Cary to Cali

DIY

2008-08-17T15:07:00.000-07:00

Where can I get info?

Adventurecycling.org :: maps, FAQ, official info, find a group
crazyguyonabike.com :: inspiring stories, photos, advice to be taken with a grain of salt

I'm still confused and scared and I want my Mommy!
read on, sucker....

3 BIGGEST MISTAKES TransAm Riders make

Taking too much stuff (more info below)
Taking too litle time
Doing it for the wrong reasons. Bikes are a great way to experience the country, not see every bit of it. If you want to see every national park and see every city on the way, you will be sorely dissapointed, and prolly won't make it. If you're not doing it because you want to pedal it to the other side, you will probably find yourself miserable.

Are those Adventure Cycling Maps worth it?
Absolutely. I'm a stingy SOB, but those maps are awesome. They tell you where there's food, camping, how to avoid death on roads of doom, where the hospitality secrets are, etc. Buy em.

Do I have to go West to East cuz of the winds?
Absolutely not. Like the Adventure Cycling site says, the winds on the flats come mostly out of the South, making it suck equally for both Eastbound and Westbound riders. We actually got more headwinds than tailwinds in Kansas and Nevada, but more crosswinds than anything.

20 mph crosswinds suck. The only way to avoid em is to get up at 3 in the morning when it's usually calm. A staggered paceline also works to a degree.

Are the Appalachains really harder than the Rockies?
I didn't believe it when I was told, but they really are due to the steepness. Other stuff that you might notta known:

Nevada is not flat. Not the part we went through, anyways. It goes like this: 10 miles uphill, 10 miles downhill, 5 miles flat, repeat. All day.
There are mountains everywhere. Except for Kansas. Appalachains, Ozarks, Sierras, Rockies, and a bunch of other ones. If anybody says "I think it's going to be mostly flat tomorrow" PEE ON THEIR TENT AND TELL EM TO SHUT IT. No seriously, there are uphills everywhere, embrace that fact or die.
Guess what? Utah isn't flat either. Our longest climb was in Utah, not Colorado.
LOCALS DON'T GIVE GOOD DIRECTIONS Not when it comes to bike routes anyways. We only got good directions TWICE in 2 months. Every other time, they led us down dangerous roads. People will try to give you directions. Just nod and smile.

How much water do I bring?
Bring at least 2 water bottles and some way to carry 2 more liters. In the long stretches between service in Utah and Nevada, I would STRONGLY recommend you bring AT LEAST 7 water bottles worth (5 liters/ 1.5 gallons). You can probably flag down someone for water, but me, being the jerk that I am, prefer to play it safe.

Don't bring a water filter. Bring some tablets for emergencies. Oh, by the way, there's nothing to purify in Nevada.

How do I train?
Ha! You silly silly individual. The training is the first week of riding. It's very unlikely that you, with your job and social life and all that jazz, can adequately prepare for the mileage you'll be doing.

However, it's a really good idea to go on an overnight trip and test out all your jazz before you leave. I didn't do that. My only training was riding to work and back and everywhere in between every day for a month (20 miles a day, maybe? 25 max).

Oh my gosh, you musta gone through like 50 tires!
No, I wore out my back tire after 3000 miles. I'm still riding my front tire, it must have 5500 miles on it. I replaced my chain after 3000. Never replaced brake pads or anything, though I would recommend carrying some spare. You will wear out stuff a lot faster if you don't properly inflate your tires, lube your chain, etc.

How long you take? How many miles a day?

Everybody asks this question and I just sigh. It varies, and you're largely at the mercy of the landscape and the distance between towns. If you're in good shape, and you've got an 70 pound bike (like I did at the end) expect to average no more than 70 miles a day. You want a rest day once a week, or you and butt will be miserable. A rest day does wonders for the soul. If you're traveling light (50-60 pound rig) you could likely do 80-90 mile days.

I look exactly 2 months to ride 4000 miles (TransAm+Western Express). Averaging around 66.6 miles a day. We actually started out doing 40-60 mile days and ended with 70-80s because we had to play catch-up. I would not recommend taking any less than 2 months. 3 would have been sweet and would have allowed for some side trips and tomfoolery.

What kinda bike do I need?
You can do it on an old 10 speed if you're a good mechanic and a strong rider. You can do it on a mountain bike if you're willing to work a lot harder. A standard road bike will work if you're prepared for broken rear spokes and maybe an aching back.

The best option is a touring bike with a triple chainring. As long as it's in good mechanical condition (any good bike shop can verify for you), you have a decent mechanical knowledge, and it has adequate cargo-carrying capacity, it's hard to go wrong.

What you bring?

WELL, I'm really glad you asked. This is VERY IMPORTANT, so read carefully. The key is weight: I recommend no more than 70 pounds (bike and gear combined, minus what you're wearing). If you really try, you could get away with around 60 total, and if you put some serious cash into lightweight stuff, 40lbs. Lighter weight individuals should definitely CARRY LESS.
I started out with around 85 pounds, and ended up dropping 10 pounds in Ridgway, after the sage advice of an Eastbounder named Sky. I never dropped my heavy Canon DSLR, pots + stove, and stash o grocery store food. By dropping these items, I could have sent my front panniers home and saved another 8-ish.

I really had no problem with hauling all the weight up the hills. But my body did. If I hadn't dropped the weight, my achilles might have ended the trip early for me. Literally, as soon as I dropped the 10 lbs in the middle of CO, the tendinitis stabilized, my knees were happier, and everything slowly got better.

SO, stuff I brought:

Bike:

Surly Long Haul Trucker
rear panniers: Old used Topeak (thanks Dr. Lee!!).
front panniers : Deuter: not as flashy as Ortleib, but prolly lighter, and cheaper, and worked great for me
Mirricycle handlebar mounted mirror (actually designed for MTBs, worked great, gave me (relative) peace of mind on deathnasty roads
Cute lil bell, a necessity
Speedometer: Specialized Speedzone Sport Wireless- easy to remove for shady areas/ when you don't want to look at it, I would recommend taking a speedometer to make map reading easier (you'll have a better idea of when turns are coming up, and if you missed one)
Seat: Specialized Avatar. Make sure you get one that YOU LIKE! Or you shall suffer.
Racks: Rear Axiom Streamliner, Front Axiom Lowrider (for the front, put the bolts in backwards, nut the end, so you won't be semi-screwed like I was when the bolt broke and I couldn't get it out)
Lights: Cateye blinkies front and rear- used frequently

Clothes:

Cycling shorts: 2 pair (dropped my third in CO) Specialized Pro and Comp.
Jersey: one. (dropped 3rd in CO)
Socks: 1 pair King Kong, 1 pair Wool-E-Boolie (dropped 3rd pr. in CO)
Shoes: Specialized Sport MTB w/ BG high-arch footbeds (got rid of toe numbness, arch hurties)
Gloves: Spec. Ridge Longfingers, Garneau cold weather (only used cold ones once in CO, but I woulda SUFFFERED without em)
Rain Jacket: cheapie thing made out of stuff they make Doctor's surgery scrubs outa- breathable, waterproof, packable, cool. Buy it at the Spin Cycle.
Rainpants: packable hiking things
Halo headband- keeps sweat outa eyes n glasses
Cheap sunglasses
Giro Xen helmet w/visor (visor is helpful for rain + riding into the sunset)
Off-bike shirt: western button up shirt, I'd recommend lighter colors
Cargo shorts: I'd recommend a lighter fabric than the khaki material I wore

Sleeping stuff:

Sleeping bag, Deuter 50 degree bag. NOT warm enough. Bought a cheap wool blanket and my friend Katlyn sewed it into a liner (I shoulda put a zipper in the liner to make getting in easier) Thanks Katlyn!. It gets down to upper 30s at higher alts in July+Aug.
Sleeping pad: Thermarest inflatable (Thanks Rents!!)
Dr. Lee's tent. Sent home in CO to save weight (it was a 2-man). Replace with tarp. I would recommend taking a lightweight one-man if you can afford it. I had a couple miserable nights in Cali and Utah due to the mosquito+heat combo. Sweat+buzzing+biting=no sleep.
8x10 all purpose tarp (picked up in CO). Lightweight camping tarps are available.

Foodstuff

MSR whisperlite stove, tank+ regulator (Thanks Lee!!)
Small MSR stainless pot + lid (sent home 2nd pot in set home in CO)
Random groceries
Tough string to hang food in tree for bear country (bearboxes not always provided)
Fork, Spoon, pocketknife (I used kept the knife in my jersey pocket and used it at least a dozen times a day)
Military can opener (lost it and bought dollar store thing cuz I knew I'd just lose another)

Tools:

Multi-tool w/hex + flathead screwdriver
Chain breaker + a few extra SRAM links
8 + 10mm open ended wrenches for racks+fenders
Spoke tool
Tire levers (Pedros are the best, trust me)
Frame pump (don't take a dinky little thing. you will be using the pump every couple days or your tires will be worn after a few weeks)
Extra cables, spokes+nipples, rack bolts
Touring cassette tool (allows removal without chain whip)
Old school patch kit, NOT glueless! (I recommend packing 2 kits into one box)
At least 2 extra tubes
Extra folding-bead tire
Rock N Roll chain lube

I used every tool I took, though I only needed the spoke tools and cassette tool to repair others' bikes. I had to borrow a leatherman to fix my mangled front fender. (Thanks Sean!!)

You'd be surprised as how few bike shops there are out there. Many bike shops won't have a touring tire or even a fatter 700c tube in stock, so call ahead if you're counting on it.

Hydration:

2 water bottles. (24oz standards: insulated bottles won't do you much good)
3 liter Deuter reservoir, very nice to have
filled up 32 oz powerade bottle in UT and NV when we had not services for 60-plus miles. Drank everything.

Random Junk:

Canon SD1000 camera, charger, cable (bought extra SD card in KS)
Canon Rebel camera, charger, cable, polarizer filter + extra battery (sent home bat + filter in CO, never used either)
iPod nano (put in wash, broke)
mp3 player given to me by me aunt (thanks Auntie!!) (sent home cuz I figured I'd have plenty of music when I got back, so I'd see how I did without. Did pretty well.)
MSR water filter (sent home, never used- in dry areas, there's almost nothing to filter)
iodine water-filtration tablets (emergency backup, never used, but tiny and light)
Gore-tex sack for food bear-proofing (sent home, used pannier instead)
Needle and thread, used to repair panniers, clothes
3 bungees, did the trick. Woulda been nice to have one of them cargo nets
Handkerchief- useful for all kindsa mess including napping, bread holding, pantleg tying, waving round your head like a helicopter, etc. (Thanks Anne!!)
Pepper spray- for dogs and dog-like humans. Thankfully, never used.
Shoelace- tied around seat tube- just in case. Used as belt when I lost mine.
Electrical tape wrapped around seat tube, helpful. I should have brought some duct tape, too.
Pen+paper for doodling, writing stuff, etc.
Colored pencils (sent home in CO)
Good book (On the Road, Unbearable Lightness of Being, etc.)
SMALL lightweight cable lock. Most places are very low-key, no need for a giant chain or u-lock.
Ziploc bags

WOW, I think that's it. As soon as we rolled over the Golden Gate, we were blasted with a nice freezing wall of air. I got some jeans, a hoodie, and a U-lock to protect me from the savage SF bike theives.

What the heck ya eat?

Grocery stores. They're sweet. Bring a lightweight camping stove that can run off of unleaded (there won't be much kerosene to be had) and you can eat like a king. When you go through town, pick up some goodies to cook. Just make sure you don't weigh yourself down with too many turkeys.

If you have multiple people, split the cooking equipment and food among you, to save weight and room. We invented something called the food fund. Everybody puts 10 bucks in, you buy communal meal foodstuffs with it, and you replenish it when necessary. No need to figure out how much each person owes and all that garbage.

Many people travel without stoves. Guess what? You can eat cold soup! Restaurants work too, they just get expensive fast.

Other revelations: Nutella, peanut butter, cheese (stays fresh for 2 or 3 days in the burning hot sun), jelly (good for a week), honey (NEVER GOES BAD)

Where the heck ya sleep?
Anywhere you can manage. If you're on the route, people around town will likely know where most of the cyclists sleep.

What if nobody knows? Or they tell you something that sucks, like the expensive RV park down the road or a luxury hotel? Churchyards are good. Schools. Fire stations. Most of the times, it's good to ask. If there's nobody around, just set up. If it's shady, slip in after dark.

When we were off route in the beginning, and people weren't used to seeing cyclists come through, a lot of people let us camp out in there yards. Hospitality will surprise you. Just don't look like a creep.

$$$

After all the random expenses that came up (bike stuff that I already had but had to buy again, hotels, ferry rides,etc.) and 10 days in the extremely expensive San Fransisco, I thought I was way over my $3,075 budget, which included the bike, all purchased equipment, food, lodging, plane tickets, and $500 for 'random crap.'

Turns out I was right at budget, spending between $3000 and $3150. (Breakdown below.) Not any more expensive than living and going to NCSU full time. The way I look at it, I got a free bike and a lot of useful junk out of the deal, too, since I'll be commuting all over the place on the bike.

Approx Costs: Stuff Total 1412 Trans,Lodging Total 382 Food Total 1363 Actual Total Purchases 06/02-08/14 1860 Actual Purchases+Bike n Equipment 2999

(Stuff includes bike, equipment, repair stuff on the road, care package and shipping, U-lock and stuff purchased in SF, books)
(Trans includes tickets and FedEx for stuff back home)

State-by-State stereotypes

Virginia: is for lovers, and friendly people, and the Confederacy. Appalachains ouch, awesome swimming holes, never ending state, watch out for heat stroke due to humidity. Best descent of the trip, without question. Dagum racoons, where'd my bagels go?

Kentucky: unbridled spirit (and they really mean it), Hazard KY was a nightmare, watch out for coal trucks, still steep like VA.

Missouri: no, you can't just roll up the backside of every hill, but they are a little nicer than the Apps. Surprisingly pretty. Enjoy the green while it lasts.

Illinois: no, it's not flat, although it starts to get there. Um, that's about it.

Kansans: purty damn flat, though not a pancake. Crosswinds galore. Friendliest people ever. Nicest drivers anywhere- got so many waves we felt like celebrities. Ask nicely, and you can get into a ton of the pools for free, use showers in parks, camp for free, etc. City parks almost always have a park you can camp in for free. Enjoy.

Colorado: Goodbye flat, climb for hours, descend for a lil bit, amazing views, goobye friendliness and free stuff, hello terrible tourist drivers and tiny shoulders. Cold at high altitudes. Snow for Eastbound riders. Not just green mountains, desert-like stuff, too. The scenery made up for any shortcomings, which is saying a lot.

Utah: most varied terrain of all. Longest climbs, steepest descents, roller coaster roads, tons of motorcycles, expensive camping. Unbelievable terrain, lots of thorns, no toilet paper.

Nevada: most boring state ever. Huge sky, sleep under the stars, quitest roads ever, roads to nowhere. NOT FLAT. Winds suck. They don't go away at night, so don't even try. Last day in Nevada was beautiful. Supposedly, most westbounders that don't make it quit here.

