Day 23: 7/31 - Ferries, ferries, ferries!!

It was very early start today because we had to make sure we hit Ocracoke by 4:30 pm to get the ferry to the mainland. Here were the highlights of the day:

35 miles straight into the wind. Hooray!
At our first stop of the day, we pulled off the side of the road and drug our bikes through the sand into some shade. Then the hilarity began. Apparently there were these cacti that blend in with the sand grass, but have 1 inch spikes and sit only a few inches off the ground. Now, our biking shoes have one hole the size of a penny in the bottom, and these cacti just happened to find their way into Esmith's shoe. We hadn't seen these cacti yet, so we had no clue what was going one when Esmith starting hopping around on the other foot yelling. The cacti were everywhere, in our tires, on our bags, stuck to our shoes. No matter where you went, they were there. For some reason, Esmith was the only one that they were attacking, which was hilarious for me, just watching him step back and forth, getting more and more of them stuck in him. Great entertainment.

Next came the first ferry from Hatteras to Ocracoke, a 40 minute ride on which we met Randy and Gayle from Fairport NY. They had been staying in Avon in the OBX and were irritated that they had only just met us because they had had a huge party the night before with tons of food and would have put us up for the night. Oh well...the rainy, hot tent was comfortable enough. They were very nice, continuing our streak of meeting nice Americans on the trip, and offered us ice cold gatorades...which we accepted of course.

Next came more riding with a stop in Ocracoke just before the ferry to pick up some dinner and snacks for the 2 hour and 15 minute ferry ride ahead (sandwiches, lifesaver gummies, chips, chips ahoy super soft and chewy, etc). The ferry ride was a great break and we got some nap time, charged the cell phones, and read some. We also met Glenn and Courteney from Smyrna, I believe, who chatted with us at length about the trip and biking in general. They also hooked us up with some Bounce drier sheets, because apparently they work as an excellent bug repellent.

The day ended with the arrival at Cedar Island where our campsite was literally 100 feet from the exit of the ferry. A storm was rolling in, but we were stilll hungry so we braved the weather and rode into town to grab some rice and cheese. The night was interesting, with crazy mosquitoes attacking from all angles, and the water at the site tasted like liquified hard boiled eggs (very sulfur-y). Sleep was pretty much nonexistent as we had another rainy night with another sauna in the tent. Better days were approaching, though!