to Keystone State Park, OK

I left Tiff's house around 6:30 or 7 with every intention of following the route Shawn showed me yesterday, but I must not have been paying close enough attention because I missed my turn and wound up going at least 6 miles out of my way, which meant that I was an hour late for church. Fortunately Justice wasn't expecting me until the second service. Instead of attending the service itself, I went to a discussion with some young adults that turned out to be on the subject of Democracy. It would have been a better topic for last month... we were all pretty discouraged and cynical!

After the service I went looking for Justice, but her mother found me and told me she had gotten sick and gone home. Faced with the prospect of going to Waffle House alone again, I decided to just sit at one of the church's benches and eat my snacks. While I was doing this, a man came over to admire my rig and told me the best way to get to Keystone State Park.

West of Sand Springs, I was passed by two thirtysomething cyclists with skintight suits and mountain bikes. The man of the pair was disparaging Yuppies as they passed. He asked if I was going far, and I gave my usual response, "South for the winter." He laughed and said, "South is that way." A few miles later I passed them; he had punctured a tire and was just leaving a message with his mother for her to come get them. He didn't have a spare tube, patch kit, or pump. I helped him remove and patch the tube -- it was easy to find the holes because he had put goop in the tube that's supposed to prevent flats, and it was oozing freely from two holes. The patches didn't seal properly with the goop there, so the patched tire still didn't hold air. He insisted on giving me $4 anyway. I should have told him to "pay it forward," as Mike-in-Cincinnati did when he gave me two meals and a campsite for the night, but I didn't think of it until I had already accepted the cash.

A few minutes after that, a biker zoomed past me the other way, then came back and said hello: it was the owner of the bike shop in Bartlesville, and he had recognized me! In camp at Keystone State Park, I tried out my new camp stove for the first time. The stove works great, but the windscreen is a loss. I'll have to ask Bill to remind me how his was constructed.

31.8 mi