The day continued fairly well with relatively flat roads and seemingly non-existent hills. Unfortunately, it appeared as if all the hills we should have been hitting had been rolled up into one, crazy, unfathomable, nearly insurmountable, and undeniably gnarly hill (hill does not do it justice...let me check a thesaurus...an inselberg....not sure what it exactly means, but it looks ugly and that's what this "hill" was). Seriously, Esmith and I can't figure out how they even got the equipment up this slope during the paving process...must have been thousands of Egyptian slaves from 1000 BC, pulling the pavers up the hill on logs. Simply unbelievable. So the ascent took awhile, and a gallon or two of sweat later we were 2/3's of the way up the hill. And what behold, is to our left? A large house with a sign that says "Deli: Hot food and cold drinks". Booyah. Here is the following set of events:
*We enter said deli looking fatigued, thirsty, hungry, and angry at god for putting that hill there*
Owner: "What can I do you for?"
Us: "Food."
Owner: "Sorry, but I don't have any."
Us: "What?! You're a deli, how do you not have any food?" (it's sunday...maybe they have some rules about eating on Sundays up in these mountains)
Owner: "Well, my fridge had been on the fritz lately and finally conked out this morning. So, unless you've got something with you I can cook, you're out of luck."
Us (visibly disturbed): "Aaaagggghh...we REALLY needed food."
Owner: "Tell you what, you help me get the old fridge out of the house and put the new one in, and I've got some meats and cheeses I was able to save stored in my mini-fridge that I can make you a sandwich with."
Us: "Deal" (obviously)
So, we were able to get the INDUSTRIAL stainless steel fridge out of the house (with a little engineering skills, I might add) and got the new one in. We were fed absolutely MASSIVE ham, turkey, and meunster sandwiches with all the fixin's and also got some gatorade. For free. Ultra booyah. He also offered us a place to sleep in one of the spare rooms upstairs if we didn't want to continue biking in the heat, but we had a schedule to keep so we kindly refused. The ride continued, the hill continued, and the downhill could never have made up for that ridiculous hill...but it came close. I hit 45 mph and Esmith hit 44...my sunglasses were off, and I don't really remember much of the descent, but I do know that when I hit the bottom, my face was full of tears and my eyes hurt like hell from the wind. What a ride. Another cyclist rode by and commented on what an awesome hill it is, and we replied "Yeah, but not the other side." Him: "You went UP the other side with all that crap on your bikes? You guys are insane!!" Yes we are.
The rest of the day consisted of rolling hills, more Delaware River swims, random sightings of the Eastern European vacationers (for some reason they love the Delaware Water Gap), and eating fresh, wild raspberries from the side of the rode (perhaps ate one too many). We ended up eating an absurdly large dinner at a diner that even Esmith couldn't finish. It was fried chicken, fried zuchinni, french fries, fried scallops, fried shrimp, a salad, a bowl of soup, and a large plate of nachos. It was delicious. And disgusting. And we also had another 6 miles to ride to our campsite, which was a hellish ride. But the campsite was very well run and cut us a deal on the stay since we were only bikers. It was called "Driftstone on the Delaware" in Portland, PA. Another great campsite to check out if you are in the area. We unfortunately got hit with a storm as soon as we got there so we only got to experience it from the inside of our tent.
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