95

Sunday, September 7, 2008, New River Campground, Grauley Bridge, West Virginia
We got up around 8 am. We wanted to make it to church by 9:00. Everyone pretty much knows the routine by now. We all work like ants until everything is put away, so it doesn't take too long. We were planning to go to the nice lady's church that led us to her son, but it was across town and it was about 9:00 when we were ready, so we just walked across the street to the Diamond Baptist Church. The early parishioners had already noticed us cleaning up the campsite as they were walking up to the church, so some introduced themselves. Leisa was the first and she showed us in and introduced us to others. During the service, I was asked to explain to the congregation why we were going on this trip. I mentioned various reasons: family bonding, vacation, challenge, seeing God provide and care for us. During the Sunday school intermission, a nice man named Mike gave each person in the family some key ring crosses and cross lapel pins. He was recovering from cancer and it was part of his ministry. We all adorned our bikes with them. After the service, a woman took our picture and another told us of the "World's Strongest Man" competition taking place that afternoon in Charleston, only 10 miles away, so we planned to go. Before leaving, John Williams gave me 100 dollars and said the people at the church liked to see families doing this kind of thing and wanted to help us out. He also told me how to get to a good buffet not far from Charleston. [I think it's good for us to eat a lot of good food at least once a week on our rest day to replenish and revive us after a week of hard riding. If it's a cheap buffet, we definitely get our money's worth]. Leisa gave us some extra snack food she had and also guided us with her son Joshua to the restaurant since they were going that way. After we had already begun eating, Leisa came back to the restaurant with a card for us, wishing us well and giving us $100. Such a nice person. As I've said many times, God is meeting us up with fantastic people!
The strong man competition was crowded and it was hard to watch, but finally we perched ourselves on top of a multi-storied parking lot and saw some of the competitors from all over the world. We saw the local boy from Charleston, Phil Pfister, pull into the lead in the truck pulling competition. A couple couldn't even budge the coal-filled load at all, a little embarrassing. After we got on the bikes again, we followed the beautiful, picturesque New River (the only American river that runs entirely north downstream) which made the climb gradual not too taxing. We passed the Kanawha Falls, beautiful. Finally, we arrived at the New River Campground, on the outskirts of Grauley, West Virginia. Nice campsite on the river, expensive though, $39. We found a bunch of logs, so we took advantage of the free fuel and boiled up the bag of potatoes. Ummm good, and a great break snack. 25 miles.

94

Saturday, September 6, 2008, Elementary School, Diamond, West Virginia
Well, we made it to West Virginia today, and what a great day it was! We had to leave the hair salon early before the patrons started arriving, so we were out of there about 7:45. It was a drizzley morning, so we put on our rain gear. We crossed the bridge into Ohio (which I wasn't expecting) and headed along Hwy. 52 toward Charleston, West Virginia. After about 10 miles we got back on 60 east, following the river, and before long we were pedaling across the bridge into West Virginia. We were making pretty good time, but got hungry, so we ended up picnicing on all our goodies under a church pavilion, delicious. But there is a downside to feasting at lunch - the midday slump; all I wanted was to nap for miles after that. I actually almost fall asleep, just like when I'm driving a car under sleepy conditions. After about 50 miles, Adriana and I were ahead of the others so we took another break by an old closed store. I relished laying horizontal on the concrete (my favorite position on this trip) and closing my eyes with blindfold in place and going to sleep. When I awoke, all were there, including Gloria and the van, and eating and laughing (usual activities once off the bike). Once back on the bikes, riding through the poor sections of Charleston was interesting. We rode a lot of miles again because we couldn't find a nearby campground. At around 7 pm, we were in Diamond, West Virginia, and didn't know where to stay, so Gloria asked a nice lady if she knew the way to the police station. She did and her son James was a state police officer, so she called him up and he made several phone calls to help us out, but we ended up staying next to his house at the elementary school playground. Nice grass, privacy, security, and a place for the kids to play basketball, which James provided. His wife Sarah made us some sweet bread and delicious vegetables which he brought out to us. Nice people God has placed in our path. We all devoured it like birds. We also cooked up two huge packages of chicken in our pot. We eat a lot. 87 miles.

93

Friday, September 5, 2008, behind The Hair Loft, Ashland, Kentucky
Today marks three months since we left Castroville, California, on June 5th. The ride was hilly and cold. Near Owingsville, Willie got a flat tire. Not wanting to wait, Gloria loaded his bike in the van and deposited him 10 miles up the road, giving him enough time to repair it and rejoin the riders without slowing the group down. We got soaked once from a cloudburst; luckily we were close to an antique store that we ducked in for cover. Later in the day, Willie stopped again to fix his flat tire. Apparently there wasn't enough glue on the patch the first time, so it came off. He had to wait for Mom again, and this time had to buy some more rubber cement before he could fix it. By the time we got to Ashland, it was dusk and there were no campgrounds, so we used our lights and began looking for possible places to ask permission for an emergency tenting site for the night. At last we came to a hair salon and the nice lady who owned it, Sheri McCormick, gave us permission to camp behind the shop. Also, a generous patron gave us $20 dollars to buy the family McDonald's hamburgers across the street. Rick Reed, one of the stylists who worked there, drove across the street and returned with a large box of McDonald's burgers, fries, sundaes, and drinks (He must have contributed a lot himself) that we thoroughly enjoyed as we were all hungry after today's long ride. One message, one lesson, we have been learning and should be clear: God takes care of His children one way or the other and usually in unexpected ways. 103 miles.

