Shannon and the kids were downstairs around 5:30am and woke me up as I’d asked them to the night before. They left and I milled about until Jen came down around 7. I finished repacking in front of the morning news with her then was on the road by 7:30am.
On my way out of town I made a pit stop at Walmart to replace my bungees, then was off to Park Hills. There was a paralleling old highway road that went the whole way so I walked that for a nice morning walk. When I got in it was about 10am and the library was still not open. Around town there were no restaurants save for a Subway shop so I crashed there for an hour waiting on the library.
At the library I was give a strict two hours, I was only supposed to have one, and left the four empty terminals for the post office. I mailed off some maps to Ingrid and some letters to my family in Massachusetts and the folks in Watkinsville then was off. Outside the post office I sat down to put on some sun block and a guy gave me a Pepsi and some water.
The rest of the day was a wide laned hot sunny walk through 90 degrees of humidity. The sweat streamed off my face, as it likes to do, and my eyes again took on the stinging blindness that they occasionally get in the direct sun. Three miles into it I took a break at the one gas station I’d seen. I had some coffee for a dime a cup then called Cox on my way out to wish him a happy birthday. Evidently he had a rockin’ party on Saturday for the event.
The road seemed to drag on forever that afternoon. I could’ve sworn I walked fifteen miles but in reality I believe it was only about six or seven. The sun began weighing in the sky as I was holding out for a set of railroad tracks to use as a half way mark to stop at, but they weren’t showing up. Finally I found another store and stopped in for a rootbeer and ice cream and found out they were right around the corner.
The tracks were no help. There was no where to camp there so I trekked on about another mile or two before spotting a barely suitable spot to camp out. That night I treated myself to one of the camping dinner packs that Dairyette Dan had given me in Paducah. It was absolutely delicious. Immediately after I did the dishes I crashed on my bag and was out for the night.