Only Forward

The End and The Plains

2008-07-13T06:19:00.007+01:00

The big adventure is at an end now. You’ve probably noticed the blogging has died off, this is because I’m mostly just looking for work and brushing up on my engineering skills ready for a job. I’ve got just over 2 weeks left in Toronto then I’m back, and keen to start work asap as funds are running low and I really need to apply myself again.

I’m reading exactly the wrong book for this phase though: On the Road, by Jack Kerouac. I last read this 10 years ago when I finished my degree in Cardiff and was staying on Bert’s sofa in Nottingham waiting to move to Edinburgh, and it inspired me, showing the endless possibilities present in life, you just have to reach out and go for it. Reading it again now is even more powerful, I had a lot of similar experiences crossing the states, and went to some of the same places, when he talks about the prairies it takes me straight back there.

The plains were always the heart of the trip. When I was planning it the main motivation was not to ride coast to coast, the part I was obsessed with was crossing the plains. Coming from the UK, a land of rolling hills, valleys and crowded towns, it is almost impossible to imagine the limitless space, it is like a sea of land, rolling from horizon to horizon forever. The moment I dreamed of wasn’t reaching the pacific, this seemed too far off to think about somehow. Instead I dreamed of seeing the rockies looming out of the prairie after crossing the plains, following the pioneer footsteps, seeing and experiencing the geography of a continent.

Imagine that you are in the middle of nowhere, looking at the landscape ahead with no deadlines, no rush, no constraints, your only choice to decide which valley to follow, which mountain pass to cross, which hills to skirt or climb, which river to follow, not knowing where it will take you apart from west, north, or somewhere in-between. Will the road be flat or steep, will you ride to the edge of an escarpment to see the land drop steeply and become a plain reaching as far as you can see? Will the broad river valley gradually narrow, start to twist and turn and climb, become a canyon with gushing white water, funneling the wind so that it is difficult to even walk, the wind changing somehow towards the summit so that you know you are reaching the top, threading the pass to find a high plain, a long curving descent, the shock of a snow filled valley after plains heat behind, a tourist town, a two-horse dying town, a forest wilderness?

Will you see snakes, moose, bison, bear, alligators, chipmunks, bobcats, mountain lions, college kids, rednecks, road workers grinning and giving the peace sign, waving you through the roadworks and downing tools to wish you luck, snakes, a crowd of vultures flapping noisily into the air from a carcass, lovers parked in out of the way places, animals hanging from the neck by the roadside, armadillos hollowed out on the shoulder, wishing their armour was car proof, skid marks ending in a hole in the fence, deer running along the road clearly having fun with you, a wolf crossing, a herd of horses galloping out of the endless plains to run alongside the fence, joyous in their freedom, a mile-long freight train giving you a mournful double-blast of the whistle to acknowledge another human being in the near desert.

It is little known that long-term solo cyclists have their own religion. You may be godless in real life but on the road you will pray to the road gods, the weather gods, and the various gods of crazy and disturbed people. The idea of not tempting fate, something of a background concern in modern society, takes its rightful place in the mind of someone for whom almost all modern society has been almost stripped away, now like a threadbare carpet barely concealing the deeper, more basic urges underlying being human. You start to understand exactly where pagan gods and worship comes from, exactly why you don’t tempt fate, exactly why the wind and weather and rivers and mountains and animals were sentient and treated with respect.

The modern concerns disappear. No bills, no deadlines, no work, no tv, no possessions, no trying to impress people, or keep your place in society, no concerns apart from the seasons and the road and the wind and the possibility of dangerous people and animals. No cares about production, or documentation, or getting on with people you may not particularly like for a large part of the day.

It becomes so that you will not tempt fate under any circumstances. Most people, perhaps sane people, think of the landscape and road as fixed. They know that the weather will change but not because of anything they do. But on the road this changes. If you disrespect the road gods by saying or thinking things like ‘this road is easy, I should be there in a couple of hours’, then the road gods will hear and punish you by throwing in a big hill, or a rough surface, or 30 miles of roadworks. The weather gods are the same, feel smug about the nice warm weather and tail wind and you will soon find yourself fighting a headwind and cowering in terror from a thunderstorm that appeared from nowhere. When Bert came out he did not follow these rules, and I would look at him wide eyed and in horror, seeing the weather change and the road rise up in my mind to punish us. Modern life is a thin veneer indeed.

In the vast landscapes of the continental US you quickly realize the incredible power of nature and very quickly respect it. In cities and towns you are divorced from the underlying reality, until your town is wiped out by avalanche or flood, or the food trucks are blocked and you quickly revert to seeking food and shelter and that’s it. You start to see the way the road is barely scratched onto the surface of the land. You see the links to the outside world that keep towns alive, the food trucks, the power lines, the water pipes. In the UK these links are not obvious, absorbed or hidden by the busy landscape and the closeness of the towns and villages. When you visit the end of the world, like the Shetland or Orkney islands, these links become clear, but not usually on the mainland. In the US it is laid bare. There is an old saying that civilisation is only 3 meals away from disaster, and when you see the infrastructure that modern living is based on etched clear upon the landscape this becomes worryingly clear.

I camped rough in the middle of a city once and for the first time felt true fear when I heard someone creeping around outside the tent. I woke on full alert, heart hammering, eyes and ears wide, breathing silent, feeling trapped in the tent, straining my senses to determine the danger level. Just like cavemen must have felt hearing claws skitter in the darkness outside, back in the days when there was no real safety apart from what you could provide by defending yourself. At that point I realized that humans were more dangerous than animals, and that I would rather be on the plains listening to the buzz of a rattlesnake than hearing a human stealthily moving outside the false security of my tent.

The twisted, flattened, decayed road kill that I encountered became like gloomy, half-lit milestones, counting down to my death on the road, their clear and twisted agony like freeze-frame illustrations of all the different ways I could die on the road if I wasn’t careful. In the heat and the isolation I imagined them being placed there for me personally as reminders of the respect the road demanded, after I passed perhaps they shuffled back into the bush, their poor bodies being borrowed for the purpose by the road gods, who are surely on familiar terms with death. On the more dangerous roads the road kill milestones were more frequent, showing that my life was counting down more rapidly. I would try to avoid them but sometimes my wheels would crunch over a bone-white skull sticking out of a paste of baked skin and blood, this feeling disturbed me greatly. But I felt truly alive on the road, and if my life was to end in a smear of blood and skin on the road leading to a fused tangle of bone and blood and aluminium under the body of a truck, the driver looking on in horror and disbelief, then so be it, I will die happy.

In my pagan state things took on more significance, became more real. The road became a companion with its own personality, able to cheer me up with a downhill, or punish me with an uphill, the wind too. In Spain I found that the road murmurs to itself, and as I sweated and worked my way over it like the stylus on a record player I was privileged to be able to listen. It spoke about the way that it always followed the lowest energy route over the landscape, painfully obvious when you are on a bike but not apparent in a car, telling me about its origins of following the slow feet of mules and people, the straight parts muttering about romans and their arrogant disrespect of the landscape, the ultra modern curves winding their way through mountain valleys alongside the dismembered narrow old route rejoicing in recent resources and techniques.

In the USA the road had a different character, much harder to hear, and for a long time I despaired of ever hearing it. But gradually I came to realise that the road was much younger here and spoke a different language. In most places it hadn’t evolved from stone age tracks, or from ancient empires, it was recently born in the age of the car. It often paid little heed to low energy routes, instead paying more respect to property boundaries and geometry, cutting across the landscape almost as if it wasn’t there. If there was a swamp the road would be on stilts, if the landscape was rippled the highs would be cut off and used to fill the lows. For all the power and resources this spoke of the rawness of the country spoke of how the road was tolerated by nature, the swamp waiting at the side of the road, a rise of only a few inches would reclaim the road, an avalanche or landslide would wipe it away.

The road is the voice of civilisation, where there is no civilisation there is no road. The road spoke of the state of civilisation. Where there was poverty the road was tortured and broken, blighted by potholes, reflecting the state of the shanties that were nurtured by it. Where there was wealth the road was fresh and clear, dapper in its painted markings, wide and smooth and smug. Where there was isolation the road barely existed, stretching and attenuating itself between places, hoarding its maintenance for where it was necessary, doing what it could to keep itself alive. Along the gulf coast the road spoke of the annual battle of civilisation against nature, the hurricanes sweeping in several times a year to destroy what they can, the road broken, cracked and twisted, barely a road in places, the houses on 30 foot stilts. If the road is the voice of civilisation then in New Orleans it must scream in anguish, a modern city torn apart by flood and incompetence, the city decimated and dying, the precious light of civilisation sputtering once links to the outside world were snuffed out. 3 meals away.

The plains were like a primer in economics. Money is simply a form of converting resources from one form to another, one stage up from a barter society. It lets you store abstract things like manpower and convert them at a later stage for things you need. You do this every time you work for a month, then go spend your paycheck at the store. On the plains there is almost no food available, it is a near desert, recently converted to a farming monoculture. If you moved there as a pioneer you would be lucky not to starve, you could not live off the land. It is clear that unless you can buy food from somewhere else, you are going to starve. You have to convert your skills, guts, work, resources, into food from somewhere else. No link to civilisation, or no resources, then no food.

