Hollywood to Homestead. Day 1.

Personal inventory:
63 miles
0 mechanical incidents
2 very saddle sore butt cheeks
2 numb palms
7 cups of coffee
1 very happy camper

We arrived to Paradise Farms and were greeted by Ernest. He showed us the grounds and, most importantly, pointed out the coffee in the thermos was still warm. The farm doubles as a B&B so we met some French tourists and then chowed down on peanut butter sandwiches. Popped the tent up, made friends with a cat named Guacamole (but apparently missed avocado season!) and passed out super early. Today it’s a much shorter day and even though it’s a bit chill for Florida standards, there’s no more rain and it looks like a 20mph tailwind will be in the forecast as well!

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A1A, Beach front avenue… Rollin!

Ok. Enough Vanilla Ice references there for all of our lifetimes.

First day out and it’s rainy what Floridians call “cold”. Meaning 60°. Loving it. Straight shot down from Hollywood into South Beach, plenty of horns and nasty comments because apparently not only can folks not drive, but they can’t read the sign that says “bicycles entitled to entire lane”. Whatever. I smile and wave. One of these days I’ll flash my badge to one of these types and pants will be pooped in.

Got a nice Cubano sandwich at Abuela’s cafe, then pushed on to camp out on an organic farm in Homestead. Even the sun came out in the afternoon. Not too shabby, feels great to be back on tour.

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☀️🚲👍💯

72° at 11pm. Yes! The shift from -25° to that has me so speechless that I decided on using emoji for the subject of this post.

Arrived in FLL, met our Warm Showers hosts Dave and Leo, as well as their Couch Surfing guest Tim. A great pasta and meatball dinner ensued, followed by some of Leo’s world famous deserts. (Seriously, he’s such an amazing baker that they throw an annual party where he whips up dozens of various deserts, including 5 types of flan!). With food and wine in the belly, the next step was unboxing and re-assembling the old warhorse and packing up the saddlebags.

Presto chango, I’m now back in bike mode, ready to hit the open road tomorrow and live life outside and under my own power. Nothing is more proper. Stay tuned.

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