California: Surreal beauty. Vineyards. 4000 ft descent (mostly). Watch out for bears. Second best descent of the trip. Not enought time in Cali. Davis, CA: bike heaven, my favorite town. San Fran, baby.

Random thoughts

Make sure you'll have some way to get a care package out to you, wherever you may be. Just address it: "Your name, Care of Post Office XXX, Town, State, Zip" It's prolly a good idea to call the post office to make sure it's okay. Don't expect it to get there on time, so send it before you need it, and don't get there before it does.
You're not soloing Everest. You don't need flint, flare guns, oxygen, etc.
Know how to put your food, toothpaste, and cookware in a tree, for bear country.
Pepper spray is more effective against angry grizzlies than firearms, no matter what the good ol boys say
You don't need DEET. Never used it.
Go nuts. Do something stupid. Talk to people. Ride and smile.

Final words
The TransAm is not a pleasure cruise. (It's not a race, either.) If you aren't 100% committed you probably shoudln't do it. It will suck sometimes. It will hurt. No matter how much you research and prepare, you will forget things, and things will go wrong. There will be times when you think you can't do it, no matter how much you want to.

If you want to do it, you will make it, and it will be more than you ever expected it to be. Send me some pictures, okay? I miss the road.

Love,
Steven Valenziano

Yeah

The End of the Road

2008-08-13T21:08:00.000-07:00

Home.

HEY LINDA!! Dirty me in the clothes I'd been wearing for the past 10 days, antes de sweaty nap, buzz cut, showering, riding over to The Spin Cycle to say heyyyyyy.

Last meal in San Fran with Parker

Something about King something. I told you I had to pee.On the flight home, I felt like a little kid with my nose glued to the window until I drifted off to sleep. It was my first time flying, and I was stunned by the beauty of the night cityscapes. Into the distance, they seemed to burn on a sea of black. I woke up around 2 to see some really wierd landscape. I couldn't tell if I was looking at trees. I didn't think so, since we were way too high for them to be that big. It took me 5 minutes to realize they were clouds.

Flight: 10PM Pacific Aug 12th ---- 9 AM Eastern Aug 13th. About 6 hours of flying, and I traversed the country that I'd spent the past 2 months crossing.

The journey has come to an end.

After a beautiful day tooling around San Fran, a night at the Green Tortoise, and a day in Berkeley getting all my stuff boxed, lazing around, and packing some more, Halley helped me out big time by helping me haul one of my boxes down to FedEx Kinko's.

10 or so agonizing blocks later, we'd hauled my bike box, and a box stuffed with the rest of my stuff, taped em up for the last time (after saying goodbye to my dearest ride), and payed the $115 to Ground them to Cary. Maybe I can blame my stomach or my toe or something, but Halley definitely had an easier time carrying her share, which was just as big as mine. Way to make me feel lame Halley :)

After a whole lotta essay writing for her John's Hopkins med school app, Halley is heading home Thursday.

Across the bay on the subway, and crippled without my bike, I limped around Pier 1 and sat in the grass, looking at the tourists, traffic, bikes, and the rest of humanity speeding by in the sun and wrote and drew the afternoon away. I met Parker at Cafe Treiste, munched on a somewhat dissapointing sandwich, with the sun in my eyes, coming in low through the window, casting a warm glare on everything.

I limped 7 more blocks to the BART again, checked into the sci-fi like SFO Airport, went through security smoothly (but not without some deep breathing to deal with the smoke-breath woman behind me who couldn't stop complaining and standing way too close to me), looked in vain for a place to send me postcards, forgot the Nalgene Parker gave me on a bench, and found my window seat on the US Airways flight.

The stomach thing started bothering me again on the flight. It's getting annoying.

Richard and Mom picked me up at the aeropuerto, and soon we were speeding through the roads I've known for so many years.

I plan on posting the following things in the next couple days as a wrap-up to this blog:

Trans-Am Rider's Guide: tips and junk that I consider extremely valuable, and which I did not find in my research prior to embarking in June
Stitched Panoramic photos of the country. Woulda done it before, but didn't have the proper software.
More photos, stuff I didn't ever manage to put up
Short lil video?
Rider bios? Short descriptions/photers of the people I rode with.

By the numbers. everybody loves numbers.

6 soft things: number of beds/couches I slept on in the first 2 months before arriving in San Fran

4000 miles: I rode at least this far. My computer broke at around 3100, in Utah. Halley's read over 4000 by SF.

350-400 people: based on the number of people we ran into, my estimate of how many people do the Trans Am each year

18 jars: conservative estimate of amt. peanut butter I devoured. In the West, where services were rare, I'd go through a jar in a day or two.

10 states: Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, California

32 bears: number of bear attacks successfully evaded

4 days: estimated av. days between showers

5 hotels: stayed in across the country

5 flat tires: a couple flats were due to my idiocy. A couple due to wrong tube size.

2 pounds: the amt. of weight I gained. I lost upper body muscle, so I guess it's in me legs?

4 heaping plates: amt. of delicous food in the epic eating incident o that town after Austin

9 pounds: amt. of weight I sent home after running into Sky

Half a bajillion: number of mosquito bites I got as a result of sending home my (Lee's) tent

3 inches: amt. of useless seatpost I hauled cross the country as a result of not hacking it off

$80: amt. of money spent buying bike stuff that I already had but didn't bring/ brought but didn't know I had

Lost (or broken): I'm an irresponsible turd.

Can opener

1 loaf of bread, 2 bananas, 2 bagels lost to racoons and skunks

Belt (cedar city) I have half a shoelace holding me pants on right now.

2gig iPod nano. Put it in the wash. idiot. I'm not buying another- I too irresponsible and poor.

Front freddie fender: foot hit it while going kinda slow, plastic got mangled after getting caught by turning wheel

Plastic cover to bar-end shifter, sitting in a cow pasture in Utah somewhere

Specialized cyclocomputer. Just stopped working after my Bryce Canyon debacle. I think warrantee will take care of it.

Toilet paper stash. Lost it on the last day on a fast downhill. Cursed but didn't stop.

Rear allen skewer: overtorqued and stripped AL nut. Replaced with little hardware store thingy. Shady but functional.

Nalgene that Parker gave me. I told him I lost these things chronically. Lost it 6 hours from home.

Giro Xen Helmet. I think it was stolen at the Green Tortoise. 2nd to last day in SF. At least it didn't happen earlier

Random things I've come to miss/ appreciate:

Toasters
Refrigerators
Toilets
Grocery stores
North Carolina
fall colors
Music
Chairs
Simmering

Random things I'll really miss about the road:

Waking up with the sun without an alarm and without pain
Sleeping under the stars
Not even thinking about what to wear, because there was only two options: riding stuff, and regular stuff
Not caring about being a dirty, stinky, unrefined, directionless dagum kid
Small town America (at least certain parts)
Getting waved at like a celebrity (Kansas)
The part of my heart I left in San Francisco
Eating ridiculous amounts of food, and having it always taste good, no matter what
The great people I rode/ lived with throughout the trip. I hope to see them all again as soon as possible.

Other randomness:

Got tendonitis in my left big toe due to an ill fitting flip-flop. Tis actually quite painful. I also have a MASSIVE callous on the bottom-outside of the same toe. The combination is no bueno.

The group I rode to CO with arrived in San Diego a few days ago. I got a call from them saying that Billy's derailuer had sneaked into his spokes and wreaked some serious havoc. I returned their call in hopes of helping em out, but after 4 or 5 tries on my dying cell phone, I couldn't get a hold of them. Good luck guys.
Cell phone officially dead after 2 years. The dagum cheap motorola charging connection sucks. After years of struggling to get it to work, and 20 minutes straight of screwing with it, I've given it up for dead. I barely had enough power to arrange an airport pickup with me mum. Sillyness.

In summary

I set out on the trip with high hopes, and ambitious expectations for what I would get from the trip. I was worried that I would be dissapointed, that I wouldn't learn as much as I'd hoped, that it would be as simple as a really long bike ride.

It turned out to be more than I ever thought it would be. It may not come across in the words I've put down in this blog, partially because there was far too much to write down, and there are things I can't write in a public blog, for fear of future consequences, and the knowledge that many (/most) of my thoughts would appear immature/offensive to many people (perhaps rightfully so).

Before leaving on the trip, I would literally break out in sweat when reminded of my urge to just go and escape the things that had been so familiar to me for so long. Prior to this trip, I'd been in the same place for my whole life. All my schools, my first home, and even the hospital where I was born are within a 40 minute bike ride from my parents house, where I grew up. The longest trip I'd taken previously was a 10-day bike trip up the east coast to ride BMX on everything within sight. Those trips were enjoyable, but travelling by conventional methods and not truly exposing myself to local culture, they had a minimal impact on my mind.

It took me exactly 2 months to get to the Golden Gate Bridge. It may seem ridiculous, but somehow, the country actually seems smaller to me now. I can think back and recall all the unique 'feels' of all the places we passed through and slept in. Each one of them was unique, yet unified, I can extract a vague, impossible to describe sense of the 'spirit' of each area.

Simply, generally, and inadequately:

The South: spirited, hospitable and accomadating, strong-willed, green, lingering racism, warm

Middle America: unconditionally and ridiculously kind, flat (ish), simple, traditional, respectful

The West: big, ENORMOUS, independent, dry, remote, unique, desperate

Nevada: why do people live here

Of course those don't do the job, but they'll have to do for now. I think I'm going on 4 hours of sleep or something.

The trip definitely calmed my restlessness, postponed my flight from America, made me reconsider the value of home, generally rearanged my priorities, and hopefully made me a calmer, more well balanced person. Fortunately, according to a few accounts, I'm still a bit crazy.

Sitting in the house I've called home for 17ish years, it still seems a bit unreal that I'm finally home. I'd been looking forward to coming home, seeing family and friends that'd I'd been away from for far too long, and getting back to being productive Steve. However, the trip caused me to question, yet again, and more so than ever, the merit in 'production' and 'progress,' what it means to truly serve humanity, and all that jazz. Nevertheless, I find myself looking forward to the coming months of school and my frantic efforts to optimize my working efficiency, grow as a student, and really 'get stuff done.' As much as possible, of course. While I don't find the thought of all the work crushing, as I did before, I seriously question its purpose, more than I have before- a thought that crushes me if I think too much about it.

For this reason, part of me wants to be back on the bike, where every day was simple. There was no questioning. The purpose of the day was to get from point A to point B, taking a winding path with the simple purpose of getting there, having fun, and hopefully riding into something new. We were able to pedal through society without being constrained to its norms and held by its principles. However lacking in reality, it was amazing. We were free.

Steven
08-13-08
Raleigh, NC

San Fran Cliff'sNotes

2008-08-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

Hokay, only one pic for now. It took me all of 10 minutes of mousewrangling to wrestle this dagum photo onto the internets.

In Blue Tortoise hostel right now. Seems super-freakin-cool. Lots of young-uns, plenty of people from other countries, just talked to an Irish woman and forgot her name (way to go, jerk). It sounded cool while I remembered it.
Met up with Parker's British buds after riding over the bridge. Went up shadiest elevator ever and dropped our junk in their hotel room, and hit the nearest bar. Some totally random guy bought us all drinks and immediately went away and chatted with some other folk. Bouncer did not like my hobo-ID. Smuggled some Ben and Jerry's in. Parker got some girl's phone # without even trying. I ended the night by passing out sitting on a stool, with the Brits faces appearing occasionally when I was able to pull myself from the darkness. It was 12:30. We'd been up since 4:30 AM, I'd gotten about 4 hours of terrible, mosquito-tormented, hotnasty sleep behind a gas station, and we'd ridden 110-ish miles. Hello SanFran.
I found some Jeans and a hoodie that previously belonged to a fellow named Danny at a massive Goodwill. Bought a knock-off messenger bag for $9 from some Chineese vendor on the street. Had to go back and exchange for a second one after I found out the buckle would release after putting it on. Spent the day unsuccessfully trying to box and send my extra junk home. Had fun riding and getting lost in SF. Relatively respectful, safe drivers, no red-light delay, bumpy streets, bikers EVERYWHERE, hipsters on fixies, racers in lycra, regular peoples on MTBs, hybrids, and old 10-speeds. Just as many girls riding as guys. It takes a surprisingly long time to get around because of the lights and all the traffic. Had some fun weaving throughout the traffic. Cops don't care if you pull some shady business right in front of them, even running a light or almost-grazing a few cars at a time.
Couchsurfed at Zach's and Walkers for 4 nights. Tastylicious, organically healthy dinner at Zach's. Walker cooked up a sweet American breakfast. Dunno what did me in, but woke up with a really nasty feeling in my stomach that still hasn't fully subsided, and had me majorly miserable for 2 or 3 days. Garbage. Those days, the city had a nasty little edge on it. It dindn't help at all that they were cloudy and cold, never above 60 degrees during the day. Checked out the MOMA, SF Photographic, spent a painful day on Walker's couch, reading and sleeping. Walker's girlfriend found out about me trip and said she was hoping to do a similar thing with her father when he retired. I shared some wisdom. I need to write up all the little-known stuff I learnt.
Sun came out. Stomach calmed down. Still a little tweaky, but I can deal. Soup and coffee seem to help quite a bit. Breakfast at Morning Due at Church and 17th- FREAKIN SWEET!! Super-nice Barrista's, delicious Omlettes, uber-relaxing. Cafe Trieste- nice n cozy. The Revolution cafe- anarchy, latin music, and bagels. Rode around the Embarcadero, Fisherman's warf, touristy as aw hail, Presidio (windy as aw hail), Seal rock (no seals), Golden Gate park (surprisingly dissapointing), stomach ache returned when I started climbing some massive hills. I NEED A MOPED DANGIT. $40 an hour!!!???? No thank you.
Couchsurfed with Chad, a teacher. Did some engineering counseling with Jack. Farmer's Market on Pier Uno= very sweet. 30 person lines for the women's bathroom, though it didn't really bother me. People watching for a few hours. Free baseball in the Standing Room??? HA!! YOU STUPIT. (I stupid.)
Throw in a couple parties and some enlightening SF-local interactions, an excursion to the kid-ridden Exploratorium and a Chinatown restaurant with Halley, a few hobos, one or two showers, a surprising amount of missing North Carolina, Isotope comics, sleeping on a park bench, and a lot of bike locks, and that's been my week-plus in SF in a nutshell

Must go enjoy the SUN, and surprisingly warm weather (short sleeves!!!).

Redeye flight back to NC on Tues.

Steven
08-10-08
San Francisco

Eye yam ear

2008-08-04T13:28:00.000-07:00

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Disheveled.
Davis was suhweet. Their town logo is a bike.
We met up with some Brits Parker had ridden with earlier in the trip. They put us up for the night and took us out. I all but passed out around 12:00.
About 3 hours into the just-go-south-or-west madness. 101 is right beside us- it turns into the bridge.
We got to the middle of the bridge around 7:30. Perfect timing. It was surreal. And ridiculously cold and windy.

After one of the worst nights of sleep of the trip (gas station, hot, mosquitos, bears, nofood, 4hoursofsleep), waking up at 4:30am, and spending 5 hours getting lost and slowly making our way down the peninsula on bike paths and freeways, we caught a first glimpse of the city.

