Battling Hills and Headwinds--The climb to Monticello.

Day 3...ahh day three. I will not miss the ride to Charlottesville. Actually I'm kind of hoping to forget most of it. There were some funny parts about today, but it was most memorable as the toughest day so far. The hills really made an impact today. And 79 miles of hills really begins to wear you down very quickly, especially when every road sign reminds you of hills. I wanted to die about 50 or 60 in, but the absolute worst part of the ride was the climb to Monticello. Oh that climb. I'm ashamed to say...but I had to get off the bike and walk it up part of the top of the hill. I know, I suck. But whatever, try riding 220 miles in 3 days and not walk up a hill or two. That brings me to my next point...the Appalachians are going to suck. Oh the Appalachians...they will be the end of me. I think we will be taking the Appalachians as slow as possible.
This is a bridge at the top of Monticello where I almost died and had to walk a little. We had our first encounter with angry dogs today too. I was the first to be chased, and I sprinted fast enough to outrun them, but I almost ran straight over one dog. Then Rob took the lead and a pack of three dogs...one a Rottweiler, came out. That was nuts. From then on I made sure my mace was very easily accessible so I could mace Rob while he was being attacked by a dog. He's totally going to get maced.
On a separate note, I've been eating like a horse. I can eat a decent meal every hour or so and still be hungry. So that's totally sweet. Another interesting thing about riding so much is the natural high you get from doing cardio for eight hours a day. Jacob took a nap on the ground at a gas station today, and woke up hallucinating. That was probably one of the funniest things about today.
I had a lot of time alone today. I spent a lot of time ahead of the pack. I kept yelling at myself, I'm sure if people saw me they would think I was insane. There are just some times when you have to psych yourself into pedaling harder, more, faster, whatever. Its totally a mental thing to a point, until you hit the wall. My wall today was Monticello.
It just started to rain as soon as we got into Charlottesville today. Actually, it poured, but we missed most of it. When it stopped raining, we went down to UVA and looked at the campus, it was beautiful. Not as cool as Carolina, but really pretty. There's a crazy house that was built on a hill overlooking the college. Supposedly the builder of the house got rejected from UVA, and he built a house overlooking it so he could look down on the school (sorry to any Wahoos if I butchered the story).
Tonight we're staying with Andy Massaro's brother and sister. They're incredibly nice to let us stay here. I can't even begin to explain how amazing a warm shower is after four days of cleaning myself from sinks and buckets. I've also been growing a pretty long beard. It's kind of sketchy, but whatever, I'll clean it up soon if I don't shave it off.
We're taking a day off tomorrow before we really hit the Appalachians. I need it. We all need it. I hope I'll be ready for them after a day of rest. I really like hills, but not 60 miles of hills. It gets really terrible after a while.
Anyways, this post is getting pretty long, and I'm getting really sleepy. But thanks for reading and I'm sure I'll be able to let you know how the Appalachians go soon enough. Peace.