Saturday, May 2, 2009

Day Fifty-five, 090424 - Ft. Stockton, TX

Day Fifty-five, Date Friday, April 24, 2009
Time in Saddle: 2:30
Distance for the Day: 21.56 miles: From Ft. Stockton To east of Ft. Stockton (N30 51.463’ W102 35.182’)
Accumulated Trip Distance: 2348.1 miles
Altitudes: Starting/Ending 3194’/2983’, Highest: 3194, Accumulated: 0
Speeds: Avg: 8.5 mph, Max: 19.4 mph
Weather: Clear and warm
Expenditures: $31

I slept until around noon, then found Bill who had also arisen, and we loaded my gear back into Bill’s truck so he could take me back to Ft. Stockton, where I could continue my trip. Again, this was extremely nice of Bill – I was thinking of just taking off from Ft. Davis, but it would have been a full day’s ride just to get back to Ft. Stockton before I could then continue to make forward progress, and I just really didn’t want to do that. We stopped in at a cafĂ© in Ft. Davis for lunch ($19), and then made the trip to Ft. Stockton, where we then also had a delicious choco malted at Dairy Queen ($5) (I’m really hooked on them, now). He took my picture in front of the town’s fiberglass roadrunner, after which we parted company; he, going back to the TSP, and me going back to the town library to finish updating my blog. After leaving the library, it was 5:12 pm, so I found the local Subway sandwich shop and got my usual Footlong roast beef ($7), I stocked-up on Gatorade and food ($4), and took off for the next town. Didn’t get very far: 18 miles east of Ft. Stockton (not too surprising considering how late I left town). Found a stealth campsite a short distance off the main highway, behind a tree on one of the side roads. The temperature was mild, but the wind was pretty strong, and stayed that way most of the night, until around 4 or 5 am, when it died down to a light breeze. It was so strong, it blew the stealth cloth off my trike, even though I weighed and tied it down (not enough, I guess). Maybe I’ll need to use tent stakes in the future.

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