FreeWheel 2001by David Kincannon| Intro | Day 0 | Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | |
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FreeWheel
Day-7: Saturday, June 16 This was the last morning we had to pack our bags and get them on the truck before 8:30. Every morning I wondered how I was going to get everything in those two bags and would the zipper hold up? Some strong Velcro straps were my help and insurance for those concerns. Today was also the Red Dirt Pedaler's FreeWheel group photo day with a photo planned for 6:30 am. To show off our great teamwork skills, we had half of the group smiling and saying cheese for the camera on the north side of Bulldog Arena, while the other half were waiting on everyone to show up at the RDP canopy that was set up on the south side of the arena. Guess what? Not everyone got in the photograph. That was because there was a building standing in the way of half of us. We took Highway 20 east out of Jay and the road was crowded with FreeWheelers this morning. It seemed like everyone left camp at the same time. Today I rode with Terry Raymond and Chris McWatters. To keep ourselves entertained this week, we would sing goofy songs when we passed other riders to see if we could get them to laugh and sometimes we would play a game to see if we could get oncoming motorist to give us a friendly wave. At mile 11.9 we crossed the Oklahoma-Arkansas border. After several photos were taken, Terry rode on into Arkansas, while Chris and I rode north to the tri-state border of Oklahoma-Arkansas- Missouri. There is a rock and concrete monument on the survey point where the three states meet. We took photos of ourselves standing on the monument with our bikes held in the air like it was some big accomplishment or something. The rest of the day was an easy ride though Arkansas countryside to Siloam Springs. They routed us all over the city for a grand tour and then we crossed the finish line at the High School. There were collected a finish packet, took photos at the finish line, and got something to eat at the football stadium. We collected our luggage, took showers, loaded the bikes onto the three vans. There was a closing ceremony at the stadium. I stayed for as much of it as I could but one of our vans had left the other two were ready to go. It seemed like a short ride home, but we had a long wait at Bill Burke's house because the driver of one van, whose name rhymes with Dill Durke stopped at Braums in Sand Springs and locked his keys in the van. Hey Dill, we would have liked to stopped for ice cream also, you know. It was a great FreeWheel this year. The bicycles and riders seemed to have survived without too much trouble. In Siloam Springs they sold FreeWheel "Survivor" tee shirts. It didn't take me long to get a chain-ring stain on mine. David Kincannon | Intro | Day 0 | Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6 | Day 7 | |