Day 5 Nothing But Nets ride to Rapid City!

Oh day 5. Sweet, sweet day 5. Today we rode from Philip to Wall. The terrain was surprisingly flat on day 5 and we enjoyed a tail wind the whole way! In addition, the daily mileage was a meager 31 miles :-)

Today's unique sighting for me were a pair of antelope keeping watch over us between Cottonwood and Quinn. They were pretty big for antelope, I'm pretty sure, because they were the same size as the white-tail deer I'm used to seeing on our end of the state.

Due to the short day, we arrived in Wall pretty early. Half of our group setup for sandwiches to help consume some of the copious amounts of food churches have sent along with us. The other half, myself included, were drawn in by the famous Wall Drug Cafe. I enjoyed a non-guilt ridden hot roast beef sandwich, several glasses of free ice water, a couple 5 cent cups of coffee and some hand dipped home made ice cream. A real treat after five days of riding!

After lunch we spent time people watching on a bench outside of Wall Drug. As we were sitting there, we met a young man riding his bike solo from Virginia to Oregon. We had a nice conversation with him about routes and bike adjustments and things that bikers tend to talk about. I really admire someone that sets out to do a ride like that solo! Wow, what an experience.

We're staying at First Lutheran Church of Wall, Missouri Synod. The hospitality here has been outstanding! We're sharing the church with VBS this evening, so life abounds! We're happy to be around people again as the last couple nights have been a little lonely.

Tomorrow is our last day of riding. We'll head out around 7:30 and ride 53 miles to Rapid City, arriving at Woyatan Lutheran Church as registration is taking place for our synod assembly. It looks like we'll have a head wind most of the day, so we'll have a good work out to round things off. There could also be some storms, so if we caught by hail, I better remember to keep my helmet on!

I'll have final thoughts sometime tomorrow!