Tallahassee to Monticello, FL

One of the chicken coups at Diane and Maria's.

A totally canopied road.

A sign warning us of the canopy over the road. Not really sure why it is a hazard?

This is the courthouse at Monticello with the traffic circle around it.

Dani calling Diane to get directions in Monticello.

Tallahassee to Monticello, FL
2/26/10
Day 114
33 miles

We were so thankful this morning when we woke up inside of Susan and Kevin's house. Last night was “Florida Cold” as I would call it. The temperature reached the mid twenties, and with humidity like it is down here, that is very cold. I never believed how much humidity affected cold until this Southern Tier trip. I have seriously felt colder down here at 40 degrees and near 100% humidity with a slight breeze than I have up North at 10 degrees and our usual near absence of humidity. We ate some breakfast with Kevin, Susan, and Dominick and then started getting our gear ready to go. Susan left for work and Kevin took the dog, Cooper, in for a haircut while we packed. When Kevin came back, he and Dominick helped us get our things together and get ready to go. We checked out the triplet tandem that the family rides and I asked Kevin a few questions about this amazing bike.

Kevin realized that I was riding without cycling gloves and would not have it, so he gave me a pair of his old ones. I am thankful, and excited because I have not ridden with gloves since Arcata, CA where I lost mine. Dominick and Kevin took some photos of us as we rode off, and I hope some of them turn out, but Danielle and I are not always the most photogenic couple, especially at this point in the trip. My wild beard and hair combo does not always help out this matter. Kevin and Susan gave an alternate route today, so we will not be following the Adventure cycling route. We are pretty excited about this for a few reasons. We will be able to stop at a nice grocery store, and they say the route they gave us is one of their favorite rides around. Also, it cuts almost 20 miles off of our day. All good reasons to try a different route.
We stopped at the grocery store that Kevin and Susan recommended and found some great food and stocked up for the next few days. After the grocery store, we saw a Macaroni Grill restaurant that I have heard about, so we decided to stop in and see what it was it was like. The food was actually pretty darn good, but a bit more expensive than we usually go for. After lunch we thought we were going to head out of Tallahassee, but in less than a mile we came across a coffee shop that had free wireless internet. I was feeling a bit slow after the time change from Central to Eastern time robbed us of some needed sleep, and a belly full of pasta did not help me feel energetic. I drank a cup of coffee while we caught up on internet chores.

When we finally did leave town, we found ourselves on some beautiful roads. The route that Kevin and Susan mapped for us was amazing, and we might recommend it to Adventure Cycling. We enjoyed the peaceful quiet roads and thick forest canopy as we rode along. In no time we made it to Monticello. We looked around a little bit and found this to be a really nice little town. One of the neat features is a huge traffic circle around the courthouse that seemed to move traffic smoothly without a stop light, and it was fun to ride around it on our bikes. We eventually called our host, and Diane gave us directions to her and Maria's house out in the country. We rode out there from Monticello and checked out this nice place while we waited for Diane to get home from work. They have lots of chickens in two different pens, two horses, and a sweet yellow lab.

When Diane got home, she invited us right in and we started asking her about what sort of things they do out here at this farm. Diane and Maria used to have Boer meat goats, but they have gotten out of that business do to various reasons. Now they have roughly 100 chickens, and Diane sells almost all of the eggs to coworkers in Tallahassee. I guess this just goes to show the demand for farm fresh eggs. Diane welcomed us to have as many eggs as we could eat, so we cooked up some omelets for supper with some Cotswold cheese we bought back in Tallahassee. It was great. While we ate, we watched the Olympics with Diane and watched Apollo Ohno get disqualified in a medal race. At least he was able to make a comeback in the relay and win a bronze medal. We could not believe how much fun it was watching the Olympics. The best way to enjoy TV is to not hardly ever watch it, and then watch it for a few hours. It is incredibly fascinating! Especially the Olympics. Once it started getting late, we took some great warm showers and headed off to sleep in a nice warm bed. We had a great night eating fresh eggs and sharing stories and company with Diane. She is a great host.

Greg