Off to Philly!

After a crazy, adventurous, chance of a lifetime week we really just wanted to sleep for a week- but who can do that when you have Philadelphia and Washington D.C. so close?! As far as RAAM goes, we were pretty much done. We had a dinner that Sunday night but nothing else planned during the day, so we decided we need to go do some sight seeing. We knew we wanted to go to either D.C. or Philly, and since our day was short because of the RAAM Banquet we decided to hit Philly and leave D.C. for the longer day on Monday. We hopped in the car, paid about 4 different times to stay on the same freeway, and arrived in Philadelphia. We headed right into the Independence National Historical Park. There is so much history there! We started out at the Visitors Center and we found this cool 1700's guy!

 We walked around some more, got tickets to a tour, and then headed out to find the Liberty Bell. There was a huge line, so we went up to the spot where you can see the bell without actually going into the building. It was smaller then I thought it would be, not too exciting. It was around lunch time and we still had time before our tour so we headed out to find some authentic Philly Cheesesteak Sandwiches. We found a cute little place that had some good reviews on Google and gave it a try. It was pretty tasty, but I'm always a fan of the Philly Cheesesteak.

 On our way back to Independence Park we went through a little alley and found where Benjamin Franklins house was. They did some preserving of the footings of the house that was still there, but it all just looked like badly poured random concrete (obviously if it was like 300 years old!). Kyle was over looking at a piece of concrete from the kitchen when he heard Chris and I gasp in excitement- we found his septic tank! It was by far the coolest part- only because it actually looked like something though :)

 We found the Visitors Center to Benjamin Franklins place and ventured in. We found these really cool National Parks Passports that my Mom and I just had to have- now we have a reason to travel! To get a stamp! At each National Park they have a stamp that you can use for your Passport- too cool huh?! I know, we're kind of nerds, but we're excited!

 Here is Kyle and I by a statue of Benjamin Franklin- The Signer.

 Yay for our Passports again! We already got a stamp and we were on the hunt for more!

We stopped by the courthouse that the Declaration of Independence was signed. It was a neat little building. 

Waiting in line for the tour...

The guy that did the tour kept calling the room that the Declaration of Independence was signed the most historical document, in the most historical room, in the most historical building, in the most historical square mile, in the most historical city, in the country. He knew a lot of information about who signed it first, where everyone was seated when they signed it, and all that historical stuff. The rooms really weren't that exciting though and the only original furniture was a chair that was tucked away in the corner.

 We found LOTS of stamps!! Here's a out take picture- there's Chris photo bombing us in the background and Mom telling Kyle that this was not a good angle.

 Aw that's a better one!

 After we walked the Independence Park we drove around a bit to see some of the other sites and found where Rocky ran up the stairs! Chris was pretty tired from all his Chiefing duties and wasn't really into taking pictures, so we helped him out.

 Even though we had our Rocky picture we had to run the steps! In Chris' case, walk the steps :)

 But we all made it to the top.

 Then off we went to the RAAM Awards Banquet back in Annapolis and the Doubletree resort. It was a fun dinner and these two got some stellar finishers plaques.

Afterward we met a few crew members that didn't make it to the banquet at the pier to have some ice cream. Check out Dad's recovery diet- that's 3 scoops right there!

We got to bed nice and early and it was a beautiful full nights rest!

To the Finish Line! Annapolis, Maryland

We met up with the on-coming shift at a super nice gas station called Sheetz at the Time Station of Rouzerville, It was right about midnight and we were only 130 miles away from the finish and everyone was a little excited. It was a little surreal that after 6 days here we were, almost at the finish line! We stopped at one of the nicest gas stations I've ever seen to transition.Here's Troy just waking up and getting ready to transition with Bob.

 Troy transitioned and in came Bob's van. They did a few other tweaks to his bike seat at the transition and  then we headed in the super nice gas station to get something to eat. After eating fast food/prepared food for going on 9 days, I was getting to the point where I didn't even want to eat. Nothing sounded good- I just wanted real food! I was so excited when I saw that they had plain bagels with cream cheese and a toaster. It was the seriously the best bagel I've had in my life.

After eating something we drove up a bit and then stopped on the side of the road to take a nap. Even though we were 180 miles away, it was still going to take a while since the hills were still very steep. We got a good 2-3 hour nap in when they caught up to us. It doesn't sound like much, but realistically that's all I had been getting in the hotel any was it was pretty much normal. In our "hotel van", now known as "media crew" was Me, Kyle, Mike, Doug, and Kathy. The first little while Doug and Kathy slept like rocks while Kyle, Mike, and I went and helped and took some pictures. We strapped the Go-Pro to Mike to get some action footage of the transitions. We figured we only had a few hours left if we wanted to get any at all!

Mom and Chris decided to take Dad's van since they hadn't been with him at all.

Here's troy getting ready to start his last leg of the race!

 I loved when the little towns would put up signs to tell us which way to turn- it was very helpful!

This was Troy's very last leg of RAAM 2014. He was just a little excited to be off the bike for more then hour stretches!

This is how we looked 75% of the time, the rider in the headlights of the van.

