P4W2 Day 30 Decatur - Centre, AL 91 miles

Today was a lot tougher of a time biking than Day 29, even though the mileages were similar.  The trade off for taking the Natchez Trace was having the southern Appalachians eliminating flat passage east back to the Atlantic.  Out of Decatur by about 20 miles I hit the first thumping hill in like a week: 2 miles at 9 percent grade....25 minutes gone right there, then 5 minutes at the top of the hill to figure how whether it was real or a dream that I was getting up to 20 mph regularly just one day earlier.  Gravity never rests.  This kind of climbing continued all day long as I crossed several mountain spines of the southern Apps.  They are easy to spot when you fly west out of Atlanta on a clear day; row after row of mountains can be see for the first half hour or more of air time.  The hills were tougher with the traffic.  I never could lose some pretty heavy traffic even though I was on secondary roads for the majority of the day.

Despite a raw day with 40 degree temps and slate gray skies, there were glimpses of spring.  Many beds of daffodils had started blooming.  It was a weird site having these flowers in bloom but going past countless houses with wood smoke pouring out of their chimneys.   The damp cold of the eastern U.S. feels more bone chilling than that of the desert.  Many people today asked me if I was cold.  I told them that going uphill was fine but downhill was tough with the wind chill factor.

The Tennessee Valley Authority operates many dams in the U.S. Southeast.  The mighty Tennessee River is dammed for much of its course.  I crossed the massive Lake Guntersville Reservoir around midday.  It was amazing to see dozens of common loons in their winter plumage.  The lake was flat calm and they were fishing side-by-side bass anglers in seeming perfect harmony.

Paul's Appeal for Your Donations to OWLS through Pedal 4 Wildlife II

I credit my friend Rachel Bisesi for the photo artwork.  Such an all-encompassing photo needs to be accompanied by my all-encompassing appeal for donations to the Outer Banks Wildlife Shelter through Pedal 4 Wildlife II!

I have roughly one week of pedaling remaining on a 3500 miles bike trip across America.  To those of you that have donated, thank you for your support of OWLS!   And please pass this message along to friends and colleagues that hopefully will be interested in supporting a wonderful wildlife shelter in coastal North Carolina.  If you are following my journey but have not yet donated, I am asking for your support.  Remember, all your donation dollars go to support OWLS and their mission to treat sick and injured wildlife.

Thank you!

P4W2 Day 29 Tishomingo, MS - Decatur, AL 88 miles

Tishomingo State Park is a beautiful place.  It looks like it represents a part of the state where the rocks return.  There were very pretty slate-bedded creeks in the park, where the water runs clear, and if you are not claustrophobic, possibilities for cave exploration as well.

Last night felt like one of the coldest nights of the trip simply because it was pretty cold for camping (25 F) and the air never dehumidified after the rain yesterday.  I woke up to a coat of ice on the bike, the paniers, and the road.  The slow-rising sun made for pretty lighting on the pond inside the park.

This morning I said goodbye to the lovely Natchez Trace.  I left it like I started on it - I had the road to myself.    This re-routing decision to take the Parkway instead of rutted roads to the south enabled me to cover about 10 percent of my cross-continental distance on a beautiful road with great scenery.  Maybe someday I'll pedal the northernmost 25percent.

After I left the Parkway I realized I had to make some uneducated guesses on what roads to take across a populated stretch of the red clay country of northern Alabama.  U.S. Highway 72 was not a bad road, had variable shoulder widths, lots of traffic, and some nice tailwinds.

The highlight of the afternoon was passing by Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge.  The refuge had many waterfowl.   And I spotted my first belted kingfisher, a species that adorns the bird trail signs in the northern part of the state.

Dogs are everywhere in the south: dogs that eat dead stuff, stray dogs, dogs that chase bikers, howling dogs at night while people try to sleep, and also a place where they can be laid to rest.

P4W2 Day 28 Mathiston-Tishomingo, MS 112 miles

I was able to make some good miles today on the rolling Natchez Trace.  The winds were calm and the skies were gray.  The many bird sightings today included pileated and red bellied woodpeckers, wood ducks, turkeys, and brilliantly colored bluebirds.

Then it happened.  At around Tupelo the rain started.  I got soaked!  Cold rain with heavy traffic around the city.  I needed a break and Starbucks coffee tasted pretty darn good.

