April 8, part 1

Man, am I beat. OK, guys, picture this. Landscape like Upstate New York (hills!). Beautiful flowers. Sunshine. Heavy crosswinds that almost blew me off the road. 66 miles. That was my day today. Last night I went to bed at 8:30 pm. I heard one clap of thunder, then nothing more. But the others told me it had really stormed in the night and had blown the pool furniture all over the place. So I guess I should be grateful that the sun was shining this morning. One road today had no shoulders for about 10 miles. That was really nasty. And along the entire road there was one antique dealer after another. This must be the antique capital of the world. The flowers are indescribably beautiful. And, of course, there were more longhorn cattle today. Everything was going along smoothly. I was doing well on the hills, in spite of the crosswinds. Then I got to the town of Independence, apparently where Baylor University was founded. We stopped at the General Store for a sandwich and one of our group, who was just about to leave there, told me that there was a mistake in our cue sheet and that we should go left instead of right on 105. So Lynn and I did just that and went a mile before it struck us that the cue sheet had been correct after all. Someone had just been taking a shortcut! Instead of backtracking, we also continued on the shortcut into town. The road had shoulders, except when a bridge came. Then we had to take the lane. I pedaled as fast as I could, right in the middle of the lane. I was afraid that, if I got too close to the abutment, the wind would blow me right over. The cars weren't any too happy, but we made it. When we got into town, we first stopped and treated ourselves to some ice cream at Dairy Queen. Then it was on to the hotel, where I took a shower and a rest before dinner. Tomorrow is a day of rest so I want to go get my hair cut. It's hanging in my eyes under my helmet. It was a nice day, but very exhausting.________________War ein anstrengender Tag. Viele Huegeln, viel Seitenwind. Bin ein Paar Mal fast von der Strasse weggefegt. Teilweise keine Schultern am Strassenrand. Die Blumen sind wunderhuebsch, wie immer und die Sonne hat den ganzen Tag geschiehen obwohl es Gestern Abend ein schweres Gewitter gab. Jemand gab uns Heute eine falsche Anleitung und Lynn und ich sind falsch gefahren. Nun war es nicht so schlimm, da es eine Abkuerzung war. Jetzt bin ich KO. Morgen ist Ruhetag, da gehe ich mein Haare schneiden lassen.