We stopped at a little bike shop at one of the Time Stations to use the bathroom and they had Dad sign a Time Station poster. It was neat to see all the different signatures on it from all the different teams.

 Dad and the shop owner got to talking a little and it turns out that Dad's chiropractor Adam Baumgardner used to work in his bike shop when he was a teenager- small world huh?!

 Here's Troy coming into the Time Station! Look at that happy face! His riding portion of RAAM was finsihed!

Now it was Bob's turn to finish this whole thing up! We had fun driving up and cheering him on through out the last 25 miles of the race. Here is Mike looking for Dad around the corner.

 Doug finally woke up! Little Sleepy-head. We passed out the cow-bells and let Bob know how close he was!

 We were finally close enough to the finish that we just drove all the way there to get all set. Troy met us there and we waited for Bob. Here is Troy cheering on Bob at the finish line!

Our official time was 6 Days 17 Hours and 52 minutes!

 After the real finish line, the team (minus the riders, Phil, and Doug) went down to the pier to await that final final ride. Even though the timing ends at the pretty orange line in the above picture, they have to take the parade route to the fancy end for photo ops. Here is Kyle and I waiting at the Pier. We finally got a picture! Since we were both the picture takers we didn't get many of us together.

Here they come!

Man they look good for riding 3000 miles!

The whole team- Calleen, Mike, Phil, Kathy, Kelly, Bob, Troy Hull, Kathy, Doug, Alli, Troy Yost, and Kyle

 The Carbonneau/ Gardner's and the riders. It was a little family affair.

 Mom and Dad

 After they interviewed the riders they had the crew go up for some more photo ops.

Phil, Doug, Kathy D., Kelly, Troy Yost, Troy Hull, Bob, Kathy C., Me, Chris, Colleen, Kyle, and Mike

 Chris, Mom, Dad, and Alli

 This is Bob, Jason, and Troy. Jason is the guy that got my Dad involved with Team Donate Life (the charity that Troy and Dad both road with in the past). He was the one that started all of this! Jason met them at the finish line to say congratulations.

After the novelty of finishing wore off we kind of realized we still weren't done. We needed to go to the hotel in Annapolis and get the vans all ready to turn back in! With all the stuff we had packed in those vans we figured it would take awhile. The crew all hoped right in. We had tons of random things that we weren't sure what to do with, so we found somewhere that took donations and dropped them all off. We had to get everything from the stickers on the dashboard to the crates under the seats out. It didn't take as long as we thought with everyone's help.

After we got all the crew stuff taken care of Dad asked for our help with all his gear. He wasn't really sure how to pack everything into the few duffle bags he had. Mom and I hoped right in and got it done for him.

We got to check-in a little early at the hotel and so they only had the 3 rooms ready that the crew had stayed in the previous night (the crew that came and relieved us before we just stayed on as media crew). We gave Troy a room and he went up and crashed. We figured they would have rooms ready by the time the vans were done but that wasn't the case so we had everyone's stuff all lined up on their lawn with no where to put it. Some crew members had previously tried to get hotel rooms and the clerk lady just kept telling them the rooms would be ready at 3 when check out was. At this point we still had 2 hour until we could get up there and we were all finished. Around 1 Kyle and I decided to just go ask again, and they handed us all the hotel room keys. I think she was just irritated and needed a little time to cool off. 

We all went up to our rooms, had a nice long nap, then we all got ready to go out to eat and Buddy's in Annapolis. I was all ready to go when I accidently dropped my phone in the toliet :( I grabbed it super fast so I didn't think anything happened to it and off we went to eat. I called Marie to check on the kiddos when the speaker started to sound really muffled. Kyle and I dropped the people riding with us off at the restuarant and then headed over to find a grocery store with rice. We came back and the tables that the team was eating at was pretty full so we had a nice meal with each other with the view of the docks. I got some crab and Kyle got some non-fishie meal. Here's my bucket of shell!

We got some ice cream afterward and went and walked around the pier a bit and then headed back to the hotel. It was so nice to know that we would be going to bed and not have to wake up for at least 8 hours!

Ohio to Maryland

After we got off shift, we drove a ways to get to the next hotel in Athens, Ohio, checked in, and then went to eat. I learned that it's better to eat before you go to bed- it helped me sleep much better! We had dinner at Taco Bell, I think just about everyone called their families, and we also lost all our money. No biggie. We were standing in line at Taco Bell and when it came time to pay no one had the envelope with money. Phil ran back to the van to look and it wasn't in the van. We started thinking we left it at the hotel so Phil ran back (the hotel was less then a mile away) and didn't find it there either. We checked the van again and Phil found it. He still won't admit there he found it, I'm starting to suspect it was where it was supposed to be. 

Since our crew shifts were messed with a little bit, I got to be the next hotel driver (for the 3rd time). Since it put me back on shift with Mom and Kyle again, I didn't mind a bit! Our hotel was right by a Wal-Mart at the Time Station, so we decided to crew transition in the Wal-Mart parking lot. It came in pretty handy too, we had a mini team meeting. Dad needed to adjust the seat on his bike and teak a few other things and Troy needed a stationary place to do some physical maintenance. While the rest of the crew was helping with their miscellaneous things, Kyle and I ran into Wal-Mart to get ice, water, and a few other odd and end things that the oncoming crew would need in their vans. We lost about an hour of race time- but it was a well needed rejuvenation. Sometimes you need to slow down to speed up.

