Sunday, October 30, 2016

Oct 30th, No Wind, Head Wind, Cross Wind and Tail Wind

Last night we went to bed with some very conflicting weather reports. One set of reports predicted that we would be waking to the sound of rain on our tents and another set said partly cloudy with rain in the afternoon. It turned out the second one was more correct.

When I woke up in the morning it was the warmest morning so far, which is to say, it was uncomfortably chilly. Looking up at the sky, there where large thin high attitude clouds. After breakfast, we hit the road. The temperature was a comfortable 54 F. I was wearing my blue rain jacket because I still had not decided if rain was in the offering. The air was calm. The route was going to be a stair step pattern north then east, followed by more north then east for a couple of repetitions during the day.

The distance was 140 km (87 miles) with the lunch stop at 80 km. So I divided up the day into 20 km (12.4 mile) segments. First stop was a gas station, about the only structure between the the beginning and the lunch. The next stop (40 km) would be 1/2 of a peanut and butter sandwich that I made at breakfast and at 60 km the other 1/2 then 80 km would be lunch. It all worked out all right. The clouds started to break up as well and the day become warmer and sunnier.

In the late morning the winds started to kick up, sometimes pretty strongly. The final 3 or 4 kilometers into lunch was heading North, almost directly into the wind. I think I got to lunch at 11:30 had an egg salad sandwich and several oranges.

After lunch we continued into the head wind but after several kilometers, the road started to bend toward the East and the head wind became a cross wind. Sometimes almost blowing me into the traffic. After a while the road bent even more so that occasional the wind became a direct tail wind. Several times during the afternoon my cycle computer was reporting 40+ kph (25 mph) as I zipped up and down the rolling road.

The final stop on the ride was at the Billabong Roadhouse (about 28 km)  from the end. It was hot and dry at this point and I think that almost all the riders stopped a this location on there way into town. I had a lemon soda and a magnum ice cream bar before getting back on the road. I'm not sure what time it was, but the final 28 km must have taken me about an hour or so to get to the hotel. We have a rest day tomorrow, so TDA has set up up in a motel for the evening.

After arriving, I dried the tent on a fence in the hot dry afternoon sun. It only took 5 minutes to dry the morning dew from the tents. Once most of us got in, plans were made for dinner.

At 5:30 PM the predicted rain showers occurred. It's now 9:45 PM and I can hear the rain pelting the motel's windows. I'm glad that I'm indoors this evening and not in my tent. I wonder what the weather will be Tuesday when we get back on the road. We'll see....

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Happy Riding

Brian


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