Well we made it to Arkansas safe and sound after a somewhat treacherous ride today. It began with an 8-mile ride out to the I-55 bridge across the Mississippi River. It is obviously incredibly dangerous to ride across an interstate bridge with no shoulder over a river, so we had a interesting path across the Arkansas state line...
We walked up some steps under the bridge and made our way to a sidewalk that is covered in debris and broken glass. For this reason we had to carry our bicycles. I suppose it was a "walk a mile in someone else's shoes" situation because our bikes carry us around all the time, and we literally walked a mile with our bikes on our backs. Let me tell you, it was not fun. But we did get to see our first real state sign and take some pictures, even with the semis flying by us like freight trains. We had to meet up with the van and trailer on the other side to be escorted onto the interstate for a mile, so there was a bit of waiting around. It was a much longer morning than usual, for sure. We survived the interstate and safely entered Arkansas to begin a 65 mile ride on ONE ROAD. We also had a pretty strong headwind which took away from how blissfully flat the terrain was. The road wasn't in great repair either, lots of potholes and bumps and debris, so it was just kind of a rough ride all around. I rode with Myles, Dave, and Laem the whole day though, and we always find ways to make the time pass (for instance, pictures of Myles and Dave holding hands).
At lunch we were really excited to find leftover pasta and everybody ate it up. I immediately regretted that decision about a mile after lunch when I felt heavy and miserable and it was SO HOT outside. We found a gas station about 10 miles down the road in Forrest City and the people there were really interested in what we were doing, so it was cool to chill out for a while in the shade and chat with the locals. I also had a Sprite and my stomach felt much better. It was a hot, bumpy ride the rest of the way into Brinkley, but we arrived to a glorious spread of fruit and veggie trays with dip, chips, crackers and hummus, and even some candy (post-ride snickers = bank). When a host takes care of us like that it totally washes away the pain of a hard ride. We thought we were going to have to make our own dinner, but then a guy passing the church saw our trailer and started talking to our leaders and offered to buy us all pizza. Amazing.
It's Thursday so we had family meeting tonight, and we conference-called Tri-Sean in so he could hear our highs and lows. It was pretty cool to still have him kind of around for that. Sean: We definitely all miss you and hope to have you back! After dinner was chill/bike maintenance time and now here we are. Tomorrow we head to Little Rock, the capitol of the Natural State, and we will have a build day there so we're all pretty excited to get another break so soon :) Here's hoping for a tailwind and nice roads to make those flats count while we can.
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