Days 41 to 43: August 1 - 3

Day 41: August 1st 37,983 on the odometer

Back to the grind. We are only about an hour away from our destination, but it will not be the exciting ride we just left behind. We get breakfast at Hardees and gas up. The gas here is the cheapest we’ve seen on our entire trip.
The only excitement on our ride today is the trip down Keith’s deep sand driveway. We plan to spend a week visiting here so I’ll have a chance to rest up and do some maintenance. My tires are pretty worn now, at least to the wear marks everywhere. The center of the rear is bald. Still I was happy with their performance and want to order some new HKM’s to replace the ones that served me well. Unfortunately, Avon no longer makes them. I order some Roadmasters instead, but it’ll take a few days for them to get here.
In the meantime, we plan to go visit Jekyll Island for some R&R. By my odometer we only covered 52 miles today, bringing our trip total so far to 9,281 miles. By Ceci’s odometer we have covered closer to 10,000 miles. I am starting to get pretty road weary. My butt still aches.


Day 42: August 2nd 38,035 on the odometer

Ceci really wants to ride the bikes to the island, instead of hitching a ride with her brother’s family. I decide to chance the bald tire so I can ride with her. It’ll be about 400 miles round trip. We take somewhat back roads but they’re still pretty straight. The scenery isn’t particularly scenic, and we pass some areas that smell pretty bad. There is a very pretty suspension bridge as we get to the island though, and the smell of the ocean is far more pleasant than we had been experiencing. It costs $3 each to get on the island, and we head to an older Clarion resort where we have reservations. It seems overpriced to me, but is otherwise OK. The room is pretty nice and a short walk to the beach. The water itself is silty, but not so bad as to keep us out. I bring a few drops back to anoint the bikes. They have now touched the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans on this trip. There isn’t much beach glass but we do find a couple of shark’s teeth.
I fail again to record my mileage, but figure we went a bit over 200 miles today.


Day 43: August 3rd 38,??? on the odometer

Keith, Kim, and Ashley have a suite with a kitchen. I plan on cooking breakfast for us all in their room. Unfortunately, the stove has been deliberately disabled and none of the burners are functional. So much for that plan. Keith is pretty upset considering the money he shelled out for the place, and I don’t blame him.
We spend the day relaxing on the beach and swimming in the pool. I get a bit of a sunburn, but nothing too bad. I doubt it’ll lead to cancer. We find a lot of sand dollars as the tide goes out. This is the first time Ceci and I have been able to find complete sand dollars on a beach. Usually we just find pieces. Unfortunately for us most of what we find is still alive, so we only get a couple of souvenirs. We do find a couple more shark’s teeth. There are a lot of fish jumping in the surf, and there are a few near collisions as we frolic in the waves. Among the gulls and pelicans flying overhead I spy an occasional osprey. This is just what the Dr. ordered. We don’t move the bikes. It is hot outside.