Day 5: Hitchhikers and Hills (Charlottesville to Greenwood, Virginia)

Talk about being in the middle of nowhere. We're approaching the Appalachian mountains and have passed more cows than people. Hills are getting very steep and today was 97 and humid. If we weren't leaving at 7 in the morning the heat would be unbearable. Despite the challenge I'm having a great time. You learn to appreciate the little things in life so much more. Having access to a laundry machine today was way more exciting than it should have been. After a low mileage but tough day we're staying at a nice campsite with great amenities and an affordable camp store. 

Although climbing hills stinks, going down is a blast. In my recumbent I'm very aerodynamic and have been hitting speeds of 40+ miles an hour on the downhills (don't worry mom). 

We had some awesome sloppy joes at Wyant's store (town population 150). And there was a full book of cyclists who've passed through and signed their names and contact info

Here you can see the Appalachians well be crossing in the next few days. This is the hardest cycling of the entire tour. I'll have to be careful to not push too hard and potentially injure my knees. 

We stopped for a break at a peach orchard. Never had better peaches in my life, and tried some awesome homemade donuts. 

Some ducks wandered into our camp. Out of season unfortunately (lucky for the ducks)

A patch of wildflowers

And this is pretty crazy. My friend and fellow cyclist, Will (21 from Canada) randomly received a call from his best friend Matt to see how the bike trip was going. Will originally planned on touring Canada and Matt had no idea Will was in the United States. Matt was hitch hiking his way up to Massachusetts from the Southwestern United States. It just so happened that Matt was an hour away from Greenwood, Virginia and was able to hitchhike to our campsite. What a coincidence!

Matt is on the right and Will is on the left. Forgive the poor photography in the dark 

Our position on on google maps. 

And when I die please bury me in a cemetery with a good a view as this one