Yippee!!!! After many months of anticipation the day has arrived.

mmmmm  . . . wonder what would happen if I just hit the snooze button???

First order of business was to hit the lobby for the first cup of ‘jojo’. James the night auditor has been very accommodating to us. At this time of the morning he is like the ‘Maytag Repairman’  . . . nobody around!

Today his buddy Michael had dropped in on his morning walk down the main drag. A human resources manager for the State of Washington’s Public Defenders office, we had a nice chat.  By the time the three of us had solved all the problems of the world and I got back to our room, he coffee was cold enough it needed to be micro waved!!!

The three of us went out for one more nice breakfast before we begin the oatmeal, nuts and raisin morning routine of the ride.  Denise came VERY well equipped for the trip with a VERY large stack of Ben Franklin’s. She broke one of them to buy breakfast for us!!! Jim and I made a pact to stay Denise’s BFF!!!!

We are transferring hotels today and on the way to Ship Harbor Inn we passed this old hull of a ship in a marina that had ‘literally’ grown to the bottom. Local word has it the ship was snuck into the marina late one night, abandoned and it has been moored there ever since.The trees growing out of her are about twenty feet tall!!!

Another beautiful day of riding but only 4 miles . . .

. . . to the Ship Harbor Inn. Other riders started filtering in with Bernie and Wade being the first two. Jim was still in town waiting for the bike shop to open so he could buy a set of pannier bolts to replace those that had ‘fallen off’. Better to find out now!!!

The gang continued to filter in until we had fourteen riders and one tour leader, Allison. The plan was to have our meet and greet at 4:00pm and order out for pizza at 6:00pm. Good meeting with PLENTY to eat!

There were NO leftovers!

Interesting and diverse group, from all over the US, along with David from the UK and Corvin from Germany. It is going to be a fun group, as was evident from the number who gathered in the bar after the meeting!!

Tomorrow we do a  24 mile ‘shake down’ ride which I thought ended up back at the hotel and we would have another night on a nice bed with soft clean sheets. WRONG, we hit the road tomorrow with our first night camping at Deception Pass Park!!!