As quickly as the rain started, after an hour it quit just as suddenly.  The skies cleared and I once again had a beautiful afternoon sun-soaked road all to myself north of Tupelo.  The lovely Tishomingo State Park greeted me with super cold and clear skies for my last evening in the state of Mississippi.

P4W2 Day 27 Jackson - Mathiston, MS 88 miles

Another great pedaling day on the Natchez Parkway.
I think that this road has spoiled me for the remainder
of the trip!  Many pines and oaks line the Parkway.
Oaks here are impressively sized. The growth rate
of red oaks here looks maybe double the rate in New
England, based on the radial spacing between rings here;
about 1/2 inch (~ one inch diameter growth per year).

I had told Ben Ball at the Talk Station that I thought
that I had entered the very fringes of the Appalachians
back near Natchez.  Now I don't think that was true.  Today
turned out to be flatter than Day 26.  And I noticed that
the highest elevation in the state as posted on my map is
only 900 feet above sea level.  I think that the Apps missed
the state of Mississippi. 

Today I wound through
swamp areas with a lot of standing water.  I saw many
groups of wood ducks, including some of the really brightly
colored males.  They spook easily but I got quite close to them
due to how quiet a bike is on a smooth road.  Is it the
world's most quiet machine? (at least when the chain is oiled?!).
I tried to get close to a big flock of wild turkeys, but
they would have none of it.  I saw dozens of deer, including
several bucks that still had their antlers.


Today was also surprisingly cold.  A north headwind bit into me
all day.  The difference in speed between yesterday and today
was 2 mph, but it felt more than this.  Despite another day
with cloudless bluebird skies, the winter hat never left my head.
Ironically, it felt warmest today when the wind stopped at around
dusk.  I think I have advanced farther north than spring.  The
grass is less green up hear and the vernal pools were mostly
quiet of frogs.  Great blue herons looked like they were snacking on cold-stunned frogs in these pools.  Daffodils along the Parkway looked about 10
days away from blooming.

Late in the day I got to the historic town of French Camp.  I still
had a few miles to pedal to my campground, so didn't want to get
too far off the Parkway.  But this town is right on it.  I turned
left to a convenience store that had a little side business of
southern fried dinners.  I got a really nice meal of fried fish,
plus boiled stuff which was a welcome change from the batter fried
business of LA.  Boiled sides included true southern flare - okra (sliminess
and all), collards with butter, corn on the cob, and then also fresh
cole slaw.  The only zany part of my purchase at the store was
the pre-packaged coconut pie I bought.  In the dark at the campground
I was about to lay into one.  I noticed through my dim headlamp that
this product hadn't left the shelf very often - both pies were covered
in a healthy layer of fuzzy green mold!  Even my appetite couldn't
deal with that type of frosting.

On the way back to the Parkway from the store I noticed another
side of French Camp.  The French Camp Christian Academy maintains
some really nice old historic buildings.  I wish I had discovered them earlier in
the day.  I went into the cafe, which was located in an early 1800s cabin.
After 80 miles of cold pedaling, I could have napped by the red oak log fire for
a few days.  It felt great.  The ladies sold me my second take out dinner and some first-
rate dessert - Mississippi mud cake made from scratch in...Mississippi.  I should have asked for 3 or 4 servings.  The
old oak beam dwellings and exhibits the Academy maintains at French Camp were really
well maintained, and a great stop for somebody visiting the Parkway.  Before
I left to get back on the Parkway for my last 10 miles of pedaling, I sat in
the rocking Adirondack chairs on the porch.  I would have liked to take one
with me - much, much more comfortable than my bike seat!  The chain connecting
the chairs is to keep bike tourers from getting any ideas.

P4W2 Day 26 Natchez State Park - Jackson, MS 96 miles

A fine day of pedaling on the Natchez Trace Parkway.  Just
wonderful scenery all day on a well maintained road.  I
wound through a mixture of hardwood and softwood forests,
over rolling terrain.  Red-shoulder and red-tailed hawks,
bluebirds, red-headed woodpeckers, and nuthatches were all
seen in abundance today.  In a swamp close to Jackson, I
spotted a blue heron rookery;  the wispy nests had survived
the windstorm a couple days earlier.  Many trees had fallen across the road as a result of the storm.