It was gnar-gnar.

I couldn't stop grinning for about 45 minutes straight.

I spent my first day in the city riding around, getting lost, getting a map, getting lost some more, getting some clothes from goodwill, a U-lock (locals tell me bike theft is real bad round here), a knock-off messenger bag, and trying to figure out what to do with all my junk, other than let it sit on my bike and get stolen.

At Berkeley right now, updating the blog, taking care of disgusting laundry, baking cookies at Halley's brother's girlfriend's place, and then heading back into the city.

Will hit it full-force tourist-on-a-bike style tomorrow. Lucky for us, the Guardian just came out with it's 35th annual 'Best-of-the-Bay' issue. It's a good thing, because I only settle for the best. The best cheap restaurant that is.

What little I have discovered so far:
So far the place seems really cool. People are down with idiots on bikes zooming through the streets. It's perfect weather for riding- no sweat. SF Marathon was yesterday. I scoffed as people limped off their 26 miles. Poor guys.
Rainbow grocery=super cool organic mess with very friendly and helpful staff. Lots of crazy people swarming through the aisles.
Bay Bridge= bull (no bikes) means you gotta ride the BART across the bay. Balogna.
Rode down tunnel of doom. Do not recommend.

Arr. Time to go kiss a seal.

Steven
08-04-08
Across le bay from San Francisco

Nevada schmemada

2008-08-01T12:38:00.000-07:00

epic. Mine was taller.
Paul and Ted. They told be bout the AWESOME $3.75 buffet. 4 heaping plates later, I was finished.

I have no idea.
Middlegate savings and loan. Well, mostly just savings.

Err, exciting?

Salty?

Well, I finally found the long, flat, straight road I was looking for. Unfortunately, at this point, there were still about 300 more miles of it.

Good riddance Nevada.

Oh yes, it's called the "Bee" state. I don't think I saw a single Bee.

The most fun I had in Nevada was inventing things in my head. I planned a carboard furniture line, and started designing a compact desk lamp in my head. I'm excited to get back and start working on em.

CAL-EYE-PHONE-EYE-AAAAAAAAAYE

2008-07-31T10:53:00.000-07:00

Blissfully ignorant of the idiotic look on me face
Parker, a cool guy we met riding from Colorado
Our LAST MOUNTAIN. Now alls we gots is big hills.

Aw hecks yes.

It smells good here.

The urban sprawl is less depressing.

Wine country by sunset is ridiculous.

I only had one kid in a Toyota Echo say "GET A FUCKING CAR YOU IDIOT"

Went 40 miles off route but it was actually kinda fun.

Ate ice cream for breakfast.

Rest day in Davis tomorrow!!

San Fran emminent!!!!

Going 100 extra miles to ride the Golden Gate into town!!!!!!

MUST RUN NOWNOWNOW

STEVEN

Placerville (Most Poorly Planned City USA)

07-31-08

2008-07-29T11:35:00.000-07:00

Argh. Silly libraries without ability to upload photers.

Carson City, Nevada!!!!

Nevada was rough. Can you say 13 mountain ranges???

Woodfords, CALIFORNIA!!!!!!! TONIGHT!!!!!

I will catch up as soon as I can. If nothing else, will be resting in Davis, CA, most bike friendly city in USA.

I'm excited.

-Steven
08-29-08

2008-07-24T17:39:00.000-07:00

So hey, I don't have time to write, but I'd figure I'd post up some photos and explain them later. This whole one hour time limit thing gets old.

THANKS FOR THE GOODIES SPIN CYCLE FOLK!!! The bike stuff will prolly save my life, and I finished On the Road a few days, and have been without any quality reading material for quite some time. You guys know how to pick em.

WHAT THE HECK. Why didn't somebody show me this 2 months ago???

Thanks to all who wished me a happy b-day, and those who woulda had I not kept it top secret-ish.

Steven

Ely, Nevada (pronounced eelee)

08-24-08

5.49 Pacific Standard Time (WOOOOOOO last time change!!!)

Peoples

2008-07-24T17:30:00.000-07:00

Glen and Rena

Mike
Guyman
Josh
Familia de loco
Paul and twin

Places, Utah

2008-07-24T16:59:00.000-07:00

Zion National Forest looks absolutely insane. What the heck is that thing.

En route to Hite. Couldn't stop stopping to take photos.
Antes de hill down to Boulder. Homestead overlook.
Bryce Canyon. My view was garbage. I was freaking out at this point.

Nice butte.

I gotta ride THERE??????

This is actually CO. The Telluride chasm. It was like you were riding into the most remote place on earth. For serious, it felt like the kind of place that 7 out of 8 people couldn't tell you who George W Bush was, not out of stupidity, but just pure blissful ignorance/isolation.

Utah is insane

2008-07-21T10:37:00.000-07:00

Since last we spoke:

Blanding,
Hite Rec Area
Random spot outside of Cainville
Boulder
Bryce Canyon

Insane scenery, ridiculous heat, no water, crippled bikes, lotsa peoples, bad decisions, no time. I will write all about it as soon as I get the time and before it escapes memory.

Also, driven by visions of granduer, initially instigated by Anne and magnified by every local and tourism booklet I came across, I set off on the most idiotic, terrifying, beariffic bike trip I've ever embarked on. It was nutsnasty. Below is a taste. (note the missing pannier...)

Before Bryce

After Bryce

Steven
Panguitch, UT
Cedar City tonight

Oh yes, and I've officially decided to sell my motorcycle, despite the extreme excitement of seeing bajillions of bikes carving around these dagum curves. I'll get another one soon as I can afford it.

Random Photos

2008-07-15T15:03:00.000-07:00

Yeah, sure I look like an idiot in tights in Cave in Rock. So what? It's my birthday!! I do what I want!!!! No seriously, it's my birthday, where's the cake?

What time is it?
Johnathan's doctor on left, and 3 of the nurses that helped out throughout the night. Thanks yalls.
The most evil of city park shelters.

The cop in Sterling writing us a warning. Not quite sure what Sean was doing, maybe trying to seduce the cop into letting us jump back in.

Sooooooooooo, Walkerrrrr, whatcha doinnnnnnn?

Sweet tat I gave myself in the ER. It was the best I could come up with okay!?
Walker moonlights as a racecar driver.
HAVE YOU HAD YOUR HOME TESTED FOR EXTINCT PALEAZOIC ARTHROPODS FROM HELL???

DO IT NOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!!!!

STEVEN 07-15-08

Dolores, CO

sd1000 photos

2008-07-14T18:47:00.000-07:00

Thank you John. We are cheaters. Deer in the middle of Colorado Springs

Hey it's Tim!!
Velodrome. The racers were all business, no smiles. Racing's work, doncha know!!

I had no idea Colorado looked like this. I was stunned. I coulda sworn I got a better picture. I SAW A BUTTE!!!! Well, not a real one, but a poser Colorado butte. You have no idea how excited I was.
Prison. After I took this photo, I saw three inmates riding on a golf-cart-thingy, one of em waving at me. So I waved back. Then the other two waved, and so I grinned and gave them a thumbs up. I don't know why I did that. I don't think you're supposed to give incarcerated criminals grins or thumbs ups. I'm pretty sure they're going to punch the first cyclist they see when they get out.

I've seen a lot of these lately. Backroom of the grocery store, in search of toilet. Lotsa rocks.

Blue Mesa Reservior
Bikes at the Grocery in Gunnison. There were more before, I swear.

Got rained on for 30 miles today. A bit harrowing. Take all those situations I ranted about and add water. It was still fun.
Before the deluge. Lightening. Over the hill, before it started raining, I was really sleepy as I coasted down. Kinda scary when you're nodding off going 35 mph. Rain woke me up.
Sky. His bike makes me SICK. More on that later.

Cut short on time. Again. Now to explore town. Fare thee well.

Steven

Rebel photos

2008-07-14T17:58:00.000-07:00

Dunno if I ever mentioned, but I'm carrying 2 cameras. An old 1st gen Canon Rebel and a little SD1000 with dirt in the lens. These are my Rebel photos, I'll post the other ones in the next post just to confuse you.
Colorado springs sunset. Monarch Pass. I took another picture with a flash so you can see me better, by why on earth would I post that when I look like the biggest dork at 11,000 feet???? My point exactly.

Gunnison rodeo. If I had some extra cash, I woulda checked it out. But just riding around town was cool enough for me.

Colin and Halley!!! Crankkkk ittttt!!!!
The freezing morning ride totally took me by surprise. The Gunnison river valley was beautiful. I litterally gasped when I turned the corner and saw the thing. Blue Mesa Resevior, equally nuts. Plenty of pottys too!

I didn't thaw out till I reached the lake. But at this point, I was too freaked out by the valley to think about the cold. Of course this picture doesn't do it any justice.

Montañas!! I there's so many of them

Telluride is just around the corner.

Rambling and RANTING

2008-07-14T16:58:00.000-07:00

I apologize again. Pictures won't upload. Internal Error. Garbage. I'm super hella pissed. Not really, but jeeze, I got lots of pics I wanna post. And stories to go along with em.

Back to me last post. I gotta catch up:

Bout that screaming: turns out it was the sprinklers going off. The girls tents had gotten soaked once, and it was coming around for another pass.

Everybody ran around in confused circles for about 10 minutes before figuring out the only decent place to sleep was on the concrete walkway up to the church entrace. I kept on moving trying to get comfortable, and the motion sensitive light kept on blinding us. I'm surprised nobody killed me just then.

We woke up and it was Saturday, Aaron took care of the hotel for everyone else, I tracked down some groceries at the awesomeness that is Safeway, and found out the bikeshop wouldn't open till 11. I had to ride more than 100 miles, so I said screw it. I walked with Billy, Becca, and Walker down to a coffee shop that Tim said was modelled after the one in the TV show "Friends." Maybe I haven't been watching enough Friends lately, but it looked nothing like it.

I said my goodbyes and wished the others luck. It definitely wasn't under the circumstances that I had expected. I walked outside at 10:00 or so, got on my bike, and rode down 115. I talked to a couple random people, and followed 115 through Florence and down 50 all the way to Howard, instead of following the route from Pueblo. It turned out alright. I shaved about 30 miles. The roads were kinda sketch (I will rant about drivers as soon as I get the facts down), but I made it to Howard by 6:00. A lot faster than I was expecting to do 105 miles through the mountains.

I searched around for Colin and Halley for a good 45 minutes. I coudn't find them anywhere (there were only 2 campgrounds and a church). I had to ride a mile down the road to find a cellphone signal, and sent a couple text messages (coudn't talk, even with 3 bars, dur). After a lot of riding back an forth, I got some soup and had a cold, delicious meal in front of the campground. 7:30 or so, they rolled up, to my extreme delight, and I jumped up and down and waved my arms and the like. We camped at the Sugarbrush campground that night for 18 bucks. Delicious shower.

Next morning, woke up at 6 or so, went through Salida in hopes of finding a bike shop to grab a tube. Colin and Halley some breakfast there, so I kept on rolling. I found a shop at 8:45, and they opened and 9, so I said screw it, if I get a flat, I'll just cry about it.

And I rode up, and up, and up. And my knees started bothering me, so I stuck on one of the knee braces. And my achilles started bothering me so I just kept on riding.

It was wierd because I kept on feeling like I had a brake pad rubbing or had a small child stuffed in my pannier or something because I was going slow for no obvious reason. Then I realized it was because I was going UPHILL. Welcome to Colorado. You don't even notice when you're going uphill, except for the fact that you're going really slow. I think it might be because of the mountains or the air or something, but either way, I always have to check the grade by looking to my left. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm really going up or what.

So I kept on going up, freaking out when I saw snow on the peaks, getting a little sweaty, getting a little cold, but not really getting tired of the fact that I'd been doing 6-7 mph for the past hour or two. I forget how long I climbed, but it was 20 miles or something. I had been spinning in 2-1 the entire time, and my knee really started bothering me when I knew the end was near, and I dropped into the granny. 200 feet later, I turned a corner and was at the top and cursing the fact that I'd nearly made it in the middle ring, without knowing it. What the duece. Monarch Pass, 11-thousand-something feet. Weeee!!!!

There were tons of semi-semi's pulling horse trailers all the way up. They were mostly assholes. More on that in my upcoming rant.

I was expecting to get some nice altitude sickness, but yargh, no cigar. I saw a couple spots a couple times, but that's about it. Oh, and my hands were kinda shaky when I was handing over some change for a snack at the top. The cashier prolly thought I was about to rob the place.

Make a sweet tomato-and-cheese sangwich, look at all the tourists, talk to a Harley guy, look at the BMW biker who looks like a ninja (as do most BMW guys) , and get ready to BOMB THE CRAP OUT OF THAT DOWNHILL THAT I JUST UPHILLED.

Surprise. No bombing. The wind killed everything. The downhill after Monarch was quite dissapointing, only hit 35 or something- with some pedalling. I later learned that the wind goes down the mountain in the morning and up the mountain in the afternoon, which is probably the opposite of what you'd really want. So the 45 miles into Gunnison were not nearly as easy as the all-downhill-elevation-profile suggested. In fact, they were really hard (sweet 15 mph headwinds), and totally not downhill.

But Gunnison was sweet. Really cool feel. Lots of bikes. The rack at the grocery store was full. There was a rodeo going on- Catleman's Days- as the wrought iron text proclaimed. That explained all the horsee trailers from Texas. Jerks. City park was sweet. Sat and read Kerouac and ate till Colin and Halley showed.

We ran around looking for a place to stay for a while. The girl at Tomichi cycles (I found a bike shop!)(I found a girl in a bike shop!)(The bike shop was pretty cool!) had told me bout some BLM land west of town but we didin't really want to worry about BEARS and whatnot. So we scoured the town. We found a church, Colin talked to the pastor, and he said it was cool, just "watch out for the sprinklers at 3am."

Sprinklers? No problem. We'll just rain fly it. In fact, we found a spot in the front lawn that didn't have any sprinklers, so we were golden.

During the night, some drunk guy half-woke us up when he stumbled by yelling something like "FUCKIN CYCLISTS...CAMPING....CYCLISTS...PRAISE THE LORD....PRAISE JESUS....MOTHERFUCKERS..." I was too tired to be really scared, but it was a litte unnerving. A little while later, I was woken up by the same voice saying "Hey, yall seen a guy going past here yelling? I need to find him before the cops do" (The police station was 2 blocks south) I forced myself into conciousness enough to say "Heyyyyy....lemmme get my bearings....alright, yeah, he went north." "Alright, thanks buddy" "No problem dude, no problem." It musta been his brother. Back to sleep in 11 seconds flat.

Woke up at 6. Tent is wet. Feet are wet. Oh crap, bike is wet, oh crap, no rain covers. Crawled out into the cold (40 degrees or so), and wet. Looked for some dry clothes. I had a dry jersey and shorts. Wet shoes, helmet, socks (normally don't wear socks, but when I'm about to freeze to death...). Garbage. Shivering all over the place. Took forever packing up the stuff, miserable as I was. Colin and Halley were done way before me, and took off down the road in search of nourishment.

