Day 12 - Gulf Shores, Alabama, 46 miles, 554 miles total

I love riding through larger cities on Sunday mornings.  The normally busy streets are nearly deserted.  Such was the case in Pensacola today.

But since my motel was off the route I'm following I had to ride through town to get back on it.  I ended up riding through some rather sketchy areas and at one point a car with tinted windows was following slowly behind me making me a little nervous.  Eventually it passed me but turned into a seedy motel, then backed out and went up ahead of me and pulled over to the side of the road.

I decided then to find a different route, so turned off and went to another street I had seen on the map that would get me to the Gulf shore.  That was the last I saw of the sketchy car.


Right off the bat it looked like my luck with the rain was going to run out today.

Once on the Gulf Shore Hwy there was a nice tailwind and the area improved.  Before long I was island hopping from one key to another, which surprised me.  I thought all of Florida's keys ran from Miami to Key West, not on the panhandle.

Crossing the bridge to Florida's Perdido Key.

Soon I was passing one high rise motel after another.  As I went along, enjoying the tailwind and moderate temperature, the skies darkened.

Florida's gulf shore as the skies darkened and became ominous

Suddenly large drops started falling, and then it turned into a gully washer.  My luck had officially run out.  There wasn't much else to do but press on, as I was totally drenched within seconds.

After about thirty minutes of that, the lightning started.  I started counting seconds from flash to thunder clap.  It varied from 5 to 11 seconds.  But after awhile it cleared up and I dried out -relatively.


Perpetuating the myth


More rain headed onshore on Alabama's gulf coast

This is the first time I've been in Alabama.  I don't know what the rest of the state is like, but down here at the Gulf it's pretty nice.



A nearly drowned rat hiding under the cover of a state park building's overhang

NEXT---)



Comments

  1. KylieSeptember 23, 2018 at 7:33 PM

    Between the rain and the humidity, I trust you are staying fully hydrated!

    ReplyDelete

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