So, these are some pictures of Malawi; in the photo on the left I am at a committee meeting with the school officials and the building committee. You can see some of the school children who attended the meeting and some of them partcipated in the pen pal exchange we held with 2 different groups of students. The photo on the right is the inside of the classroom block and shows the progress that has been made. They have begun to cement the floors and need to plaster the wall and add some doors! I was thinking about these kids today when I was riding and thinking that this is why I am doing what I'm doing. So, I thought I would share this as a reminder to those who maybe don't know, or have forgotten! :)So, Stephen and I have had some adventures today, again! Yesterday we thought we had the whole navigation thing down, and thought today would just be a ride...didn't expect any glitches...don't know why, because things just don't go that way in life, right?
We started out at about 8:00 and made pretty good time to Mystic, and didn't have to go over the big bridge at all...it was a pretty ride, and pretty uneventful! That was about 22 miles. We were planning to get to Middletown, RI which would have been another 60 miles from there. When we planned this ride and drove it using our car GPS, the route took us up Route 1 into RI which was a beautiful ride; it was flat and scenic! Today, however, we opted to use the bike GPS and the route was different. We decided to stick with that and work it out the way we have been. Stephen jotted down the route that I use on my GPS and some of the mile markers for about 22 miles wort from Mystic...this is what has been working for us so far. About a mile down the road, I took a wrong turn, the GPS started recalculating, I went back to the route I was supposed to be on. The map wasn't loading, so I decided to input the route again and waited for it to load, and waited and waited AND WAITED! I called Stephen and when he caught up, we discussed what the issue might be. I continued to ride and figured it would probably load soon...it didn't. Long story short, it never did! So, we decided to use the directions he had jotted down and that got us as far as Voluntown, CT., where we found a small local library that advertised internet access, and consulted them on how far Middletown, RI was.
Here I am riding toward Stephen in Voluntown!! The ride was about 20 miles from here, and we decided that that would be the goal for the day...60 miles, then we would put the car up and drive to the hotel! And that's what we did. It was only a short distance down the road from here that we entered Rhode Island...that was encouraging and exciting. And again, Stephen was waiting there with his camera to take 'the picture'! He knew...here it is!
Well, I want to say that it is not all wonderful...Shannon said it sounded like I was on vacation...because when I talked to her yesterday from the hotel and was so happy to be hanging out on the bed watching t.v. after having taken a shower and getting ready to to eat dinner!! So, it's not a vacation...we both work hard and both days, so far, at around the 25-30 mile mark I could not believe how 'little progress' I felt we had made and couldn't believe there was another hill so soon!!! Anyway...the point is, we are working in different ways, and finding some appreciation for the small things of the day that make up for all the rest!!
Hopefully tonight I will sleep a little better...tossed and turned last night until about 2:30 and then woke up at 6...
More tomorrow!! Maybe - we will be staying at a KOA campground and won't have internet so unless we stop at someplace with wi-fi, we won't have access. That's the other thing we have decided, that we need to update our technology some more! whew!
No comments:
Post a Comment