62 miles
I awoke to the all-too-familiar sound of rain. Again.
And started praying. Again. The thought of riding in the rain anywhere is
not a lot of fun. Add to it the ‘extra’
hazards of riding in Honduras and it can become downright suicidal. The night before, I had brought my bike into
my hotel room so that I could clean it up a bit and also keep it dry from the
predicted rain. The bikes were being stored
outside, with no overhang so it was apparent I made a good decision. Again.
Breakfast was good and it was nice to sit out on the covered
patio, watching the waves hit the beach.
After breakfast, it was time to put all our luggage on the buses for
the day.
By the time we were ready to ride, there was only a light
mist falling on us and it seemed pretty evident that it would stop. We only rode together as a group for 10km
(6.2 miles) because the race portion of the day was shorter.
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| Leaving Tela, that's me in the blue & white jersey, second from left |
It was determined that the Furiosos would start first, and
then the Rapidos and racers would start a few minutes later. This was to help have the slower people
finish a little closer in time to the faster ones.
[Aside: A few years ago on this tour, it became lovingly
divided into two groups of riders: “Los rapidos” and “Los furiosos”. (The fast and the furious) Los furiosos were,
obviously, not as fast, but they were just as determined. The names stuck and now it is even a
designation of which bus we put our luggage on, for support purposes. Me?
Well since you asked, yes, I’m a furioso. OK, a furiosa.]
So, back to my story…
The furiosos were going to leave first. And we did! I set a nice pace for myself and soon found I
was in a paceline of about 5 or 6 people.
We had a good thing going. And
then we hit an unexpected longer hill.
And I got dropped. Again. Oh, well; it was nice while it lasted. We had been pushing it out a bit so I really
wasn’t upset. In fact, as I was finally
cresting that hill, the mirror on my sunglasses fell off, landing precariously
on my left foot. It fell onto the
highway while I unclipped and stopped the bike.
I wanted to run back to it before a car smashed it into oblivion. I’m sure I was quite the sight to the locals
nearby: silly gringa, placing her bike on the ground, running back down the
highway a bit, with her hand gesturing to the oncoming cars to move to their
left to avoid some unseen obstacle.
Yeah, that’s how I roll!
With my mirror safely (or so I thought) back on my glasses,
I got back on the bike and continued down the road. I was making great progress. Before too long, two of the girls who were
racing joined up with me. We rode
together for the balance of the ride.
After a few minutes, I pulled in front of them and encouraged them to
draft behind me since they were racing.
That worked well and they were glad for the break. When the finish line was in sight, I pulled
off and just yelled at them to “GO!!!” I
kept yelling ‘til they were across the line.
Then I crossed the line. And went
back across the line so I could get a picture.
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| I was told that this wasn't a "staged" picture, but a "recreated" one |
We waited for everyone else to arrive and when JoAnn
arrived, I was pretty tickled when she told me that after the start, Don
Esteban had come up to her and said, “Let’s go catch Susan.” Don Esteban did, a bit later.
Once everyone was at the finish line, we proceeded as a
group the next couple of miles into El Progreso for the event there. During the
ride to El Progreso, my mirror fell of my glasses again. Really strange. I’ve been using that same style of mirror for
years and have never had that happen.
Now, it had happened twice in one day.
Once retrieved, I kept the mirror in my back pocket for the rest of the
day. I’d use tape of some sort to affix
it a bit more permanently to my glasses.
The idea of riding without a mirror is worse to me than riding without a
helmet – and I never ride without a helmet!
After the event, it was
time for lunch, then back on our bikes.
From El Progreso we were headed to San Pedro Sula – about another 20
miles away. We also rode that as a
group, making it much safer to enter such a large city by bicycle. Cars, trucks, and motorcycles show bikes
absolutely no respect.
After the event in San Pedro, we were off to a campamento
just a few miles away. We got settled in
our rooms, showered, and then dinner.
Pretty much the routine on so many days. Oh, and I found someone with some duct tape and fastened my mirror onto my sunglasses in true geek fashion.
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| Riding en masse between El Progreso and San Pedro Sula |
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