What a great weekend and, boy, did we learn a lot. About what to pack, what not to pack, how to pack it, how good our gear is, how much more training we need and how gracious God is.
But we now know that all of that will not ride like this - safely. The task at hand this week is to figure out how to get everything that's in the panniers (over the back tire) and the front pack all into a rear trunk pack and the trailer. This configuration above was just too unstable with the weight of the front pack and the panniers being too high.
We left Saturday morning and rode the 54 miles to the Lewis & Clark Caverns state park campground. Our friends, Kevin and Laura joined us later. We discovered that our tent, sleeping bags, Jetboil cookstove etc are all going to work great for us (the sleeping bag even kept me warm and it got down to about 35 degrees). We also discovered what things we need to leave home and a few items we'll need to add.
This morning dawned sunny and beautiful and we just knew it was going to be a great ride; that is, until the breezes started kicking up just as we were leaving. Then we knew we were in for a tough ride because the wind doesn't typically start that early in the day.
And it was grueling at times. A southwest wind that gave us hard gusting crosswinds. With our long profile, that gave plenty of surface to buffet us about. About 7 miles from home, we got hit with probably some of the hardest crosswinds we've ever had on the bike. We were both praying for protection.
This flagpole is indicative of what was whipping against us.
We were grateful to not only make it home safely, but to make it home before the rain came.
This week will be focused on reconfiguring the packing. That's going to take some real insight and imagination ;o) !
Thanks to all of you who were praying for us!
Pat
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