Moving east

As difficult as it was to decide, I could feel myself beginning to get antsy and I knew that it was time for Nancy and I to head out.  Sunday called for a beautiful day of riding and, though it was meant to be followed by one last hurrah of stormy weather, all of the fried fish in me could not keep me from loading up Nancy and leaving my heavenly home-away-from-home with Al and Sally in Milton.  Emily, too, was headed out on Sunday morning for her drive back to Ohio as she had also been a big follower of the weather forecasts in the preceding days.  It was lovely to all have breakfast together and that really reminded me how fortunate I am to have found such kind people.  I headed out just after 7am with my sights on Defuniak Springs, about 60 miles away.

I followed Route 90, as I have been most of the way, and was pleased by the lack of Sunday traffic and smooth shoulder.  Several people had warned me that the road was hilly, and I had mostly been unsure whether to be concerned or simply laugh at what people in these parts might call a 'hill'.  I'd say it was somewhere in between.  I was actually quite glad to have some rolling ups and downs that certainly didn't compare to North Vancouver or even to the roads in the Tantramar but did provide some variation.  There was a bit of a headwind so having slight alterations of slope certainly made the day more interesting.  I arrived in Defuniak Springs around 2pm as hoped, as I wanted to have lots of time to look around town and weigh my options as to where I might sleep.  A key feature of the town is the springs, which means it has a large circular lake with a lovely park and walkway around it.  I wound up chatting with a lady who told me all about the history of the town and its beginnings.  While she was sorry not to be able to offer me a place to sleep as her elderly parents would find it too unnerving, she gave me some ideas around town and strongly discouraged camping as there was a severe storm alert for the area.  I had thought this would be the case in terms of weather and went to buy myself a cookie to help ponder it over.

Defuniak Springs, Florida

Check out that circularity! 

This place had a Sackville-esque feel to it

They should know better than to try and convince a traveling cyclist to share food!

Hotel Defuniak, highly recommended as being friendly, accommodating, and very welcoming to cyclists

Haven't seen one of these signs before

Essentially, Defuniak Springs lacks amenities such as fast food and 'Super 8' type motels in its historic downtown, but those can all be found about 3 miles down the road by the I-10 highway.  I decided that it would be a wise move to find a hotel for a good night's sleep.  While I did not love the idea of checking into one of the motel chains, the historic Hotel Defuniak on the downtown block seemed a bit out of my budget.  I figured I may as well go and check it out anyhow before heading to the land of soulless highway-side America (OK, I haven't actually gone down that way so I don't know, perhaps I am jumping to conclusions).  The woman at the front desk was very kind and happy to tell me the room rates as well as what might be around.  I think she noticed me wince at the price (if the appearance of a cycling 20 year old woman wasn't indicative enough of my wallet-size), but after hearing that the hotel was independently owned by a couple in town I decided that I certainly felt better handing over wads of cash to these people than I would anywhere else.  Plus, I had a feeling that I would wind up finding the motel chains too soul-sucking and would simply keep cycling to who-knows-where before collapsing in a heap of tiredness as darkness fell and lightning started and...  Perhaps an exaggeration, but needless to say I got a good vibe from the place.  She was kind enough to give me a reduced rate and explained that there was hot breakfast served.  How I do like breakfast.

I put my things in my room and Nancy in the lobby restroom which apparently often doubles as a bike storage facility and went to walk around a bit more.  By chance, I ran into the hotel owners and wound up chatting with Tom for awhile.  After giving me the usual concerned/confused look when the answer to 'how many in your group' was singular rather than plural (no offence, Nancy), he insisted that should the weather be bad tomorrow and I needed to hole up another night it would be at half-price and he would let the desk staff know.  I am pretty sure he was worried I might try and camp in a lightning storm to save a nickel or two, as I had been sorely tempted to in the first place, and thanked him for the generous offer.

The evening consisted of TV-watching, polishing off the muffins Sally and Al had packed for me, Skyping with the homeland, and listening to the rain and thunder roll in.  The latter made me content with my decisions, helped by the excessive number of pillows I could surround myself in.  The weather forecast for Monday did not look promising (aka giant red blobs and thunderstorm/flash flood warnings), but I figured I'd just go to sleep and re-evaluate in the morning.