Oklahoma Freewheel – Muldrow to Tahlequah
One of the great things about coming on trips like this is some of the people you meet. Last night, I met Greg:
And his son, Chris:
The fascinating thing we learned is that Chris is a survivor of the Oklahoma City bombing about 15 years ago. To hear his father tell of that morning just wrenches your gut. It’s hard to imagine what that must have felt like……
I’m getting to the point where I can’t make myself partake of the community sponsored meals on these bike trips. Witness this morning’s breakfast from the local Piggly Wiggly!
Actually, I think I end up with more nutritional value and good carbs eating that way than I would eating the other stuff that’s available. With the exception of the cherry pie, all that load isn’t really to bad for you!
As far as the riding today goes, the word of the day is HILLS! As soon as we left Muldrow, we encountered our first granny gear climb of the day, setting the stage for the rest of the ride.
The good thing about hills is that I’m pretty much made to climb. I’m small enough and strong enough that I can pretty much spin up and pass a bunch of people along he way. By the end of the day, I was getting tired, but still in better shape than a lot of folks.
The one interesting thing to see today was Sequoyah’s cabin. He was a Cherokee chief who was credited with inventing the only written Indian language. The actual cabin was enclosed in a modern building that limited picture taking opportunities, but it was kind of interesting. What surprised me is that Sequoyah had pretty much adopted the white man’s way of living.
Just a few miles outside of Tahlequah, I crossed a bridge over an inviting looking river. A lot of people on Freewheel pride themselves on getting into every body of water they pass. I didn’t stop, but it was a lot more tempting than the one yesterday!
I ended the day with about 65 miles on the bike, but the key stat for the day was the 4,487 feet of climbing we did!
The campsites at Tahlequah were the best we’ve had. My tent was nestled under the pines in a little park at the west end of the high school where we were based. Oh, if only it were this nice everywhere we went!
At suppertime, I wandered downtown to find something to eat and watch a little of Speedwheel. It’s the annual bike race held in conjunction with Freewheel in whatever town they happen to be on Wednesday. I picked a restaurant at random, and found that it had outdoor seating right on the race course. On top of that, as I walked up, Kelly and Chris, the two guys from Ozark invited me to join them at the table they had already procured!
Just as my food arrived, the Cat 3 & 4 race started, so we pretty much had a front row seat!
Here’s a link to the GPS track for today.
God bless….
TW
June 25, 2010 at 1:18 pm
[...] riding up hills. This really hit home last week on Oklahoma Freewheel, when I had a blast on the hilliest day of the trip. We climbed nearly 4,500 feet that day, and I found myself disappointed when we came [...]