DISTANCE TRAVELED: 46.99 Miles
AVERAGE SPEED: 7.29 MPH

          Today I woke up at 7:30, well after everyone else. I had the normal oatmeal breakfast and then packed everything up and got a day's supply of food. We finally left the campground at 9:00 and rode for five miles until we had to make our first pit stop at Hardees! Of course we couldn't continue on until I got a second breakfast of a ham, eggs, and cheese sandwich. We left Hardees and soon got back onto dirt, which immediately began to climb gently. The climb was an easy grade but was very long. By the time we got to change to a new road, we had ridden many miles without a downhill. The short 5 mile descent was welcomed as we tore down the well maintained road. However, all too soon, we came to a fork in the road. Unfortunately, as always, the uphill fork was where we had to go so we began yet another long climb. As we continued up the mountain road, we came to a turn that appeared to be our road but it was difficult to determine since there were no markers and the road was fairly overgrown. After some deliberating, we turned off and began to climb some more. Eventually we turned onto an ATV trail, which we rode on for four miles. The entire trail was covered with rocks and roots, which made the riding very challenging. (Picture38,Picture39) Riding was impossible for everyone other than Brian who was in front of us at some point in time. Even if we hadn't been tired from climbing, the trail was still very technical. And with the BOB trailing behind me, as my bike wheels cleared roots and rocks, I had forgotten to give an extra burst of energy when my BOB wheel hit. Because of this, many times, I would stop in my tracks and, we were forced to walk until the next clear patch where I could get going again. (Picture40) This trail also had some downhill, which was littered everywhere with roots and rocks. At the top, Scott sat down on the ground after throwing down his bike and then sprawled out on the trail not able to move. Unlike the uphill, the downhill was great as we weaved around rocks and roots dropping off rocks. I even went off a rock that had such a steep drop off that the metal BOB frame hit the rock and the BOB wheel was lifted off the ground! It was over 1.5 feet which is really big when using a trailer. Another difficulty that I had was that I could not use my easiest gear in the back since my chain would skip into the spokes. This made any climbing very difficult but especially technical climbing. When we got to the top, we started down only to find that we had to go up once again. Finally, we got back onto a more ridable area. (Picture41) Along the way, we passed numerous old mines, many which were very large. About two hours from the end, just about everyone ran out of water. Unfortunately, most of the terrain we were on was on ridges so streams were hard to find. Finally, we came down a little and a gushing stream flowed under the road. After filling up with water using our filters, (Picture42,Picture43) we contined on. We then began a long gradual downhill that wasn't nearly good enough for the work that had gone into the climbing of the day. Finally, after 6 hours and 45 minutes in the saddle, we got to Basin. These 6 hours and 45 minutes did not include 2 1/2 hours of resting time. Another reason that this day was so hard was that we had combined two days that the group before us had done, into one. Fortunately, this gives us an extra much-needed rest day. In addition, we discovered that we had climbed for 30 miles and descended for only 15. During these thirty miles, we had climbed more than 7,000 vertical feet! I dropped off my gear at the campground and rode into the small town for dinner. I had two sodas and 10 of us split four large pizzas. It filled us up for a while! By that time, it was already 9:00 and I needed to get to the campsite. I set up my tent and just as I finished, it began to rain. I threw everything into the tent, cleaned up from the muddy ride, and went to bed at 10:30.