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Alexander City AL to Columbus GA – 86.54 miles – 5146 ft climbing

As has been typical for this trip, the weather forecast was way off once again. Originally calling for showers after 2 pm, the rain started well before dawn. The worst of it was over by 7:30 am, so I decided to venture out in the light drizzle to try to get an early start on the wacko’s filling up the highway on the way to the Auburn football game.

The weather stayed cool throughout the day. The high for the day was at the time I left the motel. My rain jacket provided just enough warmth to keep me comfortable without sweating for the whole duration of the ride as these before and after photos can attest.

Our motel in Alexander City was full of Auburn fans. They were just some of the contingent that I would have to deal with on the highway. Although most of the drivers were willing to give me a break in the rain, there are always enough imbeciles to make things tense.

Fortunately, I only had a little over 3 miles of no shoulder riding under such conditions. With the early start, traffic was light enough to make it manageable. I did pull off several times just to play it safe.

The rain was not really much of an issue. Rather it was the road spray that got my feet and seat soaked for most of the ride. When I saw the first dry patch of road past the midway mark (around 11 am), my feet started to dry out a little bit. I now really appreciate how much the neoprene booties saved me from the road spray on the previous wet days.

The storm front never really disappeared. The rain patches just got spotty rather than being a continuous front. I had occasional sprinkles during the ride, but only once had to cover the camera back up. Still, there was not much different on this stage from the previous few stages with respect to scenery. The hills were far gentler, so there was not much effort or strain on the knees. This also meant that I could get a decent roll even in the wet conditions, since I never picked up that much speed due to much more gradual slopes.

Last night, I once again spent most of my time planning a new route away from the main highway. After dire warnings from Karen's antique store friends and from nephew Brian who hails from Auburn, I came up with a completely different route that kept me on quiet county roads far north of my previous planned route.

My new route only added 1.5 miles to the total distance, so this re-route was a no brainer. Over the 5 total miles on the main highway (US 280), perhaps 300 vehicles passed me. Once I got off the highway, I had 30 miles on the backroads until the next town of La Fayette. I had 10 cars pass me during that stretch. Traffic picked up a bit after that, but never to the point where I felt uncomfortable.

Since the storm had come through early, the winds shifted from the southeast to the northwest. This meant I had a generous 10+ mph tailwind most of the time instead of a headwind once again. Combined with the gentle rolling hills, I really did not need to expend much effort on this stage.

Once crossing over into Georgia, I still had about 35 miles left. I called Karen with my progress update, since she had no map of my re-route course. I also got a chance to talk to Brian (see photo). The Georgia terrain was pretty much the same as in Alabama. The gentler slopes meant more grazing land, so cattle were one again a common sight along the route, as the pastures were tucked in amidst the forests.

One down side to the re-routing was that I could not join Karen and Brian for lunch in Auburn or get to ride through the campus as planned. Since tomorrow is my last scheduled day off, there is still a chance that I may get to see Brian tomorrow.

Calera AL to Alexander City AL – 72.24 miles – 4524 ft climbing

Last night, Karen and I did some necessary maintenance on the hydration unit to thoroughly clean out the tube and reservoir. Karen came up with a brilliant makeshift swab by sewing some fabric onto the mid-point of a long piece of dental floss that we passed back and forth to get all the grodies out.

The weather forecast called for 15 mph headwind and cloudy all day. We were all packed and I was ready to go when a light mist started coming down. I ducked under the canopy of the motel and donned my rain jacket and baseball cap before setting off. I really needed the jacket more for better visibility. I also used the rear blinky light.

I pulled off the road a half dozen times or so to let trucks or long lines of vehicles pass me. After about ten miles, I reached the town of Columbiana. From this point on, I would be on quieter roads. This worked out well since the jacket was getting uncomfortably hot by then.

I crossed the river around the 30 mile mark and called Karen from Childersburg to give her the green light to be on her way. I then worked my way through residential roads connecting Childersburg and the town to its southeast, called Sylacauga.

After that, it was into hill country on the outskirts of the Talladega National Forest.

Once out of the hills, I passed by a cemetery, where I stopped and chatted with Gabriel who was setting up the casket lowering device invented by grandpa Cecil. I just had to get a photo of that. Gabriel also gave me some tips on the road conditions that came in handy.

This was a great ride today. Although I had to deal with the misting for the first 10 miles and then again in the hills, it was never a hindrance. The switch to the Scattante bicycle was a great choice. I was able to attack the hills far more aggressively and make mince meat of them in comparison to yesterday. I barely noticed the stiff headwinds in the second half of the trip. I am attributing this to the reduced rolling resistance of the 23mm versus the 28mm on the Co-Motion. I had just about the same amount of climbing as yesterday (although over 20% more miles). What a difference between the two rides!

Tuscaloosa AL to Calera AL – 59.18 miles – 4639 ft climbing

The weather forecast overnight changed and the rains came before dawn. The radar showed that things should clear up by 8 am, so once again the start of the ride was delayed until about an hour after sunrise.

