DC to Pittsburgh, Day 5 (51 miles)
We got up at 5:30 AM and packed up our camp to avoid the discovery of our not-so-stealthy stealth camp site by any early morning trail users. That's way earlier than I could ever get up back in the real world, but things are different on a bike tour. The key is to ride hard enough during the day that you're tired enough to fall asleep as soon as it gets dark.

Fortunately not our trail.

Early on today's ride we crossed the Eastern Continental divide, meaning that we're officially not on the east coast anymore.

Crossing the Eastern Continental Divide.

The trail goes on and on...

We got a few hours of riding in before stopping for our usual breakfast of oatmeal. While eating breakfast, and old man in fantastic shape passed by and stopped to chat. Turns out he's a former Navy Seal, now retired, and he rides along this trail every day of the year, regardless of the weather. He was also packing two pistols; I don't know what he expected to encounter on the trail, but I guess one pistol just doesn't cut it.

Cooking oatmeal for breakfast. I'm much more organized than I was at the beginning of this trip.

The Somerset Wind Farm, visible from the trail. It looks like the future!

Unfortunately, our beautiful, sunny morning turned cloudy, then to a drizzle, then a downpour. Since the trail surface is dirt, crushed stone, and gravel, that means mud. We got covered in it. Plus, Tara's cold has gotten worse, and she can't stop coughing.

I didn't know it was monsoon season. Notice the fog on the mountains.

Zoom!

We rode on to Confluence, PA, where we found a diner to stop at for lunch and to dry out a bit. I had a grilled cheese sandwich, which turns out to be the restaurant food of choice for vegetarian cyclists touring through less populated areas. Our bikes were so muddy at this point that we just left them outside without locking them. They don't look so appealing with a thick coating of mud over them.

Covered in mud.

Tara really wasn't feeling well at this point, but I persuaded her to push on another 11 miles to Ohiopyle. The terrain out here is the most impressive yet, and I'm sure we would have enjoyed it much more had we not been cold, soaked, and muddy.

Ohiopyle, PA. What was once a railroad is now a bike trail.

When we got to Ohiopyle, we decided to splurge and treat ourselves to a night indoors. When you're used to camping, staying in a motel feels like a real treat. They even had a hose outside we could use to clean off our bikes, our bags, and ourselves before going in.

Another group of cyclists had arrived at the same time as us, so we took turns hosing everything off. They were the Mt. Lebanon cycling club, headed from Pittsburgh to DC. It seems like we picked the wrong direction to travel -- every cyclist we've met along the way is doing this trip from Pittsburgh to DC, as the terrain is a bit easier going in that direction. Oh well, we just have more of a challenge, then.

Getting the mud out of our clothes.

Our muddy clothes got a soak in the bathtub, and all of our gear went on the desks, dressers and tables in our room. The rain had finished in the afternoon, so we walked around town a bit. Ohiopyle is a very cute town. The cafe across from the motel, the Firefly Grill is very good and has plenty of vegetarian options. There's also tons of hiking and mountain biking trails here, plus we're near by Frank Loyd Wright's Fallingwater, which I'd like to see, so we're planning on taking a rest day tomorrow to see the sites.

All of our gear lined up on every available space to dry.