Steve and April left before I was up. Damn it was good to catch up with them.
Kurt and I left the hotel at the same time, with different plans. Kurt headed to a breakfast place that served gluten-free waffles. I cycled directly to the Natchez Trace.
The Trace is similar to the Blueridge Parkway. Limited access, no commercial traffic, 50 mph. An awesome ride. Shade for most of the day, long shallow hills (unsurprising as we were headed slightly away from the Mississippi).
Kurt and I planned to meet up at the same destination, a campground 100 km away.
Kurt wanted breakfast, and to stop at many of the historic sites (southern culture being of more interest to him than me). I figured he’d catch me. Which he did at the 75 km mark. But he had more sites to visit, and we arrived at the campground together.
People stopped me a couple times today. Once to offer me coffee. Once a truck pulled off well ahead of me. The driver talked to me for a while about cycle touring.
Rocky Spring is a small poorly-maintained national park campground. Without potable water! And nowhere near, well, anything. Even with Kurt’s focus on water, we would both be short tomorrow. Fortunately we availed ourselves of the kindness of strangers in RVs, and should be set for tomorrow.
Tomorrow Kurt heads up the rest of the Trace (440 miles in total). The MRT turns off from the Trace about 20 km from here, to Vicksburg and beyond. I finally figured out why I couldn’t make sense of my MRT book. The east side is filed under Mississippi, while the west side is filed under Arkanas.
I’ll stop in Vicksburg for food and water, and decide east bank or west bank then. I think the east side has a campground about where I want it, but I’m going to look a few days ahead to try to avoid a repeat of the long distances the prior few days. Today was a fairly pleasant 98 km.