Greetings from Belzoni, Mississippi - the Catfish Capital of the world! We are currently back at the hotel in Indianola, about 30 miles North of today's stopping point, thanks to the Durkin's and resting comfortably. They picked us up after covering about 25 miles in just under 5 hours earlier this afternoon. More on that in a minute but let me first start with our morning.
Our alarm went off at the usual time of 7am and it seemed we were less than excited to get moving. I checked on the photos that we updated last night as Matt and Ken got a few more minutes of sleep. If our days aren't busy enough trying to run, walk or hobble through the running portion of it, we also have to type up the blog and get our photos uploaded in a timely manner in order to please our ever growing audience. At times it can be stressful trying to get everything done during the day but when we read emails or view the guestbook, I know it is all worth the extra effort. Keep up the support and we'll keep the photos coming.
Once we got moving, we headed over to the continental breakfast to see what she had to offer. A great little meal awaited us and waffles were on the menu. Ken read the paper and Matt drank as much orange juice as he could stomach in hopes to fight off his recent head cold. Mini Cini's were also plentiful as they had alluded us days before at Burger King. It was rewarding getting the last laugh on these delicious little treats.
We finally got the van packed up and were on the road just after 8. It was an hour drive back to Tchula where we left off the day before and the drive gave us a great preview of what was in store for the day. Nothing but open-flat roads with wide shoulder. We were dropped off by Papa and Mama D and started running at 9:15. It was a later start than we are use to but with our food and housing taken care of for the day it took a lot of pressure off us. All we had to do was run 25 miles and call it a day. No searching for places to eat or begging to put a tent in someones yard.
The weather was only 40 degrees when we got going but it quickly rose to the low 60s by the end of the day. It was a perfect day to run with a perfect road awaiting us. Traffic was minimal the entire day and we were able to enjoy our time out on the road. We didn't have to jump into the grass or push the cart up a hill trying to avoid traffic.
We ran parallel with a railroad track for the first 6 miles of the day and both the road and tracks stretched out as far as the eye could see. We eventually turned right and continued to follow route 12 that took us through a number of cotton fields and catfish ponds (what a combination). Ken had brought along his iPod and with Matt's speaker we were able to enjoy some music on the empty, lonely road - that brought us another mile closer to our goal. Ken made up a rule that you could only change the song we were listening to if you were pushing the jogger. It all worked out nicely until it was my turn to push and an O.A.R. song came on. O.A.R. is my favorite band but Ken and Matt have different musical tastes. I felt bad and after a few minutes changed the song. The music was a nice change of pace, especially on such a deserted road and it gave Ken a second bounce to his step. He was the most animated on the day and later told me that this was the best he has EVER felt on a run in his entire life. It made me laugh to watch him jump around and dance in the middle of the road as a song that he particularly liked came on. Just seeing how good he felt made me smile.
Although Matt is still fighting a head cold and had trouble catching his breath from time to time, today's run was by far the best we have had so far as a group. Everyone was feeling good and at times I felt as if I was sprinting in order to keep up with the guys. There was not much to see today as everything looked the same. However, we did see two crop dusting planes flying across the road and over head. One landed in an open field only a few hundred feet away from us.
Over the last couple of days Durkin and I have been working out the rules to a rock throwing game that we "invented". I use the word invented quite loosely because if you have ever thrown a rock into water before than you too have invented this game. Well anyways, the game goes like this: You throw a rock into any body of water (pond, lake, river, stream, puddle, etc) and if it lands cleanly into that body of water you earn a point. However, you are not allowed to throw two rocks into the same body of water and expect to gain additional points. If you shot but miss you are automatically back to zero and must start again. Whoever has the most points at the end of the day is declared the winner. There is also a challenge rule. Once you have earned 5 points you are able to challenge the other person to a shot they must attempt, regardless of how difficult it might be. If that person misses the shot they are set back to zero. If the person being challenged makes the shot, the person who challenged is reset back to zero. I hope these rules are not very difficult to follow because the game itself is fairly primitive.
Ken refuses to participate in this game as he calls it childish. Instead, he see how many times in a row he can throw a rock at Durkin without missing. He is currently up to 7.
We arrived on the outskirts of Belzoni just after 1:30 where Papa D joined us for the last 3 miles of the day. This was our third guest appearance of the trip after Scott in Savannah and the gang from Columbus, GA. I'm not sure if Ken said anything about it yesterday in his blog but it was refreshing to see a couple of familiar faces on the road. The four of us jogged down route 12 heading to Hollandale, our destination for tomorrow. After only a few minutes, Papa D exclaimed "Move over boys and let me get a crack at the buggy". He then pushed the jogger for close to 10 minutes which didn't bother us in the least. It felt like we just started running with him before we saw the van parked a few feet up the road. Mama D was walking toward us as she too didn't want to miss out on the fun. For the last few minutes she pushed the jogger back to the van. We finished strong as a group and I hope its the sign we are on an upswing physically.
The rest of the night we lounged around, resting and filling out stomach's. Matt and Ken took an afternoon nap (nothing new here) before we got a pizza for dinner. We just heard on the news that it is suppose to rain tomorrow but will still be in the low 60s. I hope we can get on the road early and avoid anything that might be coming our way. We have another 25 miles to travel and are getting closer and closer to the end of Mississippi.
Thanks for reading.
-Andy
PS: Just in case anyone didn't know, tomorrow is a leap day. We were talking about this a few weeks ago and discussed how we accidentally gained an extra day of travel because of it. Ken proclaimed to us that he would be having a kid on this day sometime in the distant future. We all wish you luck Ken!
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