August 16, 1998 - Farmington - Frostburg

DISTANCE TRAVELED: 39.78 Miles

TIME: 5 Hours

AVERAGE SPEED: 11.8 Miles/Hour

TRAVEL CONDITIONS: Warm but cloudy in the morning changing to heavy rains in the afternoon. There was a small tailwind in the morning changing to a 15 mile an hour headwind in the afternoon.

ROAD CONDITIONS: Fairly good roads all day that had just been paved. They also had good shoulders.

TERRAIN/DIFFICULTY LEVEL: Large steep hills all day. Although it was short, it was one of the more tiring days. Along with the hard uphills, there were also some very long steep downhills.

DAILY JOURNAL COMMENTS:
I woke up at 7:45 but didn’t actually start to get ready until 8:15 for breakfast which was to be at 8:30. After I finally got up, I got dressed and went up to my host's house for breakfast which consisted of eggs, toast, and fruit. After eating, we talked for a little while and I then went back to where I slept to pack up. After packing, we went over to an area to have a "family meeting" which is held every Sunday morning. Everyone living in the area comes and sings songs. After the singing, we then introduced ourselves and told why we were on Bike-Aid before arranging everything and throwing it into the SAG. I walked over to the coffee shop which they own and looked around. They had a display of all of the books that they publish along with some pottery that is made by the people living in the Bruderhof. Although some of it was expensive, it was all very well done. After sitting around until 11:30, Matt, David, Brad, and I finally left together. We started out with two large uphills which was then followed by a three mile downhill which was very steep. I had a great ride for that part but then we had numerous steep uphills with tons of rain.(Picture100) The downhills were not fun since we had no brakes to speak of so I only went 20 miles an hour. If it was not raining and the road was clean, I could have easily gone 45 without pedaling. At one point we stopped and sat under some trees since it just so happened that this was the one day that I decided not to bring my rain jacket along with me! I was totally soaked and by the time we left I was very cold. We rode on and I quickly warmed up until we reached a store to stop until the rain passed by. We all bought some food and I ate my bagel before going on to a McDonalds for lunch. I had two 39 cent cheeseburgers, fries and a coke! I still wasn’t full but didn’t feel like ordering more so we got ready to leave just as the SAG arrived. I was able to get my rain jacket out and after putting it on, I was finally getting warm again. We then took a long downhill out of McDonalds which once again made me cold along with the rain. Finally the rain stopped and we once again were going uphill so I was able to warm up and take off my rain jacket. I rode along and finally reached Frostburg at 4:30 and just as I was about to turn, I saw David who was installing his new computer. We rode to the church together and put our bikes inside before going to the local college to take a shower. After cleaning up, we went back to the church where I fixed my tire so that it no longer had a lump in it. It was getting worse every day and was so bad that when I would go on flat pavement, I could feel where the bump was. After fixing it, we had dinner which consisted of a full Thanksgiving dinner. It tasted great and filled me up for a little while especially since we had a great cake to finish off the dinner. After eating, I worked for a little while and then tried to call my parents but was unsuccessful so I went back and worked for a little while before calling again at 10:40. After talking for a little while, I went back and waited for the church phone to be free so that I could get onto the internet to update my home page. I finally got on around 12:45 and then went to bed around 1:30.

TRIP ROUTE:
Get on 40 East to Kaiser Ridge. There, get on alt 40(old 40). Follow to Frostburg. Get on Broadway and follow right to the Frostburg Presbeterian Church.