Leaving Marianna we set off at 7am for DeFuniak Springs, continuing our journey along Florida’s panhandle country.

We start at sunrise to get the benefit of it being only 86F although, with the humidity, the ‘feels like’ temperature is about 107F. Still it feels bliss compared to later in the day.

60 miles and 1500 feet of ascent later we arrived at our motel knackered and deflated – another front wheel spoke had gone! We had been standing off bike taking on some refreshment when it went. Big lardy me wasn’t even sitting on the bike! I think its just a case of all the spokes having reached the end of their life with the hardship of our three tours. Unfortunately, we don’t want to stop for another 2-3 days to get the wheel properly rebuilt.

All was not lost, however, as we had purchased two spare spokes for the front wheel in Tallahassee when it was rebalanced. Susan ordered in some beers and pizza to the motel room and I set to replacing the spoke. You won’t believe it when I say I threaded in the new spoke and it was the wrong bloody size! The Great Bicycle Shop in Tallahassee are you listening – you’re not so great, you’re not so good, you’re not even blinking acceptable! Not even beer and pizza could cheer me up – thats how bad it was.

DeFuniak doesn’t have a bicycle shop and our only option was to head to the next town of Milton and hope the front wheel held up. Only 61 miles.

Susan, the cunning person that she is, started hiding my pizza and drinking more than her fair share of the beer trying to keep my weight down for the following day. She feared for the front wheel when I sat on the bike. I had the Panhandle Blues.

We started cycling before the sun was up and, thankfully, the first 30 miles were relatively flat and we made good time. After 40 miles with no further spokes down we were in good spirits. Happy smiley people.

21 miles later we reached Milton and went to our third bike shop in America where they replaced the spoke but with one of inferior quality – it’s all they had. We are now in Pensacola where we visited our fourth bike shop and now have 6 quality front wheel spoke replacements. Just in case. If the situation doesn’t improve before Austin, Texas, we will have the front wheel rebuilt from scratch.

Let’s leave the spoke crisis for the time being. Here’s Susan at one of our multiple stops at a local garage for fluid. These garages are our lifeline as we’re drinking 2 litres an hour and that’s actually not nearly enough.

Susan’s still not taking the heat too well and the last couple of cycles have been particularly tough. I’ve got to try and judge when to stop as she will just keep on going. When we stop I can tell she’s suffering whenever she sits on the ground. I take pictures of her suffering, of course, as a historical record of the cycle but I’m not allowed to post them. It’s not pretty but then neither am I standing there soaked through looking like I’ve wet myself. Not a pretty couple.

We are now in Pensacola, Florida, and tomorrow we will cross into Alabama. The roads in Florida have been relatively fine though the traffic can at times be busy. We expected that – it’s not big open Canada or the deserts of Australia.

Visibility is important on American roads. As well as our usual rear flag we have three rear lights and two front lights. One of the rear lights has radar and is linked to the GPS that sits in front of me. I get a radar notification that a truck (they all have big trucks here) is approaching and the rear light flashes faster. Great piece of kit. If our rear light was human it would have had a nervous breakdown with the standard of driving here.

Nearly all States have a mandatory 3 foot clearance for cyclists – its the law. Unfortunately, I think a significant minority have mixed up their feet with inches. Also in their defence it must be hard to judge feet and inches when you are on your phone. It’s unbelievable!

Pensacola is a nice seaside town on the Gulf of Mexico. Known as the ‘ City of Five Flags” due to the 5 governments that have ruled it – Spain, France, Great Britain, USA and the Confederate States of America. Susan and I are staying for two nights at a lovely AirBnB. We have the whole house to ourselves.

That’s my beer balcony where I try to consume as much beer as I’m sweating out. You wont believe me when I say my beer drinking can’t keep up.

To finish, here are some local boys having a local ‘hoedown’ in Pensacola singing one of Susan’s favourite songs.

And finally finally, after 485 miles, here’s our ‘where’s the wallies’ now place map:

You may never wish to cycle across America but then you may never get to Caryville, Worm Fiddlin’ Capital of the World. You just know you’re missing out.

