I tried to sleep in but woke up at 7:30am anyway. I decided to rent a car from Enterprise for the day since I wanted to make it to the USS North Carolina, Fort Fisher, and the serpentarium today as well as a show at the Brown Coat Pub and Theater tonight. Public transit here sucks so the 30 bucks to rent a car is worth it.

I started out at the USS North Carolina which was amazing. The ship went through WW2 protecting aircraft carriers (as well as other missions) and survived many battles. I’d have never made it in the Navy though because I’d hit my head all the time on the low ceilings.

Here is me firing a turret.

This is where I would have worked — the coding room. That machine is an Electric Cipher Machine (ECM) and was used to send and receive encrypted messages.

After the ship I drove down to Fort Fisher but it got really foggy all of a sudden. There was a guy taking his bike out onto the wall in the fog which was crazy to me. That’s him way out there.

There is a ferry that takes you across the water to Southport that I would have crossed on with my bike had I stayed in a hotel in downtown Wilmington. Sadly, I couldn’t bike that far yesterday so I’m skipping it. I still ended up seeing it though which was pretty cool. This is me on the wall looking back towards land.

I also made it to the aquarium at Fort Fisher which was surprisingly awesome. I didn’t know it even existed and it looked pretty nondescript but it was a really well managed museum. Here’s two guppies hugging each other (or banging? Can’t tell)

Here’s some fish swimming upstream.

Finally I made it to the serpentarium downtown and holy crap that place was fun. So many terrifying snakes and reptiles were there staring at me like I was a tasty snack. The saltwater crocodile was probably the scariest to me because it was accompanied with a story about how a group of them essentially devoured 80 Japanese soldiers who were retreating from battle. Look up the Ramree crocodile massacre if you want to read about it. Here’s one of them.

Also enjoyed some of the other reptiles namely the black mamba and the iguana.

I drove back to the hotel and am doing laundry. Heading back into town to grab dinner and watch a show at the Brown Coat Pub and Theater, returning the car, taking a taxi back, then getting some rest. Heading about 65 miles to Myrtle Beach tomorrow in what looks to be shitty weather.

I spent the night last night at an AirBNB in Fayetteville and devoured 3/4 of a large pizza for dinner. I saved the last 1/4 for breakfast and called it a night after hanging out with the AirBNB host and her two Salukis for a bit. Here’s a picture of Emir on the couch with me.

I woke up at 6:30am, packed my stuff up and ate my pizza breakfast and set out on my way to Wilmington. Since today was going to be a really long ride, I wasn’t taking my time to stop for photos very often and was more just trying to get to my destination. The weather also got a bit warmer today and I was wearing just shorts and a shirt today. This is the first time I’ve rode without my windbreaker on.

I took a pit stop in Elizabethtown (about 45 miles in) and ordered two 3 piece chicken strip meals, one I ate there and one for the road. I also refilled my water bottles there. Right around this time was the first time on this journey that my legs were in pain. My knees were absolutely on fire for the second half of this journey and thankfully I was able to make it. Here’s me icing my knees in the hotel upon arrival (ignore the fat woman on TV)

I also ran away from probably 5 dogs today. One time, two of them chased me down a busy highway and the cars had to avoid them. Unreal! These people really don’t love their dogs because they’re literally going to die or get maced unless they get trained better.

Anyway, there were a few things I did stop for to take picture of. One of them was a strangely worded church sign…

I made the decision not to follow this road, although I ended up on it later in somehow.

Finally I thought these trees looked really pretty so I took a picture of them.

I ended up going 95.47 miles today at a 12mph pace and felt every inch of it. I’m thankful tomorrow is a rest day although I may still end up going a few miles to get to another hotel. I’m loving this Holiday Inn Express but $100 a night is a bit steep. I will either stay here, another hotel in Wilmington, or Carolina Beach somewhere. Either way I will be a tourist tomorrow and not going more than 15 miles on my bike.

Tonight I’m walking to a sports bar and watching some Thursday night football then sleeping in.

I woke up his morning to an amazing breakfast made by my AirBNB hosts. I had eggs, bacon, grits, waffles, fresh fruit, coffee, OJ, and sweet potato home fries waiting for me when I woke up. These people were just insanely nice and accommodating. Excuse the poor food photography I’m new to this blogging thing.

I plotted my route to Fayetteville which once again diverged from the ECG route. I decided to take route 50 which goes directly to Benson and then catch back onto the ECG route there and head to my AirBNB in north Fayetteville. Route 50 was great as expected and 25 miles flew right by. Went past some cotton fields and other crops on the way.

Also went past an overly decorated house …

Eventually I ended up at Benson which is where I planned to pick up the ECG again. Of course once I got on the ECG path dogs started barking at me but I decided to stay the course. I crossed Cape Fear River which was pretty cool.

Immediately after crossing I took a left onto Beaver Dam Road which sounded harmless enough. Sure enough another fucking boxer starts barking at me and chases me for about 100 yards. Those dogs are ridiculously fast but I outran it. About a mile later an older looking lab/pit mix was standing in the freaking road and barking at me as I approached. My patience for this crap is completely gone now so I slowly approached with mace in hand and the dog slowly backed away (still barking) and eventually ran home to mommy without me having to do anything. That dog was all bark no bite.

Side note: In North Carolina it’s illegal to have a dog not on a leash or in a fenced in yard so I could report these dogs to animal services but that’s too much hassle for me.

Anyway, I decided the ECG, or East Coast Greenway, is really the East Coast GRRRRRRReenway (dada ching!) as you have to deal with dogs the whole fucking time. I said screw it I’m just going to deal with traffic and stick to the direct routes so I hopped on 401 and took it into town. I even saw some sheep!

I’m currently killing some time at a local Starbucks until I can check into my place for the night.

Total for the day was 57 miles (which will be 60 when I get to the house) at a little over 12mph. Tomorrow I head to Elizabethtown as a stop over on my way to Wilmington.. Tomorrow I am going to huff it to Wilmington because there is no space at the one hotel in Elizabethtown. That will be a 100 miler tomorrow! Weeeeee… It is downhill with a tailwind though and temps are lower 70s so I should be able to make it. Just need to make sure to pack a lot of fluids and food.

Going to just take it easy tonight for sure… Hopefully it’s a comfortable bed.