My Inner Monologue Becomes Eighty Percent Swearing

January 23, 2016

Kristen is the first one out of the tent in the morning.

"It's pretty damn cold," she says. "The wind hurts my eyeballs."

She's not kidding. It isn't cold enough to snow but it feels that way. The wind blows hard from the west-northwest and makes little howling sounds as it rushes through the pine boughs above our heads.

Then it turns out I'm wrong. It is cold enough to snow. We know this for sure because ten minutes down the road it starts snowing. They're tiny flakes that don't stick, but there's no doubt it's snow. I can't believe it. Two days ago it was seventy degrees.

We're prepared for the cold. We knew it could be like this down here in January, so we have the hats and pants and windproof gloves to deal with it. And when we're protected from the wind we're great; not warm all over but not shivering either. It's the heavy gusts shooting across the landscape in frigid blasts one after another after another that get us.

The weather forecast says it'll be like this all day. Well fuck you forecast and fuck you weather. From the side of the road we book a cheap motel room in the closest town and celebrate like we've won the lottery.

"Six-point-two miles to glory!" I call out.

It takes us more than an hour to get there. Flags stand straight out from wind that seems like it's trying to push us back to Florida. First we struggle to break eight miles per hour on flat ground. Then seven. Then down to six, five, and four. Every exhale creates a cloud of white that disappears behind me in an instant. It feels like I'm riding in a freezer. My inner monologue becomes eighty percent swearing.

When we reach Waycross – birthplace of Burt Reynolds and home to every fast food and low-end motel chain in America – the red LED lights of a reader board tell us it's thirty-five degrees. With the wind gusting past thirty miles per hour it feels like twenty-five. By the time we pull the bikes beneath the awning in front of the Super 8 we're all pink cheeks and runny noses. But once the lock clicks behind us none of it matters. We shower, order a pizza for each of us, and drink the Dos Equis left over from last night. We crank the heater up to its highest setting. Gear flies into every corner of the room. We read and write and blast music. We get weird and happy and giddy, just like last night.

This is what adventure does to us. I hope that's always true.

We hear the wind gusts howling outside all afternoon and into the evening. We leave our room only once, late in the evening, to grab some stove fuel at the hardware store across the parking lot. We're back in five minutes and in our underwear again within thirty seconds. Then starts round two of pizza, reheated in the microwave on scraps of cardboard torn from the box they came in.

In the end it is a glorious day – and we need it. Yesterday was long, the miles were tough, and we're not yet in the kind of shape to handle that stuff. The rest will do our bodies good. So will the warmer weather that's supposed to start coming back tomorrow.

Today's ride: 11 miles (18 km)
Total: 111 miles (179 km)

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