The Ride and Flop : Days 5 & 6
Day 5 - homestead => key west For the record, one spare tube and six patches are not enough to preserve your dignity if you're trying to cover 120 miles on 'vintage' tyres. It took three roadside surgeries where I tried patching two different tubes every which way, in the hopes of getting to the bike shop on Marathon Key. Knowing that the patches were shite i had to use two of them to cover three holes (how the fuck do you get three holes at once anyway?). So I was literally praying out loud as I rolled off the bridge onto Grassy Key, the last one before Marathon. Sadly, my luck was not in, and i felt the familiar bump of rim on tarmac just as i pulled up outside of the Dolphin Research Center. It's very possible that the language which escaped me at that point was not entirely appropriate for the young visitors who were queueing up to pet Flipper. However, whoever is responsible for putting nice people in your way came up trumps, because the two ladies in the Dolphin Research centre called me a cab and found me a bike shop that stocked the requisite 23 x 700c’s. I was picked up within minutes by a sizeable Cuban Lady with a bike rack on her taxi. She told me she had been living in the Keys for 27 years and the furthest afield she’s been in that time was Orlando. Keys living looks like it could be habit forming. Otherwise, it was quite the slog. Don't know how i would have fared over the last 40 miles to Key West if the wind hadn't been behind me. As it stood, I was verging on delirious from arse pain and energy drinks by the time i got there. And the three beers i drank in quick succession did little to help matters....although they did help to…