More Pictures And A Huge Thanks To UPS

As it sometimes happens, when we try to thank people for the efforts, some get left out, so here I am with a red face hoping to correct that mistake.

Martha Hardy, who owns the UPS Store located At nathan Dean Blvd and her staff have been "D2D Angels" in helping us ship t-shirts, make posters, and copy pictures, and just being very supportive of the Ride in general. My sincere gratitude to Martha, Tammy and Derrick (who's posters are now in 3 states!)

Here are some pictures of the Ride coming out of Dallas, TX.

Thanks

Bill

D2D Ride Pictures

Except for the obvious ones, these are in no particular order due to the fact that we are still waiting on some to be sent to us.

Enjoy!

It Has Been A Privilege.....

...... to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves, who, if they could, would ask us why so many of them must die needlessy (we euthanize 10 animals every minute) and to bring the message of Spay, Neuter and Adopt to some who may not know that a problem exists.

Today at just after 4 pm, we came home to our Paulding County Animal Shelter and Humane Society after 8 days on the road on a bicycle talking to anyone who would listen to us about this nationwide problem.

My team and I are very tired, but we felt we accomplished what we set out to do, and we are grateful to all of our supporters and sponsors without whom this ride would not have been possible.

To be honest, there were times when I doubted that we could make a difference, especially considering the poor (sometimes non-existant) response from the news media. But my friend Melise Tidwell of the Paulding Humane Society said it best when she told me, "Bill, if you caused just one person to spay, neuter or adopt a pet, then your Ride was successful", and that is how we are measuring our success.

There are many people to thank and pictures to post, so please continue to read our journal here as we recognize those who believed in us and our mission.

Thanks very much.

For the animals,

Bill

Gadsden, Alabama

An interesting ride on those "Alabama Rollers" (hills)!

Two I had to walk up partially, but on the way down one of them, I got up to 45.4 mph!

I thought to myself, "If you hit a pothole, it'll be all over for the German boy!", but luckily there were no potholes and I had a great ride down.

So we got to Gadsden and met some very fine people who weclomed us with a checkered flag, and fed us and presented me with a very nice newspaper article and a gift basket in my hotel room.

We passed some very interesting sights on the way and here is just one of them: An abandoned restaurant named, appropriately enough, "RESTAURANT" (as opposed to, I guess - "BARN".

Gadsden's Humane Society shelter is brand new and was ten years in the making, and pictured with me are Jolie Entriken, Assiatant Director; Vicki Meeks, Director, and Mike Gagliardo, Chairman Board of Directors.

Tomorrow: Set out for home on the Chief Ladiga Trail in Piedmont, AL, connect with our own Silver Comet Trail to Tara Drummond Park, and then on home to the Paulding Animal Shelter/Humane Society.

Thanks

Bill

"Ride?!" Whatta Ya MEAN, "Ride"????

How about "Walk/Stagger" for Wet Noses"????

Yep, that's me, pushing the bike up a hill. This was the first hill off the Natchez Trace that I could not conquer, but it was not (and won't be) the last, I think.

Some of those hills are what I call "terraced". That means there's one hill, NO revovery period and then another hill right after the first one!

We have yet to go through Alabama, and I expect there'll be more uphill walking to come, but we'll make it.

Thanks

Bill

Finally! Some Flat Land!!!! :)

Whooopeee!!!!

I was pleasantly surprised as we left Monroe, LA to find that I had hardly any hills and those that did appear were easily negotiated, so that was a real boost to morale and brought our speed back up to 10.8 mph.

We are in Vicksburg, MS as I write - we wanted to go all the way to Jackson, but due to heavy tornado activity there last weekend and power still not restored to some homes, there weren't any hotel rooms available so we will set out for Jackson in the morning, and travel a portion of the Natchez Trace before stopping for the night.

Physically I felt much better today after recovering from the "sodium shock" I had dealt my body which caused me to retain fluid and the diuretic I take nightly could not dump that fluid fast enough, because I kept shoving more salt in. We are still trying to find a happy medium utilizing all my nutrition products, and right now are concentrating on staying hydrated and using the Hammer Gel and Anti-Fatigue capsules, but backing off a bit on the Perpetuem.

I am enclosing a couple of pictures we made along that lonely stretch of highway between Monroe and Vicksburg: one is of an old abandoned motel (I love those kinds of pics - abandoned barns, motels, movie houses, mom and pop stores, etc) and some old fat guy at the Mississippi state line.

In closing out this blog entry, allow me to remind you that y'all can sponsor me and support the animals by pledging as little as a penny a mile for every mile I ride. Just go to the site and click DONATE. All proceeds go to the shelters - none to me. I am having the time of my life doing this for the animals and those who love them, and I wouldn't take a penny for all this fun and, hopefully, the good that may come of the Ride, so please help me help them.

Thanks

Bill

The Good and The Bad

What we expected:

1. Headwinds
2. Rough roads
3. A drop in our average speed (now 10.7 MPH)

What we did not expect:

1. Louisiana road signage is severely lacking. Even though we used mapmyride.com and our GPS, we managed to take a few wrong turns this morning trying to get back to Highway 80 East. There were a couple of times when I had to double back because we weren't sure of the directions. At times the only way we knew for sure we were going the correct way was when one of the team members turned his head and saw the sign that read 80 West!

Marty (one of the team) has dubbed our GPS voice "The Satellite Seductress", and I believe he has fallen in love with her. (:)) Anyway, she did her BEST to try to get us on I-20 to the point where she was given a "personality". (Guess the team's getting bored in that van)

2. When we hit the city of Ruston, the van was pulled over and a very nice police officer (and I am NOT being sarcastic) asked us to either stop completely or get me off the road due to the fact we were obstructing the flow of traffic, and we could see he was making sense: drivers were passing the van and sliding in directly behind ME trying to avoid the car coming in the opposite direction which created a danger for both the driver and me. So discretion being the better part of valor, we opted to put the bike in the van and ride at normal speed through Ruston.

3. I think I am retaining too much sodium because of the nutrition/hydration I am consuming while riding. The plan is to cut back on the amounts when they are mixed.

4. The first casualty to the Trek 1000: Broken front cage. If that is all that happens on this tour, I will be a happy boy!

That's it. We knew we'd have some set-backs but we hope they will remain at a minimum.

Thanks

Bill