Nuclear

Today's ride was 18.4 miles, and this is the only picture I took. It was not the most scenic ride, but hey, we still get in shape and get a tan no matter what the view!

This spooky thing sits between Harris Lake and Jordan Lake, and they say there aren't any 3-eyed fish in either of them, but I don't know about that. It was really spooky.

This part of the ride was pretty tough. Lots of steep hills and no pavement - not exactly what we are used to! It was the prettiest part too, though, and the shade felt good! Our ride today was just over 21 miles.

Tobacco barns are quite common here, but they are usually made of wood. This one hadn't been used in a long time, apparently, because the tree you see at the top was growing right up through the barn! I think the color of the stones used to build are are pretty interesting too.

This is a close-up of the tobacco flower. I wish I could upload the way it smells!

We rode through miles of these beautiful plants, not knowing what they were until a nice lady who owned a big field of them told us they were tobacco plants. We thought that's what they might have been, but the pretty flowers and strong pleasant scent confused us. :)

We live close to the famous Cape Fear River and today we got to see it for the first time from the overlook point at Raven Rock State Park. We did a 2 mile loop hike there after our bike ride.

We've put many, many miles on our bicycles since we got them last year, and neither of us had ever gotten a flat tire... today we both got one!!! We think it may have been Izzi working in our lives, because it brought us to a family who needed a little help too.When my front tire popped it was so loud I screamed! This horse heard me. :) We hid the bikes in the bushes and started walking when a nice, but very poor mother and her three children gave us a ride in a car that barely ran. They refused our offer of a few dollars for gas, so after we had retrieved the bikes, we drove by their house and put $20 in their mail box. They were outside, and again tried to stop us from paying them, but it was too late! We could see the smiles on their faces as we pulled away waving, happy to be on our way home. :) We always enjoy our rides, but this one was especially nice. Without the kindness we received from these strangers, it would have been a very, very long walk on a very, very hot day for us!

There were flash flood warnings in our county and in the surrounding counties, but we decided to brave the rain and go for our ride anyway. Our bikes got really dirty and so did we, but we are glad we went and we will definately be riding this trail more in the future.

Here's Ken loading the bikes after our rainy 14 mile ride on the American Tobacco Rail Trail. It was really nice to not have to worry about the cars, and we didn't mind the rain at all. In fact, it felt nice!

Home Sweet Home

This is our little historic house. It's cozy and comfortable, has a creek running behind it, and is just one house away from a beautiful park. We just love the HUGE trees all around us!

Here's Ken fixing his bike shortly before take-off. Notice the new seats? Not cool at all, but had to be done. :)

Here we are about half way through today's 25 mile bike ride. It was TOUGH! The temp was 94.5 when we finally made it back to the boat ramp where we had parked the truck. We stopped once to jump in the lake!

San-Lee Park

This was taken at San-Lee Park, one of our favorite places to hike, fish, and camp out.

Jen Again

Here's another one.

Jen

Here is a picture of Jen - in piggy tails!

Ken and our bikes at Jordan Lake

Today we did 17 miles around the Jordan Lake area. It was the best ride so far. Very little traffic and great views of both the lake and the Deep River, which is part of the Cape Fear River Basin. We also found a Railroad museum on the way and learned there is a rail trail nearby. We didn't take it today but will on a future ride.