June 12, 2016
My way or the Conway
We had the good fortune to have a brisk tailwind for our longest planned mileage day from Moncks Corner to Conway. The tail wind blowing us North was even sweeter knowing that our friends on their way from Maine to Florida were enjoying a head wind. No we are not sadists - it was a hot day and we figured they would enjoy a refreshing breeze.
As it was very hot, Jeanna tried out her homemade full length leg coolers. They worked very well - time and money well spent.
Long experience has taught us that insects cruise at 12 mph. If a critter is buzzing the bike all you have to do to solve the problem is to speed up to around 15 mph. Or so we thought when we were accosted by a horse fly. We were wrong on at least 2 counts. For one, the 12 mph speed limit only applies to light weight bugs like mosquitoes and gnats - this horse fly was in a completely different weight class. For another the same tail wind that was pushing us along was pushing along the horse fly. On top of that the horse fly seemed to be well acquainted with the concept of drafting and rudely jumped into the middle of our pace line.
We sped up from 12 mph to 15 mph assuming the horse fly would be left behind but he had no trouble matching our speed. When we recovered from our astonishment at his burst of speed we broke into a sprint and left both the horse fly and Jeanna and Kerry's tandem behind. A few hundred yards down the road we slowed down to catch our breath and to link back up with the other tandem. The other tandem soon rejoined us - along with the pesky horse fly who had happily drafted up behind the other tandem. Viktoriya started fishing around for the pepper spray that we carry around in case we are chased by dogs. Does pepper spray even work on insects? Can a horse fly sneeze or shed tears? These questions remain unanswered because with a second more sustained sprint we managed to leave behind our 6 legged nemesis.
South Carolina is largely rural.
Today's crops were corn and tobacco.
People love dogs in SC. We saw dogs next to the houses, in the cage in the back of the pickup truck, inside of the gas station, and even in the driver seat.
Jeanna and Kerry made every effort to keep SC roads clean. They lost a small note and we all had to turn around and come back so they can pick up this little piece of paper.
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After so many miles riding back roads the 4 lane approach to Conway on US 171 felt like riding on an interstate. On the outskirts of Conway we got off US 171 and onto a residential street called New Road. This was a welcome relief until New Road turned into an unpaved road. After a mile of bumping along on unpaved washboard New Road deposited us on 4 lane US 501. There was a decent shoulder on 501 which was good because traffic was heavy. One exception was the bridge over the Waccamaw river which had no shoulder. However a friendly driver in a camper followed us over the bridge preventing cars from overtaking us until we made it safely over the bridge.
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