We again woke late and had a lazy morning of good coffee and homemade waffles, bacon and strawberries. Thunderstorms were still booming this morning, but since we only had about 200 miles to ride, we were in no hurry to get wet. The radar showed that the line of thunderstorms was slowly working its way east, so procrastination was the order of the day.



We spent the rest of the morning admiring Bill's stable of bikes, which includes a PC800 and a GB500, and working on ours. Minor tweaks were all they required – a little oil, some chain lube, and a cinch on one of my exhaust header nuts.

Around 1 pm we decided that we should get on the road since we had 6 or so hours of riding ahead of us. We worked our way slowly through Durham before the road opened up slightly, but then we reached Raleigh and again had to slowly wind our way out the other side. Here we were greeted by faster roads and darker clouds and spent the rest of the afternoon dodging showers and other vehicles. The scenery in eastern North Carolina isn't nearly as pretty as the rest of the state, but we were excited to finally be nearing the coast and the end of Phase 1 of our trip. While we tried to exercise some throttle restraint for the sake of our fuel mileage for most of the day, our excitement won out once we turned south in Jacksonville and headed the last 20 miles to my parents' house. Turning into Sneads Ferry we could smell the salt in the air and zoomed down the last couple blocks to our destination for the next couple weeks.



My dad met us in the driveway, and we got off the bikes for the final time in this leg of our journey. Our butts were looking forward to a couple of days of hot sand and salt water therapy.

We have done over 3800 miles in 12 days of riding, and aside from the chains and one simultaneous bike nap, it's been a trouble-free trip. Thanks to our generous friends who provided us with several nights accommodations and home-cooked meals along the way, our 15 days on the road only cost about $850. Over the next couple of weeks we'll be visiting family and friends, going to the beach, eating east Carolina barbeque, and surveying our vast tracts of land (we just bought 2.5 acres in Selma, NC) before we head out again to Ohio and on to Toronto in early September.

195 miles in 6 hours. The bikes are running well, but the clutches are still unhappy.