Don’t know what it is? Well cycle to Caryville or maybe just use YouTube.

Leaving Tallahassee we had a short cycle of 25 miles to Quincy. Experience tells us it takes ages to cycle out a city and so we never try for a long distance.

This day was just right and we were able to have a leisurely strawberry milkshake for lunch. To date the quality order of milkshakes is Dairy Queen, Burger King, McDonalds then pre packed garage milkshakes. Hopefully, we can improve on this list with an artisan shake that costs a fortune and if its got Gucci or or Versace on the cup then it has my vote. I’m such a ‘label’ type guy.

We stayed over at the Allison House Inn which was built in 1843 and once the home of General Allison, who became Governor of Florida in 1842. It made a great change from the usual motel chains. We were in the Governor’s room and Susan was on edge the whole time as I generally leave an oil stain scum around all the white bathroom porcelain in each motel we visit.

Throughout the day the odd bit of running maintenance covers me in oil and it kind of scums up the sink when I wash my hands. In the last motel I even managed to get a black tide mark around the toilet! Susan went bananas but it serves her right for not supervising me and chatting on Facebook. You see I cleaned the bike chain with tissues and flushed them. It made sense at the time but I wont be doing that again 🙂

I couldn’t get the toilet bowl cleaned properly and using toothpaste didn’t help. Toothpaste is an abrasive and works on porcelain teeth – can you see my thinking with a toilet? Anyway it didn’t work that well and Susan was lucky she wasn’t on Facebook again or I may have used her toothbrush.

So I was on my best behaviour at the Allison Inn and we ate in the splendour of the dining room. The owner chap, John, drove Susan to the local Mexican and we had a carry out on his mahogany table.

Quincy has also been known for decades as ‘the Coca Cola town’. Early in last century, Mark Munro, president of the Quincy bank, thought that the Coca Cola Company was well managed and people would always find a nickel for a cold drink. He purchased stock and urged family, friends and bank customers to save and invest in Coca Cola. Many local families became financially secure following his advice.

Leaving Quincy we cycled 44 miles to Marianna. It was 105 Fahrenheit on the bike and Susan continues to suffer. One time I’m going to turn around and she will have vanished – melted onto the road. We try to manage it with lots of hydration but we are really exposed sitting on the bike for hours at a time.

I’m okay though I can’t feel my toes. The cleats and the pedals and the sitting position combine to give me numb toes. I’m going to try extra cardboard in my shoes tomorrow. I’m used to it on these long cycles and quite confident feeling will return around about March next year.

Today we cycled past prisoners working on the road.

The best you’re going to get is a photo of sign because I wasn’t brave enough to take a picture of the felons. There was a felon with a stop/go sign at the beginning of the contra flow and he let us through.

We cycled through a short contra flow and, perhaps half a mile later came to the felon who was supposed to control stop/go at the other side. Susan was incredulous – ‘what’s the point in him stoping traffic away out here?

I, of course, being a master of deduction, immediately deduced he was escaping! Every time the guards looked away he would move another 50 yards down the road. He was still doing his job stopping cars half a mile down the road and waiting until he was far enough away to make a run for it. Good luck you ingenious felon!

We’re now in another cheap motel and its looks like fast food for dinner again. Last week we had McDonalds twice in a row for our evening dinner. Now I like a golden M as much as anybody else but two nights running?

I think the choice tonight is something from the garage next to us or another burger place called Hardee’s. If we can be bothered walking half a mile we can go to Taco Bell but who on earth would walk half a mile to Taco Bell’s? The great thing about America though is that all garages sell cold beer and if I drink enough I will eat anything.

Thankfully, each day takes us further from the east coast of America and hurricane Florence. We are, however, cycling to the low lying gulf area around New Orleans and see daily reports of other potential hurricanes. All we can do is keep on cycling and be lucky.

I must go now. I think Susan’s back on Facebook and that means she’s not paying attention to me. I can go and wash my hands! 🙂

341 miles down.