92

Thursday, September 4, 2008, Boonsboro State Park, near Winchester, Kentucky
We got up late since I was so tired from staying up burning the DVDs. After eating, we discussed how we could continue to make it to Maine on our limited funds: we would have to go faster for the money to hold out, so we talked about how to streamline our operation and increase our riding time through better planned breaks and longer days. So we took our first food break in Frankfort after 21 miles. Then we got off of Hwy. 60 and pedaled along the Old Frankfort Pike to Lexington. It was a pretty drive but hard for bikes because of the hills and the traffic we encountered at 5:00. We got through it though and at 42 miles had our next big break. After about 60 miles we were in Winchester and began asking about a place to put a tent. Nothing. But a nice policeman let us put our bikes in the police garage so we could drive to Boonsboro State Park and camp there. 67 miles.

91

Wednesday, September 3, 2008, campground, Shelbyville, Kentucky
We slept in a little bit since it was a luxury to be in a cabin. After eating, we biked through downtown Louisville on Hwy. 60 in the direction of St. Matthews where we would find a Best Buy [I had reluctantly agreed to buy another video camera, the cheapest one, so we could continue videoing the journey]. Riding through the city was fun. It's a diversion from the beautiful countryside and spices up the journey. Maybe everyone isn't this way, but I always love to cycle through downtown areas of cities because the traffic offers an interesting challenge, and it's usually not too fast, and it's fun to look at the shops and people along the way. It started to rain lightly on us right about the time we passed by a bike shop. I bought Paul a new front fender, which he definitely needed for the rainy weather, and tightened up my handlebars with some new nuts (my quick release had bent from repeated tightening and wouldn't work). Shortly after we left the bike store, a truck with a load of angle iron spilled its contents on the road as it was coming to a red light, so I helped them reload it. Before long we were near St. Matthews, so we locked the bikes at a Steak n Shake and drove to Best Buy. Unfortunately, they didn't have any open-box-specials, so we went to Circuit City. We ended up buying a machine that could make DVDs from cameras and video cameras for only $169 (another open-box special). Then we went to Wendy's before arriving back at the bikes. We rode through thoroughbred country, past some beautiful houses today. After awhile we stopped at Kentucky Fried Chicken [Everyone wanted to eat there since we were in Kentucky] and drinking our family large soda, which we refill about 5-10 times before finishing. It's quite a sight: All the children have large straws and huddle around the cup drinking together as the cup quickly drains into their stomachs. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat... We met some nice ladies there who gave us directions to a campground, but we decided to go past there to Shelbyville, where Colonel Sanders had his family restaurant (The Colonel's Lady) next to his house before he died. [I had eaten there as a boy visiting my grandmother in the 70s when Colonel Sanders was still alive, but I never saw him.] We looked around the restaurant but didn't eat. The rain started falling before we found the campground, but stopped while we were setting up the tent. The mosquitoes were bad. They can't easily get through the barb wire on my legs, but had a feast on my smooth feet and ankles. I started downloading the video camera's 30 gig hard drive onto DVDs under a pavilion. It took seven and I was up till 2 am burning them. It was worth it though, even with the mosquito bites. Now we have a fresh hard drive to record up to seven hours of video. 40 miles.

90

Tuesday, September 2, 2008, KOA Campground, Clarksville, Indiana
Well, we said our goodbyes today to our loved ones in Indiana. It was sad to leave; I wish we could have stayed with everyone longer. We finally got going after eating breakfast and packing at Uncle Paul's house about 10:30 am. After a five day layoff, we were well rested, but my legs got tired anyway by the time we arrived in Clarksville. Becky's back tire lost its valve, so we had to replace her inner tube. When we arrived in Clarksville, we went to Best Buy to give them my broken camera (I have an upgraded warranty so they will fix anything short of a steam roller crushing it). They will send the repared camera to General Delivery in Yorktown, Virginia, where I am picking up my next batch of mail. Unfortunately, they would not burn DVDs for me from my video camera, so it is still full and I cannot reformat the hard drive to take more videos. I will keep trying to find someone or some place to do it. The kids went to the library while Gloria and I ran around town looking for a place that could do it. Finally it was getting late, so we were forced to go to an expensive KOA campground. We ended up spending an extra $10 ($64) to upgrade to a cabin. It had air conditioning and would be a treat. After snacking, we went to Holiday Inn where KOA had an arrangement for its clients to use the pool. The kids all swam. I took a shower and now am updating the blog. It's getting late though so I guess I'll close. 52 miles.
P.S. I added older pictures, I think from post #75 up.

89

Monday, September 1 (Labor Day), 2008, Uncle Paul's house, Salem, Indiana
We woke up and Joanna, Robbie, and Tessa prepared a DELICIOUS breakfast: apple pancakes, scrambled eggs, sausage, peaches with whipped cream and juice. So nice. Then in the afternoon, we all drove to Buffalo Trace Park in Palmyra. Danny's family (except Ben and Beth in college) was there. Also there were Phil and Nona, Uncle Paul and Aunt Harriet, Mr. and Mrs. Allen (Robbie's parents) and Stephan Allen. Everyone played games: badminton, horseshoes, football, and Stephen brought a unique set of walking boards for a group challenge. The food was great and plentiful. Best of all was just being together with everyone I've missed for so long. After all left, we went back to Uncle Paul's house and worked some more on the bikes, getting them ready for tomorrow. Then we stayed up and talked until late, as usual.