Day 31 – The “S”- Just Kidding

Thursday, November 20th

Tallahassee, FL to Bonifay, FL

What a long day!  When we finally settled into our motel in Bonifay for the night (around 7pm) I passed out for a three hour nap, then after the nap, I followed up with about two minutes of work on the bikes, then another 7 1/2 hour nap, which took me all the way to (Friday) morning when suddenly it was time for us to pack up and get back on the road.  Needless to say, I didn’t get anything done on the blog, so I’m writing this on Friday.

Leaving Tallahassee was a pain.  We got out before the morning rush hour, but it traffic began to thicken shortly after we left our motel.  We were off the Southern Tier map routes and without our gps, so we relied on our simple knowledge of the area (as presented by Google Maps) and a general sense of direction (“I know we need to head West…”).  We tackled some unbelievably steep hills hidden away in downtown Tallahassee and wound through the Florida State University campus.  We caught a lot of stares from the college kids, but I don’t know if they were staring the bikes or my magenta tights.

Stressed from the traffic of big-city Tallahassee, we welcomed the less-traveled stretch of Hwy 90 to Quincy.  Plus, it was neat to finally be back on the same roads as our Eastbound route. Unfortunately, we faced a cruel joke:  heading North, from Clearwater to Tallahassee, the wind had been out of the North and Northeast.  That whole time, we were looking forward to a small tailwind component once we turned West to head out of Tallahassee.  Sadly, as we slept in the state’s capitol, the wind shifted overnight, now coming out of the Northwest and West.

So – as the story of our trip goes – we fought a headwind all the way to Quincy, then coming into Quincy, fought hills in a headwind. You can imagine how happy we were for the excuse to stop at Bell and Bates.  Mark saw us milling around and come over to say hi and ask about the trip.  We had Luke paged so we could thank them both again for all their help about three weeks ago when we had to fix my battery rack.  We also stopped by Divine Grace eager for an early lunch, but they weren’t yet open, so, melancholic and a little hungry, we moved on through Quincy.  We got a little lost trying to find CR 628, but in finding our way, we also found the Discolandia Mexican Restaurant (which I really wanted to check out!) and the Gadsen Tomato Company where they pack and distribute tomatoes.  The curbs by the building are literally lined with runaway green tomatoes who escaped the conveyor belt only to wind up ripening in a gutter.

We wrestled a headwind all the way to Gretna, where we rejoined Hwy 90 after a snack break at the Seminole gas station adjacent to the abandoned space which formerly housed the Gretna Post Office.  They had tasty chicken and an outdoor outlet, so we recharged the batteries for a short time while we ate and chatted with almost everyone who came to the station.  Even the owners came out to look at the bikes.  Everyone was amazed by the trip or the bikes, or both, and the old black men were especially interested in discussing recumbent and electric bike options.

On the stretch from Gretna to Chattahoochee we traveled a beautiful region over a fantastic road.  (We later found out that Florida has recently been renovating the entire length of 90, which explains why it’s so smooth, roomy and plesant to ride.)  We still had to push through a headwind, but oh well.

Coming into Chattahoochee we crawled up several loooooong hills leading up to the plateau where the city sits.  While rewarding ourselves with a restroom break and a Nestle Tollhouse Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich (indescribably delicious) at a Chevron station, we talked with several of the station’s patrons about the bikes and the trip.  We spoke with one older black man attracted by the bikes, who had twelve brothers and twelve sisters (all born and raised in Chattahoochee).  While chatting, he told us he was drafted to the Army at 13 because of a mistake on his birth certificate and that he had been stabbed with a sword and shot in WWII.  When Dad commented that he looked too young to have served in WWII, he told us that the skin on his face wasn’t his original skin.  We told him we probably should get back on the road.

Leaving the town, I really enjoyed flying down the monster hill I had to walk up last time we were in Chattahoochee.  It was so long and steep I had to ride the brakes the whole way down to be safe, but I still hit 34 mph.  I can’t imagine what speed I would have been doing without any brakes!

Chattahoochee to Marianna: headwind, then in Marianna: hills, traffic and headwind.  Pushing into Marianna around 2 pm we faced a surprising amount of traffic.  Both of us stressed our bodies (especially my knees and Dad’s ankle) while fighting the traffic and dealing with stopping and starting at lights on hills.  As a side note, Marianna also wins the title for having the Trip’s Most Useless Bike Lane: a pathetic 20 foot segment that dead ends in a curb.  Really, what’s the point of wasting striping tape on that?

We limped the last thirty miles to Bonifay, low on energy and desperate for some good, fresh food (all we had found was a disappointing IGA grocery store in Cottondale).  Our motel was about a mile South of Bonifay, near I10, so we FINALLY got a taste of a tailwind!  That one mile was glorious except for the mouthful of dirt we ate when a semi ran through a gravel patch while passing us.  Gritty, but not the grits I was hungry for.

The day ended pleasantly though.  After we got the bikes into the motel room and got cleaned up, Dad found a great truck stop restaurant with a fantastic cook and uplifting waitstaff.  We finally got some fresh and tasty food!  Then we slept.

Today’s Quick Stats:

Bike              Distance (mi)    Average Speed (mph)     Trip Odometer

MiniWini           105.00                   16.7                           2073.5

Sti(ck/g)          104.00                   16.6                              –

Stampedes: 2

Roadside Pees: 2