Day 62

69 miles State No 10 a hilly, country ride and lots of nice people. 

We ate breakfast as the sun broke through a thick blanket of fog near the Baptist Church outside Cambridge . Just as the sunset last night was beautiful the new day began gloriously:

We packed the wet tent (wet from last nights rain and this mornings fog) and hit the road. 

The route was quite tricky to work out. This is mainly due to the large scale map I have that makes it awkward to plan. I did however manage to plan a route that took us away from the interstate (where we can’t cycle even if we wanted to) and onto much quieter country roads. 

About 3 miles from our start point we dropped into Mr Lee’s Diner where we had coffee, toast and porridge. It was a great start to the day and we enjoyed talking to Linda:

Linda told us where to head next confirming my plan. 

We left Highway 40 and moved onto country roads passing through beautiful scenery and small towns. We were given a great tip by a nice man actually called Tip. He showed us the way to a 6 mile bike trial that led to Lore City and took us off the roads completely which was nice. 

We passed through Salesville where we stopped at a great little shop and petrol station. We even sat on the patriotic bench and discussed politics with customers while our tent dried in the sun:

Back on the bikes and back among the hills. We are now in the early stages of the Appalachian mountains. This range extends all the way down from Canada and is spoken of in a trembling voice by trans-America cyclists. It is going to be constant hills from now till we leave Pennsylvania and drop into New Jersey. It is however a very beautiful area:

We met Chris and Brandon at the Convenient Food Mart and chatted about the ride, nice guys who were interested in our challenge. Brandon topped up our water supply before we left:

We passed through a few more small towns, Warnock made me smile with the sign about GPS:

We left the countryside and entered St Clairsville where we stopped for food. Just as we were deciding where to go, a lady approached us to ask about the ride. Becky Horne works for the Belmont County Emergency Management Agency and was very interested in our challenge. We talked for just a few minutes and then went into a cafe to eat. A minute later Becky came back in, put some money on the table and said “that’s to pay for your meal”. A lovely thing to do. Thank you Becky. 

We made it to Wheeling about 1800:

Here we crossed the State line into West Virginia (State No 10, see top photo) from Wheeling we raced the fading light into Triadelphia getting in at 2000 hrs worn out, ready to sleep but once again having hit our target.