I'm a People Person

When I started my trip I was excited each day for my ride. I started with shorter days and worked hard to build up to 50-60 mile days. My evenings were primarily my chance to eat and rest up for my next day's ride. As my trip has progressed, I've had so many awesome nightly experiences, and my biking adventures have remained basically the same. Don't get me wrong, I'm still enjoying the cycling part of my journey, it just gets old each day after about 30-40 miles. I know that I'm capable of doing long milage days, but I'm eager for my evening experience. Sometimes it's spending time with an old friend or family and sometimes its a complete mystery where I'll end up. Either way it is always a good time.

This has reminded me of something I've discovered about myself in the past. I'm more of an extrovert than an introvert. I enjoy being around people, even if they are strangers. Long rides tend to get boring and lonely. Occasionally, as I get close to a destination I get the urge to have someone pick me up. That's what happened on my ride up to DC.

I was really looking forward to seeing my cousin Tim and his wife Susan and my good friend from Camp Starfish, Chris. I also had never been to DC before. I knew that if I stuck to my schedule I would have spent the majority of the weekend riding, then arrived Sunday afternoon/evening, limiting my time to visit and see DC. I struggled with having someone pick me up because I felt like it would be cheating on my ride. I decided that I was okay with it because it is more important to me to spend time with people and in DC, rather than biking solo through VA. I called my friend Chris and he picked me up near Fredericksburg, VA. By the time he picked me up I had bike 25 miles. Here is a picture of me with my bike and gear when he arrived to pick me up. As you can see, I had all of my gear ready to go, including my trailer all folded up.

On my ride up to Fredericksburg I passed through this park. It was really nice. I came upon this road that went straight through a creek. I saw multiple cars driving straight through it. I was concerned about my bike making it, but then discovered a bridge just a little ways down.

Here is the bridge a little ways down.

After crossing the bridge I followed this path through the woods. LEAVES EVERYWHERE! A whole canopy and all over the trail.

When I got to the end of the path I discovered I had just made one big loop and was back to where I started about 30 minutes ago. Wasn't really a big problem. I just coordinated a meeting place with Chris a few more miles down.