This was painfully obvious in Wyoming, where we drove through a ghost town. It was born and died with the cold war, a mining town wrenching uranium out of the semi-arid Wyoming plains for nuclear warheads until the arms limitation treaties in the early 80’s reduced demand to a point where mining wasn’t viable. Originally a town of many thousand people it was now a town of a few tens, with buildings, apartment blocks, shops, boarded over and decaying in the sun and wind.

The town, 60 miles from the nearest settlement, coincided with our need for food. The thought of eating in a uranium mining town was a little unsettling but we pushed through that thought. You must understand that in Wyoming, and in the plains in general, you will pass through a tiny settlement of a few people and, if you are lucky, a gas station and shop. You will then travel through 50 or 60 miles of wilderness and ranches with barely a tree, just rocks and dry river beds and scattered cattle ranches. A food or gas stop is not to be treated lightly.

We rolled gently into the town, a village really, but they don’t use that word out here, it sounds laughably quaint. It is clear that the town is not thriving, there is no life, everywhere is dust and scrub, the boarded up windows and doors obvious from a distance. A single beat up diner/café sits by the road with a couple of dusty utility company pickups outside. There is nowhere else and we are hungry so we decide to risk it. As usual in situations like these I am the one who is prepared to walk in first, bert and james hanging back like shy schoolgirls. Inside it is gloomy, a wooden floor and walls, an empty bar, 3 utility workers sitting at a table with some food. I say hi and am greeted cheerfully. I am used to these situations by now and walk unselfconsciously to the empty bar and sit down. Bert and James follow nervously. We talk in low voices whilst we wait for the bar staff to show. Eventually a hunched, one-eyed woman appears out of the gloom at the back of the bar and shuffles slowly towards the utility workers. They obviously know each other, she haltingly asks them if the food is good and they reply good naturedly that it is fine. At this point I have no idea if she is staff, or lives here, or is just visiting. Silence falls as she shuffles towards and then behind the bar, at which we are sitting. I can feel the tension from Bert and James. She reaches our position and stands facing us, the one-eye birth defect obvious, the slowness apparent.

It is clear that I am going to have to do the talking. “Do you do food?”. Blank look. Several seconds of silence. Maybe she isn’t the barkeep after all. I can feel the utility workers watching closely, perhaps defensively. Eventually a nod. “What sort of food do you do?”. Blank look. Silence. Uncomfortable seconds. I realise that Bert and James have no intention of helping me out. “Do you do burgers? Sandwiches?” A disdainful shrug, as if to say what the hell do you think we have, out of towner. Suddenly the utility guys take pity and shout “the chili burgers are good!”. There is sudden and unanimous consensus among us that 3 chili burgers would be great. The barkeep shuffles off into the gloom at the back, presumably to give our order to the chef. We desperately think of other things to talk about.

Eventually more shuffling gains us some cokes, and more shuffling after that delivers our food. An old lady comes out for the bill, we praise the food but she doesn’t seem bothered. We finish our cokes and make a break for it after a brief chat to the utility guys, who obviously feel for us a little, as well as being amused by the out of town British guys. As soon as we get out of the door Bert and James burst out laughing, I feel this is a little unfair as the one-eyed lady was clearly a little slow, they don’t agree that she was, this question is never resolved. We create dust getting out of there, all of us thinking that this is the sort of experience you see in movies but rarely in real life.

Crossing Wyoming by car came straight after crossing the great plains, the high plains, the prairie, by bike. This was the heart of the trip and was one of the hardest experiences of my life, yet at the same time one of the most interesting and enjoyable.

I had crossed from North-east Texas into Oklahoma a week or two ago, entering the plains as I did so. The plains are not clearly defined, some people count them as starting at the gulf coast others in northern Louisiana. For me they started in North-East Texas when I came out of a range of rolling hills and could suddenly see a grassy sea of forest extending for miles. They started out as beautiful lush rolling grassland and meadows and became more and more arid, ending with dried-up river beds and tumbleweed rolling through dusty deserted towns, with dust devils scouring the landscape, the moisture being sucked out of you, the heat and sun beating you every minute of daylight, the wind fighting you for every mile, the isolation battering against your mind, the incredible distances weighing heavily.

North Texas was where it was brought home to me that the tornado belt was not just a statistical artifact shown on the evening news but a grinding, roaring fearful reality that resulted in me spending every second of each days ride scanning the landscape for possible shelter and endlessly planning survival strategies. Do I hide in that culvert and risk drowning, the wind-tunnel effect and burial alive, or lie in that gentle depression and go with the wind. Do I chain myself to that telegraph pole with the bike lock? If I survive how will I find my bike again? Will I continue or go home? These thoughts were my constant and necessary companions on the endless, exposed plains, crawling along the vast landscape, feeling insignificant, trying to avoid attracting the attention of the vengeful, jealous storm gods.

Gradually I realized that the strong headwinds I was encountering, where you would struggle to walk upright, were not just an occasional event but a daily reality. Almost everyone I met would talk to me about the wind, about how they saw me on the highway and thought ‘that poor guy!”, about how it is like this all the time. I started to notice the way the landscape was shaped by the wind, how all the houses had a single hedge on the upwind side of the house, how all the trees and shrubs leaned the same way. I learnt how much influence a single vertical object can have on this vast flatland, feeling the wind change as I approached a tree or bush or house even if I was a hundred metres or more away.

The sound of wind howling through the arms of my glasses, which I have never heard before, became constant. My ears, tuned to determine the subtleties of approaching traffic without looking around, became useless, filled with the endless roaring of global weather systems undisturbed by terrain. My cruising speed halved, dealing me a cruel mental blow, taking several days to adapt to the new circumstances. The altitude gradually increased, with it the vegetation changed, the air became thinner and much drier, the sun stronger, the settlements more isolated. I began planning in busier roads just so that there would be an occasional car or ranch in case of trouble.

I wore a bandit mask, mostly to cut out the mental effects of the wind, isolating myself behind the blue walmart bandana and my wraparound sunglasses, sitting there in my own little world, cruising along slowly. When there was even slight shelter from the wind I would stop: a berm, a cutting, trees bordering a cemetery, a barn, a slight depression. I would ride for many miles, looking forwards to a corner just to feel a difference in the wind in my face. The mask helped to trap a little moisture as I breathed out, otherwise my mouth would dry completely on each breath. I suddenly understood why cowboys in the movies wear these masks and started watching closely to see if they were wearing them properly, plains style: cover ears for the noise and dust, nose for the dust and to trap moisture, mouth for the same reasons but it must be shaped in such a way so as not to vacuum-form itself over your nose and mouth when you breathe in. Subtleties that, I have to say, John Wayne seemed to be familiar with. John Wayne also appears to be the patron saint of the mid-west, every bar and restaurant having pictures of him.

After a few days of this I realized that I couldn’t just take a short day when the wind or weather was bad, I was going to have to keep going to meet Bert and James on time. The day I realized this was a bad day, and I emailed them to let them know I was struggling and set up fallback plans. By this time I was already exhausted, fatigued by what seemed like an endless journey across a vast landscape. I was driven by the conflicting desires of having a rest as soon as possible, and having a rest with my friends in a cool place rather than a dusty plains town.

Time was very non-linear on this journey. Last year I had ridden 1000 miles across Spain in 14 riding days, spread over 6 weeks, which was the easiest trip I’d ever done (don’t get me wrong, it had hard patches). When I reached the 1000 mile point after a couple of weeks in the USA I was on the Gulf coast, Mississippi I think, and I was a little unhappy because I was a quarter of the way through the trip already. The 2000 mile point was in Kansas, and it seemed a lifetime away from that happy point in the Gulf. The first 1000 miles went quickly, the next took forever. Time slowed and nearly stopped on the plains, more than this has ever happened before in my life. When I say that it took a lifetime to cross the plains, even though in reality it was about 3 weeks, I’m not joking or exaggerating. It went on forever! I could barely remember the start of the trip, it seemed like some distant dream world. I think this is part of the mental defense mechanisms needed to push yourself mentally and physically like this, especially when solo.

I adapted to the wind and temperature and altitude and dryness, I guess I had no choice. I no longer struggled with the heat, it was just another thing that sucked energy out of me, and it became planned in with the mileage. Most roadworks I was expected to ride through, they looked at me funny when I stopped, it took me a while to adapt to not being shouted at when I rode through. I’ve said before the road crews were usually the most friendly and enthusiastic people on the trip, the road boss usually giving me a shy wave, the workers whooping and hollering, stopping their trucks and diggers to let me through, giving me priority over all traffic. Felt good. One day, towards the end of the plains crossing, my body screaming at me when I woke up to stay in bed all day, me patiently explaining that it had to be done, just hang in there, I reached some road works and slowed as usual as I reached the stop-sign wielding worker. She waved to me frantically to stop, I slowed further, she seemed very uncomfortable even after I stopped, Turned out they got about a cyclist a day, and the one yesterday had been drunk and refused to stop, ruining their freshly poured concrete, eventually they had to get the police, it wasn’t pretty. I assured her I wasn’t that kind of cyclist. She couldn’t let me through anyway as it was too dangerous, a pickup would come get me.

