Day 42

Beautiful day starting out today, warm and it even got hot in the afternoon. We had a great tailwind until around noon and it switched to a headwind. We road along the beach on A1A from ST Augustine Beach, through Flagler Beach, and down to Ormond Beach. It was a nice uneventful ride.

We are staying with Jeff, a dear friend of ours who we’ve known for 20 years. Jeff owns an Ace Hardware store (is there any other?) in Ormond Beach. Jim worked with him at Ace and we all became great friends. We had many good times together. We are thankful for his hospitality. It will be great to spend some time catching up.

Tomorrow we will continue south down the coast.

Day 43

A very windy day, headwinds of course, which made this a very hard and long ride. We rode US 1 almost all the day. The roads were fine but busy. We ran into Bill, also riding to Key West from VA, who we had met on the Jamestown Ferry back in Williamsburg. We spent some time swapping stories.  A little later on in the day we met Dave, Walter, and Vinny 3 retired cops from NJ also riding to Key West. They were riding in honor of a brother officer. We kept running into each other all day. We chatted a lot and with the slow pace we rode due to the wind, we were thankful to make the hotel before dark. We were very happy to get off the bikes.

Day 42 pictures

Roads we traveled today....

Day 43 pictures

Our ride from Atlantic Beach to St. Augustine was awesome. We rode A1A all the way and had designated bike lanes the whole way. We rode through Pointe Verde and all the multimillion dollar homes. It was absolutely beautiful.

The weather was perfect. The reason people come to Florida.

As we were riding into St. Augustine a guy flagged us down. He was a fellow cyclist, Don, and he wanted to know about our ride and talk with us. He was a really nice guy. We have met so many really nice people.

We rode over the Bridge of Lions, the bridge going to St. Augustine beach, to get to our hotel. It is a really elegant bridge.

We took our bikes to the bike shop to get them tuned up and picked them up Tuesday afternoon.

We are doing the tourist thing and really enjoying the rest time.

Roads we were on

Bob, our angel and lifesaver, showed up to pick us up this morning right on time. He took us past the detour which really helped us out. He offered to take us anywhere we might need to go and even brought an air pump just in case we needed it. He could not have been any nicer or kinder and we greatly appreciate all his help.

It was our coldest morning yet and Jim thinks he saw frost…….. that could be questionable. We did warm up quickly and it was a beautiful day to ride. We were on bike lanes all day. It was great. We crossed into Florida this morning.

We rode through Amelia Island, Fernandina Beach , and had lunch in Mayport Village. We took a short ferry ride to Mayport Village. It was just a really nice ride today.

We have a short ride into St. Augustine tomorrow and then a rest day. We are ready to have a rest day. It’s good to be in Florida!

Roads we were on today

This is Bob......thanks for your help

Chilly morning today. It was bright and sunny and we warmed up quickly.

As we rode through the low country, on highway 17, we had beautiful countryside and lots of bridges.

We had lunch in Brunswick, at a sub shop. We met Wynn and April who own a gym in the same shopping center as the sub shop. They were getting ready to hold a charity fundraiser for two local girls that had leukemia. They invited us down to tour their gym. We saw the torture chamber, spin class room, and are glad we are pedaling our bikes and not spinning. They were really nice people with good hearts.

The GPS put us on a sand road, it was impassable. We backtracked and looked at the map and found a way to go.

When we got into Kingsland, we found our route for tomorrow was detoured, due to a bridge being out. The detour puts you on I-95. That’s not an option for us since bike are not allowed on the interstate. The other option was a 100 mile detour. When we stopped at the welcome center to find a solution, a fellow cyclist, Bob, approached us and offered to pick us up in the morning and drive us past the detour via the interstate. What a generous offer that we gladly accepted. He is a life saver.

Roads we rode today

Another crisp cool beautiful day today. What can go wrong after Krispy Kreme donuts for breakfast.

We traveled on back roads today. Very few of the big trucks that were our constant companion yesterday. We had stretches of quiet today that was wonderful.

