My back tire was totally worn out. When I took it off it was thin as paper and I am pretty sure I could have pushed my thumbnail through it. I called around and found a bike store about 40 miles from where we are camped and John, Richard, and I drove there this morning and got two new tires and some other bike stuff as well. I have not had a flat and hopefully the streak continues with these new tires. I was feeling bad because I was going to miss the National NCAA Men’s basketball game between North Carolina and Villinova. I Googled Sports Bars and a restaurant 2 miles away was showing the game so I was going to walk up there and watch it, but then Mary Ann checked with the guy who runs the campground if there was a place I could watch it, and he came driving up in his golf cart with a coaxial cable and a TV set. We are going to set it up on the picnic table and watch from my lawn chair. Three guys in their mid 50’s who left San Diego February 29th, the day after we did pulled in on their bicycles this afternoon into the campground we are in. We had a nice time chatting with them and comparing adventures. Today was a super nice rest day, driving to the bike store, working on the bicycles, taking a nap, eating, reading, and then tonight watching a great basketball game. Tomorrow we are going to ride 74 miles and be in Villa Platte, Louisiana. The weather is forcast to be nice.

We are finally out of Texas! We were almost 2 weeks biking through that huge State. We are camped about 20 miles from this sign in a town called DeRidder.  Everybody talks with a very strong Southern accent, and everybody calls me “Sir”.  The roads are mostly flat and the biking is quite relaxed in terms of effort. We are right at 2,000 miles of biking since the start in San Diego and we have averaged 69 miles a day. We are scheduled to land in Portland April 27th so we are just a shade over 3 weeks until done. We took today, Sunday off and rested up. We attended 1st Baptist Church of DeRidder, and had a wonderful time worshipping the Lord.   Because of the tough week we had last week and Richards wounds from his wreck we are going to take tomorrow off as well. I was checking my bicycle tires today and they are totally worn out. The back tire especially feels about as thick as a piece of paper, and it is amazing that I have had zero flats. Tomorrow We are going to drive to Lake Charles about 30 minutes from here where there is a bike store and buy some new tires for my bike and new bike shorts for Richard in that his got destroyed from his slide on the pavement. Days like today and tomorrow where we mostly just sit in camp I do a lot of reading and writing, and enjoy it very much. The weather is beautiful and is supposed to be for the next week. Sorry about all the rain in Oregon!

We had our first accident. The roads often have “rumble strips” on them. Those indentations put into the asphalt when the road is built to warn drivers that they are about to run off the road so stop texting and pay attention. They are a major enemy of bicycle riders. It only takes a few seconds of riding on those things with a bicycle to cause you to lose all self control over what you think and what comes out of your mouth,  more than a few seconds I am convinced would destroy your bike and your anotomy or at least do great harm. So you avoid those terrible, aweful things with great attentiveness. When there are guard rails on the road because you are on a bridge or near a bank the rumble strips stop, because obviously they don’t need them. If you are riding on the inside of the rumble strips, that is between the rumble strip and the dirt, and a guard rail is coming there is usually a one foot space to ride your bike on to transition from the inside of the rumble strips to the road side of the guard rail, and because the rumble strips are inline with the guard rail it requires a little S turn to make this transition.  If you are riding over 10 mph it is a bit tricky making the turn. Me being a chicken when it comes to maneuvering my bicycle slow down to about 5 mph to make the turn or I just grit my teeth and run over the rumble strips and move to the outside of them. We had just such an encounter 8 miles from camp yesterday.  I was “drafting” behind John and because we were cruising along at about 15 mph I endured the rumble strips instead of following John’s deft maneuvering of the S turn. Richard was “drafting” behind me and bevades he didn’t  have a clear view of the end of the guard rail around my skinny body hooked  the bottom of his riding shorts on the edge of the guard rail. The result was like one of those steers getting roped at a rodeo, he came to an abrupt stop, and bicycle and rider ended up in a heap on the ground sliding along the pavement. I heard him yell and heard the bike hit the guard rail and looked in my rear view mirror. My first thought was , ” he is dead”. I stopped and got my bike lifted over the guard rail out of traffic and looked back and Richard was up on his feet leaning on the guard rail, and I thought “Thank You Jesus”, but I was sure that he was going to need a ride in an ambulance. But all he ended up with was some very painful “road rash”. He managed to ride his bike a few miles toward camp before the ladies came and picked him up. We all had a good time laughing at him in camp as he “squealed” while his wife cleaned the wounds and bandaged him up. Darn rumble strips, I hate those things.

