Odometer at beginning of the day = 40310

We headed South from Fontana Lodge at 7:15am.We saw a wild turkey ahead of us and waited for it to cross the road. We saw two more wild turkeys a little later and had a coyote run across the road just ahead of us in Georgia. We were riding through some woods owned by Georgia Pacific at the time. That was cool. Georgia is beautiful. There are groves of peach trees, pecan trees and magnolia trees that are just starting to bloom. You can't take in enough of this kind of beauty. We arrived at our destination, Albany, about 3:30pm Eastern Time.

Odometer at end of the day = 40690

Miles ridden today = 380

Sunday, May 27, 2007

We awoke to an eerie landscape. The winds had shifted overnight and the entire area was foggy with smoke from the forest fires that had been burning along the Florida-Georgia border for the last two or three weeks. We hit the road at 7:30am. We will be doing mostly highway miles today, so we will cover the distance in short time. About an hour or so down the road we hit Florida. After about 150 miles we rode out of the forest fire smoke. It stunk of burnt wood and death. It singed our eyes and burnt our throats and nostrils. I don't see how people can live here in this. I feel badly for them.

We stopped at a Wendy's for a butt break and we still reeked of smoke. Not long after getting out of the smoke, we found it was the season for lovebugs! Insex! (See the picture at the top of this page) We wondered why all the other motorcyclists were riding with their heads down by their gas tanks like they were in a racing position, but once we started getting hit by the lovely splatters from the love bugs, it was painfully obvious. Pretty soon, the air was thick with them for miles at a time. We rode through swarms on and off in most of the State, except for the very Southern section. Gross!

We settled into our hotel in Clearwater and hooked up with Sean. It was great to see him again!! Sean gave us a tour at his home and his shop where he sells antiques. We stopped at some friends of Sean's for a barbecue. We went to Smoky Bones for supper and met Jeff's cousins Andy and Donna, as well as Andy's wife and Donna's children. It was fun to meet them and we enjoyed catching up over BBQ.

Sign from one of Sean's Locations	From left: Jeff, Joyce, Donna's two sons, Donna, Andy's wife, Andy, & Sean

Odometer at end of the day = 41046

Miles ridden today = 356