I sat by the side of the road in the wind and dust and heat. The endless stream of construction trucks stirred up the dust real bad, it was midday, hot as hell, but I could sit by the side of the road without problem. The pickup truck eventually came and we chucked my bike on top of the precarious stack of construction stuff in the back. I was long past obsessing over my bike and figured even if it fell off it would just bounce a couple of times and be ok, the guy promised to drive slowly through the roadworks. He turned out to be the boss of the project, a cool guy, and he gave me a lift a few miles up the road to do one of his chores and save me some miles.

At this point I was doing about 120 miles a day to get to the Rockies on time to get a few days vital rest then meet Bert from the airport. I should explain what this is like. You’ve already done about 2000 miles, with about 500 to go to meet your friends, and 1500 to go after that. After the first 1000 in incredible heat you had 2 days off at your friends house and were like a walking zombie. 250 miles after this you had 3 days rest in North Louisiana. Since then you’ve been slogging along in an unbelievable headwind, up a never-ending staircase that reaches all the way to the Rockies, fighting the isolation of a near desert where it is usually 60 miles between anything, an isolation that goes on for well over a thousand miles. London to Edinburgh is only 400. As a sort of athlete you are used to listening to your body, when it tells you to eat you eat, when it tells you to slack off you slack off, when it tells you to rest or take it easy that is exactly what you do. But now you break this pact. You wake in the morning and your body tells you clearly ‘no way’. It tells you that it is exhausted, that it needs rest, that you would be crazy to push it. You ignore this, fight it out of bed, shovel some food down your neck. By this time eating is as pleasant as filling your car at the gas station, it’s just something you have to do.

You leave the motel room with 120 miles of hot, dry, windy miles to go. If you are very lucky you will average 15 mph, but it is more likely that you will average 8 to 10mph traveling west on the plains. By the end you will be probably racing the sunset. There is no guarantee of a motel room, you may have to sleep rough in your tent. The map shows a tiny settlement after 60 miles and that’s it. You have no idea if there will be hills, roadworks, storms, tornadoes, mechanical problems. But this is your life now and you roll out of the town. With luck you got up early to avoid the heat of the sun and give yourself some daylight margin, but as you get more fatigued it perversely becomes more difficult to get to sleep, so you probably got to sleep around 2am after being up for 19 or 20 hours, at 6 0r 7am waking as if you had not slept at all, faced with the choice of grabbing a few more hours vital sleep and battling the sun all day, or accepting the gritty dry eyed feeling and starting early.

So you start out, 120 miles to go, already fatigued as hell, wanting nothing more than to rest. By now you’re used to slogging along, pushing through things that you would normally abort a ride over - bad stomach, little water, general fatigue, mechanical problems. The first 30 or 40 miles pass in a bit of a daze as you look at the scenery and the front wheel, daydreaming about the finish, wondering what food you might have, scanning for shelter, dodging pot holes, scanning the horizon for signs of the water tower belonging to the next settlement, listening to any odd noises to see if the bike is going ok. After the first 40 it starts to get a bit tougher, you need to eat but are sick of it, you force it down. You start to get a little stiff and sore, you use your little stretching and shifting strategies to get around this. The most important thing is not to lose the mental state that lets you keep churning on mile after mile. By now you don’t even have to consciously manage your legs and stomach and lungs, you just naturally ride at the right pace without stressing any of them. You think of your body as ‘the team’, made up of discrete components, just another machine like the bike.

At 60 miles, as the tiny, isolated settlement rolls in to view, you are more than ready for a break. Before you started this trip 60 miles was one of the longest rides you’d done, it was a serious distance. Now it is barely half way. Dinner is joyless, just more fuel, you vary it was much as you can, get as much nutrition and fresh food as you can, but this is rare on the plains, subway is the best all-round place. Luckily this gas station, set in a tiny town with tumbleweeds rolling through the streets, a big dust devil whirling round and round the forecourt, the police car giving you ‘the nod’, has a subway clone and you load up on onions, peppers, spinach and anything else you can. You fill the bike bottles with water, and take some extra water and lemonade along - anything to relieve the tedium of drinking water all day every day. The attendant lady is initially concerned but relieved when she sees you stocking up, she asks you what your plans are and its clear you are prepared for the 60 miles of dusty wilderness until the next gas station. She tells you a story of a college girl that came through on her bike heading the same way, barely able to stand, not making much sense, she had to give her water and check with her relatives and stuff. Although 60 miles of near-desert wilderness seemed daunting back in the UK it’s what you are used to now, you know your capabilities and limits, and are well prepared for worst-case survival for a few days at least. She unwittingly summarizes the mood of the plains crossing: “if something goes wrong at least there are a couple of ranches, and a car is bound to come past eventually”.

So you are still fatigued, now you have ridden 60 miles, which counts as almost nothing these days. It is hot and dusty and windy. The bike is fuelled and provisioned. It is important to learn how to ‘ping’ your body and understand the honest answer it gives, before it is clouded and overwhelmed by enemies like your ego, and pride, and competitiveness, and peer pressure. I find the way to do this is to ask yourself a question, and the first answer that comes into your head, no matter how unpleasant, is the true one. Try it sometime. Do I fancy so and so? Should I leave my job? Was I nasty to X? The first answer that pings back is real, the rest is ego and baloney. Can I ride another 60 miles. Yes. That’s it then, we go. By now I think of myself as ‘we’, because my body is a team you see? I know it sounds a little nuts.

So it is off into the wind. A small town, even a few buildings, will provide a huge amount of shelter from the wind, and every time you leave town it hits you again as you have slow down and click down the gears. The landscape passes endlessly by. You check the map, every side road is unsurfaced, and most of them travel for a good couple of hundred miles before hitting another surfaced road. Sometimes a freight train will trundle past, some of them stop in the middle of nowhere, huddling behind a line of trees as if hiding from eagles. A massive truck will roar past, usually giving you the whole lane to yourself out of respect. In the distance the far horizon is broken by what looks like ships sailing along, gradually they resolve into a few trucks with cars following, a bolus of traffic, a tentative convoy clotted together on the plains to fight off the isolation. A distant smudge of dust marks where a pickup is bouncing along a dirt track, you automatically take a mental note in case you need help, checking the map to see where they might join the thin scratch of surfaced road.

It’s now about 5pm, sun sets at about 8pm, you’ve done about 90 miles, 30 to go. No idea what’s in the town, whether there is accommodation or not. On a good day you’ll do 15 mph and get there about 7pm, on a bad day about 8pm and get there in the dark. Usually it’s inbetween and you do about 10 or 11 mph. It’s a little tight, you have a small bike headlight but don’t fancy being out in the open with no real light. Animals come out at night for a start, also the big trucks may not see you, and the road surface has plenty of traps to watch out for. Best to ride by day. Big time.

At 90 miles you are usually quite tired, but on the other hand its only another 2 or 3 hours, and that doesn’t sound like so much anymore. You ping your body, as there is always the fallback option of camping rough on the prairie. Having this option has been a massive blessing on this trip, allowing you to ride as far as you want and giving you a great deal of peace of mind. You have no illusions about camping rough though. First of all is to get out of sight of the road, otherwise you will not sleep well at all, every time a passing car’s engine note changes you will wake on ‘alert’ mode in case they are stopping. If they do stop then you must be prepared for the worst. This is what the folding knife is for - false security. The lack of sanitation no longer bothers you, a shower once a week is fine if you are not in ‘polite company’, who needs a toilet when there is the side of the road (a cheery wave is often essential in the endless flatlands). Then there is the howling, awful wind, that will threaten to shred your tent around you as you lie there trying to sleep. Americans are not renowned for being friendly to trespassers either, and the entire trip has been bordered by ‘keep out’ signs. So you weigh the choices and, as usual, opt for a motel near a restaurant. Looking back you will feel a little regret at not camping rough more, but you fully understand the decisions and would almost certainly make the same choices over again.

I recently read 'The Road' by Cormack Macarthy, a superb book, and it will give you a strong taste of the way the solo traveler views camping within sight of the road.

110 miles, one hour to go. You can barely remember starting off this morning. People ask you where you rode from and you can’t remember, you have to reconstruct it: “it is a small place about 60 miles south-east of here, with a nice café”. The morning seems like a lifetime ago, and already blurs into the rest of the trip. Now there are 10 miles to go. You switch in to short-range mode. 10 miles is about my old ride to work. I can do that. Body, can I do that? Yes. Ok. 6 miles is like riding from my sisters house back home. Not far then, half an hour, maybe 35 in this wind. 3 miles is like from Aberhafesp to my house. 20 minutes or so. During this last hour the running commentary in my head will be about how the water tower is getting closer. The last 3 miles usually passes quickly as the towns spread out a little.