At 4 am I woke up to loud thunder and lots of lightening flashes and then rain falling on our tent.  My thought was, “Oh great, we get to ride in the rain today, I hate riding in the rain”. Then I rolled over in my sleeping bag and went back to sleep. At 6 am I got up gathered all my cloths and stuff and went to the shower room, showered and put on my bicycling cloths including my rain coat and rain pants. After eating the pancake and drinking the coffee Patty fixed for me we were off on our bicycles for the day. It wasn’t very long before I decided that I didn’t need the rain gear and took it off and tied it on the pack behind my seat. We rode 72 miles today and it was mostly flat and mostly straight, fairly cool, and no rain all day. There were lots of yellow pine trees, oak trees, green fields with nice fences with various kinds of beef cattle and horses and other livestock. Because the day was easier and even a bit boring it was easy to think, ponder, and meditate about stuff as I rode along on my bicycle at 12 to 14 mph. One of the regular thoughts is “why am I doing this?” It is funny how really illusive understanding our own motive can be.  Sometimes I think I am just an old man trying to hang on in a weird, dumb way  to his macho youth, then as I think about that I think, ” I am sure that motive would not be strong enough, long enough to do this”. One thing I know for sure is that I am drawn to do things that are a challenge, and are hard, very hard.  Why? I am this way because God made me like this. I don’t know for sure, but I think He made everyone like this. Why? God’s main goal in my life now is to have me grow to become more and more like Him in character.  Hard, very hard challenges are great tools to grow in character as we conquer them.  My physical health also is one of the motives, as well as my mental and emotional health especially as I Pastor people for God. We have 23 days left before we head home, I think I will finish this and ride in the rain if I have to. Tomorrow we are riding 85 miles and will leave Texas finally and camp in Louisiana. By the way, many people opt out of doing challenging things in their life because it is hard.

The bicycle shoes we wear have little metal things on the bottom that fasten onto the pedal of the bicycle. They keep your feet from moving around on the pedal and they allow you to pull up on the pedal as well as push down, a very handy devise. You free your shoe from the pedal by twisting your foot and it causes the release. Sometimes if you forget to do the little release thing when you come to a stop you will just fall over because you can’t get your foot free to put on the ground. I have fallen over on numerous occasions, and it is always a plus if no one sees me. One time I was riding along on a trip and I saw a bungee cord laying on the ground so I stopped to get it but ai was so focused on getting the bungee cord that I forgot all about disconnecting, and I fell right over. As I lay there on the ground I thought “well, at least no one saw me”, then I looked over to the other side of the road and saw an older couple sitting in a pickup laughing hysterically. Yesterday on our ride we had to cross a major highway with lots of traffic. John and I crossed over first and then Richard headed across, and as he got to our side he hit the rumble strip and lost his balance and went to put his foot down but was still locked in and over he went.  We helped him up and got the bike up, and then I asked Richard if he would mind laying back down under his bike so I could take his picture for my blog, and then started laughing hysterically, I couldn’t help it. He wouldn’t pose for my picture . This morning as we took off we were on grass where we had camped, and it was hard to get rolling so I shifted down into the lowest gear and the chain came off. I instantly lost all forward movement and over I went. You guessed it, Richard and John both started laughing and Richard asked if I would lay back down so he could take my picture. Our wives were all very concerned about whether I was hurt and were not happy with the way we laughed at each other at times like this. A guy thing I guess. If Richard or John fall over again I will get a picture quick before they can get up, and I will put it on my blog for you to see,  then I will laugh. We rode 87 miles today in very nice weather and are camped at a nice campground at New Waverly, Texas. Tomorrow we are scheduled to ride 72 miles.