I started with a bounce in my step, ready to go after waiting out the rain. That bounce was long gone by the end of the ride. This was a very pleasant, but challenging route. There were lots and lots of hills. The problem was that I could not take advantage of most of the descents since I was braking at first for the slick surface conditions. Then I was breaking on descents for poor road surfaces. Finally, I was braking for rolling off the road when on the state highway segment to let the big rig trucks pass. Since visibility was restricted due to so many hills, I played nice with the truck traffic, which played nice with me as well.

This route was again mostly through heavily wooded terrain. The ride started out on the residential streets of Tuscaloosa. All the planning I did for an alternate route was for naught since it depended on crossing open field at one point or another. With the heavy pre-dawn rain, soggy conditions pretty much rules out that option. The fallback to the main arteries worked quite well. I think I just lucked out making my runs in the breaks in traffic flow. When I did get back on my alternate route, I discovered a gated road that I had to ride about 20 yards on soggy grass to circumvent through a pedestrian break in the fence.

Everything seemed to be working great traffic-wise. When I hit the first state highway, I once again caught a break in the traffic and ducked into a cemetery just before a string of trucks rumbled by. I thus avoided all of that road spray and easily maneuvered through the paved roads of the cemetery based on my aerial view based tracks programmed into my GPS.

Once on the quiet roads on the outskirts of Tuscaloosa, there was only a handful of cars to deal with so I could pick my line on the road to avoid puddles and rough surface. There was still evidence of the handiwork of the utilities with a dramatically pruned pair of evergreens to make way for the utility wires.

The day progressively improved. I saw the first glimmer of sunlight by 10 am and by 11 am most of the road surface was dry.

I had planned an alternate route that would add one mile, but lots more climbing as an alternative to the state route. My muscles were mush by that point so I opted to take the 3 mile stretch on state highway 25. This ended up being a good choice for me. The traffic was extremely well behaved and patient as I was climbing a hill and I returned the favor by getting off the road when I saw a string of vehicles approaching in my mirror. The shoulder side pause gave me a chance to catch my breath anyway.

When I reached the final leg along state route 70, I got a flat tire. I tried to just charge it up with the CO2 cartridge, but to no avail. I needed to make a tube change for the last 2 miles. This was a fitting end where my bicycle, just like me, did not have quite enough gas to make it all the way in to the motel.

The ride was only 59 miles, but mile for mile, it had the second most intensive climbing. Only the Kingman to Seligman stage was worse. And I really felt gassed on that one. Today, I was winded, but still not drained. The long miles day after day have been taking their toll on my quads and knees. Things don’t look any better for the next two days. The wind will again be in my face for most of the day tomorrow, but it will be much stronger, at 12 mph rather than the 7 mph today.

This evening the frustrations continued. Karen and I walked out on an annoying and unattentive waiter. We then bought dinner at Walmart with some other groceries, but the checkout person failed to give us all our bags and we had to go back. After dinner in out room, Karen discovered that my fixed tire was completely flat again. I gave up on the tire and replaced it. I will look at it again after the trek is over.

Columbus MS to Tuscaloosa AL – 70.17 miles – 3542 ft climbing

Good weather. Good roads. Good scenery.

I dressed in crimson to match the changing tide from cool and wet to warm and dry. The entire day was rather relaxed as we slept in until 5:45. I was planning a departure as late as 9 am, but actually hit the road at precisely 8 am instead, since there was nothing more to do and the weather was fine the way it was.

The National Weather Service had a dense fog advisory that ended at 10 am, but I could see no evidence of it at all from the motel. I only saw one remnant of the fog early on in the ride, but it really did not affect visibility. I think the sun burned if off much faster than anticipated, since the forecast also called for a cloudy morning.

After about 10 miles into the ride I crossed the state line into Alabama. This classic looking welcome sign was surrounded by a trailer park – quite a clash of styles.

I reworked the route to stay off the main highway as much as possible, thus reducing the distance from about 9 miles to 5 miles. This was at the cost of 2 additional miles and probably quite a few more hills. Much of the terrain was forested. There were many spots where the surface was still damp, but this was not really a factor. The cracks in the road at times were the biggest hindrance. I had to stop once on a downhill roll to pick up my pepper spay canister which bounced out of the handlebar bag side pocket.

Overall, the dogs have been well behaved. I start a rolling chorus of barking as I pass through the sparsely situated homes. Perhaps a dozen or so dogs actually chased me today as they go yelping at my feet, but these are typically the annoying little ones that pose no threat in the first place.

There was one coy old coot today that sauntered down the street towards me as if casually crossing the road, but then lunged at me as I passed by. Again, it was all bark and no bite though. All told, there was only one occasion several days ago where a dog endangered itself by getting too close to my front wheel and crashing underneath it.

