Tonight I'm in Mansfield, OH at a Holiday Inn. I was planning on camping tonight, but the day's ride was much longer and tougher than anticipated. When you throw in the unrelenting humidity of the last three or so days, it made sense to get to an air-conditioned room. I spent last night sweating through my pillow sleeping in the county fairgrounds of London, OH. The front desk agent here asked me about my ride when I was checking in, and when I mentioned the LAF she gave me a discounted rate on the room! The "government rate." Score.
Anyway, for the last two days I've had a positively incorrigible 15mph headwind. I mean this bugger just won't let up for a minute. Remember the "Mountains of the Midwest" thing? Now I believe that to be an understatement. Give me the Rockies, any day of the week and twice on Sundays.
Alright, that's enough complaining out of me. No photos today, as I'm using the lobby computer. I think what I'll have to do is wait until I get to New York, and then start posting all the pictures and videos I haven't been able to get out to you yet. Sorry, I guess you'll have to wait a bit longer. I think I've only got about a week or so left of riding, yay!
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Wind: The Mountains of the Midwest
Here's a photo of John, Natalie, and me, doing the family photo pose.
A couple of their friends have a show on community radio in Urbana and we went and they "interviewed" me. It wasn't the most...professional interview I've done so far, but it was a ton of fun. At one point I was asked about the music I listen to when I'm riding and I mentioned Tom Petty, and they wanted to play one of his songs on the air. They didn't have any in their collection, so they went to Tom Petty's Myspace page and played one from there. Turns out, all that's on that MySpace page are 30 second clips, so they kept ending up with dead air. It was really funny. Eventually, another friend, Dave, who we had played music with the previous night in John's basement and had been listening to the show in his car, came by the studio with two Tom Petty CDs in hand. Sweet.
This is one of the hosts, Matt:
This is me and Ian, the other host:
This is the Peanut Gallery:
So my rest day in Urbana was fun and it was great seeing John and Natalie again (friends from college).
The next day I rode into Indiana. I was riding south to get down towards Cincinnati when I rode into a torrential downpour near Terre Haute. I mean it was really coming down, for about 15 miles into town and it wasn't letting up. I stopped at the first motel I saw, desperate to get out of the rain and my soaked and dirty clothes (I didn't get a chance to do laundry in Urbana; or rather, I didn't bother to do laundry in Urbana), but they were completely booked. So I rode another couple of miles further into the city to the next motel, which was also completely booked. I asked if there was anyplace that might not be completely booked and the motel clerk looked at me blankly and said, "Nowhere." I asked what was going on in town and he mumbled something I didn't quite catch and asked the people standing behind me what they needed. They looked at me and made some stupid comment about it not being a nice night for a ride (thanks, that's very helpful) and then started complaining to the clerk about their bed not being a king-sized. I'm not kidding.
So I waited outside under the covered area outside the office, contemplating my next move while waiting for the rain to let up. After about a half hour it calmed down enough for me to get back on the bike. I used my GPS to find the city park, which actually wasn't very far. I rode through and found this really nice amphitheater where I decided to sleep for the night. I knew the park was closed after dark and was nervous that I would be asked to leave if the police came by, but I couldn't think of any other options.
I didn't bother setting up my tent, and just unrolled my sleeping pad and sleeping bag. Aside from one drunk guy that stumbled across the stage shortly before dawn and a maintenance man that came just after dawn to check the lights, there were no problems. The maintenance guy actually apologized for waking me.
There was some bad news though. Before I got set up for the night, I stupidly attempted to pull my bike up the steps of the stage, with the trailer attached. I think I was so tired and in such a mood that I wasn't thinking clearly. Predictably, I couldn't keep the trailer straight up the stairs, and it tipped over. Long story short, I broke the rear derailleur hanger, making the bike unusable. So I had that to think about all night long.
The next morning, again using the GPS, I walked my bike and everything to the nearest bike shop (thank goodness there is a bike shop there). Fortunately, the shop was open a half hour before the posted opening time and the owner was very nice when he told me I was screwed. You see, my bike uses a rear derailleur hanger that no other brand uses and is available only from the manufacturer. With my head in my hands and that slow feeling of dread beginning to take over at the thought of spending another night, showerless and exhausted, in the park of the city of Terre Haute, IN, a flash of lightning struck my brain and I remembered the shiny new replacement rear derailleur hanger that was sent with the bike and sitting in my seat bag! Thirty seconds later my bike was back together and I was on my way, once again.
