St Simons Says…

We’d like to play a game that is so much fun, and it’s not so very hard to do, the name of the game is St Simons says, and we would like for you to play it too…Put your hands in the air; cycle 86 miles; burn 6050 calories and eat your own body weight in fried seafood when you get there.

So, today we cycled the mammoth 86 miles from Savannah to the beautiful South Georgia island resort of St Simons. And what a ride it was. We were without our usual cycling maps, since we decided to give central Georgia a miss and track the coastline instead, but the route that we found turned out to be a gem. And thanks to Anthony’s ingenious new method for planning the routes and uploading them from Google Earth to the SatNavs, even the Gamines behaved like butter wouldn’t melt today (Kat suspects that Anthony has added some subliminal messages hidden in one of the waypoints to leave the Gamines in no doubt about how much trouble they will be in if they misbehave again, still it seems to be working!).

Setting off in the rain as the sun came up, it was a little chilly to say the least. According to the weather today, there is snow all the way from New York to Richmond (thank heavens that we’re heading South), so it is rather hot - or should we say “cold”(!) - on our heels. But, the sight of a real, properly marked, designated bike lane on our route about 5 miles into the ride was enough to warm the cockles. Today was a good day on the Moss scale, with a LeBron James cycle path pretty much all of the way. And the scenery was truly breathtaking. We cycled through Buck Hill Swamp, an area of unspoiled marshland that seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see; and a whole host of wildlife reserves, which form part of the Sapelo Island National Estuarine Research Reserve. We saw storks, herons and pelicans, we heard woodpeckers, and we also saw a scary looking crowd of pterodactyls blocking the whole width of one of the side roads, picking over a kill… OK, TMG, they were not pterodactyls, but they looked very similar, and no we did not manage to get our cameras out in time… We also saw a group of very serious-looking ornithologists (collective noun “a hush”) carrying enough expensive equipment to fund a small African nation – perhaps we should have asked them to send us some of their photos?

And talking of developing nations, we arrived safe and sound, though very tired, in St Simon. We soon headed out to feed our faces and stumbled across “Go Fish”, a rather nice shop selling clothes and other items sourced from third world countries. Since some of the clothes were really very nice, and Kat’s “capsule” wardrobe has become a little too minuscule recently (Anthony agrees), she was more than happy to purchase a couple of lightweight items, with assistance from the lovely Carolyn, the proprietor. So, all that was left to do was to replace at least half of the 6050 calories with some rather delicious seafood, and a generous glug of Pinot Grigio.

Another long day tomorrow: 70 miles we predict. Still, loyal followers, by the time we post our blog tomorrow, all being well, we will be in FLORIDA!!!

Us x