I got all my junk ready, and headed to the bathroom in the park to get some water and take my morning dump. OH MY GOSH IT HAS HEAT. I changed, ate, dried off my socks, ate some more, dried off my socks some more, piled on some more clothes, then headed off, still freezing and wet down the road. I spent at least 45 minutes in that bathroom.

I can't describe the ensuing ride without pictures. I'll get em up as soon as possible, fore I forget about everything hopefully.

Montrose.

That's where I posted from yesterday (Sunday 08-13). Apparently some bikes had been stolen in the past couple weeks. Locked mine up around back behind a tree. I was still nervous the entire time.

Colin and Halley showed up. Colin had been stung by a bee. His lip was the size of Pike's Peak. 14'er? I coudn't stop laughing. I felt really bad about that, but it was SOOOOO BIGGGGG!!!! I thought he might accidently knock someone over with it. Okay, I'm done. I guess insta-Karma will give me one in the lip tomorrow.

Went outside and met a guy by the name of Sky that had ridden from San Fran, started the 2nd of July, and was a complete genius. His bike weighed something like 40 pounds with all his gear. It was completely sick. He was nice enough to pull everything out of his bags (only rear panniers, mind you) and give me the run-down. He may have saved my life. More on that later. THANK YOU SKY.

While I was talking to Sky, a young guy on a nice road bike rolled up, pulled a few books out of his pack to stick em in the return slot, and said hey. A minute later, he had offered us a place to sleep, showers, laundry, and homemade dinner. Scott and Jenny. We went to their house down the road at 6:00. It was the most random act of extreme generosity I've come across on the trip. Pizza and salad were amazing. They even gave us desert! And beer! Turns out they had done a little touring of their own....

I STRONLY DISLIKE LIBRARY INTERNET TIME LIMITS. THEY MAKE ME SLIGHTLY FRUSTRATED.

***okay, back. I'm back. Screwed the system!!! yeah!!!

Yeah, so Scott and Jenny had ridden "5000 for Thirst." They made a bike sideways horshoe from Oregon, out to Michigan, down to Utah. They even had a sweet map to show for it (yargh I forgot to photograph). 5000 miles!!! ON A TANDEM!!! I was told those things were Divorce Machines, but they seem to have faired just fine. They raised $9000 for a charity: which one I can't remember, but I'm prettttttty sure it had to do with thirst. We exchanged crazy stories listening to Dave Brubeck, and crashed on the couches and bed.

We left early again, for Ridgway and Telluride for the night. Again, I need some dagum pics to show how suhweet it is.

But in the meantime, I can RANT!!!! And it's all the way at the bottom of this post, so nobody's going to read it!!! SWWEEET. I'll just make it super obvious.

>>>>>RANT OF AGES<<<<<<

Okay, here we go.

Cars suck. No wait, different rant.

Colorado cars suck. Actually, the trucks, SUVs, MASSIVE campers the size of 747s, little campers the size of 767s, and some of the cars SUCK. To prime you on how much they suck, let me tell you about a few of the pickles I've found myself in in the past 3 days, all occuring on windy, narrow 2 lane roads, with vehicle speeds between 50-70 mph:

SUV oncoming, panel truck passes the SUV, swerving far into my lane, no shoulder on my side, I stop on side and prepare to jump over guardrail. Panel truck gets back on his side with 20 feet to spare. I flip the bird.
SUV/truck approaching rear, another SUV pops out from behind him to pass, I'm stuck on shoulder, cringing as they both roar by at the same time, with little room to spare. Sometimes one's hauling a camper. One time, there was a truck in the oncoming lane, leaving the passing SUV about 25 feet to spare
This one happens constantly on HWY 50: oncoming traffic, hugenasty semi approaching rear, I watch it all the way in my mirror, he gives me 1 foot to spare, I jump off the road, cursing
Monarch Pass, all day: Texas horse trailers do the same thing
Road to Sapinero: fast 2 lane, me chuggin uphill at 8 mph, I hear some lady scream "GET OFF THE ROAD" The shoulder is some fine loose stuff, I sink if I ride in it. There are 2 SUVs oncoming, I figure the lady can wait 10 seconds to pass safely. They pull up next to me. Dad driving, Mom sticking her torso out the window, waving her arm at me. She shrieks "WE'VE GOT A CAMPER BEHIND US, DON'T HAVE HAVE ANY RESPECT??" No. I do not have any respect for your rich, wastefull, impatient-tourist-ass who can't wait 10 seconds to pass. All your hubby has to do is hit the brake, the hit the accelerator 30 seconds later. The worst that can happen is a toe cramp. The worst that can happen to me is I can pull off the road into the soft crap, sink in with my touring tires, and end up laying in the road for your camper to squash me. Please go to Yosimite and be devoured by a bear. I wanted to give her a digit, but instead I gave her a wave and inadvertantly swerved into the soft crap. Yay for me.
I'd say it was just toursits, but here's one for you: Oncoming cars, 70 mph. Big white truck with muddin tires pulls to pass. I'm in wide shoulder. Muddin man pulls so his perfectly clean noisemakers are riding the white line a couple feet from me, staring the whole time. It's people like him that make me want to carry a brick. Or an RPG. I couldn't resist the finger. Turns out he did the same thing to Colin and Halley, who where a ways behind me.

Other crap that has happened lately:

Colin and Halley told me bout this one: most dangerous turn in the Rockies (that's a hyperbole) , theres a sign right before it that says "MOTORCYCLISTS USE EXTREME CAUTION..." and a million of those arrow sign things. Oncoming cars. Little sports car pulls around to pass on the outside lane, heading straight for Halley. Apparently she would have been done for if the dude hadn't seen her and swerved back in. Idiot.
On Thursday, a cyclist was killed on 50, riding on the other side of the road we took into Ridgway today. Turns out some genius parents let their 14-year-old drive, the kid hit the cyclist, made a U-turn, and drove away. The rider was from Illinois. That's all I know. All I know is people is idiots.

Bottom line is, most of these here situations could be averted by wider shoulders, more driver patience, less malice in the hearts of a few idiots, and eradicating campers from the face of the earth. THEY CALL THEM TENTS. Why would you drive something the size of a tourbus in order to enjoy nature?

Rant over. Please comment on this annonymously if this offends you or if you agree or if you know of a way to eradicate campers from the face of the earth.

Let me just say that I'm thoroughly blown away by Colorado, and am happy to deal with the ridiculousness in order to ride these roads. I'll miss it when I go, and I hope to come back one day. These towns are just awesome.

Now I gotta check out Telluride, which seems to be the most awesome of all.

Telluride!!! ,CO

Steven

Colorado, no pics

2008-07-13T13:30:00.000-07:00

Sorry, no pics today. This fancy pants library has everything except nice librarians and USB ports. I've got some crazy ones and some funny ones.

Getting to Colorado

The craziness with Johnathan didn't end with him getting shipped off to surgery. John had to be there a couple days to recover from surgery. He's fine, except for all the stitches and pain meds he's on. He's flying home from Colorado Springs, CO to Murphy, NC, as soon as possible.

So how'd we make it to CO Springs?? Well, to put it simply, we cheated... The nastiness happened on the 8th. I waited for the rest of the group to catch up until about 1PM on the 9th- laying around reading, catching up on push-ups, catching up on sleep, waking up to cheerleading practice 20 feet away, posting on le blog, etc.

I talked to quite a few people who helped us with the disaster. Jennifer, the EMT offered us the use of her house, Art offered to let us stay in his apartment, and John Gould (volunteer ambulance driver) offered to lift the kids from Garden City back to Leotia. A few more people came by just to see if everything was okay. It was kinda ridiculous how friendly and caring these people were. The maintenance guy (didn't get his name) offered to let us store equipment in the boiler room of the hospital.

When I went to meet the group, I ran into Blair and Osta riding eastbound from SF. We spent the rest of the day sitting around, halfway trying to figure out what would happen with John, Helen, and Sean, and the other half wasting time in the pool and on the park bench. We really couldn't do all that much, since Johnathan's ability to travel was kinda up in the air.

It was determined that we'd ride to Pueblo then hitch a ride to CO Springs to see Johnathan off, check out the superchurch they've got over there, and maybe climb Pike's Peak and otherwise enjoy the supposedly supercool city.

I was kinda stressed at this point. I had called Colin and Halley to see where they were at, but hadn't received a reply all day. I figured I would ride to Pueblo with the group, say fare thee well one last time, then ride off into the sunset.

To make matters much worse, I realized the pain that'd been bothering me for the past couple days was actually my Achilles tendon. Blair had the same problem a couple weeks ago, and her solution was a few overdoses of ibuprofen and a couple days of rest. I didn't have a couple days to rest, but I did cave in and go get some off-brand ibuprofen (Advil gives me some nasty chills). Blair's dad (doctor) says it will reduce swelling, speeding healing.

I was able to relax that evening. We had a little party on the picnic bench in the middle of the park. Nobody seemed to mind. Everybody went to sleep and carefully reminded themselves to stay at least 15 feet away from the shelter when they got up in the middle of the night to pee. I forgot, of course.

Some ridiculous winds woke me up a few times during the night. We woke on the 10th (the day we were supposed to be in Pueblo) at 8:00AM to 25mph winds coming out of the SW. Gusts at 30 mph or so. Wonderful. Nobody felt much like riding. With these winds, we'd be chugging along at 8mph at full steam. And we had 200 miles to Pueblo. Aaron checked the winds for the next couple days: same or worse, even at night. My Achilles was not feeling up to 200 miles of headwinds. Billy was in worse condition than me- knees and achilles.

Blair and Osta rode off to brave the winds. Blair offered me both of her knee braces in case I ran into more knee trouble down the road. I took one and left her the other. Thanks Blair!

At noon, after hours of indecision, it was decided that we'd have a race. Girls vs. Boys. Ride like mad, thumb a ride, hijack a plane, whatever. Whoever got there first would buy the other party drinks. We got into our huddles and schemed. We were going to split into 2 groups of 2 and hitch it.

Then I remembered John Gould's offer. I gave him a call, explained the situation, not really expecting him to be willing to make a 400 mile round trip for us, and he told me he'd be there in 10 minutes. I was hoping we could fit everyone in, but he said he only had room for 4. I rode down to the gas station where the guys were chomping on food and the girls were accosting pickup drivers. I heard Telula say "...suckers," and I half-laughed, half-cried for them.

Once everything was packed in, we headed down the street. John said, "you know, we could probably fit a couple more in here." We saw them turning the corner in front of us- rideless. After a little inexplicable hesitation, we drove up behind them, Aaron stuck his head out the window, and said "Hey guys!" Telula saw Aaron's grin, the bikes in the back of the pickup, and she gave us the finger.

After a little explanation and, again inexplicable hesitation, Becca and Telula agreed to take the ride.

It was insanely weird to to hurtle along the highway at 80mph without my helmet on. We passed up a few Trans-Am'ers We stopped at a gas station to fill up, and I helped push a van that had stalled out 12 feet from the pump. "Ethanol" said the driver.

Aparently, a lady at the counter called us cheaters. Aaron had sworn up and down that he'd never take a ride other than one directly North or South. No West miles. I didn't care. I don't care. I previously mentioned that I'd take a ride 100 miles over Kansas, no qualms about it. It's what my Achilles would have wanted.

Down the road, hills appeared out of nowhere, Pike's peak loomed in the distance, and my heart raced. John dropped us off at a gas station on the east side of town, where we filled up his Ram turbodeisel and thanked him profusely. He gave us 6 hours of his time, at the drop of a dime. Ridiculous.

After grabbing some eats and fixing my flat rear tire, we rode into town to check out a park that we hoped to camp in, and instead found a bunch of "NO CAMPING" signs and a bunch of guys on fixies racing around the velodrome. As we watched the race end, I checked my phone, and got a voicemail from Colin and Halley. They had lost their phone, and the only reason they were able to call me was that I had left my phone number in my last message. I talked to em, and they said they'd be in Howard, CO the next evening. That meant I had 150 miles to go the next day- through the Rockies, at altitude for the first time in my life, with a still swollen Achilles. Fun.

A funky guy named Tim on an old beat up Specialized rockhopper said hey and ended up leading us on a "shortcut" to downtown. Along the way, Telula flatted. It took 20 minutes to fix it as Tim tried to help out. Fixing a tire is a one man job. The other hands just collect brake dust. We finally got downtown, had an after-last-call Laughing Lab pint at a local brewery/ bar, then looked for a place to stay. Tim gave us all kindsa info, but we ended up taking the easiest suggestion and walking across the street to a church.

The church was right on main street, and we saw 4 raccoons sneaking around, but we halfway-hid behind a Jersey barrier, locked up bikes and put the food in a tree. The guys slept in the open while the girls set up tent.

I woke up that night to the sound of falling water, and Telula yelling, "NO! NO NO! NO NO NO NO!!!"

Next time I get a comp:

What the heck happened to Telula
Finding Howard
Nearly getting hit by a dozen near idiots

AND HOLY MESS I GOTTA GET OFF IN 30 SECONDS OR THEY'LL TAKE MY TOES.

steven

More bloody pics

2008-07-09T09:57:00.000-07:00

Sorry, they're a bit outa order.

That's a little of it. They hosed off the rest 'fore I could get a pic.Thank you Helen. I don't think me rubbing his hand while they poked him with a bunch of IVs and syringes would have had quite the same effect.
Hey Ma...
Weeeeeee....

Thank you John!! Volunteer ambulance driver. Great guy, free ride.
Okay, out of order, I guess I did get a pic.
Thumbs up. Johnathan's a trooper.
Into the machine.

For future and past reference, this system doesn't do the best job with formatting, and it's a pain to upload pics. So sorry if it dont' look purty, blame Mr. Google.

Gotta run. Going back in time again today. Colorado maybe?

Steven

08-09-08, 12:10, I guess they're nice at this Lib.

Leoti, KS

There's Blood Everywhere (no seriously, bloody images)

2008-07-09T09:24:00.000-07:00

So last night was pretty nuts for us. Really nuts.

Leoti, KS, 11:30. Only have 30 minutes.

Last night we slept under a metal shelter in a city park next to a hospital, Sean, Johnathan, Helen, and I. Fettecinni alfredo, fried veggies, life was good, went to bed happy.

2:30 AM, woke up slowly to the noise of Sean waking Helen up. My brain was barely working, but Sean said "Hey Steven, Johnathan's bleeding, can you go to the hospital to get somebody to come out here?" I looked over at Johnathan, who was kneeled over with Sean at his side, was dripping blood onto the concrete. His face and forehead were shiny with blood.

He was almost delerious, and shaking. I forget exactly what he was saying, but he had no idea why he was bleeding, and he and Sean were worried. After taking a quick look, I didn't think it could be that bad, since I had seen my brother Richard destroy himself on some dirtjumps, blood spurting out of his lip, and end up okay. I fumbled around for a shirt in my bag and half ran/half shuffled into the hospital.

I tried to explain the situation to the nurses, even though I didn't quite know what was going on myself. Helen had beat me to it, and they already had a wheelchair out there. They wheeled him in, Sean following. Helen felt lightheaded, so I stayed with her for a minute, then headed inside with John's wallet.

