I risked my life crossing US 1 to get breakfast at Wendy’s. I was trying to get an early start to attain some mileage in the cooler morning. I hit the road by 7:30. About an hour down the road, I came across a car accident. The victims were being attended to and emergency services had been notified. I rolled on but I unfortunately hit the trifecta in the emergency observation parley. The path was close to the road. At one point I followed a local who was out for a ride and he used a parallel road to 1. It was much more pleasant, through a residential area. When I caught up to him he said it was the Old Overseas Highway. Unfortunately the route was short lived. I did zoom in on the GPS to look for similar roads and found some.

  In Ismaldora, I observed a couple with panniers riding in front of me. I stayed on the path and quickly saw another parallel road. I crossed the highway and followed it–another quiet back road with a bike path marked on the road. Why didn’t the East Coast Greenway take me this way?

  I stopped at the busy Midway Cafe for a smoothie and ended up on line with the pannier couple. Jeff and Diane are seasoned bike tourers. They’ve toured all over the world. They’d done the Miami - Key West route a few times. When I mentioned my disappointment with the route, they informed me that it gets better. And they were right.

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  After another mile, the water appeared on both sides of the road. A few bridges were crossed. On one long bridge, a wider shoulder would have been nice. The path utilized the older railroad bridges a few times. The ride opened up and became more interesting. The traffic even seemed more tranquil. Eventually, I rolled into Marathon and had a waterside lunch with my honey in the Fish Island Company. Luckily, we nabbed a hotel. The Bonefish Bay Motel was twice as much as it should have been, but it is spotless and spacious. We were lucky to have nabbed it, but I am paying for my ‘winging it’ style. After 50 miles, I felt better today than yesterday. Either it wasn’t as hot or I’m getting acclimated.