Early in the trip I was very confused as to how to spot towns approaching, the European methods just don’t work. Eventually I figured out that there is a very subtle rise in population and traffic density a few miles from a town. It goes from ‘no houses’ to ‘some houses’ and 'hardly any cars' to 'some cars', a couple miles after that you will see school bus stops, then you are at the town limits. You ride into the town, dog-tired. In Spain you learned to head for the bus or train station, there was always decent and cheap accommodation near there. American towns have neither, you learn to head for the grain elevator, a massive steel building around which the town is built. Trucks deliver and collect grain here, so the café and motel will be here too. If there is only one motel it will be run down as hell, very basic, a strip of a few rooms sticking out of the flat plains dust, after the town borderland of junked cars and abandoned houses. If there are a few motels you will look longingly for a franchise, you will know what you are getting then. At this point you just want to get off the bike have a bath, minimum-hassle food and go to sleep. When you have the bath you will leave a thick ring of sun cream, dead flies, dust and road grime. If there are no chain motels you will have to play ‘mom and pop motel’ Russian roulette. This could end up with a pleasant night in clean sheets waking to home-made muffins. Or a single bare light bulb keeping off the hordes of cockroaches and nothing to disguise the slime in the shower.

You make your choice, wheel the bike into the room, ignore the lies about wifi being available and the free breakfast, take your bath, have a quick nap, then head out for food. By this time you are sick of eating, and particularly sick of the 4 food sources available to a plains dweller: burger, steak, Chinese buffet, Mexican. You just want filling hot food with a high calorie content, good quality. Within 3 minutes of finishing your food you will want nothing more, nothing at all, than to be lying down in clean sheets. The walk back to the motel will be a struggle. Fatigue is cruel though, and you will lie awake, exhausted, until 2am.

Eventually you cross into Colorado via Kansas, noting that Colorado is green and lush whereas Kansas is dry and covered in dry riverbeds. It turns out that Colorado uses all the water to irrigate itself leaving nothing to Kansas, the subject of acrimonious state court cases. The Colorado towns are much more prosperous than the Kansas ones only 40 miles away.

On the last day you are cruelly punished by the road gods and given a hilly route, the weather gods gleefully join in and give you a proper headwind. You could do without this to be honest. You slog along longing for a view of the rockies. At the crest of one hill you see what might be mountains, but is probably just cloud. At the next crest, a few miles further on, you check again. You are rewarded with a view you will not forget in your life. At the limits of your vision you can just see white markings high up in the clear blue sky, as if someone has scratched the sky to let the white light of creation shine through. Gradually the Rockies push themselves further into reality, becoming a white wall of mountains tumbling from horizon to horizon from south to north, like the ruined battlements of a conquered heavenly fortress.

A long hot ride later, after sleeping by the roadside for 10 minutes and scaring a middle aged lady who stopped to check if you were dead, you reach a small town on the outskirts of Denver. You are trembling with exhaustion and the altitude, clothes caked white with salt from sweat, your body is screaming at you that it cannot ride another mile, but you have 5 to go, including a nasty out of the saddle climb over a cliff. You blast downhill through the most dangerous part of the entire trip when you have to cross a multilane interstate junction into a retail park. You despair of finding a motel, but spot one across the way. They have a room for a few days. You are thankful. You have crossed the plains, lately averaging 100 miles a day. You get some wine and drink giving a brief writeup on the blog, falling asleep to the happy sound of emails coming in from your friends and family, knowing that unbelievably two of your closest friends will be arriving in a couple of days.

You don’t care about riding coast to coast anymore, you have achieved enough, dug deep enough, more than you thought you would have to. You could die happy. And the journey is only just over half over.

Niagara Falls

2008-06-26T15:28:00.008+01:00

I planned to leave at 6am but finally got going at about 11am, not too impressive. Despite Heidi's assurances that 'it only ever rains for half an hour' i am lightly spattered for almost the whole 90 miles to Niagara Falls, making me miss my mudguards a lot. The route starts off promisingly with a lakefront path full of every type of wheeled urban creature - roller blades, skateboards, bikes, recumbents, prams and I hope it's going to be like this all the way. There's something about well-used urban leisure routes like this, it feels very happy and cool to be amongst the wheeled crowd like this. It's just a pity that nobody invited any tumbleweeds, I guess they would have felt a bit out of place though.

But the path soon ends and turns into short sections of path through suburbia, very difficult to follow and ride flowingly as I keep losing the route and having to back up. Usually I ditch routes like that and get on the road, but the lakefront boulevard is a grinding dual carriageway which I don't fancy.

A mountain-biking middle-aged south african spots me looking at the map signposts and takes pity on me, explaining in his thick saffer accent the route ahead. We end up riding together for a few miles. He tells me that I look very relaxed on the bike and I realise it’s true, being on the bike feels just like being in a comfy armchair, it just feels right, and my legs turn smoothly and slowly, putting down just enough power and at the right time to carve smoothly round the corners. He is on his first ride after the winter and looks like he is fighting the bike, holding on rigidly, legs pumping.

We chat a little about South Africa, he says he was lucky to get out with most of his money. He loves the polite society in Canada, saying that in SA it is very different, more aggressive, you get what you want and screw everyone else. I think about other South African people I know and ponder. He treats his new-found politeness like someone who has learnt a new language, using it proudly and as often as possible but without any subtlety, forcefully saying hello thank you excuse me to other people on the path whether they need it or not. It is an interesting chat and we are both sorry when it is time for him to turn back, but he is doing 15km and I’m doing 144km so it has to happen at some point.

After the bike path there is 80 miles of city, urban, suburban or industrial roads into a headwind, looking at the storm clouds all around me and listening to the roar of the motorway 50 feet away. I do not enjoy this ride at all due to the urban grind, and the usual long-ride gentle nausea creeps up to make it hard to eat the necessary food so I start to run out of energy about 20 miles before the industrial-estate motel with dirty carpet that heidi has booked me into. I get there exhausted, have a kip, stuff down food from the nearest restaurant and turn in.

My plans for an early start are once again foiled and I roll at 1030, hungry as hell and feeling a bit lethargic because of it. But a few km later I am coming into the tacky tourist vegas-lite town of Niagara Falls itself. I laugh at the buildings made up to look like Frankenstein and all the rest of it, but it’s also kinda cool and funny, and full of people having fun.

I come over the brow of a hill and suddenly there they are, Niagara Falls themselves. It is always strange to finally visit one of those places you’ve heard about and seen on TV all your life, it can feel a little unreal to start with. The falls are beautiful, but seem smaller than I imagined until I realise the scale and just how far away from them I still am, they are nearly 200 ft high.

The day is sunny, it’s a cool place and I don’t really feel like a 90 mile grind home through the urban sprawl, my least favourite riding, so I cruise a round a little before jumping into a Days Inn, ditching my gear, wolfing down a burger king and getting straight onto the famous ‘maid of the mist’.

It gives a good view of the falls from right up against them, going up to within 30metres or so and giving us a good soaking with the spray. Most impressive. Tour helicopters buzz overhead, mostly Jetrangers until a mean-looking coastguard Dauphin cuts over the falls in a fast banking spiral, turbines whistling over the grinding noise of the blades. I want one.

I spend the rest of the day wandering around, or reading my book (The Yiddish Policeman’s Union by Michael Chabon, superb), or thinking about life in general. For some reason something clicks and I get my drive and motivation back. For the last year if I haven’t been actively riding or planning logistics then I’ve just been sitting around reading, without the energy or motivation to start a project or anything like that. But this snaps in Niagara Falls and I’m back to my old self.

I’m not fussed about going out and getting blitzed or eating in a restaurant so I get a 7-11 sandwich, eat in the room and get an early night ready for the proposed early start next day.

I manage to get rolling by 9am, the day is fine but very hot at 30C, I know it’s only gonna get worse and sap my energy but what the hell, I’m looking forwards to the ride. I take a slightly different route for the first part, going through vineyards rather than industrial lakefront, much nicer. But eventually I have to get back into the sprawl and slog along, looking forwards to making the turn around the end of the lake where the headwind will turn into a tailwind. I take it easy to make it more enjoyable, occasionally stopping at cafes or to chill by the lake, and enjoying the last few miles of bike path into the city.

The last stretch is rush-hour city-centre traffic, always more aggressive than other times of the day, and the tramlines make the riding much more dangerous and skilful. But I prevail after accidentally getting a bit too into the flow and busting some traffic dodging moves that would have got me arrested if the polis had been around. In the end I do 90 miles at 14.5 mph average, a decent speed for that distance and it was great to ride lightly loaded again. I‘m not doing that route again though, I much prefer empty countryside to city sprawl.

