As I was washing up, getting ready to head back on the road, I starting talking to the person next to me, Jason, who had just been surfing. I mentioned that I had never been before and was going to ask where would be a good spot to take a day off to try it out, when he offered to take me out for a few tries. Having wanting to try it for so long, I could resist, and took him up on the offer.

I guess his board was a little small for me and not the best board to learn on, but I still had a blast. I was able to catch a few waves and kind of stood up, but only after the wave had almost died away. What a good time though.

For as far as I got, all you really use is your arms, which are something I haven’t used for anything but eating in the last two months, so I’m going to be feeling this tomorrow. But it was definitely worth it. I think when I get back to school I might start swimming laps to get in shape and give this a serious try next summer.

Now its time to shower up again and to get back on the bike, but really with a day spent like this it doesn’t matter how far I get!

Looks like today going to be a rolling day off. I’m doing all the thing I would do on a day off, but still riding, not really worrying about how far I get.

I stopped at a bike shop earlier and put some more air in my tires. Its a bear to get much more than 60 psi with the small hand pump I have, and I can run these tires at 125 psi. Its a real noticeable difference in those 65 pounds. I actually felt taller on the bike after I filled them up.

Then I came to this beach. Its pretty good. Lots of people but not crowded. I washed my shirts and socks in the sink in the bathroom and hung them on my bike to dry. I grabbed some food and went down to the beach.

There are a lot of surfers here. I can easily count 20 in the section in front of me (that’s what the picture is of if you can’t tell, its hard to see how it looks on here). The waves look to be about 4 – 5 feet tall and a few of the kids out there talk them for pretty good rides. Its been fun watching them while I eat. I think if I have the time and the money left when I get to the Keys I’ll spend a day trying it out.

I’m pretty much done eating now so I’m going to go take a shower, WITH SOAP (I did remember to buy a bar of the cheapest soap I could find). Then I’ll keep on riding south. I’ll post back later on how far I get.

Not much to report so far, but I have some time to kill so I figured I’d make a quick post.

The ant situation has died down to a tolerable level. It involved me having to completely empty the trunk bag on the back of my seat, and half of the trailer. On the plus side, my gear has never been so organized. By now I’ve worked out the perfect layout so my gear is as accessible, compact, and safe from rain as possible. There were always a few things out of place but now their all in line.

I’ve gone just over 14 miles this morning, and am now on a 50¢ ferry ride, which seems to have last all of 45 seconds. I swear loading took longer than the actual ride. It just seems kind of silly to have such a short ferry, but I imagine its probably cheaper than to build a bridge that was tall enough to still let ships up the river.

While I was waiting for the ship to arrive, I went across the street to the gas station and got some poptarts and a bigcinnamonn roll. I should definitely be getting enough calories for the morning from that.

And now for my last jumbled thought before I start riding again. There were two decent places to sleep between were I am now and where I slept last night. One was a warehouse type building that was still under construction at 4 miles and the other was a church at 9 miles. the church would have made yesterday another 100 miler but wasn’t nearly as nice as where I stayed (ants aside). Staying were I did was with out a doubt the right decision, especially not knowing what I do know now. I’m slightly ahead ofschedulel as well, or wasat leastt, so I can afford to take slightly shorter days now if it means staying at a more comfortable spot. Staying up so late on the phone probably wasn’t the best idea, but definitely helped raise myspiritss a bit and convinced me once again to go all the way to the Keys, so it was definitely worth it.

OK. Ride!