of us this is going to be a short day.
Up and down a few more mountains—Eastern KY is just letting us know we are still in the mountains even if they are not as extreme as the previous days. We arrived in Booneville pretty early today and are camping behind the Presbyterian church here. We could have done more miles, but our goal is Berea, KY tomorrow where Stephen will be leaving us and heading back to Annapolis—he will pick it up from there next year and do another two weeks planning to complete the trip over the next few years. I’ll be taking a day off in Lexington to see June and Tori, get my back wheel fixed properly, and fix anything around the house that may be broken while I’ve been gone, then I’ll head out again Friday morning. I’m feeling good and strong, so with the mountains behind me—at least for a while—after Friday I can feel a few 100+ mile days in my near future 🙂
A great adventure thus far!
Oh, I hit my highest speed yet coming down one of the mountains today at 43.2 mph. That’ll probably stand until I get to the Rockies.