Off to Niagara Falls

2008-06-23T04:17:00.002+01:00

not been posting much cos i been pretty lazy, running through the park every other day, watching movies, cooking chilli, reading books, wandering round the city, lazing on the porch in the sun watching the human traffic, going out for beer, wasting a day with a hangover

yes it is fun

tomorrow i jump on my bike for a 90 mile ride to niagara falls, returning on tuesday with pics and bloggage. i can't wait to get back on the bike, which heidi thinks is mad, but it will be sweet to ride with only a small light overnight bag rather than a cross-continental load

james has been making amazing progress on his new bike, so i've signed up to to the 'devil ride' with him on an 'as far as he can get' basis and am hoping junior will join us. We will trundle along with a ringside seat of the 'battle of the competitives' that seems to be developing.

Toronto chilled-out life

2008-06-17T07:32:00.003+01:00

What day is it? Monday? Sunday? Ah i think it's monday. I have been off work for nearly a year so have lost all track of weekdays, i only know it's sunday because my friends get all tense and go to bed early muttering about 'bloody work'. I don't miss those days at all. Unfortunately i'm just about reaching my reserve budget so my thoughts are increasingly turning to sorting out some paid employment when i get back.

Yuk.

Anyway, I'm having a top time in toronto, and have about 6 or 7 weeks before I fly back. This feels like a short time and i'm kinda winding down the trip, but it's way longer than most holidays! So I'm fighting the wind-down feeling.

Man this laptop is hot on my legs.

The 3 day train ride totally screwed up my sleep pattern, basically because i didn't get any. I went to sleep at about 5am this morning and slept through until 4pm, now it's 3am and i'm blogging! Need to reset back to normal hours.

The train taught me a little bit more about myself. Some of the people sitting around me (all with 2 seats to themselves so it was kinda spread out) formed a little group which i was welcome to join, i chatted to them all a little, but i just wasn't interested. I preferred to sit reading, listening to music and staring out the window at the scenery. I've noticed this more and more on the trip, I am very independent and feel no need to hunt down 'casual' company most of the time, usually it just doesn't seem worth the effort of talking to people. Not sure if that's good or bad! It's prob ok as long as i don't take it to extremes, which i don't.

Heidi has an awesome flat, in 'downtown' but in a quiet leafy residential street with cool bars and restaurants at the end of it. The flat has a porch/deck out the front with a bbq and chairs, so yesterday I spent a few hours stripping the bike of all its touring equipment - racks, mudguards, etc, and giving it a thorough clean 'n lube. Both the bike and me enjoy this. Now it's back in stripped-down race mode and man does it look mean. Next was a run along the lakefront, it was a bit hot though, i'm still acclimating, I struggled with the heat and was drenched in sweat so just had a short run.

Later on saturday Heidi's boyfriend, Ryan, gave me a buzz and we went out for some food and beers, having a good laugh and ending up on Dundas Square which at night looked very blade runner with big video screens and the like, unfortunately they weren't extolling the virtues of moving to the offworld colonies, or telling you what to think.

Sunday was gonna be a ride but when i got to the end of the street on the bike i saw a massive thundercloud coming, and managed to get back inside before it kicked off. Heidi got back from camping a bit later with her flatmate, my other sister Chris came over for a couple hours, then it was off to meet one of ryan's friends for some bike chat. After a month of being told constantly by bert that i was fat and looked awful it was nice to be greeted with a "hey you're skinny!".

Today, well, today was mostly sleep, then a 5 mile cross country run, including going past the university which had loads of handsome students, then heidi cooked a good meal, which amazed me as when she lived in wales she dined exclusively on chips 'n cheese, or turkey sausages. How things change. We ate out on the porch where I met her friend Connor for the first time too.

So it's a fun time over here. Vancouver reminded me of edinburgh, and for some reason Toronto reminds me of Cardiff.

Plan for the remaining time is: stay here for a week or so, do a ride to niagara falls (a days ride away) and back, bike out to huntsville to see meddler's buddies, stay there a few days to a week i guess camping on their lawn, then a mate may be coming out with work to montreal so i'll go see him, then back to toronto early july for heidi's birthday, then my folks come out so i'll hang with them for a bit then back to the uk.

It's only 400 quid return with www.flyzoom.com from the uk to toronto - get booking! Darren, I give up on you, spend the money on that single-speed mountain bike you been wet-dreamin over.

Oh yeah you lot want photos don't you. Ok ok, tomorrow i'm wandering round the city on foot so i'll take some for yous.

toronto

2008-06-14T06:44:00.006+01:00

just arrived in toronto after a 3 day train journey through the rockies, plains and about 3000 miles of wilderness. It was chucking it down when i got out the station and none of the cabbies would take my bike (it was 1am in a strange city and i had no map and was knackered so didn't want to ride). Luckily one guy took pity and let me leave it hanging out of his boot, he took in another couple of lads looking for a bar and we had a fantastic laugh on the way to heidi's house, i kinda wish i'd ignored the fact that i was knackered, soaked through and stinking after 3 days on a train without a shower and gone for a beer with them.

anyway, heidi kindly left a bottle of wine out for me so i'm getting stuck into that and waiting for the pizza to cook whilst watching the dedicated mountain biking channels on tv! She is an awesome host. Hmm, I've just noticed that after reading 2 vietnam books on the train i've been shouting vietnamese to myself as i cook- Mung bai! Didi mau! Numba TEN GI! I hope the neighbours are understanding.

the train was kinda cool, the seat was like an economy class airline seat but with loads of legroom, there was a little cafe so you could wander around ok but i still found it nearly impossible to sleep. The staff were cool and did their best to keep long-haulers 2 seats so it wasn't anywhere near as bad as it could have been. I do think talkative people should be banned from trains though.

i saw bear, moose and beaver, and the ride really brought home to me how much of a wilderness canada is, i mean we did thousands of miles and saw a few small towns, the rest of it was wildlife country. sweet

plan for tomorrow is a lie-in (is 4am and need some sleep), a run, clean the bike and get it back into day-ride mode, and explore the city.

i tired, i write more tomorrow, i wonder if those dudes will come back and invite me for a beer, one of them was damn cute

Side Effects

2008-06-09T23:04:00.004+01:00

I knew that a last minute rash decision to get out to the States to join Kelv & Bert was going to involve some wallet bashing - what I hadn't realised that it was just the start. Ever since I left them in the Grand Teton National Park, I've been agonising over whether to buy a bike, or if it was just a "phase" that would gradually drift away. I figured that I could just buy a cheap bike and "see how it goes", but then if I didn't get on with it how would I know how much of it was down to cycling, and how much to the bike... All day today I've been trying to justify the vast expense of a tricross, and all the associated gubbins that I, as a non cyclist, would have to buy just to get going - helmet, toolkits, pumps, spare tubes, lights, water bottles, racks, panniers, oils, locks, gloves, glasses, unflattering lycra outfits.

At 16:30 I nipped out of the office early to go and try a Tricross at a local Specialized dealer, who had built one up in my size. One lap around the local park totally sold it - I knew I couldn't go home with out it; negotiations began, loads of cool gear was piled up on the counter, and I finally got away at about 1900 an hour after the shop should have shut.

Unfortunately I couldn't take it for a proper run tonight, as I had guests coming over, but it will get it's first proper outing tomorrow, and I can't wait. Katie already calls it "the bitch", as she says I've been giving it more attention than her this evening - surely competition is healthy??

"The Bitch" looking for attention
A table full of "necessary" extras - I'm sure they totally saw me coming, but I'm chuffed to bits with all of it, and can't wait to be out there on a ride with you all!

Hopefully next time we all meet up I can do better than the 12 miles I managed in the peak district (on the flat) before putting it into the back of the car, and driving back from the pub!

Flotsam

2008-06-07T08:29:00.004+01:00

This is a very different phase of the trip, I keep having flashbacks to florida roads, wide open plains, the rolling solitude of life on the empty road. I’ve got over city fear, induced by what felt like a lifetime of tiny rural villages and small towns, a city no longer feels so dangerous and unsettling. Both bert and I felt this in Portland, the first time we walked out of the hotel we lasted less than a block before diving into a safe-looking bar.

I’ve spent the last few days wandering around the city and soaking up the atmosphere. It is an incredibly cool place, with downtown effectively on an island surrounded by steep, snow-capped mountains, with houses built right onto the lower slopes. Cruise ships routinely blast their horns as they leave their berth, helicopters buzz past the skyscrapers, floatplanes dive steeply down creeks to land amongst cruise ships, ferry-buses, container ships and paddle steamers. The usual low layer of cloud puts a lid on the city, cutting off the tops of the mountains, the glossy green skyscrapers disappear into the cloud sometimes, the strings of road lights descend out of the clouds on the mountains. The gloomy grey lid makes the city appear a half-formed science fiction dream, unworldly and unreal. Somehow you can tell that it’s a wilderness city, I guess it’s the wild sea and mountains forming the backdrop, or the planes and helicopters, you can feel nature waiting at the gates.

It’s the sort of city where turning a corner will reveal a stunning view in the gap between buildings, the only place I’ve seen similar is Edinburgh, and this place has the same sort of feel to it, but modern instead of renaissance. I’m going to ride north tomorrow to explore a little, past the houses huddled on the shoreline opposite downtown. It’s a bike friendly city, apart from the high theft rate, the shoreline path is full of cyclists, skateboarders, runners, walkers. It’s a bit like Edinburgh but with the amplifier turned up.

