Lightning and Thunder and Rain, OH MY!

My father once said, and has said many times since then, "never turn down a free meal!" We took his words to heart when a very friendly couple offered up the guest appartment at their house in Worcester, Vermont. Pat and Chris RULE! We just finished a fantastic home cooked meal and have a warm bed to sleep in for the weekend.

This comes with such a warm heart after our last night in a thunder storm in Stowe. Much to our luck our roommate Taylor's "naked- NO rain dance" worked and we were rain free all day for our ride. Because of it we were able to get a great ride in from Georgia to Stowe. We road about 20 miles longer than we thought we were going to, crossing over Smuggler's Notch which was beautiful! The climate was just like a rainforest. HOT and humid with a dense tree layer, waterfalls on the left and bird sounds everywhere! Way cool. We road into Stowe and had some awesome pizza and local beer at Pie Casso and road to our campsite with happy bellys and sore legs.

Not more than 20 minutes after the tent was pitched did the rain come down! All the rain that Taylor had warded off all day long decided to dump (all at once) on us and our little tent. Along with it come some of the biggest, brightest lightning that I have ever seen and thunder not far behind! It got big enough that nither of us felt safe and we headed to the laundry room for shelter! After an hour or so we made our way back to the tent, but it was a restless sleep full of "one one thousand, two one thousands" as we counted the distance from lightning to thunder.

Luckily, we did survive and promptly called Pat who welcomed us to her home and requested our presence for dinner! Who am I to turn down a free meal?! We road a short day today to Pat and Chris's house making a very important stop at the Ben and Jerry's Factory where we not only sampled ice cream, but also learned that the creators couldn't handle college, but got perfect scores on the ice cream maker test!

So here we are tonight in a warm home, safe from the rain outside. The pic is from Pat's computer... those MACS are so cool. Ya, Uncle Peter I said it :) Tomorrow a hike and Sunday back on the road! We are almost 2 weeks into our biking adventure and figure we have about 2 more weeks to go.

Scott and I are still friends :) and are celebrating the fact that out first date was a year ago today... good thing we're still friends!

Here's to lots more fun!
Lauren
P.S. Check out Flickr.com for more pics!