Camp Wood, TX to Lost Maples State Natural Area, TX

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Jo and Shawne say...
Day: 41
Mileage Today: 43.5
Total Mileage: 1651.15
Flats Today: 0
Total Flats: 44

It was drizzling when we woke up. Chug and Sandi met us outside and asked if we were sure we wanted to leave and brave the weather. We were pretty sure, in fact, that we didn't want to leave, but leave we must. Camp Wood was a paradise, but we didn't want to overstay our welcome, and the road ahead of us wasn't getting any shorter.
We left, waving goodbye to our new friends. We experienced the same too-warm-but-too-cold sensation, and had to stop several times within the first few miles to either don or discard clothing items. We finally found comfortable outfits and cycled on...uphill. We climbed a fairly steep incline, and had risen about 800 feet in two miles. We stopped for a water break, and a cyclist passed us. He was dressed in white and had panniers, but we didn't hear him coming, and he passed us without a word. We hollered a greeting to him, but he didn't even look at us, and he made no response. We looked at one another in amazement. We'd never met a cyclist who didn't want to talk. Jo assumed that he may be a foreigner and didn't speak English.
We caught up with him a little up the road, and he was leaning against a guardrail. He was young, maybe in his late teens, with short dark hair. He seemed awkward, and his limbs were long and very thin. We attempted to start a conversation with him. We introduced ourselves, but he didn't follow suit. He told us he'd started in Bishop, California, but he'd taken a bus from his home town of San Francisco to start the trip.
Shawne laughed and said, "I guess we're the only people who cheated on this trip! We drove from our home town to San Diego and started from there!"
"I cheated too," the cyclist replied, "I took a bus across Arizona and half of New Mexico." His only comment about his cheating was that he didn't like climbing.
Well, that kind of cheating really WAS cheating, and not what Shawne was talking about. This young cyclist was strange and gave off a bad vibe. We excused ourselves and kept climbing. We didn't see him again for a long time, and we scoped the back of each pickup that passed us, looking for his bicycle. We were sure he wasn't too proud to hitchike.
We'd taken a long break at the top of the pass and were ready to move on when the young man finally caught us again. Not wanting to ride with this fellow, we waited about five minutes longer so he had a good head start. Sure enough, though, we passed him on a downhill. He'd stopped in a pretty unsafe area and this time was sitting on a guardrail on a blind corner, eating a snack. He barely even looked at us as we passed, so we said nothing to him. Not talking to another cyclist is a difficult thing to do, but it seemed appropriate.
We continued down the other side of the pass, happy for the downhill. The downhill slowed and we glided through a small meadow and past a small sign advertising barbequed ribs. We continued into the town of Leakey (pronounced Lakey) to find there was nowhere to get food.
"It's Sunday," the locals explained, "You're in Fundamentalist territory...you know, the Bible Belt! There's nothing open on Sundays, and there is no food in town."
We checked the little stores anyway, but it was true. The whole town was shut down. The gas station only stocked potato chips. We found a coffee shop which was open, so we stopped in. Shawne saw our strange fellow cyclist bypass town as we parked our bikes. The poor guy took a wrong turn and starting climbing a pass. We didn't call out to him as we watched him ride the wrong way out of town, and we never saw him again.
The coffee shop didn't have food either.
"I had food earlier, but all I have left is one piece of stuffed French Toast," the proprietor explained, "what kind of food were you looking for?" We told her we probably needed some meat. "Well, remember the BBQ place you passed about four miles ago on 337?", she asked. "Big mistake. That's the only place to get any food. Tell you what, can you drive a stick? I'll call the BBQ place and tell them you're coming, and you can take my car up there to get some food. There's no food in Vanderpool either, on Sundays, so you need to get some extra food to take with you for dinner." We were, in fact, going to Vanderpool, but we had plenty of emergency food with us. We wanted to take her up on the offer, just to say we did it, but we were racing the sun, and we knew we had three large passes to climb before we even got to Vanderpool. Regretfully, we declined and travelled on.
