Sweeping with Maura

Today we got to sleep in to 6am, as everyone forgot to set their alarm clocks (some people wanted a 5am wakeup) – but it worked out well for me. As Maura and I were sweep, we let everyone leave before heading out on the route. After 1 mile, we took our first break of the day at Hardee’s (Maura wanted coffee). One of the customers wanted to know if Maura and I were married (we are not). The day started off cool (relatively) but definitely heated up quickly. The sign in Dunlap showed the temperature at 100 degrees. It seems that people along the route do not feed or chain up their dogs, as there were numerous occasions of riders avoiding dogs. A couple of squirts of water stopped some, while other resorted to simply biking faster than they could run. We are staying at another National Guard Armory, and we are enjoying the air conditioning. Tonight was the first night that we prepared our own dinner, and it was a gourmet meal of pasta, tomato sauce, beans and rice. We are living like kings tonight at the Armory sleeping on military issued cots, and I even got to eat my own MRE of chicken tortillas. The group is pretty tired from the ride so we have all just been hanging low this evening and gearing up for the big climb tomorrow!