Short post placeholder. Will post more later.

Got up at 4:45 and hit the road early to beat the heat. Middlebury gap starts out crazy steep. Over 15%. Our stranger friend from yesterday gave us an alternate route to spread out the first steep section but we went for it head on.

After the first half mile, the road leveled off a bit to a 5 percent climb. A few miles later and we were almost to the top. One last steep 15% grade to go. Laura and Katie say they have never sweat like that before. Indeed I have not seen it. they were soaked. This really was the steepest climb on nt.

At the top we took a break and began the decent. We stopped a few times to cool brakes but it went very smoothly. This isn't like out west where you have a twenty mile downhill. Two miles at twelve percent and we were at the bottom. The second biggest climb of nt east completed. Two hours and twenty minutes got us from our hotel to the summit.

We stopped for breakfast in Rochester and had some nice riding for several hours.

Then a first. I came up to the top of a hill to hear Katie and Laura yelling and I see them flying down out of view descending the other side of the hill. Then I see a horse running after them, right down the road. Yup, a very mad horse. The horse stopped and started walking back towards roger and I. We sat quietly as it then headed for a barn. As soon as it was out of sight, we floored it. Luckily it never noticed us.

We had a great lunch in a small town before Sharron. With fifty miles down we had one more big climb. A warm showers host was hosting us at the top of Sharron hill. It was very hot by this point so rog and I took our time on the climb.

We just made dinner here and are off to bed. Will update this post more later. Wally and Barb are amazingly inspirational people. Just jaw droppingly awesome.

http://www.wallyandbarbara.com/