After a slight hiccup in the morning involving the hotel being located on a private road that our van could not accessand a phone issue preventing use of a credit card transaction we hit the road ‘early’ (it wasn’t so early anymore) for what we expected to be the hardest remaining ride of the trip. We were not disappointed. When we reached Michael’s Inn 113km ~ 68 miles later, even Bob admitted, “That was hard.” We climbed over 6000 feet in the process. Bob said the difficulty wasn’t so much because of the climbing or the distance, but more due to fighting poor road conditions and traffic. My thick road biking tires made the trip, but definitely were not intended for use on some of the road we covered (think sharp cobblestones about the size of softballs). I now know what a can of paint feels like just before leaving the store.
We were welcomed with a ceremonial procession down the street at about 9pm leading out of the St. George’s Orthodox Church. Well, maybe it wasn’t ‘for us’ but it happened nonetheless. This church also had 8 massive speakers broadcasting their service since we got here (at night and in the morning — the clips are posted).
We took a tour of a spice plantation. In contrast to the image my brain has stored for the word ‘plantation’, the spices and fruits grown there are completely intermingled unlike rows of corn or whatnot. Grown within feet of eachother are plants producing rubber, cinnamon, coffee, nutmeg, cloves, bananas, and cocoa (and more). To be honest, I know very little about this kind of stuff and it isn’t my cup of tea, so I was yawning through it. Afterwards we rode some elephants, which was more exciting. We stood next to the elephants for a picture and one of them smacked the back of my head with its ear, which was startling but painless.
