It rained a bit last night, just like we thought it would, so it worked out really well that we camped under the overhang so we didn't get soaked. Along with the rain, there was just a ridiculous amount of traffic going by all night long. Every time we would get to sleep a huge truck would go rumbling by and wake us up again. It was a VERY long night. That is one thing that I will not miss- hearing the traffic all day long as we ride and nights like this- when we still can't escape the traffic. If only they could make cars as quiet as bicycles are. The forecast for today said that it was supposed to rain all day. Since we didn't sleep much, we were awake around 6:30. At that time it wasn't raining or nearly as cold as it has been lately. We ate our cereal we had picked up yesterday and used up the rest of our milk from yesterday as we enjoyed our breakfast in our tent. To try to avoid the rain for as long as we could, packed everything up right away and got on the road. We had a great tail wind and there weren't too many huge hills in the way to slow us down. The miles went by very fast today. Somehow we kept riding and riding waiting for the rain and it never came. The sky was full of grey clouds and it sure looked like it should be raining. We got chased by a couple dogs at one point, which is no surprise. Overall, the ride was mostly flat, but there were a few smaller hills here and there. At one point we felt really hungry so we had a granola bar break. Boy, those chocolate covered chocolate chip granola bars sure are great! Before we knew it we were in the city of Conway. On the way in we crossed under the I-40 again, I don't know how many times that makes crossing it on this trip, but it seems like we keep crossing it over and over again. Originally we planned on having some lunch in Conway, but since there was no rain yet, we decided to just keep going to get as many dry miles done as we could. By the time we got another 10 miles down the road to Mayflower we were starving and had to stop for lunch. Almost right away we saw at laundry mat and figured that even though it wasn't raining yet, it could start anytime, so we thought that would be a good place to stop. I sat on the bench outside and cooked our Voila meal and once it was done, we headed inside to sit at the table. We had a couple little snack cakes for a snack and enjoyed our little break. It didn't seem like we had hardly ridden today with the tail wind, so we didn't need too much of a break today. When we were about to leave, a guy that we had met at the laundry mat asked if we wanted a coke. He said that he would never be able to make it on a bike on "the tiny little lunch we had." He said that he had a whole bunch of soda in the back of his van and insisted that we take a couple. It was very nice of him. Since we were all packed up and ready to go, we each took one to have a little later. We rode for less than 5 minutes and that rain we've been expecting finally started. Even still, we had a tailwind to help us out. Within the first couple miles of riding this afternoon, Joey got a flat tire on his rear wheel. Unlike a lot of the flats he's gotten lately, whatever he hit made the tire go flat right away; it was nice that it wasn't a "slow-leaker"- those are such a pain because you find out miles down the road, or sometimes the next day. We were able to find a spot to chance the tire under a little overhang where we could be drier while changing the tire. When Joe took the tire off, he found a pretty large piece of metal stuck in it that made a hole in the tire, and poked through both sides of the tube. It is just amazing how much junk is on the shoulders of the roads. In addition to getting a flat, the tire was getting very close to being done. When we were carrying the extra tires through Canada, one shifted and rubbed against the moving wheel at one time. That caused a little bit of the rubber near the edge of the tire to wear off. That tiny section, after a few thousand miles, eventually caused a little bulge in the tire where the rubber separated from the wire inside. Although the tire probably could have gotten a few hundred more miles out of it, the blue was already showing quite a bit indicating that it was starting to wear out anyways. After all, that tire made it all the way from the Yukon, through Alaska, down the west coast, and all the way to Arkansas! I think we got our money's worth out of it even still. Once the flat was all fixed, we only had about 11 miles left go go to get to John's house in Maumille. We didn't have any trouble whatsoever finding our way there. John and his wife Susan live in a beautiful 2 story condo with their little dog Smitty. When we got there, we dried our bikes off the best we could since the rain continued on straight through from when it started. One at a time we took our bikes up in the elevator to their condo. It worked out just fine with our bikes because they have a whole room dedicated to the bikes. Once we got settled, we took showers and did a little laundry. We had fun playing with Smitty and chatting with John and with Susan, too, when she got home from work. Later that evening, we went out to a local restaurant to get some dinner. I got a really tasty buffalo chicken wrap and fries and Joe-joe got his usual bacon cheeseburger. We had a very great evening and enjoyed hearing and sharing lots of cycling and travel stories. When it was time for bed, I was so tired, not physically, but sleepy tired from not getting much sleep last night. We are so glad that we have a place to stay tonight so we aren't out in the pouring rain in our tent. Our miles totaled 50.01 today.
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