| Page 20 Day 85 - Monday 4-8-02 - mileage today 30.6 - climbed today 0 We got up from a restful sleep in the woods. There are a lot of scrub pines or as I'm told they’re also called, poll pines. They are tall straight growing pines that don’t have any branches until the top 1/3 of the tree. They are primarily used for making paper and power polls. There is also a variety of plants like small palms, ferns, grasses, mosses. Everything is green and often wet. We hear a lot of birds however, you rarely see them. We have seen deer, raccoons, and large rat like critters that, I Don't know what they are. But they aren’t opossums. We've seen many opossums and armadillos, and many different variety of snakes, all of which are road kill. I'm told to watch out for cottonmouth snakes, copperheads, and water moccasins. In fact I heard of one young man just out of the military who was walking thru a wooded area and was bit on the head by a water moccasin, he died. The snakes not only swim and slither, they hang from trees. We are really looking forward to staying at the beach house of Marvin and Ellie Mick. It is only about 30 miles away. We hope to lie in the sun, swim and generally relax. We were cycling along the coast when a girl drove by, honked and gave the American sign language sign for," I love you". I said to Myron, did you see that? He didn't. I explained the sign and what it meant. Myron tried to sign it, but couldn’t do it. He once broke a finger and it doesn’t work well. Myron said if I had to learn sign language, I'd sign with a lisp. We got a big laugh out of that. We got directions to the Mick’s home and were more than a little concerned that we were at the wrong house. We got to the gate but the code wouldn't open the gate. So we went in as someone was coming out. The name of the development was different than that on the sign out front. We found the house number and entered. We were more than a little concerned that we might have to call the police and say were in someone’s house that we aren’t suppose to be in. We are lost can you tell us the right house. But, what we did was to enter and use the phone to call the Mick’s and described the house. Thankfully it was the right one. Marvin and Ellie came out and we had a great visit. Myron knew them from California. They took Myron and I out to dinner at a nice restaurant. I had stuffed shrimp and Myron had flounder. The meal was outstanding. We are thankful that the Mick’s not only let us stay at their house but they also treated us to such a fancy meal. Day 86 - Tuesday 4-9-02 - mileage today 15.4 - climbed today 0 SORRY IT’S DISCONTINUED Today is a rest day at Marvin and Ellie's beach house in Shell Point, Fl. All we did today is rest, sleep, and rest. We did go kayaking for a short time. Myron needed to find a town to have some supplies sent later this week. He picked a town on the map and tried to call information, for the phone number of any business in Shamrock, there wasn’t any. So, he called the chamber of a town a little further down the road. When he mentioned that he couldn't find a number for any business in Shamrock. The lady said," sorry shamrock has been discontinued". I was writing at the time and listening to the call in the background. Myron couldn't believe what he just heard. I turned and looked at him and we laughed. We arrived to Shell Point with very little food supplies. There wasn't any food store close. The closest was a convenience store 6 miles away. Thanks to the Mick’s saying eat what you want we had plenty. We did ride 7 miles to a restaurant for dinner. On the way back it started to rain. The road was quiet, so it was a nice ride. For the first time since my ride across the country 2 years ago I saw fireflies. They are so cool to watch. It took me back to the cookie lady's, (that’s another story). Myron has a Nite Rider lighting system, it is incredible. I would love to have one but they are $500.00. It is as bright as a cars headlights. However it is about 450 dollars more than I can afford. Day 87 - Wednesday 4-10-02 - mileage today 59.8 - climbed today 0 NO STRIPES FOR ME First of all we would like to thank Marvin and Elle Mick for their generosity. I can’t speak for Myron but I sure wasn't ready to leave. I quickly relaxed and got the lazys. I slept like a log and could have used a few more days of R&R but that doesn’t burn the miles. I talked to a friend Deven, last night and told him that we only had one day of rain on the trip so far. Well it rained last night and for several hours today. I jinxed myself. Just as we were ready to leave it started to rain. It continued on and off most of the day. As we were riding and we saw a road crew right out of an old movie. I thought of, cool hand Luke. The crew was cleaning up the side of the road wearing black and white striped shirt and pants, just like the old chain gang days. I'm glad I don't look good in stripes. Today we had a lot of truck traffic. The rain and these trucks driving 60mph with only one truck length between them made for a nerve racking ride. Myron noticed the rivers were black. The water was black as midnight, why is that. It looks cool but I wouldn't swim in it. We had dinner at a cafe in Perry. Just as we were entering the cafe a car across the street went out of control running into a power poll, causing big bangs and sparks. We went into the cafe and said to call 911. Luckily the lady walked away from it. Thanks to Karen at the southern oaks RV park in Perry, we had a nice place to sleep and clean up. Day 88 - thurs. 4-11-02 - mileage today 46.4 - climbed today 0 80 MORE PLEASE Myron and I stopped for breakfast at a cafe in Perry, Fl. We had a good breakfast and as we were at the cashier paying our bills. Myron used an ATM machine that was sitting there. He punched in a withdrawal of one hundred dollars and only got 20. The machine kept cycling. You could hear the machine trying to spit money out but nothing came out. The owner watched this entire going on, fortunately he spent years servicing those machines as a career so he knew what to do. He first ran a tape to see if Myron’s transaction was recorded, it wasn’t. Yet it gave him 20 dollars and no receipt. He called the bank to see if they had a record, they did. They showed that Myron withdrew 100 dollars. Ron the owner of the restaurant was so kind to Myron and gave Myron the 80 dollars saying that it would be easier for him to recover the money from the bank than it would be for Myron. Thank you Ron. I'm sorry I can’t remember the name of the restaurant. We finally got everything settled and were on our way at 11:15 am. We battled rain on and off most of the day. The lady at the chamber was right the other day. We could not find and trace of the town Shamrock, it is in fact "discontinued". As we were cycling into Cross City we saw a cyclist ahead of us. We passed Dave and asked him to join us at Dairy Queen for a malt, he did. Dave is not your typical bicycle tourist. He lives in Ocala, Fl and road to Mississippi and back. He is not your typical tourist as I said, he cycles with a bell child carrier as a trailer. He is 63 years old and rides wearing Levis, a denim shirt and big heavy boots. We enjoyed meeting Dave, we wish him well. He will be home today. We had big rain and thunderstorms, we cycled when safe but we finally decided to find a place to camp. We found Po Boys RV Park on the east side of Cross City. Kathy (smiley) Benz the manager was very helpful. She set us up with all the comforts of home. We stayed the night under a covered patio out of the rain. She also recommended Linda’s Italian Restaurant for dinner. Smiley (Kathy) walks 10 miles a day and is a vegetarian. She also bikes 5 miles a day in the evenings. She is retired and in excellent health. Like Myron she is living proof to what good health practice will do for you. .............................Continued on page 21 (next pg) |
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