First Flight with the Wrights

From Virginia Beach we took a number of back roads to Kitty Hawk on the Outer Banks of North Carolina...to be more precise, we stopped at Kill Devil Hills, the site of the Wright brothers first flight on December 17th 1903. The first three attempts were a little over 100 feet but the 4th attempt they managed to keep it in air for over 800 feet thus achieving man's first powered flight...this was control of flow of air over the wings, weight being lifted, steering and controlling ascent and descent which we now of course take for granted.  BTW, Kill Devil Hills is 10 metres BELOW sea level (per GPS) and so Dave and I were hoping for no hurricane water flow.  This of course explains why all the summer homes are built high on stilts. A complete replica is setup.

Virginia Beach

We left Williamsburg and had a really intense ride on a number of expressways, each with multiple lanes including high bridges over shipping channels and tunnels under other shipping channels. Virginia Beach has lots of hotels on a great length of sandy beach. It was cold and windy, so we walked up and down the boardwalk, strolled out onto the fishing pier and bought the requisite T-shirt.

Williamsburg - Virginia

Well, with the impending storm we decided to stay put in a town that had some history, some touristy stuff, some interest.....and we picked the perfect place.  For those of you who followed us in 2008 let me tell you that Williamsburg has it over Gettysburg!!
What's more is we decided to do the Ritz by staying in a suite in one of the colonial Williamsburg hotels right on the site....so that we didn't have to bike....and we walked all around colonial Williamsburg and learned a lot of history about the time of US independence (1776). The Bruton Parish Church, dating from 1715, had pew boxes where both Washington and Jefferson stopped by to worship.....hey Bev and Dave have put their butts in the seats of greatness (expand the name on the pew).

We discovered the American love of guns was really a colonist thing with the British governor decorating the  entrance foyer of his palace with a massive albeit impressive collection of weapons.

What makes  

Williamsburg really impressive is the over 500 actors dressed in period costume who bring the history of the period to life.  This includes fife and drum marching bands, Benedict Arnold taking over Williamsburg, and militia firing muskets and canons.

We expect the storm to arrive at about 10 pm tonight and we will be safe and tucked in.  There is a tornado watch just the other side of Interstate 95, not far from us so we feel lucky.  We will leave for Virginia Beach tomorrow, eastern seaboard here we come....that said, Bev is upset that her bike (chrome!) is so dirty!!!

Super sized....remember that??

Yup, we're in the States.....and we are hoping to maintain our weight.....holy cow, how can we drink this iced tea?  We'll never outrun Yogi if we have to visit too many washrooms.

Spring has arrived

On the second day, the sun was shining and Bev said "we are going for it today....let's get as far south as we can before storm Yogi hits the east". Midway across Pennsylvania spring arrived in a matter of about 10 clicks Forsthyia and crabapple trees were in full bloom and petunias were bragging with colour.  Trees had buds and little green leaves, the like of which we Torontonians had not seen since last year.  The weather was warmer, it was really pretty driving along the Susauehanna River to Harrisburg Pennsylvania. From there  decided to join the trucks on interstate 81 to save time. We crossed into West Virginia and into Virginia for close to 600 clicks.

Who hired that weatherman??

Wow what a bad day for biking! It took us forever to get out of the driveway and then with the border crossing and the weather (it was supposed to have stopped raining after lunch), we managed only to get to Batavia about 1/2 way between Buffalo and Rochester!!  It wasn't a heavy rain (that kind of downpour is fine, you just have to watch out for hydroplaning in the wheel wells on the roads) rather it was a constant heavish drizzle...the kind that keeps dirt on the windscreen....and then with occasional fog.  The poor visibility was mentally draining and we were wet and cold.  Bev was straining to see Dave through her helmet windscreen and her bike windscreen all the while thinking "when the hell are we going to stop??"  The bikes went to bed early all dirty but covered up.

Finally off again!! 2013

We are now formally retired and enjoying it immensely.  We can go on a road trip when we want instead of only in the summer vacation period....ok, we are now off to tour down the US eastern seaboard down to the Florida Keys and back via New Orleans.  This was never possible in the summer due to the storms; we'll leave on Tuesday April 16th and should be back on May 13th. See you on the blog....