There was nothing too daunting about a 500-mile cycling trek to four high school boys living in New Orleans in 1976.
Scott Williams, then a 16-year-old schemer, mapped it. They’d pedal out of southeast Louisiana and into Mississippi, make their way up to Vicksburg and cycle back. They would ride two legs of the Natchez Trace Parkway. It would take a week, maybe more.
On Father’s Day nearly 45 years ago, with brimming packs slung across their backs and teenage will to guide them, the rising high school seniors took off.
It was easy all those years ago.
The ride was for adventure back then, Williams, the Mississippi native, says. But the cycling trip he s on now, spanning the entire 444-mile Natchez Trace Parkway, is different. It s his boyhood dream. And it means so much more.