Our Longest Day So Far

Today was our longest day so far, but more on that later.....  Yesterday was a rest day and I think everyone had a good rest simply because there was really not much else to do.  Of course we did the usual things - leisurely breakfast, laundry, bike cleaning, etc.  It is normal routine that our chef does not make dinner on our rest day, but since there was so little around, she did make us dinner last night.  She'll get an extra night off somewhere down the line.  This is Emily's first trip cooking for a WomanTours group and I'm absolutely loving what she prepares for us every night.  No weight loss in my immediate future!  

We put our rest to good use today - 130 km.  The riding was quite easy, so I was at the hotel by 2 PM.  Great weather, just a bit of wind (sometimes head, sometimes cross or tail).  Scenery was not so different from other recent days - rural & countryside/forest.  We did see a bit of corn growing; not as tall as last week.  I guess we're just that much further north.  I read somewhere that spring advances at 15 miles per day, and we're outpacing that even with our zigging and zagging.  The challenge today was a lot of cracky/crappy roads and few with a lot of truck traffic.  They tend to either fill the white line with rumble strips and leave too-narrow a shoulder to ride on or skip the rumble strips & shoulders altogether and have constant cracks and potholes covering the right-hand 2 feet to 6 feet of road surface - ugh!  Bottom line - when riding on those conditions I don't see much of the scenery.  I'm too busy looking down at the road.  

By 40 miles I still hadn't taken pictures so I took one of our SAG stop.

 

We usually have a small Subaru doing the SAG stops, but because of the long day the Subaru leap-frogged to 60-ish miles.  Also - the vehicles had to make a few other deliveries today.  The rider who tumbled off the rumble strips and hurt her shoulder last week has had to fly home to heal and was leaving from Charleston this afternoon.  That's our second departure.  We lost another woman last week with tendonitiis in her knee.  Another woman received news at dinner last night that her dad had passed away so she is leaving the tour for a while.  And yet another woman was driven to the medical centre in Moncks Corner so that she could get some medication for an infection that has developed.  Never a dull moment with this group!

Here are some typical views for today (when the road allowed me to look up!).

We've been in the trees for so long that we haven't had much in the way of "vistas".  This will have to pass for today's "vista" (I-26).

Evidence of a bit of a headwind.  US flag on top, South Carolina state flag below.

Interesting arch over a gate to a factory on the outskirts of Moncks Corner.

Hundreds, perhaps thousands of brand-new white Mercedes Benz trucks parked in a field outside Moncks Corner.

We're still in Civil War and Plantation country, with occasional historical markers.

Stats for the day:

130 km from Point South SC to Moncks Corner SC.  Temps 9C to 30C.  A bit more humidity today, but not too bad at all.  Just over 1000 feet of elevation gain; still pretty darned flat riding!