They let us watch as they cleaned him up. We all cringed as the nurse said, "Oh that's bad." C'mon. I didn't get a good photo of his face, but he had a huge gash from the top of his nose to the base of it, and a gash on top of his head, like he'd been whacked by a rock or something.

The cleanup took a long time, and then they wheeled him in for a CAT scan, which took forever, then back to the ER room for the doctor to stitch him up. In the middle of the stitching, the doctor got a phone call, and, holding the phone with a dressing, recieved the news that John's cartilage was broken in a few places, and his maxi-sumthin (I think the bone above his nose) was broken and was protruding 2 mm into his sinus.

He finished sewing up his forehead (7 stitches), then called an ambulance to ship him to Garden City (?), 40/60 miles SE, where the nearest surgeon would fix his face. They had room for two passengers, so Helen and Sean left at around 5:30AM.

During all that waiting during the op, John had regained some of his bearings, and told us that he had got up to pee right before he found himself bleeding on the ground. Looking at the trails and puddles of blood, it looks like he got up to pee, leaning against the metal shelter, turned to go back to bed, hit his nose on a low hanging, nasty piece of sheet metal, his head on the corner, fell on the ground, then wandered over to Sean and woke him up. The sheet metal actually went into his nose and broke the cartilage.

It still seems a little surreal. I've been holding down the fort, reading Kerouac. Some local cheerleaders came to practice under the shelter, so I asked them to watch over my stuff and headed here. The slow group stayed 25 miles back in Scott City (arrived last night at 11p or something!) and they're one their way over here right now. When they get here and we talk to Johnathan, we'll come up with a gameplan.

Johnathan's pretty messed up, we're worried this might be the end of the trip for him. Sean has offered to stay back with John a week while he recovers, but it might be too bad.

I'm playing it by ear, but I may need to jet in the next couple of days. I'm trying to contact Colin and Halley, who we haven't seen in quite a while. We'll see.

Kansas Pics

2008-07-09T09:21:00.000-07:00

Oooh.
Uck.
Sorry, terrible photos. Dunno how I managed that one.

There's no way to capture the beauty of this place in a photo. It doesn't even look that nice with sweat-smeared sunglasses on. But when you take them off, and see the unframed landscape, it's nuts.

Crosswinds ctd

2008-07-08T09:24:00.000-07:00

Shawn, John, Helen, and I played hearts at this restaurant in Rush Center, where we slept last night. I didn't ever figure out what the place was called. I had to conceal my French accent, for obvious reasons. This was probably one of the least friendly places in Kansas, yet it was more friendly than most of the places in previous states.
Today is cloudy. It's not a gloomy cloudy, though (photo's underexposed). It's actually really relieving to not worry about the sun for a change. Kansas is still sweet.

We ran through some irrigation spray that was drifting over the road (thank you crosswind!). Didn't know if it was just water or if it had some wonderful pesticides in it, so I held my breath. The mist felt amazing in the 98 degree heat.
Ran into this guy yesterday, his name is Steven with a V (Hi-five!!!). He was smoking a cigarette on his way to Oregon. (Not so hi-five!!!) His daughters just graduated college, he divorced his wife, quit his job, and hit the road. (Can't say I've been there!!?) I wished him luck. I'm sure we'll meet again. He was not as creepy as this picture makes him out to be.
Gas station. Only in Kansas.

These guys made like we wanted to talk. We were kinda preoccupied with the whole riding across the country thing. Sorry guys.
Sunrise on the road

Tourist shot. This photo was taken right after splitting up with Shawn and John. They went ahead after I took that photo of le turtle.

The Adventure that was Yesterday, continued (but it was really the day before yesterday, you feel me?)

Aaron had told me that they'd prolly get a late start: roll into Hesston no later than 9.

I woke up at 6 just to get out of the church premises before people started showing up in the morning, and I somehow packed everything on my bike in 15 minutes flat. It normally takes me 30 or 45 to get all the stuff rolled up, stuffed in, and bungeed to the bike. I felt like superman.

I went back to the park and ate, read 50 pages of On the Road, stared wishfully at the now dormant ring of water, and did some sketching. Aaron called me before 9 to let me know they'd be running a little late, and that they hadn't left the house of some TransAm vets that'd put them up for the night.

By 10, I was getting a littly impatient, especially because the sun was starting to get really hot, and I was sitting in my tight clothes, so I wouldn't make them wait when they arrived. At 11, I gave them a call to see where the heck they were, but again, nobody answered. By 1130, I decided to roll. I didn't have a clue where they were- they might still be on their way, or they had passed through and hadn't been able to reach my phone or something. Either way, it was getting late, I had been up for more than 5 hours, and I didn't want to have to ride too late.

I got on the bike and rode a couple miles down the road before realizing that I had probably missed my turn. I cussed a little bit and turned around. It was almost 12, and I didn't have much food, so I decided to wait till 12 at the grocery store for it to open.

5 minutes to open, sitting on the curb reading, Shawn and John roll up. Aparently they had gotten some flats and had some trouble getting ready and whatnot, and hadn't left until 11. The rest showed up shortly, and we left half an hour later.

Lesson learned. Don't get split up. I type this now, after riding ahead of the group to the Library in Ness City. The others said they'd be coming. We shall see yes?

Road to Sterling. Not supremely interesting. Sterling was pretty sweet, though. The last 5 miles were straight North, with the wind. We flew. 28 on the flats, 35 on the not-really-downhills. Got there JUST as the pool was closing, so we surveyed the lake for "No Swimming" signs, saw none, and jumped in.

John was on the shore when a woman came up to him, told him about the $300 fine for swimming, and he yelled at us just as a cop rolled up, smoking a cigarette, and walks up to John. We drag ourselves out, trudge over to the cop, who's now jotting some stuff down on his pad-thing. He got our names and info and gave us a warning.

He really didn't care, he actually swam in the lake when he was a kid. Aparently all the poop and stuff gives people infections when they go in it. Shower, cook, rogue sleep in the shelter. Up at 4AM to catch up with the rest, who had ridding until 2AM, 50 miles down the road. Crazy kids.

Steven

07-08-08

Ness City, KS

60 more miles to go.

Hello Crosswinds

2008-07-07T08:48:00.000-07:00

note: finished off captions for previous post. checkemout.

Ah, so lots of cool stuff. I've been trying to write stuff on my hand so I can remember what to talk about when I get to a Library, but lately there's too much sweat and grime on me skin and the pen just clogs up. Gross.

The Adventure that was the other day

Sooooooo, I last posted from Newton, KS. Well, before that post, I had called a few people and left em messages asking them to call me back when they got into town. I wasn't quite sure if we were stopping in Newton, or the town 10 miles down the road. After the Library closed, I still hadn't gotten a call, so I called the rest of the crew. I called 7 people in total, and only got voicemail. I was getting kinda worried, because it was definitely possible that they had gone right through assuming that I had done the same.

I figured I might as well tour town, so I pulled back out onto main street and my heart jumped when I saw a few bikers half a mile down the road. I couldn't make em out real well, but I thought I saw some panniers, and Aaron's red jersey, so I started sprinting in my cargo shorts and flip-flops.

They made a left turn (like the maps instructed) and I followed, but when I went around the turn and found myself on a residential thru-street, they were nowhere to be seen. Vanished.

I rode about a mile down the road, hoping to see them, and pulled over in a high-school parking lot in frustration. I made a couple more phone calls, to no avail, and tried to figure out what I should do. I didn't know if it was them, but if it was, I should go to the next town. If I waited in Newton, I might have to play catch-up the next day. I had no idea if they were going to call me.

I finally decided that I should go to the next town, which was much smaller. I figured I'd have a much better chance of finding them there, than in Newton, which was 5 times the size of Hesston.

11 miles down the road: Hesston, KS. I had ridden 110 miles thus far. Gas station attendant hasn't seen any bikers. Neither has grocery store. Crap. Phone finally rings, it's Aaron. "Hey, we just got here." "Where's here" "Newton" Crap. I decided I would ride back to Newton and have dinner with the crew. After trying to ride a few feet into the headwind, I changed my mind.

I ended up cooking in a SWEET park. Real big, see-saws, tall slides, some crazy gyroscopic astronaut training device, water cannons, A RING OF WATER. My eyes water just typing about it. I prolly woulda looked kinda funny running up in front of all the parents, shoving their children aside, and jumping gleefully through the beautiful ring of m ist. I will regret not doing so for many years to come.

As night fell, I was talking on the phone (one bar signal, yaay) to the one and only George, when I was viciously assailed by some ridiculous mosquitos. They were getting me through my shirt. I had to hurry up and finish the phone call, frantically pack my tent, and race out of the park, past a few young folks who didn't seem to be having any mosquito troubles. Dagum kids.

It was mostly dark, so I scoped a little plot of gras behind a United Methodist Church, tented up, jumped in without any mosquito buddies, and fell to sleep at ten.

Well anyways, it's not over, but we are about to roll out of the Library at Larned. Did 51 miles by 9 oclock. I'll wrap it up later, promise. Purty pitchers, too.

Talk to ye soon,
Steven
07-07-08

Happy 4th!//Kansas r0xorz

2008-07-05T15:41:00.001-07:00

He didn't wave. What a jerk.
Soooooooo, these are not roads.
Nice one, Walker. I've only gotten one flat so far, a super slow leaked that lost about 30 psi a day. Caused by a tiny little sharp rock. So much for flat free.
There are hills in Kansas?? WTF?

A not so flattering picture of Telula, Helen, and Becca.

4th fireworks, shot by the locals. There were no official fireworks in Pittsburg, KS.

But they did have a sweet street party. Lots of bad country music covers and some Will Smith rap!?!? It was fun, though, talking to all the locals. Many of them were quite befuddled when they learned that the girls were from this country. I was taking pics with my big camera, and some semi-wasted girls come up and are like "Oh my gosh, are you a proffessional photographer?" "No." "Oh my gosh, if we take off our shirts will you take a picture of our boobs?" "Ummmmmm, no." "Are you gay?" The funny thing is, that really happened.

The past couple days have been super sweet.

A few naysayers of my decision to ride East to West cited the fact that the winds would be blowing in my face the whole time over the planes. According to adventurecycling.org, the wind mostly comes out of the south. Well, for the past two days, it's been blowing SW or NW. What does that mean? Fast rolling, no wind in the ears, long miles, super fun.

We've covered 200 miles in the past 2 days.

Other great stuff:

Me knees feel a LOT better. I've been able to hammer away (with a little restraint) all day, without anything more than a hint of pain. I'd call it pressure. I hope it's due to the overtime stretching I been doing. I've also been giving em a little ice. No drugs, though

My butt feels a LOT better. Before the trip, plenty of friends insisted that Chamios Butt'R was freakin awesome. I quietly disagreed. My idea of freakin awesome has never been rubbing squishy cream on my ass and inner thighs. Turns out it's not squishy, it's a lot like moisturizing cream, and it is FREAKIN AWESOME. The chafing was becoming unbearable at the end of long rides. For the past two days, it's just been a little unconfortable towards the end. Plus I get to wierd people out by making a big deal of butt lubing time.

Peter Gabriel. In your eyes. Stuck in head. I hate you Aaron.

I must go! Library is kicking people out. Also must find rest of group. I'm ahead today!!

Uber-quick shout out to Mrs. Bishop! Linda told me you are my most dedicated fan! I'll be sending you an autographed Steven blow up doll right away!!!

Fare thee well,

Steven

06-05-08

Newton, Kansas

2008-07-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

Yippeee! Hmmm, no Colleen. At least I'm welcome.
They dropped a couple names o towns I'll be going through (Big Sur, Sacramento) so I'm ever so slightly worried. But not really, I'm a lot more concerned with just getting to CA. Recent bodily malfunctions have got me worrying if the Aug 6 San Fran deadline is realistic. The group has been going faster lately, so I really don't think their pace will be an obstacle, only my abilities.
Went to get some food and find a can opener in Pittsburg. I coudln't stop thinking about how much I hate these city strips. I snapped a picture to remind me of the sick feeling in my stomach. Am I the only one that finds em disgustingly impersonal and wasteful? I dunno if me bum is ready, but I'm sure ready to be out in the middle of nowhere again.

I didn't find a can opener and the guys at Ace were jerks. What the deuce.

On the plus side:

The library is FREAKIN SWEET. In my cross-country library tour, I've never seen a library so schweet: public, university, hole-in-the-wall, or otherwise. They have an entire shelf of graphic novels, a totally relaxing reading section, and some friendly (and chatty) front deskarians.

I've been reading the main stories (Columbian hostages rescued, 600 Starbucks closing, fireworks-related home destruction, Witchita teenager murdered over a car honk), checking out the Rolling Stone interview with Obama (pretty sweet). I also remembered that the radio that I brought with me (thanks Aunt Jean-Jean!(no that's not her name, but I can't type in Mandarin, sorry) is also an MP3 player, so I loaded up some NPR podcasts. Prarie Home Companion seemed appropriate, as well as some BBC World News to keep me up to date, and some Car Talk to counter the car-hate.

Bike shop here is kinda sad. Have yet to come across a nice one. The closest one was in Charlottesville, but the employees were kinda jerktastic.

Steven
07-03-08
Still in Pittsburg, KA.

OH YEAH!! Missourri is MO. I don't know how I didn't figure that out sooner, MoDOT trucks were all over the place.

Last tidbit, FYI: While I love the fact that gas prices are at record highs (for obvious reasons) it also kinda sucks for many of the people in the areas we visit. Rural drivers have to drive farther to get necessities, and gas costs them more because the trucks that deliver the fuel have to burn more fuel to deliver the fuel. Super.

Okay, time to go rest.

Hello Kansas

2008-07-02T14:48:00.000-07:00

Next few days look to be stormy. Maybe we'll see a tornado? Prolly not, but that would be pretty B-A.

Knee killed me even worse today. I think it's because I slacked off with the stretching for a little while. I've already begun stretching obsessively. I'm going to try some ice, too. I've refused a couple generous offers of Ibuprofen by me fellow riders. I don't believe in them dagum drugs, and besides, I think if my body is going to freak out and send stabbing pains through my knee, it's a sign to back off. I wouldn't want to miss out on that.

We're officially in the plains. Well, mostly. I guess it'll get flatter, but this afternoon was extremely flat. And windy- try 30 mph or so out of the Southwest. Reduced my speed to around 10 mph on the flat. 5 miles of road headed due north to Golden City: even with the bad knee, I was pulling 20 on the flats, it was awesome.

Met some riders coming East from SanFran to NY. They said Kansas was sweet- lots of 100 mile days, sidewinds out of North and South. I hope they didn't mean NW/SW- sometimes it's real easy for a tailwind to go unnoticed.

REST DAY TOMORROW. Hopefully I can pick up some chamios butter, stretch the crap outa my knee, read some Kerouac, watch a movie or three, and be totally ready to rock by Friday. I really hope so.

Best wishes,

Steven
Pittsburg, Kansas,
06-02-08

The adventure that was Yesterday:
A note on yesterday- turns out I wasn't the only one who suffered. Quite the opposite, actually. Everybody had lots of trouble with the gravel, which I didn't even notice that much because of the kneeness. Did i mention it was a 95 mile day? That's the farthest I've ever ridden in one day. I was actually the first person into town.

