Gil had fresh coffee for us, and even popped out for fresh donuts before we left, but we were still dragging from the day before so we restrained ourselves to a donut hole each. We took off after big hugs all around, knowing we’d have fun all day thinking about how well our day had ended!
We had somewhat of a tailwind for part of our early miles, but when it became a headwind it was brutal. We are having a major heat wave in this part of the world, and Chelsea and I can no longer tolerate heat after having had a number of episodes of heat exhaustion over the last few years.
Chelsea has been feeling the heat more acutely than I, starting almost immediately in the day, and this day was no different. That being said, when we stopped for our first break I knew I was in trouble right then. We took a long break, enjoying our leftovers from the great meal the night before, and decided that we would do what we could do, and trust that things would work out.
The ride was the usual hot and humid story, with some hills again. The scenery was reasonably boring – not pretty enough to take our minds off how miserable we were. We stopped at one turnoff about two hours or more into the day, and settled ourselves on the edge of the road in between the onramp and off ramp, feeling a bit on the numb side.
As we stared a bit mindlessly at the road a pickup truck pulled up at the crossroad and a guy got out to dig into something in his truck bed. I thought to myself, “wouldn’t it be awesome if he was digging into his cooler to offer us a cold bottle of water!” No sooner had that thought flitted across my mind, than I realized that he was holding up a bottle of water and looking at us! Stunned, I just stared back, then pointed questioningly to myself. He nodded, so I scrambled quickly up off the grass and dirt and headed over to meet him.
Without saying a single word to us, he handed me two bottles of ice-cold water. I did manage to say thank you, but he just nodded, got back in his truck and drove away!
We guzzled half the water in about two minutes flat.
A short time later, we finally reached a good resting place, a gas station with a bench in the shade. We’d already talked about trying to get a ride the rest of the way into Port Lavaca, as I was really clear we wouldn’t make it in the heat. We’d been there about three minutes when a beautiful Suburban pulled into the lot right in front of us.
The rest of our day was a pleasant blur. The driver of the Suburban was Melanie, who was on a trip to Port Lavaca with her oldest son Brent (12) and her youngest son Will (7). After chatting with us for a few minutes, she offered us a ride into Port Lavaca if we could fit our gear, bikes and trailers into the car. It took us much longer than usual, but we were pretty committed to making this work!
Melanie not only took us into Port Lavaca, she drove all through town looking for the best possible place for us to stay. When we finally decided on a campground at the foot of the bridge, she covered the daily entrance fee and covered the night’s camping fee. We were astounded.
After hugs and huge thanks, we said goodbye to her, and sat in the heat in our new campsite to ponder our amazing luck. We’d no sooner gotten our sandals off Chelsea’s bike when the phone rang – it was Melanie again calling to see if we wanted to have lunch with them!
We had an hilarious afternoon with them. Melanie herself is a riot, and her boys are really bright and active boys. We loved being with a family again, especially one that was so full of life. After lunch at Dairy Queen, we went shopping with them and did two more errands before she dropped us off again. Not only had we had a wonderful time, we’d been treated to lunch, three gallons of fresh water, and a bag of ice! And even better, we’d missed the worst of the heat at the campground.