It was a REALLY cold night last night- almost like we were back in Oklahoma or Texas. Neither of us slept very good last night and woke up pretty tired. We had plans to get up as early as we could so that we might have a chance to make it to the "Viking Biking" ride in Pittsburgh that our hosts for tonight told us about. But, with being so sleepy and it being really cold out, we ended up not being able to push ourselves to get up until around 8:30. We packed up and headed off to find a gas station or somewhere we could by milk and sit at some tables inside. It didn't take us too long to find one, and we were just so happy that it had a table inside! We finished off the last bit of Honey Bunches of Oats that we had bough while we were in Wheeling, and since we were still a little hungry, each got a little donut from the donut case there. A nice start to the morning. It's so weird to think about how in a week, we will no longer have to eat at gas station tables or look for a place to sleep every night. Going back to "being normal" is definitely going to be an adjustment from this lifestyle we've been living on the road. As John in Wheeling said- "we chose to be homeless for a year," although I don't really care for the word homeless. It's not like we have nothing at all. We have a tent, and we could afford a hotel if we absolutely needed it and we have everything we need to cook and travel along, not to mention we do have a home, we just aren't living there at the moment, but that will all change soon. After breakfast, we got our warm gear back on and hit the road, going in the wrong direction at first- I don't know what we were thinking. Brain fart! That's ok, that happens once in a while, no one is perfect. Once we finally got going the right way, it was probably around 10:30. We had more climbing to do. Our legs were both pretty sore from all of the climbing we did yesterday. Again- hill after hill, and the ones in town were pretty steep and long. Once we found the road that would take us most of the way to Pittsburgh, the hills got a little less steep, but longer in general. At one point a car went by us with a couple young teenagers in the back. When they went by they yelled "Helloooo" and a whole bunch of other stuff we couldn't understand. It is funny because people beep and honk at us all the time- sometimes friendly with thumbs up, and other times angrily because we are "in their way." But these kids were funny as they were all waving out the back window at us. We caught up to them at a light, and they were still looking out the window. Joey put his hand out for high fives as we rode by and they were more than happy to get them. When they passed us again, they all yelled "Byyyyeee!!" It was too funny! The traffic, ALL DAY, was horrible. Just a constant stream of traffic. SOOO many cars. I don't know why we don't do something about that. The closer we got to Pittsburgh, the worse it got, obviously. Any time there is more than 100,000 people in a given area, cars don't seem to be the most ideal way to travel any more. For about 5 miles we were riding with the same group of cars. They would pass us, get stopped by a light, and we would catch right back up to them- and it was hilly, so we couldn't go that fast. Just bumper to bumper traffic in most places, kind of ridiculous. When the cars were going the same speed as us on the bikes in a hilly area like that, it just doesn't seem like it makes much sense. As we were getting close, we knew a couple roads that we would take after getting off of route 19 to get into the city so that we didn't have to go through any of the many tunnels that are frequent when entering from the south. We passed by a bike shop and Joey decided to go in and see if they had any free bike maps of the city- sure enough they did. They also told him a way that would be less traffic than the way we were planning on going. Either way though- we had to go up a HUGE hill, which we figured would be coming since we knew that we were getting close to the river. Boy was it steep! The road zig zagged a little on the way up and there were a couple sections that had to be at 20% grade. It was tough to say the least! We just kept going up and up, looking for Brownsville Rd, which ran along the top of the ridge. Our legs were burning and our lungs had that burn that you get when you are really working hard. Luckily, the sun was shining, so we didn't have to wear our face masks or heavy gloves anymore- that was SO helpful! I never thought I'd be so happy to finally get to Brownsville road. Wffeeewww- that was steep. It reminded us of being back in San Francisco or Seattle. As we were riding along the top of Brownsville road, we had some small rolling hills, but nothing at all as strenuous as what we had done. The view was spectacular- houses blanketed all the surrounding hills. As we were riding up