Me, Norma and Phil before leaving Elkton

Before leaving Elkton, we ate fresh pineapple and muffins that Norma had baked the night before.  We went over the route that google had planned for us with Norma, and then packed and said good bye.

It was a beautiful, sunny day, and we warmed up within the first mile or two on the hills, enough to stop and peel off a layer.  While the weather was beautiful, the terrain was again full of rolling hills, and about halfway through the day, we lost the wide, protective shoulder on which we were riding.  It became a rather frightening ride on route 1, where we rode as close to the edge of the road as possible, hoping that no cars would hit us.  I was unable to look back, for fear that I might veer into the ditch to my right or into oncoming traffic on the left.

A great view from the orchard

We stopped at yet another orchard at the top of one of the hills and bought cookies.  Never have I been to so many orchards in one season.  Had I known that they all sold freshly baked cookies, I may have gone out of my way to visit more of them before.  We were still too far from Baltimore to buy a pie to strap to the bike, so we continued along route 1 after tasting a few of the cookies.  Our last stop was around 3pm for a late lunch at the Gunpowder Lounge, just on the edge of Gunpowder Falls State Park.  We stopped there for about an hour, cooled down significantly, and hopped back on our bikes to head into Baltimore.  My descents were poorly timed, such that I would arrive at the bottom of each hill to stop at a traffic light and lose all momentum for the next uphill.

When we were 6 miles from our destination, we stopped so I could phone Coleman, my friend who was hosting us.  As I took my phone out, it was ringing, and it was Coleman, who was already on his bike.  I shared with him our location, and we confirmed a meeting spot.  Coleman found us on North Broadway and led us through the city to his house, on his mountain bike.

We showered and walked to a new restaurant nearby, where we had beer and pizza, and then bought a pint of Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream to take back and eat at the house.  I planned a route for the next day and programmed it into Garmin before going to bed.