Mike by Bike

I awoke in Navasota to ANOTHER storm, 2 inches of rain in an hour according to the weather channel. There is only 1 thing to do in situations like this, go back to sleep! I hit the road in bright sunshine at around 1030 a little concerned that I had 65+ miles to do in the heat of the day. Past the town of New Waverley there was a section of road works where the road surface was very rough, I got through it no problems and pushed onto my motel for the night. It was all the H’s that day, hot, hilly and humid! Making it a pretty tough day. My bike ended up paying the price with the road surface tearing up the rear wheel pretty badly.

OK so I now needed a new tyre, I had no idea how long this one would last. The green you can see is the puncture guard so it wasn’t all the way through the tyre just yet. Looking at the map there was nothing in route until Baton Rough maybe 350 miles away, no good. Over to Google and I found a big town called Beaumont with several shops around 100 miles away but only 30 or so off route. I swapped the tyre to the front wheel hoping the reduced wear would give me time to get there.

I was a bit nervous setting off the next day but it seemed to hold up well and didn’t visually deteriorate any further. It was a nice rode through the Sam Houston National Forest (this may have actyally been on yesterdays ride looking at the pics, I can’t remember)

I arrived in Kountze, still on route and would head to Beaumont the following day. As I was heading off map I had to rely on Google maps for directions, this proved frustrating as it would not map me on a direct route but instead took me around the houses and turned a 20 mile ride into a 46mile one. Anyway I made it, got my tyre replaced and brakes adjusted by the guys at Bicycle Sports. They also told me I could head straight up the freeway that Google was routing me away from, so that’s what I did and got back onto route with 60 ‘bonus’ miles in the legs, more than making up for the 20 I did in the truck to Globe 🙂

Fast forward 2 days and I’m now in Deridder, Louisiana my 5th state of the trip with more than 2000 miles on the clock. I really enjoyed my time in Texas, the scenery may not be the best and the roads are terrible in places but the people are so warm and welcoming it more than makes up for this. Also its huge, I’ve been here just over 3 weeks and covered around 1000miles.  The best thing though is being able to listen to and enjoy country music without the fear of persecution! (M & H I’m looking at you!)

If anyone is wondering what I do when I’m not cycling, here you go – sit around and watch Friends repeats. Living the dream my friends!