Arrival in Cumberland

"I saw a bright light at the end of a tunnel". Not just any tunnel, but the kilometer long Paw Paw tunnel along the C&O towpath. 

I could tell you so many interesting facts about this tunnel, which cost millions of dollars to build, but I do not know the interesting facts, so I'll leave it up to you to search them out on the web.

 

 

Thankfully we had a good couple dry days of riding. Then the rain came and Shirley and Shirley's bike both were covered with mud when we finished the Towpath. This kind of stuff is kind of hard on chains and sprockets.

Our first 2.5 days of riding were dry, so we were clean and comfortable for camping. Then we started seeing people coming towards us whose legs were covered in black mud. Soon we found out why. It had rained a lot up ahead.

Even my fenders were not enough to stop mud from flying from pudddles to bikes and bikers. Craig and his mountain bike would have had a blast riding the last 20 km into Cumberland.

This gave me a chance to test out the belt drive in these dirty sloppy conditions. I might be imagining things, but it seems to work better with the muddy lubricant?

Not a single problem and so easy to wash off when we stopped.

On arrival in Cumberland MD, the local bicycle shop provided us with bucket of soapy water, several brushes and a hose.

We had to give our bikes, our gear, our shoes and ourselves a good cleanup before any motel would let us in. Yeah, that's right, after a couple nights camping, I got soft and we got a motel, a Marriot Inn no less.