Time: 9.24pm
Weather: Hottttt
Location: Hope Community Church
6 days left.
I mentioned that we stayed at a fully-cushioned climbing gym. I had a hard time waking up this morning. Some people are super excited about today's ride cause we're crossing the last border and cruising into California!
As I was packing the van, Gel told me that we're gonna have breakfast at a cafe. We had pancakes and coffee (I had water cause I don't drink coffee). We spent a long time at Gathering Grounds Cafe doing portraits. The owner of the cafe had leukimia at his 20s. One thing I learned from him is that I should just stop worrying about stuffs and live every day happily. I mean, he's having a pretty good life now-owns a cafe in a small town, and talks to customers and all. I'd want to live that life. Actually I started realizing how short life is few years back. So I never really regret the decisions I made-just like biking across the country. It is crazy, but it's definitely the most amazing thing ever.
We left the cafe at about 9am. I heard that the border is at about mile 20. I wasn't sure if my knee was gonna be able to last the entire 82 miles, and I was like I'd definitely be able to make it to the border, if I can't continue, I'll just sag.
It turned out that I was able to finish the whole ride. I was tearing up when I reached the stayover. My knee wasn't fully healed yet. It hurt the most every time when I stopped and started biking again. It takes me quite some time to get into a pace I'm comfortable with. Truth is no matter how good the pace was, my knee hurt, so much. I'm so grateful to have a group who's so patient with me, especially Corinne who always looked out for me. She'd look back every 5 minutes to make sure I'm not gapping too much, check with me if the pace was okay, and would do callouts for everything she saw. Thanks Alex for holding such good pace; thanks Sarah for always asking me if I'm okay; and thanks Shutian too for being patient with my slow pace.
Today had been one of the hardest days I've had cause I'm injured. I thought about a lot of things on my ride today. This whole ride requires more mental strength than physical strength. Pain is just a state of mind. If you think you can do it, you can; and if you think you can't, you can't. I also think that all of the tough time I go through in this ride-hard riding days, terrible weather, injuries, and any other troubles, have shaped me into a much stronger person. From this point on, I think if I face any hardships in the future, this ride will be my source of strength. If I can bike across the country, what else can I not do?
From New York City to California, 3800 miles (I sagged a lot-some people have already hit 4000). The people I met, the scenery I saw, everything means something, something special.
Okay, this post is getting a little emotional. I'm glad that we finally made it to California! The mountains that we passed were very pretty too! The only bad thing about today's ride was that the road was so dusty. I had a thick layer of dust on me by the end of the ride today. The best thing about today's ride beside crossing the California border was the chocolate milkshake at the Hi-Lo cafe 10 miles from the stayover.
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