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Published: January 26th 2019
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Today would be the day that Bike & Build history is made: We will be the first team in the organization’s history to cross the state line of Delaware!! I think this is the only continental state a trip has never touched! But not without some pain to get there...
July has arrived and with her comes some scorching heat here in Harve de Grace. We enjoy a buffet breakfast, grab some extra granola bars for the road, and get moving. The sun is blistering as we lather up sunscreen and get ready for our ride. We opt for route meeting to be in the minamal shade across the way from the building where my teammates enjoyed showering last night. Oh well, I would need another by now anyway. Bike and Build.
In typical K2C fashion, no one is ready or wants to be the first group out. Most days I’m anxious to get on the road and have no qualms about going first. I’m usually on the side of impatience as I wait for others, but I have my days too. Today however, Jess, Sarah, Michaela & I decide to ride out first together. We back track a
bit through the neighborhood we rode in on get rolling. We ride on a trail and meet up with the team and we try to figure out where to go. Luckily Beth & NJ scouted it out last night & point us in the right direction. No longer the first group, we ride on.
There’s some steeeeeep hills to wake up our thighs this morning and Dr Jack Road defeats us and is sure to go down in team history as one of the toughest roads on K2C. As we attempt to climb, we can hear the voices of our teammate just ahead of us on this road—so close but so far away as turn after turn is relentless and only adds more grade. We break to snack and GAM at this ridiculous road. I take an ironic photo of my bike parked by a no parking sign. We continue on.
We then meet up with the team at our designated spot where we prepare to completely take over a one lane road and ride across a bridge together, sandwiched by the support vans. The lunch van is driven by Erik & Lily, which means more friends on
the road for this day in history! Noah and I plan to ride one in the front of the pack, one in the back to capture our team on this monumentous occasion with our GoPros (you can turn them around and have them face the riders behind you! Mind blown!) I then have a devastating realization—my GoPro memory card is full! Frazzled, I file in with the group toward the back and Jess side by side with me.
We roll out with a plan to pull off once we cross. We roll out and meet the bridge immediately and the hype gets real, real fast! I get the team fired up and of course we all break out in our cheer and I attempt to capture it with my phone as hands free as possible—sport bras are great for this! We get to the other side jazzed up and so excited to have experienced that together as a team! A moment none of us will soon (or ever!) forget!
As we are pulled off, I share with the others the bit of video I did manage to get & Chris, who I was riding behind, tells us about
how he received his first flat of the trip while on the bridge—no wonder he wasn’t in his normal riding form! We take in the moment all giddy and get back on the road, with our thoughts on lunch and the Delaware state line.
The girls and I pull into lunch after getting rudely honked at by a passing car—loud enough that our friends already at lunch at the back of the wawa could hear and were worried and asked what happened. I may or may not have explained calling them a certain profanity. We gorged on left overs and sat/laid in the bit of shade we managed to find in the back of the parking lot. A group of us then sought the cooling relief of AC & a bathroom, with the potential of a coke or ice cream. We discovered that one of the two bathrooms was disgusting and inhabitable so we awaited our turn in the mini line we created while scanning for more snacks. I discovered cokes with the names Chris always (mistakeningly) calls/called us in the beginning of the trip. We take a silly photo, buy snacks/Gatorade/cokes and get back out to the heat
to our bikes.
We saddle up and roll out shortly after another group and are met with more rolling hills. The Delaware state line approaches and since I was leading our pack and passed the other group, I was the very first Bike & Builder to ride into the state of Delaware on a Bike & Build trip! No worries, my sports bra tactic was able to capture the moment. We actually passed it and kept riding and then decided to turn around and ride back up the hill to wait for our friends and capture them riding through this state line as well. We all sought more shade shelter up the side of the hill in the side of the road as we awaited for everyone to ride in and gather. Sarah sought a bathroom and I almost joined her for some iced Dunkin, but was too full and too hot to stomach it. We took some ride group & large group shots by the sign, Raffi & Michaela climbed trees, and history was made!
Legs itchy from the grass and heat, we rode on to Wilmington where we were met by some confusing chalk pointing out
where we were going to stay and where we would shower. Hose showers! I was so excited to get off the bike & out of the heat, I grabbed my stuff and showered immediately, joined by Ryan & Aiden. Feeling relieved and excited to be so close to home, I texted my mom to see if she wanted to meet for dinner and talked to Celess on the phone about meeting up with her and Jaci while were in philly for three days—THREE DAYS!!
The team and I then started making moves to grab dinner and drinks from a local bar about a half mile away. Luckily it was starting to cool down just slightly and we enjoyed a nice walk through the city. The leaders were pressed on time since they had a leader meeting before we were all the gather for town hall later. We enjoyed some local brews & apps, the leaders had their meeting at the bar, and we walked back as the sun was setting and the drinks were hitting some more than others a bit.
Town hall was on the floor in the large auditorium/gym floor where we were staying, forming our
usual large circle of friends, some laying down and trying hard not to fall asleep. We did our highs, lows, & shout outs and the leaders discussed our options for our Build day in NYC. We could either do subway rides for our social justice tour, or ride around Manhattan and Brooklyn for the social justice tour. The social justice tour was going to be hosted by an alum who started the non-profit in place of building since having large groups of people volunteer in NYC with affordable housing agencies is next to impossible since they require volunteers to be ceritified in certain things. We voted and decided that we would be riding bikes. Since we had a bit of time to be in NYC, I encouraged others who were fixed that the subway was a quintessential part of experiencing New York (which I agree) that we could ride it outside of the tour.
Exhausted from the heat and excited for our ride into philly, we all crashed after town hall. I decided to go into the hall away from the sleeping riders to clear my GoPro onto my flash drive so I could adequately capture tomorrow, which is
bound to be another unforgettable day! I was texting Glenny about him coming down to meet us in Philly (or me meeting him in NYC) before dozing off excited for the day ahead ?
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