Mar 27 (Day 86) - Tailwinds

The tailwind that I expected yesterday never materialized. Today was a different story. The weather folks were spot on when they forecasted strong east winds that would eventually swing around to blow from the south. These 15-20 MPH winds moved me along at my fastest clip of the year. I was able to cover 59 miles to Panama City in about 3:15 (with no stops!), or an average of just over 18 MPH. I reached my planned destination so quickly that I immediately began searching for someone further down the road with whom I could stay tonight. Winds like this are very rare, and I wanted to squeeze every mile from them that I was able. I ended up finishing in Sea Grove Beach, 90 miles from where I started in Apalachicola. I easily could have pumped out another 40-50 miles, but I would have outridden the lodging I have arranged for the next few days. I am just about certain these will be the 90 easiest miles I will ride this year. There is a strong possibility that I will be staying here tomorrow as well as the weather forecast for tomorrow is dreadful: thunder and lightning all day. There will also be more thunderstorms Saturday morning, so I am going to lose at least 1.5 days to this nonsense.

90 more miles today!

I wrote a few days ago that I was hoping to keep my miles down during this stretch. So far this has not happened; I have been averaging 65 miles a day for the last 10 days. Part of this is that potential lodging places are far apart in these sparsely populated areas, and part of it is that I am getting stronger and riding faster. I just completed consecutive 90-mile days and I feel great. If there is a really good birding spot (St. Mark's, e.g.), then I can fill up the day birding and photographing. However, if there isn't anything particularly exciting to see, I may as well keep moving since I do not know when I am going to be forced into days off. 

I am hoping to hit a few decent migration fallouts before I get to Texas. Every migrating species I can find now is one that I won't have to search for while I am in Texas. There might be some decent movement after all these storms, so I want to try to position myself to find some new birds once the weather clears. 

As a side note, I was informed by my hosts for the night that I crossed into the central time zone today. I seem to have completely lost track of where I am on the east-west axis of the country. I am much further west than I realized. I guess this is good news since I'm headed west anyway!