By Ben |

The plan today seemed simple enough: ride from Texoma to Wiley, set up camp in a park there, and have dinner with Sara (Ballard) Moore and her family.  Two problems: my knees hurt more than ever, and the Texas maps are a smaller scale than I'm used to.  This is not to mention the rain, which was just a bother.

Around 3:00 I called Sara to say that I wouldn't be making it to Wiley, but I thought I could get a hotel in McKinney by dinnertime.  We made plans to meet there.  But by 4:00 it was clear I wouldn't be in McKinney until about 8!  Her three-year-old son is on a tight schedule, so we had to cancel.

It's a good thing, too, because shortly thereafter I discovered a flat tire on the trailer... don't know how long it had been flat.  The sun set right about then, so I fixed the flat by the side of the road in the dark, and not a single car stopped to ask if I needed help.  I was pretty ticked.

The good news is, I did get to McKinney before 8, and I got a very nice room with a hot bath and ice packs and a pizza and a bottle of wine and a silly movie, and I had a nice little pity party for my knees.

60.0 mi