Where there is a shoulder there is a god

 For some reason I wake up too early but realize that too early a start can put me in the middle of rush hour. Forcing myself to sleep in, I made it to seven. Once on the road I stop at a circle K just down the road where I grabbed some breakfast before setting off in earnest at 8:35.  The motel in Jacksonboro saved me and the town had a good seafood restaurant but other than those two pluses I never need to visit this town again, not much to the place. As the motel owner informed me there was a good four foot shoulder on 17 after the convenience store which lasted all the way to my turn off onto Route 21. Despite the debris on the should that could puncture my tires, the pressure was off. The  combination of it being Saturday where the traffic was light,  the wind at my back and a decent shoukder, I had a pretty good ride to Beaufort.  For the last few miles I found a wide concrete pathway taking into the city. Hailing a fellow bicyclist, he informed that downtown was a tourist ripoff. With no warmshowers people getting back to me, I called Bruce Elliot, a friend and woodworker in Waterford, Connecticut, to see if I could stay at his house in Beaufort.  He said no problem and contacted his neighbor that I would be arriving and staying for two nights. His house is located about six miles out of town in an idyllic village. The same architect who designed the set for movie “The Truman Story” designed this village. The charm of this place was somewhat surreal, somewhat of a utopia.  Why Bruce and Sheila don’t spend more time down here is a mystery to me.  With no food in the house I biked a short distance to the village and had an exquisite early evening dinner.  The fun neighbors, Don and Carmin,  who gave me the house key where there also. Once back at the house, I relaxed and picked up a book to read.  Fortunately the television was disconnected.  Tomorrow, I am simply hanging out and resting up.