Lebanon, TN to Dayton, TN - 126 miles

Today we again were greeted with morning fog for the first ten or so miles. It is quite a spectacular site - low waves of mist cascading down on us, other bicyclists emerging out of the fog as we pass them. The sun shines through like a golden plate in the sky. At times the top of the fog is visible and you can see he blue sky above. Slowly the sun melts the cloud cover away.

The group was Brian, Alex, Keith and I up to the first stop. Another group formed as we pulled into lunch. Grilled chicken and potato salad for lunch. We had some great white stone picnic benches to eat on. Alex, Larry, and Gerald started off without everyone. Keith and I pulled out together. We had three major climbs ahead of us. Each was about four miles long. The first one Keith paced me, then the next one I paced him. The climbing was actually pretty nice, the road was graded well, and the pavement was good. We pulled into the last rest stop with Lon and had some more junk food. Yellow Spinergy Bob showed up and we took off as a trio to do the last climb. We pulled in as 4-5-6 after Alex, Gerald, and Larry.

Before the climb, however, we had a gorgeous descent into a beautiful valley. The town at the bottom was Pikeville. The other side of the valley came closer and we had to climb out of it. Bob set the pace for the climb. At the top we hit a few rollers then a nice screaming downhill into Dayton.
The days climbing was 7000 feet, the last valley we went through really made the day. We basically started at the top of one ridge, descended for miles, the climbed back out up the other side. The climb out was awesome because we climbed along the ridge and to our left was the valley slowly getting smaller and smaller.

There seemed to be a dog in every yard and they all liked to chase. There were also quite a few mountain families in pickup trucks and vans that just looked plain scary. This is Deliverance country.
We have two tougher climbing mountain days ahead of us. Almost all of the climbing tomorrow starts after mile 100. The next day isn't supposed to be any easier. Then we will start to get blasted with the headwinds blowing off the Atlantic. We are getting close to the end; the smell of saltwater will soon be in the air.