92 miles to Gambier and Then a Beautiful 52 to Columbus

Hope everyone enjoyed my guest blogger who posted before this one about our build day with Rebuilding Together in Akron. I literally wrote one sentence and then there was a van about to leave for Wal-Mart that I ran to get it leaving my blog still up on Marty's computer who I was borrowing to write. He took it upon himself to write his version of my blog, which I later was too tired to finish and allowed him to post haha.

Anyways, the build day was pretty good. It's always so nice to have a day off for your butt... trust me, it needs the rest after being on a bike seat for hundreds of miles over the course of days. The house we helped out on belonged to a really sweet 82 yr old woman and we did a variety of tasks around her house including cleaning out her basement (and moving a very heavy fridge from the 50s), some landscaping, and painting. Overall it was a great day, and Marty was not lying about the amazing box lunches we were given that did include a very tasty mint. He was also not lying about my taking a nap while waiting for the van to come pick us all up... hey. there are two things I am learning from this trip and that is I am very tired and very hungry pretty much all the time and yet complain about it all never since I'm having such an amazing time =)

That night it rained and thundered all throughout dinner time, which we didn't mind one bit since we were inside and happily eating all the delicious food prepared for us by our host. After dinner the rain finally stopped and a gorgeous full rainbow appeared in the sky. We all went outside and stared at it for a really long time. It was so bright and clear it seriously looked like it wasn't even real... it was so cool. The sky and clouds were also really beautiful and we all enjoyed the view and each other's company until it started getting dark and decided to go inside to get to bed since we were doing 92 miles the next day.

The day started at 5am when the alarm went off (we decided to start an hour earlier that day since it was going to be such a long day mileage wise and there was also a prediction of afternoon showers). The first twenty miles or so went smoothly with some rolling hills, but nothing too difficult. About five or six of us stopped to use a restroom around this time and when we were getting ready to hit the road again one of the girls I was with noticed a man lying on the ground across the street from where we were. She said it looked like he was having a seizure or something and that she thought she saw him shaking. She started walking towards him and I'm not sure why, but something in me just told me to run over there. So I made someone hold my bike and took off running over to the man.

I was the first one to get to him and immediately noticed the pool of blood around his head. He was laying on his back and he was breathing heavily, but his eyes were closed and he was not responding to anything we were saying to him. I called 911 (the first time I ever have in my life) and calmly explained to the operator that we needed an ambulance. There was a bike on the ground by the man and it looked like he must have fallen off it and hit his head. The ambulance showed up in a few minutes and they managed to get a bandage on his head, put a neck brace on him, and took him to the hospital where he would probably going to have to have stitches. The whole encounter was really scary and definitely shook me up for a lot of the day, but in the end I felt like everything was ok and we helped someone who otherwise may not have gotten the help he needed.

The rest of the ride was interesting since we were officially in Amish Country. It was pretty crazy to see these people rolling around in their horse drawn carriages and funny hats and beards. The scenery was really beautiful though. Who knew Ohio was so green! We got to have two lunches since it was such a long day. We have what they call a 90/90 rule: if the temperature is over 90 degrees or if the mileage is over 90 than we get two lunches that day =). Although feeling pretty tired before the second lunch, getting that food and gatorade in me gave me what I needed to finish the last 20 miles pretty hard. The last 10 or so we rode in the rain, but at the end of the day it felt so good to arrive.

We stayed in Kenyon College's dorms and it was soooo nice to have a bed! They even gave us sheets and towels so we didn't have to use our sleeping bags or quick dry towels (they feel like you're rubbing your body with felt lol). We made our own dinner since no dinner was provided to us... pasta (which they burned and set off the fire alarm and the fire dept. came to turn it off hahaha) and cake and ice cream for dinner. I was so exhausted and slept really soundly in my nice dorm room bed.

This morning we woke up to our cue sheets saying we only had 52 miles to ride to Columbus. We were all in good spirits about that after our long almost century ride yesterday. The college provided us with breakfast at their dining hall and it was AMAZING. The ride was beautiful and fairly uneventful (which isn't always a bad thing lol) and I arrived in the first group at the JCC where we are staying tonight. We all decided to go swimming in their outside pool with water slides! It was really fun to swim and hang out and see everyone's horrible spandex tan lines haha. We also played a modified version of the game "Marco Polo" by simply changing the words. The person who was "it" would say "Bike" and we would all respond "Build", it was pretty funny and the lifeguards on duty got a good kick out of it.

So far I am having an unbelievable time on this trip... it's so hard to describe just how awesome it is. One thing that's really funny though is just how much you start to appreciate the simple things in life being on Bike & Build: Eating, sleeping, showering, a good cup of coffee (or some mornings any coffee lol), friends, amazing scenery, and the sun shining on you while riding along and singing a good song with your cycling buddies... does life get any better?