One of the dogs that chased me (and was thwarted by some water to the face) ended up gnawing on Shawn's pannier, scaring the crap out of a couple people, and ended up getting hit by an oncoming truck while running after the last pack of people. The old Chevy truck never slowed, and our riders could only stand and stare as the dog breathed its last and twitched as it died. Apparently it didn't split open like most of the roadkill we see, so they placed it in the owner's yard (they rang the doorbell, nobody home), and wrote a note explaining the incedent. The whole deal really kinda sucked. Dogs.

Ive seen tons of crushed turtles in the past 2 states. Today I stopped to help one across, and realized that it had been killed without any obvious signs of damage, only some blood running out of it's mouth. Others will have their intestines and shells spread over a few yards of the road. Cars.

Oh yeah, Telula left her wallet at some restaurant and didn't realized it till 10 miles down the road. Somebody was ridiculously nice enough to pick it up and drive it to our campsite 20 miles away. The gravel wreaked havoc on the girls' skinny-tired road bikes, and they got a ride in a pickup for a couple dozen miles. The guy had a pistol on the floor of the passenger's compartment, and seemed amazed that Becca was from the United States and not some far off country.

Aaron and Walker got stuck behind a paving truck on some hot asphalt, were enveloped in a cloud of paving-goodness, and freaked out when they thought their tires were melting. They weren't.

Picture time!!!

2008-07-01T15:11:00.000-07:00

Have I mentioned Im in Missouri? Have I mentioned I don't know the abbreviation?
We braved the mighty Mississssip, a really narrow scary bridge, 30 mph winds, and thats about it to get to the big M-whatever. You had to lean your bike into the wind, and then lean out just at the right time when you were passing a girder. The speeding commuters were a sweet bonus. Please observe the road leading into what used to be a field.
Home o Popeye. Chester.

Would you like a beer? What kind? Beer. No seriously, whats the name. It's just called Beer, well, Beer 30. Shut up. No really, I'm totally for serious. Seriously? Totally for cereal, dude. Wow.
Look! A pretty spring! 81 million gallons a day. Thats nuts.

Don't worry, the spoke in your derailure helps with shifting.We all thought Shawn was a genius for taking advantage of the passing thunderstorm to wash his nether regions. He quickly learned that roofing tar does not help with chafing.

Seriously.

The route took us on some roads that were under construction- tons of gravel. The speeding cars and construction trucks threw up TONS of dust. It was mighty scary on the downhills too, little banks of gravel popping up to throw you off. And it was super fun with all this stuff happening with a roaring engine on your back.

The dust got my throat really dry, so I went to take a gulp of water, and a freakin giant bug flew straight into my mouth along with the water. I spit it out everywhere and half laughed, half gagged for about a minute. Then I took this picture and climbed a monster hill.

Post rain windy road. Hit 43 mph on the hill before. The guys ahead hit 48.

On.
Today was a very hard ride for me. After 10 days without a rest day, the chafing is becoming a bit severe, my left knee is killing me, and the heat didn't help. Plus I got a sweet stabbing stomach ache of pure nastiness when I tried to go too long without eating, and it's still sticking with me (I gotta go lay down for it to go away). We are resting on the 4th, however, and I'm wery excited.

I wasn't too busy suffering to enjoy the scenery however, and I was able to help this little guy cross the road.

Guess whoooooo. Even my shadow looks dorky. Oh well.

Ash grove tonight.

Bendavis last night. (thanks random gas station guy!)

Emimence was Beer30 night.

Chester was Popeye night.

Now I go wash road grime off meself in the library baño. Oh yeah, and find people. We got split up (and by that, I mean, I was super slow), and nobody's answering cell phones. Thanks guysssss.

Steven

07-01-08

4 weeks on the road

2008-06-30T11:20:00.000-07:00

Nastyhand. Note the watch tan and the greasy hands. This computer is ridonkulously slow with the photo uploads, so I'll have to post the rest up later. Sorryyyyyyyyy.

It's ridiculous how much stuff I forget to put into these posts. I think up stuff while I'm riding then forget about all of it as soon as we stop.:::

COLLEEN LEFT US. Dunno if I ever mentioned this, but she was the mom of our group, but in a good way. She took care of us, but didn't bitch us out when we did stupid things. The whole trip, she's been the caboose, leaving us each morning with a friendly "I'll see you assholes in Kansas." But she left us in Illinois due to unexplainably painful fatigue on some of the monster hills before Carbondale.

Her name's Helen, and I'm not forgetting again. She got chased by 15 dogs today!!! (she counted) Here's their blog thingy:
biketransam.wordpress.com. They've been leaving earlier than us, but taking longer breaks, so we catch up halfway through the day. Today we caught em early after Becca broke a spoke. Good news: I was able to straighten out the wheel enough to get her going again. Bad news: next bike shop is halfway through Kansas.

Just read the introduction and started On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I don't think I coulda found a more perfect book to read on this trip.

Ozarks are SWEEEEET. Easy grades, long hills=fastnasty. Sure, there are some short steep ones that make you want to die, but overall, they are a lot faster and more fun to ride. I don't have to curse under my breath as we're cranking up a 2 mile hill. The drivers seem pretty friendly- lots of waves, few middle fingers. We've had trash thrown at us in the past two states, which never occurred in VA or KY.

Songs stuck in my head cuz I cant get em out cuz I don't have no music:

that Nutcracker song

Piano Man by Billy Joel (Walker picked up a harmonica from a little General store, and it was all over)

Your time is gonna come, Led Zep

I was hoping that if I had overeacted about my iPod, it would all be okay. I was guessing the world would right itself and my iPod wouldbe healthy after a couple days of rest and evaporation. But nay. It appears to be officially deceased. Maybe I'll scatter it's ashes in the Pacific.

We ran into a couple other biking parties:

Dad and 12 year old son. Both on mountain bikes. Dad doesn't wear a helmet. Kid is ridiculously fast up the hills- in part due to the fact that he's not carrying a load, and also because he's completely nuts. We only rode with them for a little while. Supposedly they're doing 100+ miles a day, which is completely sick. Dad says they're going to hike the AT over summer break (most people take 6 months). I get the feeling junior is going to grow up a bit disfunctional.
Halley and Colin, two just graduated college graduates from college. Haven't spoken with them much, but they seem cool. I might be riding with them for the Western portion of le trip. They're ahead of us now. I said I'd call em, but haven't. I suck at life.

I've been trying to design some foldable shelving in my head, for implementation in le apartment when I get back, but so far have been unsuccessful. I have a real hard time concentrating on anything for a any length of time. I spend a ridiculous amount of time thinking about the fact that I can't think about anything.

Lost my little military can opener. Crap.

Had my first soda of the trip. Some nice guy offered it to us when we stopped to jump in a river. Grape soda. Can't turn down free stuff.

We broke 1500 miles a couple days ago. This is good.

I gotta figure out how we're doing for schedule. I might have to duck out before Colorado. This is bad.

I, along with many other people, are getting tired of these dagum broad-leafed trees. I WANT TO SEE DEAD STUFF OR MOUNTAINS OR SOMETHING. Sure, the landscape is a little different, but I'm really excited to see the Rockies rising out of the plains, and the desert landscape on the other side.

We saw a dead armadillo. Cracked shell, guts everywhere.

Ticks. I guess I get them when we stop and run around in the grass or something, but I've found 6 or 7 crawling on me so far. One latched onto my no-no area last night. He dead.

Catchup

2008-06-27T09:38:00.000-07:00

Eat that horsee!!!! Technology wins!!!
Purty roads at 7 AM after Mammoth Caves.

Whoa now, don't get too excited.
Guy from Netherlands, heading East. 58 years old. Check out his Dutch setup. Aparently these rigs are ubiquitous over yonder. Talking to him was quite inspiring- Western Express is looking to be real hard, but freaking awesome. We shall see. He's been all over the place. Toured the Netherlands 4 times-- twice with wife, once with son, once with daughter. He says Amsterdam is still the most beautiful city he's been to. I might have to check it oot.

Amish country clouds.

The cicadas are in full force these days. We found hundreds on an Orange Osage tree in Harrodsburg. Lincoln country.

Bourbon capital of the world: ah crap I forget the name. There was a bourbon refinery to the left of this frame.

Mammoth caves were pretty sweet. Touristy as hell, but sweet. And cold too. 54 degrees. You can only go down in a tour, so you don't mess up stuff. The scale was pretty amazing.

I am still alive. I haven't seen a scale in a month, but I think I've lost some weight. Not good. Trying to gain it back at Mammy's Kitchen.

Insanely wierd sunset in Carbondale.
Hiding from the rain in front of JC Penny. We left shortly afterward, and got poured on. Can't stop whistling that song- "Raindrops keep fallin on my head..." You know the one. Crazy storm, Carbondale. There was lightening jumping from the cloud into thin air. Never seen anything like it.

As you may already know, I almost never drink caffeine. However, I felt a little guilty while using 8 travel books at one time at Barnes & Nobles (scoping out the West and SanFran) so I got a grande Americano. I am currently completely freaking out in my head. It took me 10 minutes to find Kerouac's On the Road because I couldn't say my ABC's to K. I kept on getting messed up around F. I'm not kidding. So please excuse any idiocy in this post.

So, stuff that's happened:

Won a race against a couple kids in an Amish buggy. Smoked em good. Pics soon.

Ran into 3 girls from Boston area, heading West, they've been sticking with us for a few days, though they'll prolly split soon. Telula, Becca, and I've forgotten the other's name about fifty times now. They might be headed to San Fran, so we may meet again.

Before Elizabethtown, stayed at Baptist church, courtesy of Bob and Violet. It was absolutely ridiculous. Violet served us a humongous dinner: creamed corn, amazing chicken salad, black eyed peas w/ salsa, ham, salad, canaloupe, ice cream w/ every conceivable topping, brownies, and sweet tea. They do this for every biker that comes through. 31 last week. 200+ last year. Ridonk. Watched the Pianist. Depressing, but good.

Left Kentucky. Western Kentucky was pretty sweet. There were about 3 days of picturesque rolling farmland. I'll miss it. Despite that fact, we all let out a war-whoop of joy as soon as we rolled off the ferry into Illinois. Woo hoo. We'll be crosst the Mississippi by the end of today.

Anne caught the itis, something similar to what I got on the WORST RIDE EVER. She's had a lot of real life stuff going on, and she's leaving us today. I've been hanging back with her on a regular basis now, and I'll be sad to see her go. I'm not surprised though- she wasn't determined to get to the west coast, she only wanted to see stuff and have fun. I don't think I would make it if I wasn't so bent on getting to San Fran. We'll see. 2500 more miles, not much time. Ahhhhhhhhhh crappppp....

Left my iPod in my jersey pocket when I put it in the wash. It's not turning on. $150 down the drain. I suck. Bad.
Lost my Art to Wear handkercheif shortly after letting it hang in my brake pad and frying it.
Bike looks more and more hobo-like every day.
With Anne gone, it looks like I'm almost certainly doing the Western express leg (Pueblo CO, to Sanfran) solo. I've got mixed feelings. I'll probably talk to more people, learn a bit more. But the 1500 miles will probably be a bit harder, more lonely, more dangerous without some riding partners- what with the lack of water and civilization and whatnot. We shall see is all I can say. I just hope to get to the Rockies asap. We've been taking it a bit slower than I hoped we would, and this is the easy stuff.

The caffeine is still freakin me out here. Everybody gone. Must go find others. PS, Carbondale is big. Multistory buildings. Weird.

Fare thee well

Steven

Carbondale

06-27-08

Springfield Stopover

2008-06-20T11:25:00.000-07:00

In the middle of great ride on the way to Mammoth caves. Prolly wont be able to update for a while due to lack o libraries. Next library on the map is listed in Dixon, KY. We're stopping in Bardstown tonight, en route to Cave city to check out some underground awesomeness. Watching a movie tonight, possibly the Happening? yes no? If you have any suggestions please gimme a ring. I wish you good day, dear sir or madam.
Ned Overend rocks!!! Yeah!!! Yeah!!!
Sometimes there just aren't any bathrooms at 6 am in the morning after you've had 3 humongous quesadillas, if you get my drift. However, there are bridges with poison ivy. Argh.
Harrodsburg library map showing where all the people that visited came from. Pretty sweet eh? There were a couple people from out of country, but nobody cares about them cuz they aint american right? right.
Yesterday, forgot to mention, we ran into some random guy that Colleen worked with briefly in Nebraska. In Kentucky. Random.

Everybody's waiting for me as usual.

Steven

2008-06-20T10:54:00.001-07:00

Correction, we was at Harrodsburg, KY. I was a bit confused when I found that there was no such thing as Harrisburg KY.

Berea and beyond

2008-06-19T15:52:00.000-07:00

Sweet road. Made me gasp, seriously.
Jailer?
We seem to be lost. Ended up riding an extra 19 miles. Hardcore.
Yesterday. Dog on 4-wheeler- nice balance. He was funny as hail. And nice, too.

So yesterday we rolled into Berea, and now I'm in. I dunno, where am I. I'm at a library at a computer with a keyboard that has one of those tiny little backspace keys and it REALLY RUINING MY DAY, MANN. We're in Harrisburg, KY.

Just got an e-mail from a concerned party that mentioned that I prolly shouldn't trash talk on KY so much. I'd just like to say that I'm probably one of the least hateful haters in our party of KY hating cyclists, and I must also say that today I thoroughly revised my opinion of KY after an absolutely beautiful day of rolling countryside roads.

But first, let me tell you about my WORST DAY OF CYCLING IN THE HISTORY OF EVER.

It all started the night before, when we set up camp for Booneville. My opinion of KY was immediately elevated from a 2 to a 5 after discovering that the local baptist church had set up an awesome little hangout for bikers with a shower and a shelter and a portapoty and lots of sweet fake flowers. I had a healthy dinner of every food within sight, and supplemented it with the most delicious quart of mint chocolate chip ice cream I've ever had, mixed with the most delicious orange I've ever had. I ate wayyyyyy tooooo muchhhhhh.

I woke up the next morning at 6, and immediately started feeling sick in the stomach. Not too sick to eat a hearty oatmeal n raisins breakfast. Well I kept feeling more nautious. I decided I'd stick with the slower peoples and take it easy. So took care of business and went to sleep. I woke up 20 minutes later, people almost ready to go, looked around, and threw up my breakfast- quite violently, I might add- right next to the stairs. I immediately felt awesome. I cleaned up my mess, and we hit the road.

10 miles later I felt like complete garbage again. I was fighting nasuea, I felt like I'd been run over a car several times over, and I still had 50 miles to go. My arms hurt to hold up the bike, my fingers hurt to click the shifters, and forget about me legs.

Mile 15: chug some pepto bismol (for those of you who aren't aware, I don't do drugs, I never take pills, this is drastic).

Mile 20: Pepto bismol didn't help, ride up some of the steepest hills we've messed with yet.

Mile 30: Break for lunch on side of backcountry road. I went off, relieved myself, and fell asleep next to my bike in a ditch on the side of the road. Woke up, rode back up the hill to meet the guys, fell asleep again, helmet and sunglasses on.

