OHPA!

You may be reading this and think, based on the title, that I have just come home from a Greek wedding. That is, however, not the case, though I did pass a Greek Orthodox Church on the way here so I guess I could have tried. In the past three days, I have completed two more states. Ohio and Pennsylvania flew by and we are now in Camden, Michigan. While in Ashtabula, Ohio, we stopped for a build day and were again split into three different groups. One group went to pull up roots to prepare a site for the foundation. Another group went to help paint buildings for the community center, and my group ended up at G.O. Ministries' soup kitchen. You may be thinking, "Michael, that doesn't deal with affordable housing!" When we cannot find enough work to do in a town, Bike & Builders will serve wherever needed. We picked up trash around the outside, got rid of some siding, and put together food boxes for members of the community. The center just received news that they are going to be getting a new building and are so excited to get started with the changes. When we awoke in Ashtabula, we were greeted by some terrible storms. Our ride for the day was cancelled and we had to shuttle to Avon Lake, which was such a hassle, but when we arrived, they had awesome snacks, cornhole, and Monopoly. I got a little too into the board game, but it was still fun. Avon Lake provided our first host visit, where we stay with the actual members of the church at their houses. Tony and I stayed with the Coy family, and it was so great. We ate dinner with over 80 members of the church then headed to one of their lake houses. We all jumped right into the crashing waves of Lake Erie and swam around for over an hour. The waves were literally 8 feet tall. We then headed back to finish our laundry, and then found out we both had our own room with a queen size bed. When the 5 AM wake up call came, I was not too eager to get out of bed. We headed out on a 90 mile ride to Bowling Green, which was soooooooo flat and nice. We arrived around 2 and relaxed for the rest of the day. Today was a 77 mile ride here to Camden, Michigan, and it was a bit more windy. We stopped at a Dairy Queen, and I talked to some nice ladies in line, who ended up buying my slushie and giving a small donation to Bike & Build. It is so cool how many people I have talked to on the street about our wonderful cause. For all of you following out there, and especially you Dairy Queen family, thank you so much for all of your support. Tomorrow, I get to see my parents and I can't wait! Indiana, here I come!