Tupelo MS to Columbus MS – 73.90 miles – 2563 ft climbing

After yesterday’s ride and the forecast for rain all day, I went back to the drawing board and completely reworked my planned route for the day. The changes added 5 miles and it worked perfectly. The roads were wet and the rain came down in a steady drizzle, but after 4 hours the rain tapered off and the last 3 hours were on wet roads but free of any additional precipitation. The skies looked threatening the whole time, but fortunately nothing came of it.

The day started out reviewing my route in Google Earth and Bing’s birds-eye view to make sure the road surface was paved. I caught one error from last night and made a mental note. Other than that the route was just about ideal regarding road surface and traffic.

I downed a couple of bottles of Boost which has to be zapped to unfreeze them from being in a too-cold refrigerator. I debated holding off for a break in the rain, but after studying the radar, I concluded that the best time to leave was at daybreak once again. I actually waited about 20 minutes since it was so dark at sunrise. Also, with the additional route checking, I was running a bit behind anyway and decided not to rush things. Karen took care of the loading the bags into the car to move things along.

With my zip lock baggie in place, I took a few opportune photos when trees sheltered me from the rain.

An indication of how well the route worked out was demonstrated by the sign in the photo below indicating that no trucks were allowed.

I still had to dodge around street puddles frequently, but there was so little traffic that this was no distraction. In fact, the ride was quite enjoyable in spite of the drizzle.

The scene below shows the bleak backdrop when the rain was at it heaviest. It was at this point that I turned onto Mississippi Route 6 where a cyclist had been killed a couple of months ago.

I took every opportunity possible to keep on the least traveled roads and so when I reached the town of Amory, I had a several mile respite from Route 6.

When I merged back onto Route 6, I had about 7 more miles to cover. I gutted it out and started counting cars. There were exactly 50 vehicles that passed me over that stretch. The whole trip there were only a handful of 18 wheelers. With a modest shoulder without ruts, I was in the safest conditions possible. Neverthess, it was still quite stressful. Once I was clear of this highway, I called Karen to give her a progress update and let here know there were only 30 miles to go.

The rest of the route was extremely peaceful. My clothes were drying out and the traffic was well behaved. The cars were infrequent, but common enough that I couldn’t just meander all over the road without checking my mirror often.

I arrived in Columbus before the rains picked up again. My strategy worked as planned. Before departing Tupelo, I spotted a likely break in the radar storm patterns and barely made it to the motel in Columbus before the next cloudburst.

Karen also reached a milestone by finishing up her applique blocks that she started at the beginning of this trip.

Batesville MS to Tupelo MS – 93.53 miles – 4529 ft climbing

After the harrowing 25 miles or so on Mississippi highways, I decided to reduce my chances for being road kill. Upon rising, I planned alternative routes that added about 6 miles for the day, but reduced the amount of miles on the highway of death from 20 to 7. Believe me, every additional mile was worth it, even if the roads were dicey rough at times.

Starting out at the crack of dawn, I thought I would traverse the 20 miles to Oxford (home of Ole Miss – University of Mississippi) while traffic was still relatively light. What I didn’t count on were the inbred hillbillies with IQs too low to register on any tests. Putting them behind an 18 wheeler is a recipe for terrorizing cyclists.

The best analogy I can give to relate the experience is to imagine the shot up signs so common through Texas and Oklahoma. The vehicles just can resist taking target practice on something so nice and bright yellow – about the same color yellow as my windbreaker.

My first experience with this was when a lone truck approached from behind. Rather than getting over, I watched in horror as it angled as close to me as it possibly could, then roared by, blasting its horn at the opportune time for maximum decibels in my ear and optimum shock value. This happened on numerous occasions during the day.

One puny little sedan even tried the same tactic with great effect. I never figured it would be so daring as it took me by surprised and forced me off the road after crossing the devilish road ruts that made mincemeat of my rear tube as it blew out. The damn ruts are on many of the highways. Today I had to deal with it on the 4 lane divided highway of death out of Batesville and again on the two lane highway through the Holly Springs National Forest as shown below.

What makes the whole route today so disturbing is that you never know when that terrorist will come up from behind. Even roads that seemed safe for miles and miles can suddenly turn vicious. I equate it to a quiet creek that turns into a raging torrent during a flash flood. A half dozen trucks will just appear when none were on the road for the entire length up until then.

There was one incident of scoring one for the good guys. I was cresting a hill and watching three vehicles racing from behind and overtake me. The first one blew by me closely, but nowhere near as close as those devilish trucks. The pickup truck that followed gave me the full lane. The trailing vehicle, which apparently the lead car did not see, was a county sheriff who immediately put on its lights and chased down and pulled over the first car. It serves him right.

Most of the time today I had to constantly monitor the traffic behind me. My game plan was to make a strategic exit onto the shoulderless side of the road when seeing approaching traffic in front and an approaching truck from behind.

There were also long stretches when I just eased back and pedaled at a leisurely pace through the quiet rural woods and residential areas. Those times kept me sane and composed from the adrenaline rush of the early morning encounters with the devil.