I arrived in Nashville late Sunday afternoon, checked into the hotel, then drove around town a bit.  I think I need to come back to Nashville with friends and more time to go out & about.  Ultimately it ended up being just a stop along the road to Geoff’s place in Morrisville, NC.

Watching the weather last night and again this morning, it was clear there was some nasty weather in the area.  My trip to Geoff’s house would take me close to coast, then I would travel home via I-95 on Tuesday.  The problem with this plan was the line of thunderstorms between me and Geoff; this was further aggravated by the forecast for Tuesday: thunderstorms, heavy rain, high winds & damaging hail, along the I-95 corridor.

Though it was disappointing, I decided it didn’t make sense to continue to Geoff’s place in Morrisville.  To make matters worse, this is the second year in a row I’ve planned to visit my brother and had to abort.

Choosing a new path, I momentarily considered heading back to Albuquerque, but that was just wishful thinking: I’m planning to move to Albuquerque in the near future, but need to make many arrangements before that can happen.  I decided the best path was to head north, and a little bit west, to break thru the storm front and find some dryer weather.  It was a soggy ride with steady light rain, interrupted by some heavy downpours.  By the time I reached Illinois, I had cleared most of the weather.

Riding in the rain isn’t too bad if you are prepared, but there are a couple of annoying points: bathroom breaks take a while as you have to remove most of the gear; all the plastic gear gets that sticky damp feeling.  Even though my gear worked, I’m still going to look around and see if I can find something better for future road trips.

Tomorrow, while the east coast is getting the heavy weather, I’ll be riding I-70 into Ohio.  It may be a bit chilly and I’ll have to be careful not to drive back into the storms which are moving east ahead of me.

Today’s detour will cost me my decompression day: at the end of a long trip, I like to have a day at home to get back into the swing of things before going back to work.  I had planned to get home on Tuesday night, but my arrival has been postponed until Wednesday afternoon.  Even though I will need to be at work the next morning, it’s still better than riding thru a massive storm.