Meriwether Lewis camp Tennessee to Colbert Ferry, Alabama – 65 sunny miles.
I awake in camp happy with the sun shining into my tent. First thing I notice is that I can see my breath. Brrr it’s cold but the sunshine is good news. We load ourselves into Brad’s car and head to the little town of Hohenwald for a southern breakfast. It is nice to have a SAG wagon on mornings like this. We get a later start then planned but that gives the sun some time to warm up a bit. We climb and descend through the Tennessee ridge country. The road is smooth, the traffic is light and we have a slight tail wind. After the first couple climbs we stop and remove our warm riding gear. The forest canopy connects the trees on either side if the road. For many miles we ride in this tunnel of nature with leaves crackling under our tires. The stop in Collinwood for lunch takes a couple hours of our precious daylight and we have to burn a lot of energy to reach our campsite before sunset. Lucky we cross the Tennessee River and into Alabama just as the sun hits the horizon. Brad finds up a beautiful stealth campsite on the river. We set up camp and head to Muscle Shores to meet Cindy and Russ for dinner. We return to the campsite with full bellies and find a local armadillo searching for his supper. We chase him off and crawl in our tents and I am feeling grateful for another day on Mother Earth.