We ate lunch at Midway Café. They could not tell us for sure why it was called Midway but it was half way between Savannah and Darien. We had a great lunch buffet there…. Fried fish, fried chicken, hush puppies, grits, stewed tomatoes…………. Good southern cooking!

It was a really long ride today. We were ready to be done at 40 miles but we had another 24 to go. Lots of breaks and snacks got us to our home for tonight, Darien, Ga.

Roads we traveled today.....

We woke up to 46 degrees this morning. These Florida people bundled up like little kids going out in the snow. We warmed up and starting shedding layers by mid-morning. It was a beautiful day. Lots of wonderful sunshine.

We were on mostly back roads today. Some were in need of a lot of repair. There were a lot of trucks on the road with us and as we neared Savannah we realized we were coming in via the Sea Port and the trucks never stopped.

It was a nice ride and we got to our hotel early afternoon. It is a pretty cool retro style hotel, The Thunderbird. We had RC and moon pies waiting in the room for us. Gumby was pretty happy about that.   Jim is ecstatic about breakfast…… Krispy Kreme donuts and coffee!  We walked to Historic Savannah and enjoyed walking around.

Very challenging day with a little of everything. The GPS put us on a dirt/sand road that turned out to be a private road. We walked our bikes about 2 miles total because you could not ride on it. We also ran into 2 bridges that were out and had to detour around them. A cold front is coming in and the winds were raging. We were blessed to have them at our backs for a little while and not consistently in our face.

We did make it to Beaufort and all in all it was a good day. We had beautiful sunshine all day – it’s been a long time. We are getting ready for cold weather the next couple days with lows in the 40’s. We made a trip to the store to get beanies and gloves. Riding in the cold is fine once you get moving so it’s no big deal.

We made a stop at the ruins of a really old church – see pictures below. There were gravestones from back in the 1700 & 1800’s. All in all it was another great day to be riding. 

Roads we traveled today.

We had a good ride today. The roads were okay (even though the rumble strips were back) and the traffic was light. We rode through several small towns, which we love. Parts of the towns of Summerville and Walterboro were beautiful. Summerville had downtown all decorated for a fall festival - very cool.

We rode 56 miles today and we expected to get wet with a 50% chance and menacing clouds but we never did. Lunch was hard to find as we had a long stretch of nothing but trees. The hotel we had booked did not have any WiFi as it was not working so we changed hotels.

We will be in Beaufort, SC tomorrow which is a really cool small town close to the coast. From there we go to Georgia. Getting closer to Key West everyday - 18 more days. Hard to believe. We miss our family,friends, and our church but we are having the time of our lives. It's been an extraordinary trip.

Roads we road today

Nice ride today – 51 miles. A little chilly and cloudy starting out but it was ok. The roads were 2 lanes with no bike lane but the road was not too busy. Lots of logging trucks but they gave us plenty of space.

We ran into the Canadian couple we met yesterday – Scott & Carol. They were headed to Charleston and we were going another direction. We had just finished lunch (Subway and lucky to have that in the middle of nowhere) and they were stopping for their lunch.

Pretty typical day – riding through woodlands with not much else until we got to Moncks Corner where we are staying tonight.

Roads we were on - notice the first 2 pictures and you will see the "rumble strips" the state of SC uses on some roads. They make it difficult for bicycles. You have to ride on the rode and away from the edge or run over them which is not what you want to do.

Rest day today, no riding except to the Super Wal-mart and the laundromat. Spent the day in Georgetown, SC. There is a waterfront historic area with restaurants and shops, a very nice area. Did a lot of walking and it felt good to be off the bike.

We met 2 couples today Capt. Ron and Jeanne & a Canadian couple riding from Toronto to Clearwater Beach on their bikes. I hope we don’t look as tired as they did….. We got to share with them both about our ride.

We had a nice day (actually had sunshine for most of the day) and will be back to pedaling tomorrow.