Day 6

Mileage: 90
Total mileage: 448

Today was a pretty mellow day. I was on the bike by 7:30 and rode the morning straight through. Little did I know that last night's camp was only two miles from my favorite restaurant in the whole world: The Home Place. It's a fantastic converted farmhouse where they serve all you can eat home-style country food. Before you gasp at how I could miss such an opportunity last night, know that its closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Humongous oversight on macro scale planning, at least not the tragedy it would have been if I had camped right next to it last night and it was open. Picture because it looks awesome.

The only other interesting thing this morning had to do with water. I drank most of the water I brought up from Roanoke last night because it was really windy, but today I planned to fill up in Catawba. Unfortunately, the little I saw of Catawba was all deserted convenience stores and farmhouses, so that wasn't an option. I didn't want to ride the 25 miles to Christiansburg on one bottle (possible, not pleasant) so I decided to ask at one of the houses beside the road. I noped out of the first driveway really quickly after I saw the Rottweiler on their porch, but at the second house no one was home. So I just filled up my bottles with their hose and kept moving. Do what you've got to.

This afternoon I got a brief break in Radford while the local bike shop was repacking my front hub. I got to take a nap which may become a regular event, it felt good getting back on the bike. I'm more comfortable riding at this point than I am walking around in towns.

Starting this afternoon, everywhere I went after Radford I kept getting asked if I was riding the country for MS (multiple sclerosis). I quickly realized that the massive group which was a few days ahead of me in Whitehall was just a couple hours ahead at this point. Apparently they were doing a charity ride for MS. So all afternoon I had to keep explaining that no, I wasn't out here doing something for a cause, I was just trying to fit in a long bike ride before my medical career got started.

With lots of time on my hands, I thought of a decent prank to get back at them. I'm pretty confident I'll pass them tomorrow which means every water stop and restaurant, I'll have been there first, not the other way around. Everywhere I stop, when people ask the usual questions (where are you from, where are you going, why the heck are you doing that? ) I'll give them some off the wall, zany cause, a different one at every place.

Yeah, me and this group are raising money for a research program to find out why kangaroos can't hop backwards.

My group and I are going cross country to raise awareness for ovarian cancer screening in men. Everyone always assumed men couldn't get ovarian cancer without ovaries, so no one's ever studied it before.

So the first guy from that huge group, everywhere he goes, people are going to go 'Hey, after you part of that group going cross country to save the endangered rubeola virus that's being threatened by vaccinations? '

I'm assuming these guys have MS printed on their jerseys which could conveniently stand for marsupial, male screening or measles, depending on the need :)

Can you tell I have a lot of time to think?

In Draper today, I was riding through when a random guy offered me a Gatorade. Turns out that random guy was Andrew from Florida who was painting a mural for a local store and apparently just likes giving Gatorade to TransAm cyclists. We chatted for a while and I took a picture of him with part of the mural, it looks amazing.

Finally, around 8 I got into Wytheville (pronounced withville) and had no idea what to do. I ended up following the signs to the visitors center which took me up a big steep hill. I had no hope of it still being open, but lo and behold when I got to the top of the hill... it was closed. Of course it was, I was there at 8.

But looking around, I noticed a vending machine which scored me a wall outlet, some nearby grass and a porch in case of rain. Score! Looks like I'm sleeping here tonight! Tomorrow will probably be around 70 to 90 miles and I want to get out of here before they open so I don't get in trouble (don't know if I'm allowed to camp here). Looks like I'll need my sleep, G'night!