there, it was already close to 1pm. We knew that we had missed the Viking ride. A bit disappointing, but there was nothing we could do about it- except maybe leave Wheeling earlier yesterday and started closer to Pittsburgh today. We had a nice long downhill down to the river. On the way down, we got a good view of downtown Pittsburgh and the river. We didn't have any trouble at all finding where we needed to go. Almost right away, we found an Aldi's in the middle of the city. We decided to stop there to get some pasta for lunch before we were off to find REI and the park where the Viking Bikers would be meeting for the potluck lunch. REI was just a block away from the grocery store. I was so excited to FINALLY be able to return my camp pillow. The great thing about REI is they have that awesome return policy- where you can return anything anytime for any reason. I had bought that pillow sometime at the end of October or the beginning of November and it stopped holding air by the end of December- something malfunctioned with the valve. Anyways- I carried that pillow that didn't work since Oklahoma--3,000 miles ago! We haven't seen an REI in forever and that is part of the reason that we decided to ride to Pittsburgh. So, I was able to finally get the useless pillow off my hands and had almost 30 bucks back in my pocket! Mission accomplished. From there, again- we had a really easy time finding the park that our hosts Dan and Patricia told us about. At first we weren't sure where they would be meeting in the park, but that question was very quickly answered when we saw a bunch of people on bikes dressed up as Vikings. It was too funny. They had just finished up with their ride and were about to head over for lunch. A fun group of people. As we were riding over to where everyone was meeting, a couple said "oh, this must be our people!" We had found our hosts for the night! So, for the next hour or so, we relaxed by the river and chatted with people there. Although we had felt nice and warm earlier, the wind was chilly and once we were not moving our bodies cooled right down. Dan and Patricia said that there was more than enough food to go around at the pot luck and that we were welcome to join them for that- so we will save our pasta for later. Although everything was delicious- the best thing was probably the vegetarian chilli. It was nice and hot with a little kick. For a while, we all stood over by the grill to keep warm while we snacked. Although we were sad we missed the ride, we were glad that we at least got to share that experience with them. Since we were all cold, the 4 of us headed out to go to Dan and Tricia's apartment where it was nice and warm. We took the trail to the "Hot Steel Bridge," which was just amazing. There was a full wide path for bikes and pedestrians on the side of the bridge! We had a great view of downtown in the middle of the bridge too. After getting to the other side of the river, we continued on for a short while on the path and then turned to head up to where their apartment was. They warned us that we had a "pretty gnarly hill to climb to get there," and that it was pretty long. It was indeed very long but not nearly as bad as I was anticipating, or at least it wasn't as bad as the ride up to Brownsville Road! After our tired legs made it to the top, we got to their house- they were pretty much right on top and had an awesome view of the river and the area nearby. We got our bikes put in the basement and then headed up to their apartment. They had the best view in the whole house because they were on the very top apartment in a super cute apartment. We got to stay in the "hobbit cave," which was a tiny little room shaped like a triangle (one of the pointy parts of the roof). For the rest of the night, we just relaxed, which is all we wanted to do. We both felt like we could just fall asleep at any moment after last night. We each got a nice hot shower and enjoyed learning a little bit about home brewing since Dan and Tricia were working on brewing a new batch of beer. They had an awesome little fridge in their living room that they had drilled holes in for taps for the two home brews they had ready. So neat! Joey got to try both their current beers (batch # 49 and #50 of the "babelon brewing") a Mestizo Mexican Chocolate Stout and "Tallywhacker III." Joey of course liked the chocolate one best. Joey and I had fun talking with them and watching a little basketball and Jeopardy. For dinner, since neither of us felt like riding down the hill and back up again to go to the grocery store to get stuff to grill, we all just had our own thing. Joey and I ate our pasta and cheese and were quite happy with that. Another awesome, but tough day, to add to the story. Our miles only totaled 36.97, which was much less than we though we had to ride to get to Pittsburgh from where we were this morning!