I woke up feeling only mild nausea. I still couldn't eat. After a few miles, I realized it was far from over. My body felt more destroyed than ever. My mind was barely there. It took every bit of energy and concentration just to keep on pedaling, knowing there were hours more to follow. The downhills were only a mild relief, as I felt so weak that controling the bike down the hill was a challenge. After a while, it actually hurt more to coast than it did to pedal, so I continued cranking even when I had no need to.

For the last 20 miles, I ended up putting my iPod in one ear, listening to the Smashing Pumpkins while imagining various Disney cartoons playing the instruments. Daffy duck was on vocals, that crazy cat was rocking lead guitar, and that angry pig with the gun was banging on the drums. I couldn't come up with any other characters at the time. Yes, I was messed up.

We finally rolled into Berea, and it was like we were in another universe. It was amazing. Businesses, schoolbuidings, parks, congestion, Wal-mart. The library was sweet. I was in a daze. I laid on the sidewalk; indifferent, while the group debated places to sleep. Us boys ended up sleeping behind the library in a sweet little shady cove. The girls went the route of luxury and relaxed in the campground down the road. I munched on a little off-brand FrostedMini-wheats, chugged some water, sluggishly set up the tent and stuff, and passed out by 8.

Worst day of riding. Ever.

The day after the worst day of riding. Ever.

I woke up at 8. 12 hours of sleep. Yesssssssssss.

We rolled at 9 or 9:30 or something. I didn't care much, I was in relaxation mode. If you ask some, it was a tortuous day of getting lost , grinding a bajillion rolling hills, and getting lost. If you ask me, it was completely perfect. Other than my chafed sitting implement.

Beautiful farmland, blue grass, very little traffic or wind, fast rolling hills, fluffy white clouds (lots of whales, lobsters, clown faces, upside down rabbits), and one of the most picturesque shady little roads I've seen yet. it war sooooooooo greeeeeennnn.

Well anyways, library close, yet again. Me go now.

Steven
05-09-08

Hazard is Hazardous

2008-06-17T13:42:00.000-07:00

Heyyyyyy, check out this cool map that my dad made to track my progress cross le country!

In case I didn't mention it, the Appalachains are supposed to be harder than the Rockies because of the ridiculously steep stuff. The Rockies are a lot taller, but a lot more gradual. So put that in your pipe and smoke it, Uncle Mark :)

This steep stuff is murder on the knees. I've been taking it easy for the past couple of days, but I get some nasty pain if I push myself, like I did just now. It's incredibly frustrating being in good shape, yet held back by weak knees. I got pain like this a couple years back. The orthopedist I went to see was completely useless, but stretching ended up fixing it. Problem is, we've all been stretching nonstop, so I'm not sure what more I can do, other than take it easy.

Also, I discovered this morning that I got me some poison ivy. On le legs and a little on my right arm. Last time I got it was 4 years ago, and it sucked, massively. We'll see how it goes this time. What's really troublesome is that I've been real careful, and I don't know where I got it from.

One other exciting note: Kentucky still sucks. Today, we went through my least favorite part of the entire United States of America, thus far. Hazard, KY (as in Dukes of Hazard) can suck it. Seriously, it was disgusting. Up until this point, I've been taking pictures of stuff to remember how nice it is. Today, I took pictures to remember how horrendous it was.

We started today's 65 miles with a beautiful ride through some green backroads in some 65 degree weather. Very fast, very fun. Then the roads just got nastier and nastier. We ended up on a 4 lane highway with huge medians strewn with rock, coal, glass, and bits of motor vehicles. The coal trucks were huge, loud, and incredibly intimidating as they bore down on you. They almost never moved to the inner lane, and for some reason, they had a ridiculous vortex following them that pushed you out, then sucked you back towards the road.

The road narrowed, and we were forced onto the rumble strips every time a truck started roaring behind us. Anne was right in front of me when we heard screeching tires right behind us and BOOM, the library is closing right now, and we's gotsta go,

Booneville, KY

06-17-08

OMG, Linda said hey!!! OMG!! Imo call you K??

Too much for one post

2008-06-16T12:42:00.001-07:00

Walked and I sat down to a game of chess while devouring 1.5 quarts of chocolate ice cream. He destroyed me. Cool.
Hostel wall-o-rules, in case you were curious. I took a book entitled "Can Man Live Without God" from their pile-o-books-you-can-take. I was later informed that it might have just been a pile-0-books. I dunno.
stormnasty

WHOLY CRAP. It's arm guy, in KY!! 100 miles or so from where we saw him in VA.
Tasty KY treat. Peanut butter rolled in icing. Apparently KY is one of the most obese states in the USA. I blame this thing.

Sorry for the out-of-orderness. This blogger thing is a pain in the butt to reorder photos with. KY cliffs+Johnathan. I thought his name was John, and nobody corrected me, and I just found out a few days ago I was wrong. I really didn't figure him for a John. He called himself John the other day. I win.

Unbridled is one way of putting it. Hey purty lady. (Bike)
Aaron didn't want to go hide behind something while he took his lycra off, so he just did it with his pants on. I still have no idea how this is physically possible. There was lots of grunting involved.

Billy took a different approach.

Curry for dinner, cockroaches for dessert.

Sooooo, I'm sitting in the library away from everyone else because this was the only available computer, and I look over and everyone is gone, so I think I'm going to run now.

Roll me Away, from Kentucky

2008-06-16T11:46:00.000-07:00

We ran into this guy- Dave, on the road. He camped with us one night before we split. He's a bit slower than us, but a lot steadier. He's never biked before. Graduated college this spring. Air Force pilot training in October or something. (Heck yes.) He's aiming for Oregon. Go Dave!
This was way back in VA. Walker and I missed a turn and rode an extra 8 miles or something. But this was way worth it.

Billy in VA.

Western VA. We had stopped to admire the view. Check out this guy's arm.

Sweet hills.
Breaks Int. Park, double rainbow!!

I know Chris, you warned me about Breaks Interstate Park, and I strongly warned everyone else, but after a day of hard rain and 80 miles through the mountains, we didn't care much. Shawn's mom had reservations for a room in their shady little motel, so we all crammed in and fell asleep to Indiana Jones.

We trucked down the mountain to eat some Mexican, courtesy of Shawn's mom's rental car. Ate wayyyyyyy too much. Nearly threw up on the way back up. It was bad.

Last night, I don't even remember the name of the town, KY. We found a middle school to stay at. The buildings we slept next to were getting bulldozed at 8 am in the morning. I slept without my tent so I woudln't have to deal with the dew and whatnot in the morning. This spidey made it's web on my bike.

Word on the street is Food Lion Moose Tracks is da bomb. Too bad there's no Food Lion out here. Past couple towns, there's been either nothing or just an IGA. Walking through the folks smoking in the breakroom, I heard somebody say "When are you going to divorce him?" For cereal?

That last town we stayed at- Damascus, was purty dagum cool. The hostel was even cooler. $4/night donation gets you a bed, kitchen, shower, and a cool hangout spot. An army of boy scouts showed up on our second night. The leaders weren't too friendly and the kids were nuts.

Anne and I found the craziest piece of playground equipment I've ever seen. Imagine a see-saw, with tires to bounce and gain momentum off of, and a good risk of losing teeth/butting heads. Well crap, no, it doesn't look like that, I'll have to draw you a picture sometime.

We're now in Kentucky. We spent almost 2 weeks in VA, and we were ready to be out, but now we're all kinda pissed at KY for the following reasons:

Total anarchy. No helmets on motorcycles. No mufflers on cars. Dads hauling ass down the road on 4-wheelers with their kids in their laps, both without helmets. WHO ON EARTH DRIVES A GATOR DOWN A 45 MPH ROAD?

The hills are not ending. We've heard from countless people that "yup, it's pretty much flat from here on" To us, a 7 mile climb is not flat. Only reason we want flat is a few of us are developing some knee problems, myself included. I'm taking it easy, but we'll see how it goes.

Dogs.

Shady roads. Gravel around corners, more climbs than decents, George Bush. Well not really George Bush, but damn.

Rain. Our first day in KY, we got dumped on for a few hours. It wouldn't have been if not for the narrow shoulders and lotsa cars.

It's not all poop, though. It's still fun riding, it's just we're ready to git out of these here Appalachain thingies. West.

Other items of note:

Almost no foriegn cars in the country. A few of us waited for about 20 minutes on the side of a 4 lane highway. Out of 100 or so cars, we saw ONE import- a guy in a Toyota pickup who slowed down to tell us "good luck, and be careful, people can be crazy around here." A lot more pickups and SUVs than I'm used to, as well. Harleys everywhere. The louder, the better.

Tiny towns. The town we're in right now is HUGE, listed pop is 800-ish. Convenience stores with bathrooms are few and far between. Grocery stores are even more rare. Toilet paper is a good find. I've been taking a few squares from every place that has some.

We're still encountering a surprising amount of hospitality and unexpected friendliness. We get stopped by random people who want to know where we're going. I'm still trying to figure all that stuff out.

Argh-ish

2008-06-13T13:39:00.000-07:00

Today and yesterday have been purty crazy. However, Friday the 13th decided to sneak up on me and get me good. We're resting today in Damascus, VA, and a few of us went down to the river to cool off. The water was real cold until you got in, and it was just a little chilly. Well, my theory is I got some mini-hypothermia, because when I got out, I immediately started feeling dizzy. I had goosebumps and I was shivering a little. By the time I got back to "The Place" hostel a quarter mile away, I was really messed up- super lightheaded, freezing cold, and a bit confused. I'm doing better now, walking around in thermals and rain pants, but I only have a few minutes so I'm just going to pop some pictures up and git out.

A couple highlights when this thing is loading:

-what first appeared to be man doing tribal dance in twilight ended up being totally drunk guy skateboarding destroyed bicycle

-Johnathan barely being able to order at Subway due to his BAC

-COOL WEATHER!!!?!?!!

-Boy scouts in the hostel, just rolled up, kids are punks, and dads refused to return my enthusiastic greeting. Jerks.

-Amazing curvy downhill into Damascus, preceded my surprisingly enjoyable 5 mile-ish climb

-4 bike shops in Damascus. Zero good ones. Weird.

-The Dairy King has no dairy. Also Weird.

-Library close very soon. Must run.

Me hungy

2008-06-11T14:18:00.000-07:00

I took pictures of some people to boost their self-esteem/ practice my skillins. Anne later dropped her chain on a STEEP uphill, failed to clip out, and fell right in the middle of a curvy 2 lane road. Twas kinda scary. Luckily, there was no traffic. Had their been, it could have been ugly.

Prettyful sunrise before hitting Christiansburg. I got up early to sew a ripped pannier and read a copy of Robinson Crusoe I picked up used in Ashland. The book has been killing me lately- I fall to sleep every time I open it.

We stayed in yet another backyard, cooked some ridiculous burritos, and ate pancakes in the morning. We later melted in the heat on the hills, and decided that it's defintely a bad idea to do serious cooking in the morning. We gotta get out earlier. Luckily the heat has subsided (87 high today!) and we can ride through the heat of the day without suffering.

I gotsum funny pics, but they're currently captive on me camera since this library has some blocky funny business that won't let me upload pics using the comp. I promise I'll show em to you laters.

500 miles!!!??!

We broke 500 miles today. It's day 10 of le ride. We've been picking things up lately. 60 miles a day in the mountains. It's really not bad when we take it easy. I think I could do 80 or 100 if I was on my own. I'm kinda planning things out for the ride from CO to SanFran.

Looking at the elevation profiles for the Western Express route between Pueblo CO and San Fran, it's kinda nuts. I think it peaked at 10,000 feet or something, and one of the last decents drops 6,000 feet, straight down. Nuts. Other highlights include a town named Stoner, sub-40 degree nights, 80 miles between any sort of civilization (which means no water), and a lot of uncertainty.

Yesterday, as I mentioned, the pancakes held us up a bit. We were cooking pancakes for 5 hungry guys using 2 little campstoves, so it took way too long. I stayed back with Anne and we actually had a pretty pleasant ride despite the heat and the fact that I ran out of water a couple miles too soon. (I dumped 2 liters of water all over the pavement trying to fill my water bottle.) However, towards the end, the heat was really getting just ridiculous.

We reached the heart of the town: a gas station and convenience store. It turned out to be the coolest convenience store ever. Really friendly ladies running the place, one of em made me a reuben for less than 3 bucks. Loaded up on nutrients with some V8 (everybody shortly copied me, jerks). And we went into the backroom and sat at a little random table in the kitchen/pantry/yard supply/novelty-t-shirt-storeroom combo.

Then I dropped $1.75 plus tax on a liter of Moose Tracks ice cream. My life would never be the same. I spent the next 15 minutes in pure bliss, using a spoon I found in the sink, I savored the most refreshing, most coolest, MOST BESTEST ICE CREAM TO EVER MAKE ITS WAY INTO A 3X4X5 INCH BOX IN THE BOTTOM OF A CONVENIECE STORE FREEZER BIN. I could write all day about how awesome those 640 calories of sugar-free artificial goodness were, and I still couldn't articulate it properly. Just imagine the best food experience you've ever had, and multiply it times a bajillion. I'll post a picture when I get a chance.

The past couple days riding have been a bit different. Since we're out of the really big elevation change, we've been dealing with about 600 feet of elevation change. But it's wierd how it hits us. It's super steep up and down, over and over again. It feels rare to find a nice slow climb where you can really get moving. It's ride-fast-as-hell-down, then grind-slow-and-painful up.

I've been taking it easy, looking around at the scenery. It's ridiculously beautiful when you just stop and look. (Again, pictures later) We've also seen a very confused groundhog, a vulture, tons of roadkill, some deer, and a couple foxes.

Today we passed up a family on a bike. One bike. Dad on the front, a 7 and 10 year old in the middle, and mom on the back. I think they're going cross country. We said hey before they turned into a hotel parking lot. Softies.

Last night I took a shower with a hose. The air was kinda cold, and the water was really cold, and everybody just looked at me and called me insane. But I didn't sleep sticky for the first time in a while, and it was completely worth it.

Ah yais, one other thing of note. The mountains here are strikingly different from those in North Carolina. Way more farmland. It's pretty much all farmland, except for the super steep stuff. Mostly grazing land. It struck me as strange since I'm used to seeing nothing but trees in NC. Or maybe it's because I'm riding different roads? I dunno.

To the people who commented on my previous post that I was supposed to get back to, promise I'll get back to you soon. Everybody just ran down the road in search of food and shelter. I gotta go find em.

Steven

Wytheville, 06-11-08

Fast as aw hail

2008-06-09T10:06:00.000-07:00

The house we stayed at the night before was ridiculously generous. They offered showers and bathrooms, but we'd been pampered by civilization the nights before so we decided to stay out of their hair. We accepted the wine.

Camp last night, behind a cool little convenience store in the tiny little town of Vesuvius. During the next 12 hours, we had about 6 or 7 cars pull up and say hey and ask us if we needed anything. We were absolutely amazed by the small-town generosity and friendliness. We used the faucet on a neighboring house, and stuck our food in their empty dog kennel after learning that bears come around all the time.
These guys were all over the road, alive and . This guy was till alive, but just sat there and moved his wings when I touched his antennae. No wonder so many of them get whacked.
Purty flower. Got mauled by the wind by the end of the day. Poor flower.

