Who needs sleep? Or coffee? I had a destination: the city of Steelers, Pirates, Penguins and… maybe a basketball team.

The simplest answer is always the least obvious. To me, anyway.

So this ends up being yet another “yes” experience as we decided to eat lunch together in Cumberland, MD (the end of the muddy C&O) and the beginning of the GAP trail (GAP = Great Allegheny Passage) and continue riding together.

As I’d left him, Whitey Jackson was leaned up against the Airstream slick from the thick coat of dew. Many, many, many birds welcomed me.

All the struggle I experienced about when to set off was for naught. I had that ‘today’s the day’ feeling on Wednesday the 23rd as I popped my panniers onto Whitey Jackson’s racks.

STILL MAROONED AT MILE MARKER ZERO.

Not to cart out dead-horse political tropes from a long-dead political horse race … …BUT remember that conservative snowflake battlecry/outcry from the 2012 presidential election campaign? ‘You didn’t build that‘?