Day 16: When turned my back the biker gang... I'm tired. 7.5-8 hours peddling

Day 16:  When turned my back the biker gang...

I'm tired.  7.5-8 hours peddling, with brief stops.  80 miles from Ocean City to within 30 miles of the Chesapeake Tunnel Bridge to Virginia Beach.  Didn't leave till 11am, so I could parade ELFusion before the new oC crowd.  Could have done all 110 miles today, had I left at 7am, but what's the point?  I don't know how much of tomorrow will be spent aranging logistics to get over the bridge tunnel... if that is even possible. 

very good sun today.  Often a tail wind, and drag from the vehicles wizzing do insanely close.

The entire ride is pretty sparsely populated.  Technically not a highway, the rout I am on is highway speed.  Some of the time there is an adequate shoulder for me to ride on.  Some of the time there is none.  Dicy! It seems that the bright turn signals on ELFusion are working to alert traffic racing up behind me... well, at least something has me alive so far... and I think that is it... I blink them in rapid succession l r l r l r... and I think it warns folks to get in the left lane. So far.....

Until about 4pm I averaged 13 mph or so, when the sun was strong, and dropped to about 10.5 from then on... peddling moderately all the way.

I don't do the less traveled bike routes because, A, the purpose of this crusade is to generate stirrings of the heart, and head which means being seen, and B, the bike routes tend to be heavily wooded, which isn't real useful for a solar fusion vehicle. 

I get my directions from google maps to whom I lie and say I am a car that wants no highway or tolls.

Oh, one of my programs said I climbed about 700 feet, which is quite bit of work.

I stop every 10 miles to check my battery level, tho thanks to some donations, I expect to leave Durham with a proper gauge.  But for now I use a multimeter and estimate, and it requires stopping.  I can't afford to run out of charge, and more importantly, I work to live within the confines of the solar fusion power I draw as I ride.  Again, the meter several days from now will be an enormous help given how I am pushing this vehicle wayyyyyyyyyyy beyond what anyone has even thought of pushing it. 

So at about mile 60 I was wayyyyyyy down the road, middle of nowhere, but there was a gas station so I pulled in so as to be off the highway when checking the charge level.

As usual, folks gathered and wanted to know what it is all about.

After the first group departed... the bikers came. They seemed nice ehough, and I told them what I had to say.

But when I turned my  back to put my hydration pouch in the backpack in my elf, they had taken a collection and handed me some money, so I could eat.  "You don't need to do that," I said.  They looked like they needed it more tham me.  "Thank you for what you are doing for us all."  And they left with a huge roar of their machines.  Those with means, so different, almost always.  Spiritually dead.