On the way, we found a graveyard with an interesting history. The owners of the land sold it as a cemetery for $1.00 and a guarantee that the two of them would be buried there. It is the only cemetery in the region, so the penniless as well as the powerful politicians, and the elite are all rubbing shoulders in the cemetery.
We climbed the first pass with no problem. It was steep and slow, but we enjoyed the feeling of blood pumping through out bodies once again. The initial shock had worn off of our legs...the poor things thought that since we took a couple of days off, we were done with the trip!
The second pass, however, did not go as well. It, too, was steep and slow, but we encountered more traffic. One girl pulled up right behind Jo and laid on her horn. Jo was as far to the side of the road as possible, so she didn't stop riding or react in any way. When it was finally safe to pass Jo, the girl pulled up next to her and started yelling obscenities. Then she raced up to Shawne and did the same to him.
Jo says she was still mad at the girl by the time we reached the top of the pass, so we stopped to sit down for a while and eat a snack. We made sandwiches of peanut butter, jelly, and whole grain cereal. We ate two sandwiches apiece and we each drank a whole water bottle. We headed down the other side and started climbing pass #3. It was a great climb until the sun came out. It was the first time it had shown it's face today. Within moments, it was miserably hot and stayed that way for twenty minutes. The air was stagnant, and stifling. Sweat poured from our faces as we struggled uphill, and Jo watched as sweat dripped off of her nose and landed on her bicycle.
Finally, it was overcast and cool again, and we peacefully finished our ascent. The views at the tops of all our climbs today were amazing. Mountain after mountain, all about the same height, stretched out in all directions. Tall trees blanketed each mountain, and groves of maple trees gave shocks of Fall color to each. It was beautiful to look down upon them, and we held hands as we silently breathed in this sight.
We finally got to Vanderpool, and it was getting late. The store was open, and had some canned food, but nothing worth eating. We headed to what looked like a decent state park. We waved at motorists passing by, but no one waved back. We wondered aloud if this was the cold attitude of Eastern Texas that we'd been warned about in Alpine.
We reached the state park, and dusk was settling in. We stopped at the ranger station, but it was closed for the day. The fees posted outside showed that to pitch a tent, it was $21.00. Since we were running short on daylight, and the next pass started within a half-mile of this state park, we decided to stay. When we got to the campsite, there was a sign stating the campground was full. We found the camp host, and she said there was no discount for cyclists, but there was one cancellation, so they had a site open. We could camp at site #9...right next to the restrooms.
We set up camp, and found that our neighbors were less than desirable. Their dog barked continuously, and when Jo couldn't take it anymore, she disappeared to take a shower. The restrooms were dirty and old, and the showers were in bad shape, but the water was clean. Several women came in while Jo was in the shower and sat around, loudly complaining that they had to wait for her. Feeling ornery, Jo stayed in a bit longer than she needed to. The women could see her legs under the shower curtain, and started making rude comments about "Mexicans" and finally tut-tutted their way out, saying that Mexicans are inconsiderate, and that they'd just have to shower later. Jo said she can only assume that since she has a great tan, and it's winter, they must have made the assumption that she's Hispanic.
When Jo got back to camp, the dog was still barking, and the neighbors were drunk. They were talking loudly and cutting through our campsite by walking right next to the tent so they could get back and forth to the restrooms. Pretty soon, the neighbors were smoking pot too, so they were stumbling by our tent, holding one another up, and laughing loudly. We politely asked several times if they would take the road to the restrooms instead, but our requests were ignored.
Twenty-one dollars? For this? Negative. Jo decided that we will get up early and skip out of here before the ranger station opens. If we don't make it in time, and we have to pay, they'll get their money and an earful too.
Earplugs firmly in place, we fell asleep under a full moon.

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Photos

Cool!
They don't ever seem to have any in stock at Home Depot.

Toads Cafe
We noticed the font used for the word "Toads" is the same as our local bar, "Toads"