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Atlantic Coast Tour
May 10th - Somers Point, New Jersey to Wharton State Forest, New Jersey
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Team Blueberry breaks away from Somers Point like bike racers in their best form. It must have been the two days of rest. The rains that poured down all day yesterday finally stopped early last night. We have a tail wind and dry roads. The pelaton of weekend warriors wiz past us as if we are standing still. We see another group on the other side of the road. They holler something about us having a tail wind. Becky yells, "Yahoo!" back at them.
Our first stop today is at the Weymouth Furnace County Park. We are told that it has an artesian spring from which we can drink, but when we arrive a sign says not to. We spend some time checking out the ruins of an old iron smelting plant where they made munitions for the war of 1812. Another nearby pile of stones was an old paper mill.
As we cycle down the road, services are few and far between. We make the traditional stop at a local McDonalds. Louie says, "We must have visited every single McDonalds on the east coast." Becky thinks it is another good idea for an extended bike tour - tour de McDee. The only place we find for groceries is a local WaWa, a type of speedy mart they have around these parts. Louie does the best he can. This is what we call "surviving on gas station food".
A strange thing happens just before we leave Batsto. One of the women from the museum comes running up to us. She looks panic stricken. She gives us a worried look but says nothing. The woman gives Becky a folded up sheet of paper, takes a couple of backwards steps, then hurries back into the museum. When we read the note we learn about the Jersey Devil for the first time. The Jersey Devil apparently lives in the pine lands of New Jersey. It has the head of a horse, the body of a kangaroo, the wings of a bat and cloven hooves. Although the letter appears to be a warning it also says there have been no documented sightings since 1966. Surely this is some kind of hoax. Unafraid, we still plan to camp alone, and in the darkness of the Wharton State Forest tonight.