Rockfish gap a few miles back- 1900 feet. Here: around 3600(I think?) We stopped and helped some guy walking down the mountain with bike in hand. Turns out he had a flat but no pump. Don't trust CO2 on a mountain, I guess.

Hey peoples!!!! Colleen got sun poisoning or some crazy mess, so she's taking the next few days off. We miss you Colleen!! (Yes Lee, yes.)

Sean you silly son of a b. Pushed her in. Oh yeah, Walker ed open a beer right before a lady came out of a neighboring house and said "No diving, no beer" while she brandished a huge .44 revolver. Walker then proceeded to "not-quite-dive" in while we all watched in horror and astonishment. She gave us a mean look and let us proceed. The water was amazing. Walker is stoopit.

Wet bikes. My hood is whack. My mirror is really coming in handy.

So we were riding along yesterday and we started going up. And up. And up. And 30 minutes later or something we were like, this sucks. We soon found out that not only do the Blue Ridge Mountains suck, they rock.

After a few miles of riding some awesomely rural mountain roads with winding descents, we climbed up a beast of a hill to meet the Blue Ridge Parkway, and realized we woudn't have food for a long time. So the group hopped on the Parkway and started chugging towards the campground 16 miles down the road where Walker and I were to meet them with groceries. Meanwhile, Walker and I ed down a 2 mile hill, rolled into a Kroger, came out with enough food to feed all of Uzbekistan (including 40 cookies for 2 dollars, SERIOUSLY) strapped it all to our bikes, and pedalled (melting all the way) in hot pursuit of the other peoples.

A while down the road, Walker and I turned onto the road with the campground, and realized that it just went down, fast. We ended up topping 40 miles and hour (I was too scared to look at the computer after that), and never dipped below 30 for more than 2 miles. It was nuts. When we got to the campground, we were told it'd be $1 each if we just wanted to go in and look for our buds, and that they hadn't seen any damn cyclists that day. Poop. No cell signal either. Garbage. We didn't have a clue where the group had gone, and no way to contact them. So we sat down and stuffed our faces while contemplating the horrendous climb that faced us, and if the descent had been worth it.

Then we just got up and rode up that dagum hill, granny ring, first couple chainrings (never hit 1-1!!) and a lot of sweat and pain. The descent had been worth it, no question. A guy at the store up the road said he saw some bikers, but he didn't know what they looked like or how many or anything. Thanks, guy. So we decided to ride the rest of the stretch on the Parkway and hope we found the rest of the crew.

It was a hard, grinding 12 miles or so. After the last 15 climbs or so, Walker was like "Dude, I'm pretty certain this is the last climb, then it's mostly downhill from here." I trusted him because he had ridden 250 miles to DC on the Parkway and Skyline Dr. After the first 10 lies, I was ready to push him off the mountain.

We were unbelievably relieved to see our turnoff to get off the Parkway. The hills were fun, but after 40-ish miles that day, we were ready to get off. And looky there, who's waiting at the bottom of the hill? Those dagum sons-a-guns that never showed up at the campground. Eating dry oatmeal since they didn't wait for us to bring the goodies. Turns out it was just a miscommunication.

Down the road was an INSANE DOWNHILL. The best descent I've ever ridden on the road. Probably the best I'll ever hit. It was ridiculously steep, smooth asphalt with sharp, blind turns. The signs told us to take them at 20, but somebody maxed their speedometer at 40 (despite the fact that we had to brake hard aroudn the corners). The g's were exhilerating, and tires squealed around the corners while we did our best to keep ourselves from crossing the yellow line. No roller coaster will ever compare.

We met a guy at the bottom of the hill that said he'd been there 15 years and seen some big races on the mountain. Apparently people would down the hill, heat up their tires with all the braking, and blow their tires on the railroad tracks.

He pointed us to a bike-friendly convenience store to camp in, and the woman behind the counter told us about some top-secret river down the way with a deep section that we could swim in. The water was 65 degrees, perfect for a bunch of sweaty riders.

Walker and I did about 61 miles that day. My speedometer said we maxed out at 99.9 mph. Something tells me something was screwy for a few seconds there. We slept well.

Sorry for all that writing, but you didn't have to read it and I wanted to remember it.

Lexington,VA, 05-09-08

Spidaman and Sandal Tan

2008-06-07T09:36:00.001-07:00

I sat down at the kiddie corner in the Ashland library to peacfully play trains, when this kid comes over and rocks my socks off. I think he's being spidaman right now. He asked me if I wanted to come over for a playdate. He then asked me if I had kids.

This dog was at fisherman dude's house. Apparently he was a stray. He was huge. He terrorized a few people's tents, ate our hamburgers. Turns out he just wanted to be pet. However, after petting him, he fell in love with us. When Walked clipped in to ride away, dog ran up and literally whacked him in the balls. Walker wimpered for a good 2 minutes while I tried to ride away myself. The dog was so sad to see us go that he tried to corner us in the driveway, almost got whacked by a couple cars, ignored our shouts and fists, and followed us about a mile down the road until we could shake him. It was sad. He just wanted some love.

Tractor=bike rack.
Whoa sandal tan man.
Dudeman fisherman's son worked for Budweiser. Walker is not drinking a Budweiser. Anne is drawing a pretty picture for dudeman's daughter. CHARLIE BROWN WAS OUT OF HIS MIND. More on Charles later. I drew a big house for dudeman's daugher. I wish I coulda drawn a little housie.
We stayed at a frat house last night. Epsi Capsilon Fiza. Zoe knew a guy. Obviously. Walking back to the house after dinner, I saw a fence atop the mansion (it was seriously a mansion). We found the trapdoor, and discovered the most bearable place in the AC-less chateau was the roof.
Zoe left us. Why did you leave us Zoe???? She had to grad school. Pity the Zoe. I'm not sure if I'm spelling Zoe right. But seriously Zoe, we gonna miss you.
The speed demons on the dream ride. This ride occurred a couple days ago. It was seriously beautiful. Perfect temperature, quite country roads, fast hills, good times.

The final stretch to Charlottesville, VA ended up being a bit of a death march. We met a guy with the Adventure Cycling map that we needed (the only one we didn't have- it got lost) and I took some photos of them. I talked to him for a lil while. He was riding from Iowa solo, and was getting a bit lonely I think. He was nearly to his final destination of Richmond, and he had some gggggnarly sandal tan. GNARLY. He suggested that we take Route 22 instead of what the maps said. I said, lets follow the maps. I guess a lot of people disagreed.

We ended up on some nightmare of a little two lane (OH SPEAKING OF WHICH, more on that later (near death experiences, threats of vengeance, all to come)) A couple of us decided to try to make our way back to the bike route. All we had were the silly maps on me camera, and a tourism map of all of VA (not detailed). We ended up getting a bit lost, getting some crappy directions, turning onto another busy road, getting more crappy directions, and riding into town boiling, hungry, and tired as aw hail. We thought the other group was way ahead, but turns out they had a little fun on 22, as well: they had to wait for an 18 wheeler accident to get cleared up- 30 minutes baking on le side of the road because the cops wouldnt let em by.

So, lesson of the day:

follow the dagum bike route
never trust people's directions. NEVER. NEVER EVER EVER. Geeze. Well maybe sometimes, but almost never. People don't know what it's like on a bike.

Other lessons to follow:

How not to spend $80 buying stuff you already have
How to deal with a nasty, nasty situation
What happens when you 'kinda' run a red light on a busy back road (bad stuff)
How to lose your baggage on Amtrak
How to stay less-than-sticky on a low budget bike trip

Today is a rest day. We're doing 20 miles tonight. Tomorrow, the mountains. Oh goody.

Hot

2008-06-07T09:17:00.000-07:00

Of course, the past couple days have been quite nutsnasty. We've learned several things.

Record high temperatures suck. Well, I dunno if they're really record highs, but I do know they suck. We learnt this stunning fact after riding for a couple hours in the middle o the afternoon, and nearly melting. Headwinds, 99 degree temp, plenty o traffic: suck.

This is me good ol bike after riding ahead, getting overheated/starving, pulling behind a gas station to rest. The tree and the field were awesome, despite being 100 feet from the highway. I got hungry and thought, "hey! I'll grab a Snickers!" (seriously, for some reason those commercials got in my brain), and on the way out, I ran into the people I had left behind. Very lucky. I woulda been mighty confused waiting for them for an hour or two and not finding anybody. We're not really using cell phones since it's hard to keep em charged. Plus, mine is crappin out.
So we've started waking up around 5:30/6, roll at 7, break at 12, ride again at 4. It's fantastic. It feels like a day off because we have so much time to chill or explore.
The evening after my last post was the day we discovered the horrendous heat. The night before we had a nice little scare. We stayed in this fisherman's backyard. The weather called for heavy lightening, hail, and possible tornadoes. Scary. He ended up giving us a bunch of fish burgers and steamed crabs, and entertaining us in his shack up on the hill. We watched the weather channel as a huge red blob of crazy weather passed over and pounded on the tin roof. Turns out a tornado touched down a few miles away.

The picture above shows the next night, when we got even more good weather- threats of nasty storms again. Turns out we just got a wave of heavy rain and an awesome lightning show that lasted for a couple hours. I stood out and watched as the cloud-to-cloud stuff lit up the sky overhead. It was everywhere. I don't think I've ever seen such an amazing show; forget about fireworks. I called it a night when 4 bolts came a little close for comfort.

The couple at this house was generous enough to let us stay in their garage. In exchange, we took turns entertaining their speculations on the weather and giving us directions. The husband and his friend were quite drunk, and I think they spent around an hour (solid) talking about directions. It was fascinating. But seriously, it was interesting to hear about their careers, families, and dreams, both realized and lost.

Embarquation

2008-06-04T12:23:00.000-07:00

Wholy poop.

So much has happened in the past couple days, it's day 3 of the ride. 3:26 pm in St. Stephen's Church. I think that's the town name. VA. I'll write what I can.

*disclaimer for the rest o the ride. I don't know how often I'll be able to update. I'm at a tiny little library right now. About the size of 3 trailer homes. Dunno how many places/ time we'll have

I may actually be able to update kinda often, though. Today is horrendously hot. Colleen's fancy pants watch read 99 degrees at about 1:30. We're talking about getting up at 5, roll out at 6, ride till we start melting, and get rolling after a couple hours till evening. Just to avoid the heat. We're not on the Adventure Cycling route yet, it doesn't start till a few days down the road. So we're on a scary little highway for a while- which doesn't help anything.

The first day, we got a ride to Assateague, MD. The beach. You're welcome. We all paid a dollar to dip our wheels in the sand. Jerks. The word got around bout where we were headed, and people started snapping photos of us. Celebrities, after the first day! I got attacked by a wave and couldn't wash all the sand outa my shoes. We almost died in the sand trying to get our bikes back over the dune-thingy.

We saw our first carniverous animal, a wild pony. The roads were beautiful and fun to ride. Very flat, wide shoulders, nice drivers (mostly). I think Anne got the first honk. At one point, the sun coming through the trees was just picture perfect. Of course I didn't get a picture. However, I did get a terrible picture of everybody riding by a used car lot. Ooooooh ribbons!

When it started getting late, we started looking for shady places on the side of the road where we could camp. Apparently, most of the land managed by the Bureau of Land Management is cool to camp on without permission. After not seeing anything kosher for a few miles, we decided to ride to the State Park a few miles down the road. Then somebody had the bright idea to ask some random house if we could stay in their massive yard. All us shady people chilled by the road while Colleen and Mims went to the door. I didn't really think we were welcome.

A few minutes later, we were setting up camp in front of her out of commission chicken-coop thingies. We made one of them our 10,000 square foot changing room. Walker and Mims sliced up an awesome spaghetti-zucchini-chicken meal. The lady that let us stay at her house demanded that we let her wash our dishes. We made a fire in her pit out back, and her high-school-age son ended up bringing us MARSHMALLOWS. I made a Clif bar+marshmallow on a stick. I dubbed it the Steven. I recommend you have a Steven sometime. It was too much.

And that isn't the half of it. More soon K?

Steven

It begins...

2008-06-01T01:51:00.000-07:00

Well I said I'd do a decent post, and despite the fact that I gotta wake up in an hour or two, I'll bite le bullet and stick to my word. I'm about to pass out, so please forgive any lamenastiness.

Well, it's 4:51, and I'm not quite done getting my stuff together. I've been stressing my face off since 6 am this morning, though work at the Spin Cycle provided a nice (semi-not-really) break. This is most of the stuff I'm taking, all laid out next to the pannier it's going in:

I've recieved SOOOOOOO much help from so many people, I really can't thank everyone nearly enough. I am eternally at your service. Steve and Lee stayed up till 3:30 to give me a hand- mostly in the form of moral support.

But needless to say, I'm a little more tired than I'd like to be. I just gotta fill up my iPod with nothing but Ace of Base, post my motorcycle on craiglist (I'm suddenly poor, you know you want it), and pack the rest of my life for the next 2 months in the back of a car, and cart it to the train station.

9:00am and I'm gone to DC and we (a bunch o people from State I met randomly) are riding in a general Westerly direction). Along the way, we will be promoting awareness of the plight of Zimbabwe in hopes of generating funds for relief. Checkoot ride2008.com for details.

I hope to answer these questions and MORE in the coming months:
-how the heck you gonna eat?
-what you are going to do about them Rockies? with 90 pounds of bike and gear?
-which is hotter: Grand Canyon or Yosemite?
-where the heck you gonna sleep?
-how bad are you going to stink?
-is everybody right when they call you crazy for 'riding against the prevailing winds' for 3500 miles?
-is you really going to be enjoying yourself after 2 months
-will Ace of Base's "I saw the sign" ever get old, even after 2 months of it?
-WHY THE HAIL ARE YOU DOING THAT??

I'm really quite bad off right now, so I'll end this by thanking everyone again. I'm so lucky to have such great people by my side.

We'll talk soon. In the meantime, ride and smile.

Steven

Goodness Gracious Me

2008-05-29T04:27:00.001-07:00

Well, I'm about to have a heart attack finishing up work and trying to get ready for le ol trip. I promise a nice post before I leave on the 1st, but for now, I give you crappy one: a call for help.

Well not really a call, but a puppy-eyed appeal. If I only had puppy eyes.

I've acquired a bajillion things for the trip, but I could use some help with a few more. Lemme know if you can help me out. I won't die without em, but it'd be sweeeet.

I'm willing to beg, borrow, or buy:

Any old earbuds/headphones- for me sanity
GPS- save some serious $$$ on maps
any wi-fi device that I could access the interweb and update this here blog with
Solar device charger (for camera bats)
Friends in San Francisco that I could stay with for a night or 2- round August 3-August 10

A cyclist was killed here.

2008-05-18T00:00:00.000-07:00

I've ridden by here at least a hundred times in the past couple years. It's a straight 25 mph road. There's a cat on my keyboard. Time to sleep- riding to work in the morning.