What makes the scenery so good along the Parkway is that
it is a commercial-free zone.  No advertisements.  Litter
is rare.  Lots of well-maintained exhibits and farms along
the road.  And a super-smooth road surface that makes pedaling
easier and quieter. 

One of my stops today was in front of an historic home in
the really sleepy town of Port Gibson.  Figured I better
take a photo of blooming flowers while I could before I passed
them to the north!

Lots of folks have asked what I eat.  Late in the day I was riding
well (read: comfortably!) and spotted a Fresh Market right near
downtown Jackson.  Taking a loaded touring bike through a rush
hour roundabout in the state's biggest city will turn some heads!
After several days on small and limited grocery stores, I was
overwhlemed in the bountiful Fresh Market;  I picked up a real motley
crue of stuff that I then ate for dinner; one pound fresh salad,
two hard boiled eggs, four stuffed grape leaves, one package (4
servings) imitation crab meat (Alaskan pollock), one mango protein smoothie,
4 ounces chocolate covered pretzels, one package bagel chips,
one quart tangerine juice, one can smoked almonds, and one Pay Day bar.  After eating this,
the whole loaf of pumpkin walnut bread looked out of place in my
tent, so I ate it too.

P4W2 Day 25 Simmesport, LA - Natchez State Park, MS 82 miles

My goal today was to travel north into Mississippi, the 49th state
I've to.  The route in the morning took me due north.
I pedaled on a massive windswept levy of the Mississippi River.
Water control and diversion structures were everywhere.  It would take a lot
of study or a stop in one of the many Army Corp of Engineers offices
to determine what all the structures where for and where the water was headed.
Many, many birds inhabited the river bottom lands still left flooded;
white pelicans, bald eagles, countless hawks, pileated woodpeckers, and wood ducks were all seen today.

I made 70 really slow miles as the west wind throttled me full-tilt.  In fits
and starts I pulled the winter biking garb back out of my bike bags; it
had gotten pretty much ignored over the previous week and I had a hard
time finding it and then putting it on...once I was on the levy there
was no place to stop or hide from the wind over the flat miles to the
river crossing.  The big bike was a partial blockade from the wind!

By mid-afternoon I had crossed the big river on a wide and (now needless to say...)
windy bridge.  The Mississippi with a cold clearing wind whipping it into a
muddy froth, looked pretty intimidating if I was to get blow off the bridge...maybe a 150 foot swan dive.
This marked the third time I had crossed the river on my bike trips.  In
Minnesota, the river is, obviously, considerably smaller.  There is a lot of
erosion between here and there to create that kind of mud load.  Chocolate milk has nothing on the Mississippi this far down.

Natchez, MS is a really nice town.  It has sweeping views of the river and
stately red brick buildings.  In a lot of ways it resembles a smaller version of
Williamsburg, VA.  I had three good stops in town.  The folks at a really nice
visitors center gave me some route advice.  I stopped at the Natchez Coffee Company and
gave the owners son a geography lesson on where I had pedaled over the past 3 weeks.
And I stopped at Trippe's Western Auto to get my bike tires changed.  Chris
Trippe, the owner, was a great guy.  He told me that his grandfather bought and
owned one of the original Western Autos in the 1930s.  Chris's store remained
an independent franchise after the other stores were taken over by by Sears in a buyout
years ago.  He had added a bike department to his store due to the popularity
of bicycling here.

My goal for days was to intercept the historic Natchez Trace Parkway in order to cut through a
wide swath of the Deep South on a good road.  I had done a bit of homework on the
Parkway and read that it was a bikers dream.  This is spot-on.  Late in the day
I finally left town and got on the Parkway for the last 10 miles of riding.
A smooth, quiet, and pretty road with great scenery.  Dozens of deer hurdled off in front
of me.  Frogs chirped from river bottoms before their likely re-hibernation due the
recent cold snap.  I even treed a raccoon that wasn't quite sure what to make
of me in the new-found cold twilight.   Stately oaks, beeches, hickories, and pines line the Parkway.

For folks in my reading audience that may be considering a bike trip of their own, the
rolling topography of Natchez Trace might be for you.  The scenery is apparently outstanding during spring
bloom and fall color seasons.  There are lots of places to stay along the Parkway,
and motorists appear really cognizant of bikers; for the first time during the P4W2, I had
motorists stop in both directions to let a biker past safely.   Wonderful!