Century #1, standing in 3 states, etc.

Nearing the end of our Day Off in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. We're onto 8 straight days of riding with scary mileage, but here's a summary of the last week.

20Jun: From Little Rock to Clarksville, Arkansas; Our first century! 105 miles and I think we all felt pretty great. I rolled into second lunch, looked down at my odometer, and couldn't believe I had already done 73 miles; just 32 more to the 1st Presbyterian Church where they took great care of us. I got the best soy chai latte ever at a local coffee shop and we had an amazing potluck. Debbie gave us hugs. Dr. Terry offered his chiropractic services for free. Marci invited us over to her house to set off fireworks. (I decided I was exhausted and just went to bed.)

21Jun: From Clarksville to Fayetteville, Arkansas; another long day at 91 miles. Some crazy people decided to do 9 more so they would have back-to-back centuries under their belts. We climbed through the Ozark Mountains and I decided the Appalachians did their job... a 2000-mile climb really wasn't that bad. :-) We were given free rein of the church and I enjoyed my own room complete with a tv and "The Polar Express" (I fell asleep after 20 minutes).

22Jun: From Fayetteville to Grove, Oklahoma; 74 miles, exciting bonus! Our route took us through the 3 Corners, I stood in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri (we biked in MO for 2 miles, adding a bonus state to my list of states visited). The ride was hilly and my legs and knees started to register the fact that they've been putting on a lot of miles... We had a ping pong table and got to have a cookout (with s'mores!) at a park thanks to our hosts.

23Jun: From Grove to Bartlesville, Oklahoma; 75 miles, we got a late start due to some stormy weather. I was one of the first to leave and decided that adrenaline helps a lot. Despite some nasty headwinds I pushed pretty hard, mainly because I was convinced the clouds all around me looked like they could form a tornado at any moment. (Don't worry, Mom; if there were really tornadoes the leaders wouldn't have let us leave :-)). I ended up being one of the first to get in to the church because other groups left late, got lost, got flats, or had minor paceline incidents. The Church of Christ had a bunch of signs to greet us, as well as homemade cookies, popcorn, lemonade and fruit waiting for us.

24Jun: Day Off in Bartlesville; Last night had a birthday/bachelorette party for one of the riders on the trip. Started off at a bowling alley and continued at our host site. Kind of amazing. Slept in this morning, ate a delicious breakfast, and we had our first truly successful bike clinic. About 15 kids from a camp here brought their bikes and B&Bers talked to them about what we're doing, how to take care of their bikes, helped them pump up tires and clean chains, and went for a ride with them around the parking lot. I rode into town with Dave and Suz to go to the bike shop, check out the Price Tower and art museum, and run a couple other errands.

Long week ahead so it's time for bed! More photos coming soon.

Arkansas!

Somehow I'm only managing to find time to post once a state, and the states will only start going by faster... But here goes!

We've now biked over 1200 miles and have crossed our second state line into Arkansas. Unfortunately I missed one day of riding between Sweetwater and Dunlap, TN due to some crazy spider bite/chemical burn??? I ended up going to the doctor, who was this awesome guy who has done an Iron Man in Florida and one in Canada. We chatted about biking the whole time he fixed me up, and all is well now.

I was sweep on our first 90+ mile day with Ana when we went into Savannah. It was a lot of fun hanging back and stopping to eat watermelon, trying on some Amish bonnets, saving a turtle, etc. (I've now helped three of them to the opposite side of the road, but I've lost count of the number of squished ones I was too late for.)

We had two days of building in Maryville, TN and a day off in Memphis. We actually stayed in Germantown, but went into Memphis for a night of fun. After 7 days of biking in a row, it was a much needed rest! Then we rode into Arkansas. We had to walk our bikes over the bridge to cross the Mississippi River for fear of getting flat tires. (The group I was with still managed to get 2!) We're all getting pretty good at changing them though...

The terrain quickly changed from mountainous to flat. Our ride from Memphis (actually Germantown) to Brinkley, Arkansas was 87 somewhat miserable miles of flat, rough roads with a whole lot of nothing to look at, as well as some serious headwind. But I crawled into bed right after dinner that night, and had an awesome 68-mile ride into Little Rock to make up for it.

We're building here in Little Rock for two days, then its on to our first century!

The Mighty Mississippi.

Tennessee Baby!

So much has happened since my last post... Internet is a luxury and usually I'm too exhausted at the end of the day to update this thing anyway. But here's a (hopefully) quick summary:

We've biked a total of 663 miles, give or take a few. Today we arrived in our second state--Tennessee!! After climbing about 8000 feet, I was expecting an enormous, colorful "Welcome to Tennessee" sign to triumph in front of. Unfortunately the sign was small and not very colorful...













Over the past few days we have climbed some serious mountains. I've decided spending the majority of my life near sea level has wreaked havoc on the fitness of my heart, lungs, and legs... But for every intense climb (one was 10 miles long...) I'm usually rewarded by a crazy awesome downhill (top speed is currently 40.7 mph!) and some amazing views. We were on the Blue Ridge Parkway the last few days, and pictures cannot do the mountains justice.

Yesterday we had our third Build Day in Asheville, NC. I got to build with Mountain Housing, a local affordable housing organization that serves the county. It was great to learn about an organization other than Habitat since that's the only experience with affordable housing I've had. We built this awesome ramp to make the house more accessible. I got to use a really big drill. :-)

Other than that, I continue to be amazed by the generosity of our hosts and the interest people have in what we're doing. And it's so hard to believe that the 30 of us have only known each other for 2 weeks. I'll leave you with a glimpse of what we do in our spare time...

An intense game of Around the World Ping Pong.

Ballet practice.
Go-Karts in Wake Forest, opened especially for us.

Emily and Ana (and Ben) helping me test out the underwater features of my awesome new camera.