I’m glad I’ve rented a room in downtown, it feels kind of like I’ve moved here and I get flashbacks to making the big move to Edinburgh, it has the same feel of boundless possibility. Just like then I found myself staring half-drunkenly into the bar mirror at myself and saying “Kelv, you are in Vancouver!” This bout of introspection was stopped by Jo turning up in her cycling gear in the suit bar, flirting with everyone she could find in order to get directions to a student bar nearby, where she picked up an elderly british holiday couple whilst I was getting drinks. She is one of those people who crazy people on the bus make a beeline for I think. I prefer my ‘stay away’ field. We had a good night, slowly getting a little drunk and watching the students line up for the production line of martinis that their vouchers entitled them to.

I’ve returned to solo traveling mode without any glitches, I find I read a lot more, getting through a book a day and feeling a little lost if I don’t have one. I also seem to spend an awful lot less time waiting outside shoe shops and hearing the words ‘single speed’.

The realization that I was solo once more was brought home to me when I went to the cinema, after buying my ticket I realized that I was following a mad old woman in a purple nylon jacket up the escalator and into the cinema, that I have become part of the city’s flotsam, I am one of them. As part of this I have discovered the cheapest food in Vancouver, street meat, which can be pretty cheap. Sometimes disturbingly so. Still, it’s filling and tasty.

Amazingly I’ll be back in the UK in only 6 weeks time, which I think will pass quickly. I will have a lot less money than when I left, but I don’t regret spending a single penny, cent or dollar. This trip has brought truly priceless experiences so far, and each day continues to do so.

Interestingly both Jo and I have the same blind spot with traveling solo. I can happily spend all day in a bar solo, especially with a book, see a movie, chill out by the water, whatever. But I struggle to go into a busy bar by myself on a Friday or Saturday night, somewhere that you can’t just sit and read a book. The thought of just standing there by myself leaning against a wall puts me off every time.

It’s cool to spend a few days exploring the city but I’m starting to feel the moving-on itch, I think I will miss the riding so am planning a few long rides / short tours out of Toronto to visit various people and places. If I had the money I would definitely be heading up to Alaska, but I don’t, so I won’t. Next time. I'll have to make do with the train to Toronto in the meantime.

Street meat can be pretty cheap

2008-06-06T19:28:00.003+01:00

still in vancouver, got a cheap hotel/hostel in the city centre as jo is away camping for a few days, it's just next to the car park where we got broken into. Wifi is a bit dodgy but i'm gonna go for a run round vancouver shoreline now, past the float planes and helicopters, then write some bloggage in a bar somewhere

my cellphone doesn't work in canadia so no point ringing or texting, i won't get them, will sort out a cellphone soon although is kinda nice not having one, email is best for getting in touch. Or ring the hotel.

had a good night out with jo, started off in a suit bar but quickly went somewhere more appropriate, hopefully today's 6 mile run will sweat out the stale wine. Have managed to watch a couple of movies, after wanting to all the way across, saw Iron Man (bit pants) and Harold and Kumar go to Guantanamo Bay (not as good as the first 2 but ok). Felt great just to wander vancouver after wanting to come here for so long.

get the train to toronto on tuesday, takes 3 days, i got a reclining seat so its either gonna be fun or a nightmare, will stock up on books. Train has wifi so will be a good time to write stuff.

ok, i go for my run, taking my camera just for you people

Brighton, UK

2008-06-06T09:04:00.005+01:00

You have 4232 unread emails. Its good to be back. No, really it is. I left Kelv Tuesday in Vancouver and headed out to the airport loaded down with my months purchases. The 9 hour flight gave me plenty of time to mull over the 1500 bike miles and 500 car miles I’d spent with Kelv and James.

After landing at Gatwick I had to pop into work in Crawley to get my house keys which was a rude reality slap in the face. Luckily I’d got the day off so went straight back to Brighton, built up the Swobo and headed straight for the beach. Blue skies, waves rolling in, sun shining… it actually beat the Pacific! Lying there for a while and later cruising around the seafront felt like I was still on the other side the planet. It was time to put the Swobo through its paces. I headed for the biggest hill on the sea front, where the under cliff path links to the upper cliff path just past the marina and about 15% for 150m. That should do. It was tough no doubt but achievable, even in trainers and not SPD’s. Feeling confident I decided to give the bike a trial with panniers on and ride into work.

Yesterday I transferred the rack and pannier from the Tricross over to the Swobo for my first ever ride into work. Myself, Meat and Sammo rode out of Brighton under blue skies headed for Crawley 25 miles away. The true meaning of singlespeed was brought home to me on the climb to Devil’s Dyke, but once I’d warmed up and ate some breakfast everything was going fine. It’s a great tourer setup as long as you aren’t in any hurry. Top speed is about 22-25mph before the pedalling rpm gets too much. It flies uphill and descends pretty decently as well, about 38mph max coming down Devil’s Dyke. Coming home we rode the Downs Link, an old railway line which runs all the way to Shoreham. It performed as well off-road as onroad with the fat Vittoria tyres coping well. I'll be getting some tips from my Dad in Wales next weekend about riding Fixed. He thinks I should probably get a larger chainring as its geared a bit low. We'll see. All in all an awesome purchase for £300!

Probably need to say a little about our tour steed, the Tricross. We were both amazed with the bikes performance. 4000 miles on Kelv’s £700 Sport model and just a new cassette, chain and one tyre. You can’t get better than that. I think I must have helped sell about 5 on the trip when I saw people eyeing them up in bike shops. The custom build I had from Specialized was spot on and the well engineered gradients of the US roads didn’t pose a problem for the 34x27 setup, even with the panniers. No granny action on this trip. In fact I was kind of disappointed by the lack of tough climbs. Bizarrely 6% was the steepest gradient we had to contend with on the whole trip. The toughest climb was probably Flesher Pass in Montana, but that was more to do with the 35 deg C heat.

Kelv is still alive as far as I know, though he’s put his bike aside for a while and put on his new Brook’s running shoes. Last I heard he was headed to Toronto on Tuesday…

No More Bertie

2008-06-03T21:28:00.001+01:00

Bert has just left for the airport so it's back to solo mode for me. Already feels funny without him around. Not to worry, cool city to be explored. Not leaving my bike anywhere though!

Vancouver, the city of broken glass

2008-06-03T08:27:00.002+01:00

we've made it to vancouver after a day of watching bert go mad in shoe shops, he would fit in well in sex and the city, it can't be long before he starts looking at prada

unfortunately our hire car was broken into within an hour of being parked in downtown vancouver, they only stole one of bert's panniers which contained some clothes, his camera, and some other stuff, luckily they didn't take his other pannier loaded up with new cool stuff, and we both took our passports, documents, wallets and the laptop in my rucksack so that was safe

bummer

we're now crashing on the floor in jo's place, one of heidi's (my little sister) friends in vancouver, and we've been for some beers in Denny's! We are stylish people it is true.

vancouver is awesome though, great big steep snow covered mountains rising up just behind the city and a really strong asian influence, i can't wait to explore, it feels kinda like singapore

do you guys want this blog to continue now i'm not on the bike and bert has gone home? let me know, am happy to keep babbling

thanks for all the end-of-ride comments, it was well cool to read them all the way across

"I Don‘t Think So. Beagle"

2008-06-02T03:10:00.002+01:00

So we reached the Pacific, by hire car instead of bike, after saying I was gonna ride across America but getting a lift with James for a few hundred miles across Wyoming. Disappointing huh?

No.

Not at all.

Not for me.

You gotta understand the mindset. It’s not about the end at all, it’s about the journey. I know that’s a bit of a cliché but it’s true.

The point of this trip, riding across america, was not to ride every inch of the way, I don’t care about that, I’m not trying to break a record and I got nothing to prove. The point was to have an interesting and fun journey, to have new experiences, to break out of a stale life orientated around a job.

Man has it succeeded in that.

It feels like it’s been going on forever, looking back to the first few days in Florida, or the Gulf Coast, or Brandon’s, or Oklahoma, or the plains, seeing a tornado, first snake, tumbleweed, reaching the rockies, each one feels a lifetime ago. Then there was a cool and much-needed holiday road-trip week with james and bertie in da truck. Then riding through walls of snow 8 feet high, past bison, wolves, geysers in the prehistoric landscape of Yellowstone. 60 miles of wilderness between a few houses and a gas station became the norm rather than something to be feared. So much has happened I need to sit down for a while and get my head round it, I haven’t really had time to absorb it. I know that sounds a bit mad but life on the bike is quite busy, especially when riding with a crazed fool that enjoys trying to sabotage your line and force you onto the shoulder when you‘re not paying attention.

