The hotel room was a little too comfortable last night and I was a little lazy this morning. Up at 6am. Had a good breakfast at the hotel then hit the road at 6:50. 66 degrees this morning going up to a toasty 91 today.
About 5 miles out I made my first turtle turtle save of the trip—he was in no hurry to get across the road so was almost certain to end up road kill—my good deed for today.
Passed through Makers Mark Bourbon distillery area today. There were these huge black build everywhere…I assume to store the bourbon. You could actually smell the bourbon in the air—almost taste it. Everything was painted black….even the no trespassing signs on the chain link fence around the compound was painted black.
Through Loredo around 8:20….started to heat up already.
There were wheat and corn fields everywhere—in farmland now—and huge Catholic Churches. Nearly every yard had these little shrines in them…one even had what I assume was Jesus under half of a cast iron bathtub.
Stopped at the New Hope Food market at 20 miles in for Gatorade, orange juice and a large Rice Krispie treat. They also have the lowest cigarette prices in town—just in case you wanted to know 🙂
On through Howardstown over rolling hills then headed up toward Bardstown and started seeing a huge hill come up on my Garmin—reminded me a bit of VA mountains I thought I was done with—it was a big one and I was soaked with sweat by the time I got to the top.
On to Buffalo KY where I stopped at this little run down pizza place—pizza zone. A nice little old lady, who was watching The Virginian on TV in black and white, made me a 12” cheese pizza and talked me out of having extra cheese put on it because they already add a lot of cheese, she said, and extra would cost me $2 more—no need to wast my money she said 🙂 I ate the entire pizza and drank about a gallon of ice tea. $11.65 for the meal…I left her a $5.35 tip…figured it was the least I could do since she saved me $2 in the extra cheese and I drank about all the tea she had made 🙂
About 5 miles out from Buffalo climbing a hill an old timer out checking his mail told me I needed to put an umbrella over that thang. I said why, is it going to rain? He said no, the sun is gonna dry you out 🙂
Stopped at the Pilot Truck Stop in Sonora at 55 miles in for a little cool liquids—cold bottle of orange juice, cold Diet Coke, cold bottle of water, and cold quart of Gatorade—it was 90 degrees and it was HOT!
Mailed a postcard at the Sonora post office….this one actually had writing on it now that I have a pen 🙂
Early afternoon was going down a long straight stretch of road out in the middle of nowhere and about a 1/4 mile up the road I see what looks like Sasquatch walking toward me in the middle of the road. I was thinking, ok, I’m in KY so would this technically be a Sasquatch or a big foot? Anyway, when I get closer I see it’s a very tall man—maybe 6’6” or 6’8”—and he is dressed like it’s winter carrying a beer in one hand. When I pass him he points his finger at me and says something unintelligible, but my best interpretation is “Hay Maan, looks lik ur gonna schlap the rest of this trip” And no, there are no misspellings in that. My daughter has already pointed out all my spelling and grammar mistakes in this blog :-). This is just my best interpretation of what I think he said. Not sure where he got the beer from—there was nothing for at least a mile ether way. You sure see some strange things on a bicycle tour 🙂
About 15 miles from my destination the sky’s opened up and it came a downpour—thunder, lightening, wind and all. It felt good but the rain was coming down so hard and the wind was blowing it hard so it felt like needles sticking in my face. I was riding past this house, was barely able to see through the rain, but caught a glimpse of a guy standing in his garage with the door open. So I rode up and he said come on in out of this stuff. His garage was a huge woodworking shop—he is cabinet maker named Blake. We stood and talked for about 15 min until the storm blew over then I thanked him and headed out—very nice guy. Thanks for taking me in out of the storm Blake.
Stopped at Rough River Dam State Park tonight and am camping. $17 for tent site and hot shower facility—I’ll take that 🙂
Crossed over into the Central Time Zone at some point today, so looks like I can hit it even earlier tomorrow—if I can force myself to roll out of bed that early.
Other than the blistering hot afternoon sun, was a good day of cycling.