Oh, by the way, the owner of the bike shop (Fat Bikes) informed me that the reason there were no rooms available anywhere in the city of Terre Haute and I had to sleep outdoors on a concrete stage was that there was a diesel truck pull at the fairgrounds that weekend. Yep.
Anyhoo, the rest of Indiana was actually quite nice. It's more hilly and has a greater variety of scenery than anyplace I've been since Colorado. I actually got to ride through a State Park, which had trees, instead of cornfields! Right on. There were places, however, that resembled much of the rest of the midwest (i.e., flat, cornfields, nothing else) where the wind was more of factor than it's been before on this trip. In fact, every time I've been riding south I've been reduced to a snail's pace. It's really demoralizing. During my radio interview in Urbana, Ian mentioned that wind is the mountains of the Midwest. I took that to heart. It really does slow me down as much as climbing does in some circumstances, but it's worse because you know it's going to last as long as you keep heading in the same direction, which at times is to the horizon and beyond.
I'm in Cincinnati, OH now at my friend Liz's place (we were roommates in Queens, NY a couple of years ago). Cincinnati is really hilly. Liz just got home from work, so more on Cincy later.
A couple of their friends have a show on community radio in Urbana and we went and they "interviewed" me. It wasn't the most...professional interview I've done so far, but it was a ton of fun. At one point I was asked about the music I listen to when I'm riding and I mentioned Tom Petty, and they wanted to play one of his songs on the air. They didn't have any in their collection, so they went to Tom Petty's Myspace page and played one from there. Turns out, all that's on that MySpace page are 30 second clips, so they kept ending up with dead air. It was really funny. Eventually, another friend, Dave, who we had played music with the previous night in John's basement and had been listening to the show in his car, came by the studio with two Tom Petty CDs in hand. Sweet.
This is one of the hosts, Matt:
This is me and Ian, the other host:
This is the Peanut Gallery:
So my rest day in Urbana was fun and it was great seeing John and Natalie again (friends from college).
The next day I rode into Indiana. I was riding south to get down towards Cincinnati when I rode into a torrential downpour near Terre Haute. I mean it was really coming down, for about 15 miles into town and it wasn't letting up. I stopped at the first motel I saw, desperate to get out of the rain and my soaked and dirty clothes (I didn't get a chance to do laundry in Urbana; or rather, I didn't bother to do laundry in Urbana), but they were completely booked. So I rode another couple of miles further into the city to the next motel, which was also completely booked. I asked if there was anyplace that might not be completely booked and the motel clerk looked at me blankly and said, "Nowhere." I asked what was going on in town and he mumbled something I didn't quite catch and asked the people standing behind me what they needed. They looked at me and made some stupid comment about it not being a nice night for a ride (thanks, that's very helpful) and then started complaining to the clerk about their bed not being a king-sized. I'm not kidding.
So I waited outside under the covered area outside the office, contemplating my next move while waiting for the rain to let up. After about a half hour it calmed down enough for me to get back on the bike. I used my GPS to find the city park, which actually wasn't very far. I rode through and found this really nice amphitheater where I decided to sleep for the night. I knew the park was closed after dark and was nervous that I would be asked to leave if the police came by, but I couldn't think of any other options.
I didn't bother setting up my tent, and just unrolled my sleeping pad and sleeping bag. Aside from one drunk guy that stumbled across the stage shortly before dawn and a maintenance man that came just after dawn to check the lights, there were no problems. The maintenance guy actually apologized for waking me.
There was some bad news though. Before I got set up for the night, I stupidly attempted to pull my bike up the steps of the stage, with the trailer attached. I think I was so tired and in such a mood that I wasn't thinking clearly. Predictably, I couldn't keep the trailer straight up the stairs, and it tipped over. Long story short, I broke the rear derailleur hanger, making the bike unusable. So I had that to think about all night long.
The next morning, again using the GPS, I walked my bike and everything to the nearest bike shop (thank goodness there is a bike shop there). Fortunately, the shop was open a half hour before the posted opening time and the owner was very nice when he told me I was screwed. You see, my bike uses a rear derailleur hanger that no other brand uses and is available only from the manufacturer. With my head in my hands and that slow feeling of dread beginning to take over at the thought of spending another night, showerless and exhausted, in the park of the city of Terre Haute, IN, a flash of lightning struck my brain and I remembered the shiny new replacement rear derailleur hanger that was sent with the bike and sitting in my seat bag! Thirty seconds later my bike was back together and I was on my way, once again.
