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Published: June 13th 2018
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This morning we woke up to a cover of Annie’s favorite Jay-Z song “99 Bottles” since it was her last ride day with us ? There were also many wedding themed songs (including Train!) since she’s leaving the trip early to plan her wedding. We packed up and ate an interesting spread of food—some choosing hotdogs, others steak, while others made combos or Nutella and almonds on tortillas and whatever other interesting combos they could come up with (Chris being the most notorious for this particular skill).
Jana and I cleaned the plates in the bathroom sink with hand soap-not the best situation but at least we were in it together! We had route meeting, Colin shared his team’s cheer, we did ours (probably our best yet!), and the team got rolling. My ride team was just me and Michaela but with Ryan’s phone being dead after getting wet yesterday & Colin not having everyone’s number/not on our group me, they teamed up with us and we set out on a mission for coffee...and to ride bikes.
Around mile 13 we found coffee at a gas station and everyone else on the team seemed to have the same idea.
I went for the iced double shot espresso can from Starbucks & grabbed an American flag for $1 since earlier that morning Beth had reminded me that tonight was our celebration for Annie and it was going to be American themed (yes!). I rode with it in my backpack and we rode on after batting with sweep (Amanda & NJ) and taking a picture with the Cheerwine bench (Michaela was very excited about it!).
Following Noah’s recommendation from the van, we all stopped again at mile 26 at Corner House Cafe—it was so cute! Some people were sketched out by how perfect it and the surrounding area was, but I loved it! I even found a Pooh Bear dictionary and a Gerald & Piggie book—I used to read those to the kids I was nannying! Ecstatic about my Pooh Bear & King of Pops find, I sprang to order their recommended nitro draft cold brew coffee and the special—omelette how you like with with brioche & hash browns. I opted to have mine with local sausage, Brie, caramelized onions, mushrooms, & tomatoes and let me tell you—it did not disappoint! Happier than Pooh with honey, I happily ate my
way brought my food, stopping only to take some pictures and polaroids.
Eventually we got back on the bikes with lunch at mile 39, but not before Colin fell while circling around us—he has a skill for not unclipping! We rode on 61 and though it was pretty & shaded, there was no shoulder and the roads were rough so it wasn’t as enjoyable as people wizzed by us at fast speeds. We made it lunch where I only filled up on water & Gatorade and hung in the shade for a bit (& found out my friend’s little sister met Carson Wentz while working at Lowe’s! ?) before rolling on for the last 60 miles.
As we got closer to Charleston the roads got busier so we were thankful when we reached a bike trail. We stopped to chalk for Annie & sweep, with love from team NC2SD & Magpie since Ryan, Colin, & myself all did NC2SD (2016, 2011, & 2014). We passed one of Colin’s buddies houses from med school & his old apartment and he started pointing out his old stomping grounds as we approached downtown Charleston. As we were going over a bridge,
we saw lightning over the city and sought shelter at Colin’s favorite coffee shop Kudu. Turns out I was actually here before when I was visiting a two years ago with a few of my friends! I tried DMing while enjoying a caramel mocha warm latte—so much coffee today! ? The baristas were cool guys impressed by our journey when we said we were at mile 50 and had 10 more to go, considering earlier that day they had a group who just finished 35 miles and they thought that was cool. I love that my job for the day is to just ride a bike! ?
Once it had been 30 minutes, we started to roll again, only to hear more thunder and lightning. We pulled of with Aiden, Jess, & Sarah and hung out by a bus station where I tried DMing again. We then walked down the street a bit while I was on the phone scoring us $25 to Lewis’ BBQ (thanks to Laura’s rec!) and 50 chicken nugget tray from Kickin Chicken. We eventually sought shelter at the post office and awaited the shuttle since it was still lightning and it was around 3:30
and we need to be off the roads by 4:00. We were disappointed that we wouldn’t get to ride the big bridge over to Sullivan’s Island (something I was very much looking forward to) but that didn’t stop us from DMing and making a farewell video for Annie for sweep challenge.
Chris and Mikey were in the lunch van so they came to our rescue and with the help of Colin’s wife Alicia and her friend and their car, we were able to shuttle all the humans, bikes, & coolers to our host at Sunrise Presbyterian Church. The host was beauuutiful as it sat right between the ocean and the intracoastal. We quickly showered (1 shower for 17 is quite the task...!) and then I set up dinner presentation to be sure to avoid another disaster like the last time we tried to present and not everything was hooked up right.
We enjoyed a nice dinner of spaghetti and homemade meatballs (our first pasta dish & very much welcome!) with salad and the most delicious brownies with toffee ever! My group did awesome giving the Bike & Build presentation and answering questions. With great weather and the sun
about to set, we all decided to go for a walk and watch the sunset over the water and city of Charleston—and it did not disappoint! We came back and awaited laundry crew to return and started to get ready to go out for Annie’s America themed bachelorette party (thought the theme was a surprise to her until later).
We drank coffee, ordered our Uber’s, & were headed to downtown to go to Uptown Social, a bar downtown with a rooftop that Kristi’s friend works at. We danced a bit and then the party really got started when NJ & Beth showed up with “Annie Dempsey 2018) name tags, red white & blue glow in the dark bracelets, and an America flag cowboy hat that they attached and American flag bow to—it was amazing!! She loved it and we all danced the night away while sweating buckets due to the humidity but it was so great!
Around 12:30am we started calling our Ubers to get us back to the host in time for our 1am curfew. Happy about the success of the night & celebrating Annie well, we found our corners and all went to bed almost immediately.
Kristi, Amanda, & I discovered that it was much cooler downstairs so set up camp down there and fell asleep in no time.
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