Day 9

After rising up from Beverly Hills (the name of the city the rv park was in), we headed out of town to get some breakfast.  We rode for about 10 miles and got to a Dunkin Donuts where we stuffed our faces.  It was a good thing, because we wouldn't have too much ahead of us for a while.

The majority of the ride was through the woods.  This part of Florida's main industry was logging.  The trees where systematically planted in a lattice that was very cool to see as we rode by  Rows upon rows and columns upon columns of tall, thin trees seemed to go on forever.  It was a very natural, pine smelling area and was a pleasure to ride through.

We made the average stops.  We stopped at a BBQ place about 10 miles prior to our destination for the evening.  It was some pretty good southern cooking, and right along our path  We got amazing sweet tea there (man this stuff is good down here…. try it out at McDonalds).   Shortly after we headed into Cross City.

Cross city was a charming small town, everything you would expect from a country southern town.  Everyone knew everyone, and we stuck out like sore thumbs… but that's the way we like it.  After securing our motel spot we grabbed some food at a local diner  We got a good meal, and noticed they'd be open early tomorrow for our first triple digit mileage day on the road… we'd be back.

We went out to grab some ice cream after the diner, and saw some of the same folks that were in the diner at the gas station where we got our ice cream.  We got to talking with them for a while.  They were interested in us since we were outsiders, and the whole cross-country bike riding thing…, and they told us a little about what things were like down here  It was cool a cool exchange, and Paul actual got a phone number out of it, ha.

We didn't get to bed as soon as we wanted, surprise surprise, so the start wouldn't be at the break of dawn like we expected we'd need for a 102 mile day.  Either way, we were ready to give it a shot.

Life was good.