07.02 Baton Rouge, LA

Today we began our direction change from just heading west to heading northwest. We’ll be in Louisiana for a few days and then begins our tour of Texas. It was a difficult day. After five days of no biking, my body didn’t appreciate the 85 miles in the awful heat and humidity (it hit 99 degrees…it was already 96 around 7:30am). The roads were horrible, so bumpy and uneven with lots of traffic and roadkill and bugs. Thankfully I didn’t get any flats or have any setbacks today, and Team Tardy actually arrived at the church second. It will be a day that will go down in history. Good thing we did too or Marco would have had to present Bike and Build to 100 little kids all by himself. Instead, I got the job, haha. It was fun though. The church we are staying at in Baton Rouge has a summer day camp and we talked to the elementary school kids about what we’re doing (photo explained). Basically, I explained the program in the simplest form possible and then they just went crazy asking questions. Have you seen any snakes on the road? What do you eat for lunch? Yesterday was my birthday. Did you ride on my street? They also made me lift a bike in the air over my head, because some kid said only boys could do it. It was entertaining all around. Dinner was provided by the church and was awesome…salad, bbq pulled pork, green beans, lasagna, corn muffins and peach and apple cobbler. Tomorrow we get to ‘sleep in’ until 5:45am…yesssss!

Randoms:

*I don’t think I’ve mentioned yet that my bike is named Ella. No particular reason; I just like it.

*Belated shout outs for the mail drop from last Thursday: Mom for the card/candy and Tansey/McF for the certificate of awesomeness. Totally made my day J

*Aunt Cathy – Saw a Cathy Street today!

*Shout out to the Koski family who sponsored my ride through Baton Rouge. I couldn’t find a postcard here but you’ll get one, I promise!