Day 79 Troutville to Vesuvius

We were suprised to find Carleen at 7am by the pavilion equipped with her camera in hand snapping photos of us like we were celebrities! We chatted with her for a bit and were on our way. We were riding down the highway and there went Carleen in her car! She stopped twice down the road to take more photos of us! A bit strange but we just kept riding! The boys went to Burger King for lunch and I just couldn't do it, so I ate a pb&j instead. We rode our bikes over a walking bridge which was a bit rickety but we survived!

We made it into Lexington by the afternoon and decided to take a long break there. We toured Washington and Lee University and walked around the old historic town. We ate some ice cream and enjoyed the beautiful sunny afternoon! We rode the last 20 miles or so with a light sprinkle of rain and pulled into Vesuvius behind Gerthie's Store. We ate some delicious peaches and took some hose showers, played some cards and drifted into dream land!

We had been hearing about the horrors of the climb right after Vesuvius for months now. We met numerous people who said they had feared for their lives on the descent down and were uncontrollaby hitting 45 mph while slamming on their breaks. The same mountain that we had to pedal up! We were told it was about a four mile climb and the steepest on the map. I was worried and definitely have dreamt about it! Another guy we talked to actually crashed on his way down, skidding his elbows pretty bad, so bad that Elbows became his nickname, and had to go to the hospital! Others told us that their rims were so hot they were smoking! Tomorrow we would find out for ourselves!!!

Kristen