If you’re still focused on the idea of riding every inch of ocean to ocean then I gotta say that reaching the rockies was that moment for me, crossing the plains was by far the hardest part of the trip, they’re quite hilly and man they are windy and isolated, oftentimes my only company whilst riding at 8mph would be a cloud of dust on the horizon showing where a pickup was speeding along a dirt road. I actually started planning in bigger roads just so that there would be a car along once in a while in case something went wrong. The isolation of the plains could be a little unsettling, you don’t need much imagination to start imagining things that could go wrong, empty wide open spaces are an easy place to disappear, or be disappeared, and a couple of times I got a little spooked by someone or something and snuck my big folding knife out of the bar bag and into my pocket, just in case.

After reaching the rockies the character of the trip, and my drive, changed, I no longer needed the ‘ocean to ocean’ motivation, I had achieved more than enough, learned enough about myself, dug deep enough for long enough, to not need it.

So reaching the pacific after nearly 4000 bike miles and a few hundred by car is just another step on the way through this journey, another incredible moment amongst many. The journey is a continuum now, not a point.

It was kinda strange to follow lewis and clark’s footsteps for most of a thousand miles to be greeted by a tacky tourist seaside town, just like a british one, or the costa del sol. The Pacific Coast looks almost exactly like the west coast of Scotland, if you didn’t know where you were I honestly don’t think you could tell the difference for a while.

The dry thin air of the high plains gave me some sinus problems, I had a gentle nosebleed for most of a month, leading to an extreme snoring outbreak that bert has been stoically putting up with. Now that we’re back down low in moist air that really does feel thicker this has cleared up and bert was treated to a silent night. To compensate, I started talking in my sleep, apparently having a conversation with someone, after turning down their offer with a “I don’t think so” I finished with a firm “Beagle.”

I have no idea either.

We’ve hightailed it back to Portland, which was the scene of the real end of the trip. It seems fitting that the trip ended spontaneously in a drunken night of wine, shots and rums wandering round a strange but bike friendly city barely able to talk going in straight bars and gay bars and getting in trouble for accidentally jumping the toilet queue and talking to random strangers and drinking with the rickshaw guy and swapping shirts ‘cos he liked my “we still hang bike thieves in Wyoming’ t-shirt and riding the rickshaw, too drunk to see straight, through an intersection, barely able to steer, the rickshaw guy shouting at me to steer right steer right and just managing to, then neatly parking it next to a police car, we don’t remember how we got back to the hotel but I slept on the bathroom floor in a nest of towels after puking and wondering why there were lots of people in the other room which was bert talking on the phone to his workmates in their office. We were both still puking at 4pm the next day, the hotel staff had to bring a delivery menu up to our room as we couldn’t make it out of the door.

That’s how a trip like this should end, not in a long gritty slog over major hills into the teeth of a wind so strong you can barely walk or talk, along a busy dual carriageway full of trucks and cars with no hard shoulder in the cold grey wet rain.

Seaside, Oregon

2008-06-01T06:12:00.014+01:00

We've finally made it to the Pacific, though not on 2 wheels but in the hire car. Neither of us feel any regrets at all for completing the trip in this fashion, we just simply ran out of time. We'd budgeted a day to ride the 110 miles from Portland to Seaside, but driving the route today there was no way we'd have made it in less than 2 days. Bizarrely the road out towards Astoria was one of the hilliest we've encountered in the whole trip. That combined with the headwind, busy main road road and narrow or non-existent hard shoulder would have made it a very gritty end to the trip. Instead, we've taken a leisurely drive after a mammoth shopping spree in Portland this morning.

Portland rocks. Pure and simple, its the best place I've been to on the whole trip. We explored most of the Pearl district today and some of the east side, hunting down bike shops around the city. I bit the bullet and bought a singlespeed. My God its good. A Swobo Del Norte. It's a solid build with a switchable rear hub, fixed one side and freewheel the other. It also will take panniers & mudguards (I'm planning to ride it on the Ireland tour later this year) and it'll take 32mm tires so it can be used offroad. Its a beast, solid and mean looking. It felt great cruising around Portland on it whilst Kelv jogged alongside in his new Brook running shoes.

I could get used to riding it round this super bike friendly city...

Seaside has been a bit of a let down, the weather is overcast, its cold and the main town is like Skegness. Not quite what we expected. The beach however is great with fine white sands and scattered groups huddled around beach fires lighting up the 5 mile seafront. Tomorrow we're going to clean up the Tricross' and take them for a spin out to Fort Clatsop before unfurling the Welsh flag as we hold them aloft standing in the Pacific. If the weather doesn't improve we'll likely head back to Portland. Monday we drive up to Vancouver.

Its strange but the trip doesn't actually feel like its over, even though we've made it to the coast. If anything it feels like a new one is about to start. I'm so motivated by cycling now that I can't wait to get back to the UK to get out on the bike(s). The Tricross will be converted back to offroad use ready for tackling the South Downs, the Swobo is going to be upgraded with new bar tape, toeclips and a single front brake ready for practicing riding fixed on Brighton seafront, and the Trek is going to get a nice new set of racing wheels ready for the Devil Ride. Bring it on.

I've got a big blog brewing (no I don't need the toilet), about all the little things I've forgotten over the last month, but nows not the time. I need booze and tunes. Tonight I need bed :0)

Portland, Oregon

2008-05-31T09:33:00.004+01:00

Portland. 1:30am. The hotel room is littered with the debris of 2 apocalyptic hangovers – used towels, odd socks, empty coke cans, obliterated Chinese takeaway containers, Kelv mesmerized by flashing lights on Animal Planet on TV, half full mugs of stale water, receipts for a rounds of Jagermeisters at 3am, a stinking sweat soaked tshirt from a bewildered rickshaw rider.

The trip unofficially ended this morning at approximately 2am in a bar called the Tube. Kelv’s restroom queuing etiquette nearly got us ejected early, as did our animated discussion about riding Nant-y-Arian, as did our relentless consumption of Rum. Earlier that evening we’d wandered out of the hotel wide eyed and dazed like Tarzan in New York. After weeks in comparative wilderness and small towns being in a city fazed us. A group of people with $200 dollar haircuts and ill fitting fashionable clothes sauntered past us as we lurched down the street dazzled by their glitz. After walking a few blocks we got the fear and walked back to the first bar we’d seen. We sat at the bar next to 2 guys who looked like a warped tribute to Gareth Pugh and Meatloaf.

At some point in the evening we commandeered a rickshaw for what seemed like hours. I can’t remember a great deal, but the following flash backs have stuttered back into memory today: Sitting in the back with the rickshaw rider, whilst Kelv pedaled us into oncoming traffic; Jumping out whilst at fullspeed because I was so disgusted with myself being ridden; dragging the rickshaw rider into a bar and pouring jagermeister down his neck; Kelv swapping his Pedal House tshirt for the riders stinking, soaking, off grey/off fleshtone tshirt. We somehow managed to make it to the hotel room and somehow I managed to phone Michal at work. The conversation is hazy, except for lots of schoolgirl giggling, stunned silence and fuck yeah’s.

Today we’ve both been sick and deep in our own words of self loathing. What miserable worlds they are. Most of the day has been spent shuffling around the room, to the bathroom, back to bed, to the bathroom, to the floor. Kelv eventually made it out to get a Chinese takeaway about 6:30ish and we managed another sortie to the ice cream parlour a block away at 8pm. From what we’ve seen of Portland sober this evening it looks like a great city. Tomorrow we make up for today by going on a massive shopping spree. Trainers, tops, bottoms, a bike, cycling tops, er did I say bike… I’ve been thinking of getting a single speed and balls to it I’m going to buy one tomorrow.

You may be wondering how the hell we’re going to carry all the shit we’re buying, let alone another bike. Well… after arriving in The Dalles on Tuesday we had planned on riding to Portland Wednesday, but the week of hard miles had took its toll. We had a day off in which time the relentless winds we’d been warned about so much finally materialised as did the rain. So the plan was to hire a car in The Dalles and drive to Portland. Unfortunately the car hire company messed us around and after waiting all day for a car to return, nothing came in. So another night was spent in The Dalles. On Thursday we had the same situation with the car hire place, so decided to hire a motor to the east of Portland to get us into the city. It was a nice sunny day, but the wind was relentless as ever. To make it the 70 miles to Portland to get the car before it closed was going to be a challenge. We decided I’d go on ahead on my own at full speed, grab the car and drive back and get Kelv.

After only about 5 miles and a few calculations on average speed, it seemed pretty clear I wasn’t going to make it in time. The wind was insane, keeping maximum speed to below 15mph even on the flat. Not only that, strong gusts almost blew me off the bike a few times and I had some nice blasts on the horns of SUV’s as they passed. The route to Portland that day had 3 fairly big climbs and 20 miles of Interstate. In that wind the Interstate was going to be a nightmare. Luckily a lady at another branch of the car hire company in Hood River 20 miles away called me saying they’d got a car. We were saved!