After 4 nights broken down in Palatka we eventually headed to Gainesville.

If you ever find yourself driving through Palatka then please keep driving. There were some memorable moments, of course, like the chap sitting in front of us on the Gainesville bus telling the driver that six passengers at $2 a time meant it wasn’t worth ‘robbin’ him. I was quite relaxed as I had already heard him inform his pal that he really couldn’t do more time in jail for ‘robbin’.

His pal was an interesting character. He had stories of being thrown out the house when he was aged 5, being in the Vietnam war, and being dishonourably discharged. As he said ‘I just like shooting my mouth off’. He took a particular liking to Susan. There’s me sitting on edge ready to spring into action and she’s chatting away like its a coffee morning to ‘robbin’ guy and ‘shooting the mouth’ guy.

‘Shootin the mouth’ guy mentioned he was writing a biography of Bass Reeves. Now I happened to know who he was talking about – probably saved me from being robbed and shot.

Bass Reeves was the Black Lone Ranger. Born a slave, Bass became a deputy U.S. Marshal and was said to have arrested 3,000 felons and shot and killed 14 outlaws. He was a master of disguise and worked with a Native American tracker. Sound familiar? Look him up because he is arguably the greatest lawman of the West.

Sitting on the bus with ‘robbin’ man and ‘shootin the mouth’ man I was wishing it was good old Bass sitting beside me rather than Susan! To keep the story short I’m not going to mention the other passengers including the guy who was going to Gainesville to get injected with something, the woman who had to keep moving seats because she couldn’t be within 3 feet of anyone, the ex marine who pretended to be blind and then the big guy with the biggest eyes. You may think I’m exaggerating. Honestly, he had the biggest eyes ever. Ever!

So back to cycling. It was a relatively uneventful cycle to Gainesville (56 miles), Live Oak (70 miles), Monticello (66 miles) and Tallahassee (25 miles). We are struggling in the heat. We’ve endured Australian desert heat but give credit to Florida heat because when you add the humidity factor it’s unbearable.

Temperatures are in the 90s (I’m sorry we don’t do Celsius here) and the humidity makes it hotter and factor in a fully laden tandem and its like cycling on Mercury. We are both burnt and blistered as sun cream just runs off.

Susan struggles in this extreme heat and heatstroke is a real issue. I’ve found an ice cold strawberry milkshake works wonders for her. I drink a lot (water!) and leave a slug like trail of sweat wherever I go. So I’m always cool – in a slug like trail kind of way!

On the road to Monticello we met Martin – the first touring cyclist we have met in America.

Martin has previously cycled from the west coast to New Orleans and now he is doing the Jacksonville to New Orleans leg of the trans America journey. He was maybe going to stop in Tallahassee but after meeting Susan and I he may just go all the way through to New Orleans. There you go Martin – the goal is now in black and white 🙂

I’ve mentioned how unbearably hot it is but all you travellers to Florida will know that the late afternoon brings thunderstorms. So far we have missed them all including hurricane Gordon that was ahead of us and hurricane Florence that’s behind us.

I know that we will get caught eventually but in the meantime, here’s Susan sitting in the sun and the rain falling just over the horizon.

We’re now in Tallahassee which is the Florida State capital and was chosen because its halfway between St Augustine and Pensacola. It’s in the county of Leon which is named after the good old Ponce de Leon of course!

We will spend two nights in Tallahassee because you will never guess what happened – a bloody spoke went! Cycling along, 8 miles from Tallahassee and ‘bang’ another spoke down! This time it was the front wheel.

Now to be honest it was a bit of a relief and Susan and I can start talking to each other again. When seven spokes went on the rear wheel we had a bit of a domestic issue. Let me put it this way. Susan sits over the rear wheel and seven spokes went down. I sit over the front wheel and no spokes were down. Well I know what you’re thinking and nobody has to say the obvious. The facts kind of speak for themselves.

Now that the front wheel spoke has gone we now know its nothing to do with weight of either person. It’s just wear and tear. I can stop hiding the chocolate bars.

