Greg & Camille Go Bike

The critters strike again. After dinner, the recyclables had been washed and left on the table. A few minutes after we were in the tent, we heard some rattling. We got up and could clearly see they'd been knocked over, so we put them in a plastic bag and hung them next to our food and trash. Greg could see a pair of eyes glowing in the brush ahead.

In the middle of the night, he woke up again to hear a scratching noise by the hanging food. He vaguely recalled hearing chitters, some movement, and then the scratching stopped. We like to imagine that one raccoon had communicated to the rest of the clan about a discovered score elsewhere in the campground. Greg got up and saw that our bags all still appeared to be safe and secured, so he settled back into bed. Shortly after, the raccoons returned, and we could hear a plastic shopping bag being trampled on. They'd returned with their score.

In the morning, we found the smaller dry sack containing mostly snacks was completely gone. There was no debris from it being torn open or any sign of it whatsoever. Damn raccoons.

We'd planned to get an early start to the day as Camille had a 3 pm meeting scheduled, but that didn't quite happen. Around 8 am, we packed up camp, scarfed down most of a bag of cereal, and some cold-ish brew (Camille's attempt at getting Greg some early coffee). We biked through the park and some woods on the way out and then mostly through neighborhoods until Ormond Beach. It was really hot really early, but the biking earlier in the day was very scenic. We biked along the coast of the mainland with views of the intracoastal waterway.

South of Daytona Beach, we veered away from the coast and onto US Route 1 with a nice bike lane. We were curious about some franchises there, specifically Cumberland Farms and Wawa which we'd thought was more regional. Before long, we were back on the coast and enjoying the pleasant views. New Smyrna Beach, around the halfway mark for the day, was our first stop for some coffee and brunch. The waitress at Jason's Coner seemed interested in our trip but didn't want to annoy us. She seemed really sweet though and gave us an entire pitcher of water after hearing about the trip. Greg had coffee, and we both enjoyed omelettes and french toast.

After breakfast, we picked up where we left off along the coast, now with a nasty headwind and ever more brutal heat. A lot of this stretch had us biking on paths which were probably meant more as a sidewalk than a multi-purpose path. The on-road stretches no longer had a bike lane though, just a mostly acceptable shoulder sadly with no shade. We turned off a bit earlier than the Adventure Cycling route to hop on a nearby rail trail and followed it for the last 8 miles into Titusville. The trees along the sides were welcome refuge from the sun's harsh rays.

At the Airbnb, we met our host Kelley. She was an enthusiastic host, yet understandably preoccupied by the recent passing of her neighbor. We learned that their family had moved from Colorado, then Alabama to her husband's job here at Blue Ocean. Kelley was so knowledgeable about the area and activities to do. The boat tours to see bioluminescent acquatic life sounded especially interesting; we're excited to return when they're in season!

We squeezed in a quick visit to the Space Museum, 45 minutes before closing. Although we mostly only had time to read through the exhibits on the Mercury and Gemini programs, it was interesting to read about the objectives for those programs and for individual missions. Frustratingly, they asked us to leave 15 minutes before closing, so we headed over to Space View Park to scope out a spot for watching tonight's launch.