Day 8 [Salome, AZ]

It was a milestone kind of day for me today in a couple of ways.   First off I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment when I broke my first state border.  The first few days of this trip were pretty rough on me.  I hadn't trained enough and as a result was not in good enough shape for the task ahead.  I sort of chose the train-as-you-go method and paid the price for it.  Now, eight days in, it's safe to say that I'm catching my stride.  My legs are recovering quicker, and I'm finding it much easier to get excited to ride when I wake up in the morning.  The second milestone I reached today was kind of my realization of the above.  Let me explain how it hit me.  About 22 miles into my ride today I reached the town where I had planned to camp called Quartszite, Arizona.  I set my sights pretty low for today because I assumed I'd still be recovering from my 70 mile ride two days prior.  While eating lunch before heading to the campground I realized that I felt great.  My legs seemed fresh, my energy level was high, and really the only thing that hurt was my ass because the seat that I bought a few days ago is even worse than the one it replaced.  So I headed onward another 40 miles until I reached the next campground on the map.  All this stuff put together kind of renewed a faith in myself that I had been lacking since starting the tour.  Tonight I'm sleeping in the Salome RV park.  Five bucks for camping and a shower (and even WiFi).  Can't beat that.