Day One Hundred-three, 090611 - Vero Bch, FL

Day One Hundred Three, Date Thursday, June 11, 2009
Time in Saddle: 7:37
Distance for the Day: 81.94 miles From Jupiter To Vero Beach, FL
Accumulated Trip Distance: 4837.53 miles
Altitudes: Starting/Ending 9’/10’, Highest: 57’ Accumulated: 974’
Speeds: Avg: 10.7 mph, Max: 23.5 mph
Weather: 75° partly cloudy, warm to hot in the upper 80s
Expenditures: $22

Got up at 7am, and began preparing to leave, organizing and packing stuff up. I told Lynne I’d give her my Shakespeare book, and she said I could take any one of the many paperbacks she had in return, so I picked Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.” I read “The Fountainhead,” and enjoyed that, so I knew I’d probably like this one, too. She got up around 8am, and we hugged and said our goodbyes. Lynne was a wonderful host – generous, giving, good conversationalist, lives in a paradise of upscale condos and free public beaches with nice snorkeling, and a new friend.

I hit the road at 8:30am, and just continued up Hwy 1 for a few miles until I could get to the next segment of A1A (the highway that goes north/south along the very most eastern coast of Florida), and followed that from Jupiter to Stuart, Ft. Pierce, and finally to my next Warmshowers host, Terry C in Vero Beach. It was a hot, humid day, and the mini marts were kind of sparse along A1A, but they did come. I stopped for a Subway meal deal ($8) (prices seem to vary between shops – most other Subways were $9 for a footlong roast beef + meal deal), and a couple of other stops for drinks, snacks, and fruit ($14). I called Terry to let him know I was in Ft. Pierce and would probably reach his house around 7pm (it was about 3:45pm at the time), so now, I was on the clock! It was a good 26 miles to go, and I had three hours fifteen minutes to do it. I got to work, pedaling along at a slightly faster-than-usual clip. My knees were giving me a little more trouble than usual, today, so I’d stop and rest ‘em every hour or so, as I watched the house numbers on Hwy A1A slowly and agonizingly climb from 3000 to 4000 to 5000, etc. mile after mile. Terry’s address was in the 13000 block, and as 6pm approached, I concentrated on keeping my speed up without hurting my knees or feet. I finally made it – the time: 7:09pm. Not too shabby. I pulled up to his house, and found him inside a portable hyperbaric chamber that a friend of his was letting him experience. His secretary, Barbara, was there, too, so the three of us chatted while we waited for Terry to finish up in the chamber. When he was “done,” we unzipped the chamber, and out he popped – done to a turn! Terry is a very cool dude – friendly, generous, and fun-loving. Plus, he likes Enya (the Irish singer), who is one of my favorites! His place is *very* cool, with the Atlantic Ocean just over a narrow, separating dune in his backyard, where sea turtles come in to lay their eggs. Facing his house is the Indian River, with fish, dolphins, and manatees. Beautiful! The four of us had dinner together – a tasty and nutritious store-made concoction called ‘Voila,’ by Birdseye frozen foods, which was a combination of vegetables and chunks of chicken – yummy! After dinner, Barbara took off for home, and I went out to the beach with his other friend (whose name I don’t remember - Terry, help!) to see if we could see any sea turtles or their tracks, but didn’t see any. (We went the wrong way – instead of turning right, we should have gone left. I did that in the morning, and found lots of them.) After returning to the house, I helped Terry and his friend pack up her portable hyperbaric chamber, and she took off. Terry and I chatted about our cycling experiences and Life for a while before he had to go to bed for work the next day, and I stayed up a while blogging. I got to bed around 1am, with the sound of ocean waves whispering faintly in the background.