So an extra day in Tallahassee to get the spoke repaired and the wheel tuned. The bike shop was great in doing the work quickly and it allows me to catch up on my beer intake.

Another picture of Susan in front of our Monticello motel. Oh it was a rubbish motel but after Australia all U.S. motels are fantastic.

I’m sorry all the pictures are of Susan. It’s so hot just now I only wear a pair of speedo trunks and cycling shoes. I really cant publish that!

From Tallahassee we head west along the Florida Panhandle and our next rest day will be in Pensacola.

So far 273 miles down. A lot more to go.

One days cycling then four nights and three days stationary in Palatka with a broken rear wheel. At 44 miles in 8 days I estimate, at this rate, we will reach San Diego in January 2020. Now that really would be an epic trip.

Thankfully, the rear wheel, commonly known as the ‘bloody rear wheel’ is bloody well fixed.

We travelled by 7am Greyhound bus from Palatka to Gainesville (40 miles) to drop the wheel off one day and did the same journey the following day to pick it up. Unfortunately, the only return bus to Palatka each day was 4pm and so we had two whole day wandering Gainesville. Sorry friendly people of Gainesville but it was two days too much.

Do you know in 2007 Gainesville was ranked as the number 1 place to live in North America. Yes it has a good university but I’m sorry there has to be more to it than that! I’m sure there is and it’s just that we didn’t see it because we spent too much time in Starbucks hanging out with the students, hiding from the heat and drinking our fruit coolers. Oh I know we can be so so trendy at times!

Anyway, a lovely chap called Michael at Gator Cycles rebuilt our wheel, staying late last night and coming in early this morning. He said it was the toughest wheel build he has had in 10 years. His assistance was outstanding and much appreciated.

So now we are all set to go.

Unfortunately, I have just put the rear wheel on the bike which is currently in our motel bedroom. In doing so we now have a puncture. Oh the joys.

So tomorrow hopefully we set off on day 2 of our cycle route. Where does day 2 take us? Back to Gainesville of course!

Once, twice, three times Gainesville, I really don’t love you.

We started cycling on Saturday with an unsettling clicking noise coming from the rear of the bike. We had tried to trace the problem the previous day with no luck and decided to press on hoping it would sort itself out. It’s not as daft as it sounds as the long chains on the tandem often click on the running gear.

After 20 miles we found the source of the problem. A rear wheel spoke had broken and wrapped itself around the hub. We suspect this happened on the flight over.

I was reasonably happy as I had imagined all sorts of problems with the rear Rholoff gears. Essentially if that had been knackered our journey was over.

So off we set, noise free and happy.

Here’s a picture of Susan on the bike at a time of happiness.

Our happiness lasted 10 miles until another spoke went down. Spokes are like dominoes – when one goes down it puts additional pressure on its buddies. By the time we reached Palatka (44 miles) the rear spoke platoon was down 3.

Now the best place to get the wheel repaired is Gainesville which is on our route. So early the following day we set off cycling to Gainesville.

Within 5 miles another 3 spokes were down. Bang. Bang. Bang. It was clear we would never make the landing in Gainesville so we retreated back to Palatka with no further casualties.

That’s great Susan thought ‘back safe and not stranded on the highway’. Unfortunately she has a hopeless optimist for a husband. By my reckoning it had all settled down and we could still go for it. So we turned the bike around and headed back to Gainesville.

Now this is where I begin to believe there is a higher power watching over me because we hadn’t gone 200 meters before we lost another. It’s like someone saying don’t be so stupid. Bang. Spoke down. Now turn around.

As it now stands we’re sitting in the conference room of a hotel at 1030am waiting for a room. Susan feels like she has cycled all day and looks like she has cycled all week. I’m still thinking maybe we could still get to Gainesville.

What happens now? We’re not sure. I expect it’s going to take a couple of days to sort. Our war planning meeting will be held this afternoon in Steamboat Willie’s over a cold beer or two.

So the trans America cycle started with a bang. Well 7 bangs to be precise.