It’s Raining Cats and Dogs

A 70-mile ride into a rest day and it was well earned today.   We moved from central to eastern time zones yesterday so we lost an hour.  It was hard to get up on time.  And then when Joe did wake up, he found the coffee maker had given up the fight.  Joe without his morning coffee… Like a lot of people without their morning coffee, it’s rough.  He headed out about 7:45 this morning without his coffee and anticipating another long, windy ride. 

Because it was already a banner day, let’s add in some dogs.  When Joe called me at 9:30 am he’d already been chased down the road by a German shepherd.  “A big, angry dog. Like the German shepherd from Hogan’s Heros”. He was peddling along and heard a bark and by the time he heard the bark the dog was already across the lawn and into the street.  Joe had 2 choices- fight or flight.  It was too much to grab the pepper spray, which is velcroid to the handlebar of his bike, so he put his trust in his legs and pedaled harder.  He dropped a gear and was moving 16 miles/hr when he looked over his left shoulder and saw the dog snapping at his rear tire.  A couple more pedal strokes and the dog was unable to match Joe’s physical prowess (Joe’s words 😊) and Joe got away.

And later on, in the afternoon as Joe and I were taking a walk, he turns to me and says, “I forgot to tell you about the other 2 dogs that chased me today” !!!!!! Again, he was pedaling past a house not paying attention and before he knew it, there was another German shepherd and a black lab running at him.  He chose option #2 again and these dogs were out of shape, so he was able to get away.  He left them behind and when he turned around, they were both just standing in the middle of the road.  After that, every house he pedaled past he had his hand on the pepper spray and was looking for signs of dogs. 

What a morning!  Dogs have been one of my biggest concerns about this trip and I’m glad those legs didn’t fail him.  And that he has a plan for going forward for this last month.

Neptune and I got going at a much easier pace today.  After taking down everything we took our usual walk around to stretch our legs before the 1 ½ hour car ride to the next spot.  Trust me, it’s a long car ride for Neptune.  On our walk we saw a couple of cats resting under a car.  There are signs at the park to not feed the cats, so we knew there had to be some well-fed cats roaming around.

We had a nice drive into Wabash, IN and got here about 1:00 pm.  It’s a beautiful town and has claimed to be the first electrically lighted city in the world.  However, it looks like only the courthouse grounds (photo included) was lighted.  We are staying at the Wabash City RV Park, which is located right next to the Wabash River.  It is a very open area with many spots available.  I tried to back into one spot for about 10 minutes before reevaluating and leaving the park to come in from another direction.  That time I nailed it!  Joe arrived about 15 minutes later.  Thank you to Tracy for adding Neptune to the Garmin so that he was there to greet Joe.  We are still laughing at that.

We are right across from the city water treatment plant, and that is where we checked in and picked up the keys for the water and electrical access for the RV.  Not a whole lot of other campers here.

We took a walk down the Wabash River Walk and enjoyed the drinking fountain, bike rack and paved trail.  There is also a camping site for canoes, walkers and bikers.  One of our favorite things was the clowder of cats!  Joe has a picture of 5 black cats and one grey one.  The next time we came by we saw even more.  We’re looking forward to seeing them again tomorrow. They are right across the street from us. 

Our next priority was getting a new coffee pot. Joe tried to fix it, but we ended up at Walmart to get a new one.  Joe, being Joe, has hidden the old, broken one away from sight in the truck so that he can work on it when he gets home.  “It’s just a bad relay”.  I don’t know what that means, but he’s going to be needing some projects when this adventure is over.

We came upon The Downtown Throwdown.  Street wrestling!  Plus, other street vendors.  We stopped by a cocktail bar in town, Moon Dog, for a local beer and a snack.  We saw a trolley and wondered if they had them in Sacramento? 

Tomorrow is a much-needed rest day.  Joe has been traveling some huge miles and is looking forward to sleeping in and then doing the usual bike maintenance, etc. 

Have a wonderful weekend!  Thank you 😊