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.

My plan for the day was to drop off my bike at TLC Bikes and then head into town and check out the North Carolina Museum of Art and their Porsche exhibit. On my way to the bike shop I got a flat tire which was really annoying but didn’t really set me back. I picked up a couple more tubes and a patch kit to be safe. Gary at TLC did a great job tuning up my bike and now everything works as it should. Thank god my derailleur works properly now. I can’t thank him enough for the quick turnaround.

After I dropped my bike I hung out at Jubala Village Coffee again and had too much espresso, coffee, and biscuits. My god that place is amazing. Here’s them making me a fresh cup of coffee,

Anyway, I eventually made it to the museum and it was really cool. Here are a few of the cars.

There was also a really cool sculpture garden there and the art museum was nice too.

I eventually made it back from the museum to pick up my bike but was running out of daylight. I had to hustle to beat the darkness so I ended up getting a bit of a workout in on my “rest” day. Oh well.

Tally for the day was about 30 miles and now I’m hanging out in South Raleigh with a very nice lady currently picking me up Chinese food.

Tomorrow I head to Fayetteville which will probably be a little over 70 miles and will stay in some crap hotel.