Kiki Bikes Across America

Archive for May 26th, 2009

Torey and I started off the morning with breakfast with our Couchsurfer hosts near Yorktown. We had eggs, bacon, toast, juice, and strawberries. Our hosts were really nice and friendly – from Russia, but have lived here for 7 years now.

We met up with Chris and George at the Victory Monument in Yorktown at 9am and then mom and Mopsie showed up to see us off. We took photos and then dipped our tires in the ocean and then rode off. We knew we had a lot of weight on our bikes when our tires sunk into the sand completely and the rims couldn’t be seen anymore.

Torey, Mom, and Mopsie all trailed along following us – Torey for around 8-9 miles and then Mom/Mopsie for 16 miles. They snapped photos of us biking along. At mile 35 just before Charles City, we stopped at a small sub shop on the side of the road and the guys had subs and I had leftover chicken salad that Mom gave me.

Somewhere between lunch and the end of the day, we were chased by two small dogs – that were speedy as anything. We kept having to yell at them as they got really close to our bikes. We didn’t seem to think they were serious dog chasers – but we were wrong. We lost them after a couple minutes when they got tired and we continued on our merry way.

We then continued on and at mile 60 took another extended break at a restaurant/deli which was shut down and no longer in business. George and Chris found a water spicket out back so we all refilled water bottles and splashed ourselves down to cool off. We got a snack and then Mack, another cyclist doing the Transamerican Trail showed up. George/Chris had met him earlier in the morning at Victory Monument. We hung out there for a bit while a thunderstorm came through and then we continued on towards Glendayle. This is where Mack was staying the night, and for us it was another 20 or so miles past to get to the Freed’s house. We finally arrived after a tiresome 88, almost 89 miles at 6:56pm! We all had our showers and then popped the pizza in the oven and ate around 8:30 or so. Now we’re all heading to bed here shortly.

Day 01 – Yorktown, VA to Mechanicsville, VA

GPS Reading (minus the first 3 or so miles):
84.4 miles
28.7 max
13.5 avg
6:16 moving time

Computer Stats:
88.84 miles
Total miles to date: 88.84
29.5 max
13.7 avg
06:28:02 moving time

Snake count: 5 dead on side of road. One really nasty fat one that luckily I didn’t roll over!
Dog chases: 1 today
Aches/pains: very little the entire day. Almost no back pain, miraculously!
Favorite piece of gear: solar panel! I’ve powered two days of the GPS strictly using the solar panel. I haven’t used any AA batteries yet! Keep the sunrays shining when I need them and we’ll be golden!