Mileage - 39.8; Total Mileage - 39.8 miles
Margarita Count - 2
Today started out cold at about 48 degrees. By the time we ate some breakfast and packed up camp we rolled out about 9:30am. It was cool enough that I wore my leggings, bolero, gloves, and rain jacket. I was plenty warm and wound up shedding the extra layers as the sun warmed up the day. We had a mix of blue sunny skies, partly cloudy, and very cloudy. It was cool on and off all day, and there were a couple of times I almost pulled out another layer!
The wind was blowing out of the north-northwest today - sometimes pretty strong. It didn't bother us much because we were mostly traveling east to Toledo Bend Reservoir and had piney woods along the road that helped shield us from the worst of it.
We got about 6 miles of warm-up in this morning before we got the first real hill. It wasn't too bad because it had a stair step about halfway up that let us catch a quick breath before continuing on. I think we climbed the same 50 - 70 feet all day. It was just up and down all day.
We were on Recreational Road 255 for most of the day (about 30 miles). If you live in Texas and don't know about Recreational Roads it is interesting. Wikipedia has a good write up on it. it was a pretty good road and traffic was fairly light most of the day. There are very few homes or businesses along the road. The road going up most of the hills widened to two lanes and then merged back to one lane on the down-hill side. It sure helped the cars since we were slow climbing the hills. We could see the road widening ahead and knew we were going to climb again!
We knew we wouldn't have any services today for the first 34 miles and packed extra snacks to get us to a restaurant or store. I had found the Buzzard's Roost on Google when planning this trip and knew it was the only restaurant we would see today. We rolled in at 1:45pm and saw the sign that said they were only open until 2pm on Sunday. I quickly went inside to find out if they were still serving and they graciously said yes. They had a sign inside that said, "Many have eaten here - few have died!" We had a very good, quick lunch and got out of their way so they could close. Boy did that food taste good!
Today's ride had the most climbing for the tour and so we are feeling good tonight having that out of the way. I'm sure there will be a few muscles that take a little to get moving in the morning, but that will work itself out as we get going.
Right before we got to camp today, we crossed over into Louisiana. The only store we passed this afternoon was in another Texas dry county so there was no addition to the margarita count today. Maybe I'll have more luck tomorrow in Louisiana.
Just as we were pulling into South Toledo Bend State Park, we hear a car honking and it is Reba in her van. It was so good to see her! She plans to ride out for a little while with us in the morning and then come back to the park and get her van. She'll meet us again tomorrow afternoon at camp and we can continue reminiscing about bygone days 😚.
The wind continues to blow tonight and we are hoping it will die down in the morning some as we start heading north along the eastern shore of Toledo Bend Reservoir.
We're both tired and will sleep well tonight. That's one of the benefits of touring -you always sleep good!
Always a good nights sleep.
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