This morning at 6 we started our engines and headed down the road. I packed my bike last night and Beth put the last few things on hers this morning. I must be pretty excited about this trip, because I was awake before 4 am.

Three were a few clouds in the sky. We ran through a little spitting on the way to the Howard Frankland bridge. On the bridge we saw the floats for the St. Petersburg Pride Parade being hauled over from Tampa.

Just past the airport we watched a huge, white, beautiful thunder cloud illuminated by the rising sun and fog lifting off a couple of ponds. Those were sights we usually miss because we are home watching the news at that hour. It was also 79 degrees with high humidity, which generated one vote for watching TV in an air conditioned space.

Several miles down the road it became obvious that the pretty, white clouds had turned to dark rain clouds, so we donned our rain gear and rode through the rain up to Perry, FL. Beth remarked that it was a good thing there was no interesting scenery because all we could see was gray. There were several shades of gray, but it was a gray morning.

The advantage of a rainy, cloudy day is that the temperatures are cooler. Just past Panama City, the sky cleared it got hot and sticky.

We had 10 miles of stop and go traffic approaching the tunnel in Mobile, AL, but that was the only problem we encountered. We got to our hotel, Rocky Creek Inn in Lucedale, MS about 5:30 Eastern. We covered 547 miles. The hotel is inexpensive and typical. We took a dip in the pool, but it was warm as bath water and not as refreshing as we’d hoped.

Tomorrow’s target is Dallas. As usual please share on Facebook and/or leave a comment here.