Oh, by the way, the owner of the bike shop (Fat Bikes) informed me that the reason there were no rooms available anywhere in the city of Terre Haute and I had to sleep outdoors on a concrete stage was that there was a diesel truck pull at the fairgrounds that weekend. Yep.
Anyhoo, the rest of Indiana was actually quite nice. It's more hilly and has a greater variety of scenery than anyplace I've been since Colorado. I actually got to ride through a State Park, which had trees, instead of cornfields! Right on. There were places, however, that resembled much of the rest of the midwest (i.e., flat, cornfields, nothing else) where the wind was more of factor than it's been before on this trip. In fact, every time I've been riding south I've been reduced to a snail's pace. It's really demoralizing. During my radio interview in Urbana, Ian mentioned that wind is the mountains of the Midwest. I took that to heart. It really does slow me down as much as climbing does in some circumstances, but it's worse because you know it's going to last as long as you keep heading in the same direction, which at times is to the horizon and beyond.
I'm in Cincinnati, OH now at my friend Liz's place (we were roommates in Queens, NY a couple of years ago). Cincinnati is really hilly. Liz just got home from work, so more on Cincy later.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Doggonit, I'm Doing a Full Update
Okay, let's backtrack again. I think I left you last time around Fort Collins, is that right? We'll just assume that it is, cause I'm too lazy to go back and read my old posts. So the day we left Ft. Collins, CO was the day we ended in Stoneham, where I infamously lost my shoe. I think everything that can be said about that has been said, so I'll move on. The next day we rode to Holyoke, CO through some of the worst heat we've experienced to date. My cyclecomputer read as much as 113 degrees F, though of course, that reading is affected by the direct sunlight on the plastic housing. A few miles outside of town it began raining, eventually turning into a torrential downpour. Fortunately, we found a laundromat to shelter us (and do some much-needed cleaning) before the rain got really bad. After the rain let up a little bit we found a campground and that's where I took some photos like this:
The next day we set out for McCook, NE. This was a tough day. Fred had a bunch of flats and I discovered a problem with my chainring that forced to me to ride with essentially just two or three gears until we got to Lincoln several days later. Fred also crashed on an oil slick turning into the town of Palisade, NE, getting some pretty good road rash on his calf and aggravating his broken wrist. The one bright spot of that 102.6 mile day was the American Legion Hall in Palisade. As we rode into the small town we asked a man crossing the street if there was a market in town where we could get some food, and he suggested we come into American Legion where it was air-conditioned. He gave us beer and we chatted with the locals for a bit which helped tremendously, and we flew through the last leg into McCook.
In McCook we found a free city campsite with bathrooms, showers, and electrical outlets. Unfortunately, just as we were about to go to sleep this guy walked unsteadily up to us carrying a huge backpack. He started telling us about how he was hitching across the country to somewhere. It became clear that he was drunk and not really coherent. Once we finally extricated ourselves from the conversation and got into our tents I noticed that he was sitting on a picnic table across the campground, just staring at us and the other people that were camping there (the site was almost full, mostly of people in RV's and on motorcycles). Anyway, I was nervous all night long that he was going to try to steal something and didn't sleep very well. I looked up many times and he was always just sitting on that table in the dark, until very early in the morning when I looked up and saw him lying down under a covered area nearby. When I got up in the morning he was gone, so perhaps my suspicions were unwarranted, but the dude freaked me out nonetheless.
The next day we were supposed to ride to Holdrige, NE. But we only got a few miles east of McCook, just past the small town of Indianola, when the bolt that holds my seat clamp tight broke off as I was attempting to adjust my saddle height. We rode back into Indianola hoping to find a hardware store, but everything was closed for the town's "Old Settler's Day Celebration." We rode into the town park and were practically pounced on by people offering assistance. Two men, Bernie and Travis, spent nearly two hours with us, trying everything they could think of to help fix the problem. Eventually, Travis led us back to his garage where he drilled a new hole in the clamp and poached a quick-release skewer from an old bicycle and got us back on the road. Then, at around the same place on the road that I first broke off that bolt, a woman driving into town stopped, ran across the street, and handed us each a bottle of water, with no explanation other than she thought we could use them. How about that? Nebraska is good people.
Despite that heartwarming experience, we only made it 55 miles, to Arapahoe, NE, by 8pm. An awfully long day for a short distance.
The following day wasn't much better for riding. The heat was hot, to borrow from Neil Young, and we only went another 60 miles to Minden where we stayed in a motel for the first time since Fort Collins.
