Day 14, Damascus to Council.

Climbing, climbing, and more climbing. It seems lie the hills never end.

There are so many old barns that I wasn't able to take pictures of all of them, some of the best ones were in places where I couldn't stop for a shot.

We stopped at this bridge to watch the water flow. It's simple things like this that sets the mind free.

Lisa spotted this snake in the water. Kind of looks like an eel if you ask me.

Yes, we had rain, but even then, the scenery was awesome. This neat hill was just across a gas station where we made a pit stop.

These were some of the happiest horses I have ever seen. They looked like they wanted to be there.

Down town Mineral Springs. Yep, that's it. The whole town.

I couldn't resist this shot. I love bikes, this one looks like an old sting ray.

These things were growing everywhere. It's not what you think, but if it were, I'd be rich.


An old abandoned water mill. I wonder what it was used for?

Another old barn. I was tempted to go check it out, but I'm afraid of snakes.

Yep, looks like wer're right on track.


Day 14, Damascus to Council. “Entering Coon Country”. 52.48 miles.

We are with out internet tonight, so this will be posted the next time we do. The morning started out wet. It rained lightly almost all night. Damascus is a quiet town. Population less than 1,000. Our camp site at the Methodist Church run hostel is centrally located. Right next to the library. We were thankful for the accommodations, even though we opt. to camping out side.

The rain stopped at about 7:00AM. We slowly got our things together. I packed my things away, and then wiped down the rain fly of the tent. That little micro fiber towel sure comes in handy for chores like this. After loading up the trailers, we headed to a place called “Cowboys” for breakfast. In these parts, biscuits and gravy is a big hit. So I ordered that with some eggs and coffee. They only charged $3.99 plus the coffee. By this time is started raining again, so Lisa and I put on the rain jacket. It was humid to begin with, so having that jacket on was like being in a sauna. The sky started getting pretty dark, and we could see lightning and hear the thunder in the direction we were headed. Since we didn’t have the option of just sitting the weather out, we decided to push on in hopes that the weather would let up. I offered a prayer, asking The Lord for His intervention. He has been good to us so far, and I leave these thins in His Hands. About 2 hours into our ride, the rain stopped, and a little while later, the sun came out. We were on one of the longest and toughest climbs to date, and I was sweating profusely. The humidity felt like it was 150%. The climb lasted about 4 miles, pretty steep for the most part, with dozens of switch backs, most of them hair pins. We broke for lunch about half way up, right next to one of them cool little streams. Since there was nothing for 30 miles, we had to bring our own lunch. We had apple butter sandwiches, grapes that Paula had left us, and some chips left over from the day before. Sounds crude, but you take what you get in situations like these.

If not for the shear beauty of the thickly forested landscape, with cool little streams running at every apex, it would have been one boring hell ride. Traffic was pretty light considering it was Memorial day. That was a good thing, cause these roads are pretty narrow, with no shoulder, and not much room to pass , especially with on coming traffic. Once over the top, we had a cool 2 mile ride down into the valley. We rode along the valley floor for a few miles, stopping every so often to take pictures. We stopped at the community of Rosedale to pick up a few things for dinner and breakfast the next morning. There are no stores or restaurants till the following day when we hit Davenport. When we left Rosedale, the weather started turning for the worse again. To rub insult to injury, we were climbing again. There was more thunder and lightning coming from the direction we were headed, and it started raining again. Worse than earlier. I again offered a word of prayer, and we pushed on. The rain got pretty heavy at times, and by this time it was rush hour, and we were on Interstate 80, a major thoroughfare linking the East coast to the West. We turned on our red blinking tail lights so we would be more visible to cars coming from behind us. We occasionally pulled off the road to allow traffic to pass, especially those big trailer rigs. You can hear those things coming from way off. Although it was only 3:30, with all the cloud cover, it seemed like it was near night fall. I almost considered telling Lisa we should find a place to settle down for the night in hopes that tomorrow would be better, and we could make up some of the lost time. I’m glad I didn’t, cause once we reached the top, we were again treated by one of those long winding descents to the bottom of the valley, where we found the William P. Harris State Park . Our home for the night. Being a holiday, no one was around, so we made our selves at home in one of the covered pavilions. The rain had stopped, the sun came out, and it was wonderful. The place even had electricity, and a cold drinking fountain. The even left the rest rooms open. Tonight, we sleep on the tables and cook our meal on my one canister sterno stove.

Good night everybody, Thanks for all you well wishes and prayers. We really appreciate all the moral support. Aloha, Ted.