Along with our  little stop Mom and Dad finally got to see each other! The way the crew rotation worked out, Mom was never crewing for Dad :( She was always in Troy's van.

After all was situated, I drove the crew coming into rest the 2 minutes to get to the hotel and we all slept very well. I got 7 hours of sleep that night since I got to sleep, go pick up the crew a few minutes away, then come back and go to sleep. It was pretty nice! As we were laying there trying to sleep it dawned on me that we made a huge mistake! Since Kyle, Mom, and I were all on the same shift- there was no one IN the race that would be taking pictures. We text the other shift and told them to get some pics. Chris got one of Mike, but I can't find it :/ At least he tried!

The next morning we woke up around 8 or 9 and started getting showers and doing our hair. I had taken a shower and was blow drying my hair when the power went out in our room. Oops! Kyle was just about to take a shower and the manager of the hotel didn't seem too concerned that we didn't have power so I set up my headlamp in the bathroom for Kyle and he took a shower to headlamp light. :) Once that was all taken care of we headed out to go meet the crew that was on shift.

 On our way to look for the crew we passed through West Virginia...

 and we found VERY yummy BBQ place and had some amazing grub. I know it looks like there's a fly in the macaroni and cheese, but there's not- I promise!

Had to get a snapshot with this wooden carved pig! You can't tell in the photo, but there are wings on it.

There was a route change in the Route Book so we decided to drive the route backwards so we would be able to see how the route changed. I'm kind of glad the route changed because instead of coming mostly through the town we got to drive around the town through the outskirts. We crew transitioned right before the route change and tt was so fun to be with Kyle again, he just makes life funner! There was BEAUTIFUL scenery so we took the opportunity to get some pictures.

We saw the gorgeous barn and pinwheel and decided Mom needed a picture of with Dad in tow. Isn't it beautiful!?

Here's Troy! I love to see the pictures of these two guys when the race started and then how their beards keep growing as the race goes on. 

There are certain time stations in the RAAM that has pretty crazy turns and this time station had a few crazy ones. There was one time that it told you to turn right on a certain highway where we almost turned right onto the freeway. We caught our mistake and drove forward, parked, and got ready to have a rider transition. We kept in good contact with the other van in letting them know where we were and them letting us know where they were. Troy was on the bike and as we were riding up to them we started to get reception on these small hand held radios. They are line of sight radios so we knew we had to be close to them. We got closer and closer to the mile point they said they were at and then the radio started going out and they were no were to be found. We finally got them on the radio and it turns out that they took the freeway that we were about to take and didn't. They hoped back in the van and Kyle got on the RAAM tractor App and told them where to go to get back to us without having to turn all the way around. Luckily, it only took a few extra minutes and we were able to get Troy in to rest. 

We went through lots of out skirts and made our way back into a little town again. They had us go down a street that had a bunch of one way streets coming off of it. There was one section that said to make a left turn after a certain bridge and we totally missed the turn. Luckily, Troy was in the van so it wasn't that big of a deal but we wanted the other guys to know about the turn since they missed the last one. Kyle called them and let them know it was a tricky one. We thought about stopping and marking the turn but since there were a bunch of one way streets we figured it would do more harm then good with us trying to get back onto the right route and not messing up our odometer. 

We got all set to transition, they let us know they were only a few miles away, we woke up Troy and got all ready to go. Then Kyle got a call from Doug... "Hey, you know that turn that you told us not to miss? Well, we missed it." Uh-oh. They threw Bob back in the van and got back on the route. While we were waiting for them to find all their way back we ran into the team of a solo rider. Troy got to live his life long dream of having pink hair.

After Troy went out we finally pulled out the Go-Pro and got some really fun video. Troy was going up a pretty steep hill and wanted his camelback so we handed it out the window for him and watched him try and put it on by myself. He would get the pack right where it should be, go to slip his other arm through, and it would slide off again. He probably did it 10 times before he accidentally got it stuck over his head. :)

A little later we were going to have a pretty good descent and wanted to put the Go-Pro on the front of the car. Since the hill was so steep we were only going about 5 miles an hour, so Yost volunteered to go run up, put the go pro on the van, run along side Troy, and then hop back in the van. Since it's not smart to run in front of a moving van, we stopped the van for a few seconds (while still keeping the rider in our headlights) got the camera on, and then went to catch up with Troy again. Funny side note- we mentioned this to Troy Hull a little later about when Yost started running beside him and he couldn't remember that at all! We even have video!

Once a dentist always a dentist- brushing his teeth- good job Endodontist Troy!

We had a lot more hills and a lot more descents and our shift came to an end. It was really bitter sweet know we would get to Annapolis by the time it was our next crew transition. Annapolis was less than 200 miles away and we figured by the time we got to the hotel we wouldn't have long to sleep before it was time to go meet the team at the finish line. We decided it would be much funner to go be the Media Crew for our finish instead!