We got back on track the next day, as the riding was flatter and the air was less humid. We rode 81.6 miles to Fairmont, NE where we camped in a city park next to a swimming pool. Just after dark, a car pulled up near us and a family got out and walked up to where we sitting. The mother was holding a large tupperware container filled with homemade cookies and she told us that she heard there were cyclists camping out for the night. She was expecting a larger group and had made a ton of cookies. I felt bad, I couldn't eat more than three, even though they were really good. So thanks to the Bridges family, you folks made our day. See what I mean about Nebraska people?
After they left we hopped the fence into the pool and cooled off a bit before bed. I think we were punished for that bit of intransigence, when the sprinklers came on at 4am.
The next day we rode a blistering pace of 16.8 mph for the first 50 miles towards Denton, a suburb of Lincoln. We stayed that night and the next at the home of some family friends of Fred's. It was really nice to be in someone's home for a while. We were even given an old truck to drive in to Lincoln to get to a bike shop and to hang out with another of Fred's old friends (he used to live in Lincoln). Here's a shot of my ridiculous rain gear. The brim of the hat was blown upward by the wind, it's not really supposed to look like that.
After our much needed rest day, we rode into Shenendoah, IA, where I finally got to meet Kristan Gray of KMA 960 Radio. She had interviewed me twice before and was so amazingly nice and excited about the ride that I just had to pay her a visit. Minutes after walking in the door she had both Fred and I in a studio booth doing another interview. She talked to us for about 45 minutes or so, about a great many things. That was a really good time, I'm so glad I got to talk to her in person.
The rest of Iowa, however, was not so kind to us. As I've already mentioned, the roads and drivers are, on balance, not cycling friendly. And then there was the problem of the broken hub in Osceola and losing my riding companion the next day, which is not, of course, specifically Iowa's fault, but it's a problem of trends as I see it.
Anyway, I finally made it out of Iowa, crossing the Mississippi River into Illinois. I've enjoyed this state, even though the majority of my riding has been on roads without paved shoulders (like Iowa), because the drivers have not been hassling me (unlike Iowa).
So, finally, we're up to date. 1,608.07 miles over 20 days of riding. I'm more than halfway, with approximately two weeks left to go. Next up, I have to get through Indiana on my way to visit my friend Liz in Cincinnati. I was initially planning on three days between here and there, but that would put me in Cinci a day before Liz gets back from a weekend trip she's taking. So now I think I'll try to break up Indiana into four days, reducing my mileage each day and giving my legs more of a rest. I feel strong, but I can't shake the sensation of a creeping fatigue in my legs. It's a fatigue that I feel mostly off the bike when I'm walking and hasn't seriously effected my pedaling, yet, but I need to keep an eye on it.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Through to Illinois
It's been a while since my last update and there's much to tell, but I'll start with the biggest news: it appears that I'll be completing the ride by myself. A few days ago Fred left me on the side of the road and I haven't seen him since. So I suppose I'm going solo from here on out, which is fine. I'm in Urbana, IL, staying with my college friends John and Natalie. We're about to sit down to dinner, so I'll leave the details for later (don't worry, tomorrow is a rest day, you'll get a proper update soon). Here are some pics: yet another campsite sunset;
crossing the Mississippi River;
CORN!
crossing the Mississippi River;
CORN!
Saturday, August 18, 2007
And.....We're Back
Okay, problem solved. I had to get a cab 40 miles up to Des Moines to a bike shop where I bought a whole new wheel. It would have taken too long to get a new hub shipped from the manufacturer and I still would have needed a bike shop to rebuild the wheel with the new hub, so I sucked it up, paid for the cab and the new wheel. Fred and I are both super tired after all the stress, so we'll probably just spend the night here even though we technically could make it to the next town over. With the exception of an amazing radio interview we did with Kristan Gray of KMA in Shenendoah on our first day, Iowa has not been kind to us. The roads here are atrocious and the drivers are the worst this side of Boston. That being said, all the people we've met off the bikes, including my taxi driver, have been wonderful. But Iowa roads are not cycling friendly.
Uh Oh
Hit a big snag just now. We're in Osceola, IA. We were just riding into town on a side road where there was construction and a heavy gauge wire caught my rear wheel, ripping a spoke through the hub. Normally, a broken spoke is no big deal, but the problem is the spoke is fine, but my hub is destroyed. So now we're weighing our options to figure out how to proceed. At the bare minimum, we've lost another day.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Photos, Finally!
Here are a few quick photos for you. Our picnic dinner one night; some lovely flat-land scenery; a midwestern sunset storm. And the header photo is of the road out of the mountains toward Denver.
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