A bit of car palava followed, getting the car in Hood River, driving to Portland, getting the other car we’d hired for the rest of the trip, driving both back to Hood River, dropping off the first and heading back to Portland. Before we left we stopped in Hood River for some lunch. Hood River was another great little town with obviously a very active population as the town had 3 bike shops and multiple kayaking and sailboarding shops. I saw my first S-Works Tricross (the carbon version of our bikes) and it looked amazing. Nice at $2,500….

So we’re now in Portland and only a few days remain. Rough plan is to shop tomorrow then head out to Seaside on the Pacific coast. We’ve got a great hotel right on the seafront. Sunday may spend another night in Seaside if the weather is good, or drive to Seattle and have a night there. Monday we drop the car in Bellingham near the Canadian border and pick up a Canadian hire car for the drive to Vancouver. Tuesday I fly home :-(

Although it’s not over yet, the trip has been absolutely epic and clichéd as it sounds, life changing. It’s totally changed my understanding of the USA and I could now seriously see myself living here at some point. Places like Boulder, Missoula, Hood River and here in Portland have had a profound effect on me. Not to mention the sheer immensity of this wild country. The weather has been biblical and with scenery to match. I’ve felt so small and insignificant on many miles of this trip. It’s also completely changed my perspective on long distance riding. 60 miles feels like a rest day in the right conditions.

There is so much I’ve wanted to blog about which I’ve either forgot, or been too tired to convey when I’ve sat in front of the computer at the end of a long ride. Little things along the ride make me smile or give me a warm feeling, or just make me feel immensely content. The last 600 miles from Missoula have been stunning and as we’ve dropped from the snow line into the lower altitudes spring has really started to come to the fore. The smell riding through the forest sections was amazing . I can’t imagine a better way to experience the country.

It’s going to be hard coming back and going to work. Hah that’s a fucking understatement. I’m planning the next trip now to keep things rolling. Last year I rode a 1000 mile tour around southern Ireland and I think it’s time to go back and see the North. 1000 mile trip from Galway up to Londonderry, down to Belfast and finish in Dublin. Should do the job :-)

Rolling Rest Day

2008-05-28T21:45:00.002+01:00

We both woke up tired as hell today after 500 miles in 6 days, felt like we hadn't gone to bed, and we were faced with many miles of increasingly busy and dangerous traffic (including the interstate and big bridges) as we worked into portland centre, so we decided to hire a car to get us through portland.

So we're chilling a little while in the hotel waiting for the hire car, and we'll have a sweet day in portland tomorrow too, before the final push from the western suburbs of portland to the ocean

Umatilla to The Dalles, Oregon

2008-05-28T07:02:00.006+01:00

Its been a long long day today. We slept in late at the motel in Umatilla and made it onto the road about mid-day. The weather is still failing to live up to the warnings of hellish headwinds we've been given (touch wood!) - today was another warm sunny day with little or no wind, perfect to crunch out some big miles. I felt totally unmotivated this morning, legs were ok but just had no va va voom. A coffee after 20 miles and some tunes on the ipod seemed to do the trick though.

Since leaving Missoula last Thursday we've ridden just under 500 miles and for the first time since leaving Boulder they have all been directly West. All the way we've seen the mile markers get lower and lower, counting down our advance to the Pacific. Its shocked us both to realise there are now only 2 days of riding left - tomorrow to Portland, and in a couple of days the final leg to Seaside. Can it be over?! I feel like I've only just started!

The closer we get to the Pacific, the further back in time the immense scenery seems to go. The dominating cliffs of the Columbia River valley are lava flows dating from up to 17 million years ago, exposed by erosion caused by the Missoula Floods 15,000 years ago. We have been in awe again of our surroundings following route 14 through Washington along the Columbia river.

We were presented with an unexpected 500m climb with 30 miles to go, but at the summit were treated to the jaw dropping view of Mt Hood in the distance. It looks like a comic book mountain, an 11,000 foot block of toblerone dropped onto the horizon. Great scenery helps the miles tick by and we clocked up 105 by the time we reached The Dalles in Oregon this evening.

A long day in the saddle is rewarded with a good motel, essentials being wifi, a pool, room service and a hot tub. Screw camping. Though I did feel pretty bad when the 2 guys we saw riding east mentioned they'd had their first night in a bed for 2 weeks. We decided though that their bizarre plastic barrel panniers actually contained lobsters on ice in one and bottles of champange in the other.

With the miles counting down our thoughts have been turning to what next, bouncing between fanciful plans for our next epics, or more sobering thoughts about work. In doing this trip I've slashed my holiday quota, leaving 2 weeks until April next year so my epic plans are of the mini variety. On the cards at the moment are the 100 mile Devil Ride in Mid Wales in August, a trip to the Tour De France in July and a couple of long distance weekenders down Brighton way. I'd like to attempt the 120 mile South Downs way in one day on my Tricross, but I think its going to be a bit too much.

Portland awaits tomorrow, 100 miles away along highway 30. Lets hope that wind gives us another days grace...

Rest day, kinda: Walla Walla (Washington) to Umatilla (Oregon)

2008-05-27T03:40:00.007+01:00

Ok ok ok what did we do today, hmm lemmethink back, oh yeah.

We only had 60 miles or so to do today, bizarrely this now counts as a bit of a holiday. We had a late start, getting up just before 11am, a quick breakfast in the gas station across the road, then cruising out through town. The day is sunny and warm, it’s gently downhill most of the way, there’s a bit of a tailwind, we only have a little way to go and there’s no rush.

We cruise, that’s what we do, tick follows tick follows tock, each one a gentle push on the pedals, so gentle that you can barely feel it. Bert’s slow-ride training is coming along well and he manages to ‘pootle’ along for several miles without sprinting.

We enter the Washington Scablands, the result of a 2000 feet deep glacial dam bursting back in the ice age 20,000 years ago, resulting in a flood 1000 feet high moving with the force of a fire hose, scouring the landscape from Missoula (several hundred mile east of here) all the way to the ocean. We ride over sand ripples a hundred feet high, the landscape is deeply eroded, bedrock showing. It is truly awesome.

Eventually we reach the Columbia River Gorge, 250 feet high and deeply eroded by the flood which filled it to the brim, overtopping in some places. The gorge is awesome and I get a crick in my neck looking up at the towering cliffs and caves made from scoured-out basalt columns.

I’ve wanted to see this place ever since I heard about it but hadn’t planned it in, so was chuffed yesterday when I realized we’d be riding through it. 20,000 years is kinda recent geologically, and there’s a good chance some genuine humans were around to see it.

A few miles along the river and we cross into Oregon. Unusually, photo-slut Bert ("Here I am! Where do you want me? Love me! Love me!") doesn't want his picture taken so you'll have to make do with just me and use your imagination.

We reached Umatilla and discovered it’s a run down tiny little place with abandoned buildings on the main street. Scoff and red wine is being followed up by some quality american TV which bert couldn’t wait to get back to. Welcome to the mainstream bertie.

It’s less than 300 miles to the pacific now, which is about 3 or 4 days ride. The Columbia River Gorge is renowned for fierce headwinds so each day will probably be a bit of a battle, but it’s so close to the end I think we can grit our teeth and push on.

We have ridden past a couple of dead rattlesnakes lately and today bert has been practising the action of scooping them up and lobbing them back at me as we ride, this gives me the fear but good.

So the trip is nearly over, although it only feels like a couple days ago that bert got here, even though that was 1000 miles ago!

Hell Yeah Boy! Lewiston (Idaho) to Walla Walla (Washington)

2008-05-26T07:06:00.012+01:00

The scene: Best Western in Walla Walla, Washington. Predator is on the TV, Bert is in bed, a demolished pizza delivery is in view. Bert is becoming more and more like Superhans from Peep Show, with almost everything being declared 'bullshit'. Genuine quote from today in a gas station: "These ice creams are BULLSHIT!" Our night in Lochsa Lodge has given us some new catchphrases but I can't put them here, we are trying to get rid of them before getting in serious trouble from using them in public.

I've said before that each day's journey is like a dream and looking at today's photos really brings that home, seeing the ones from the ride out of Lewiston this morning feels like an awful long time. I find that I can't judge how far back things are once I've ridden past them, they are in the dream world immediately.

We crossed the Snake River into Washington whilst leaving Lewiston, the river that Lewis and Clark followed to the Columbia then the Pacific. We've been following their tracks for hundreds of miles now and are getting a bit L&C'd out as their name is on almost every coffee shop, garage, side road and barber shop. Every tourist sign and historic marker is about them. This is great, but we are starting to lose the sense of wonder a little.

I have a bad cough at the moment, I sound like a dying sea lion, wheezing and barking and producing green lumps at inopportune moments. I was really struggling this morning, our plan was to do 100 miles to Walla Walla including 2 or 3 decent climbs and I really didn't feel up to it. We rode along the snake for a little while, past incredible rock cliffs similar to the Giants Causeway before hitting the climb.

As usual Bert tore off as soon as we hit the hill, I struggled up the 10 mile decent climb, harder than anything we hit in the rockies. At the top I'm expecting a little pass and a descent, but I'm totally shocked to be back on the plains! There is no sign whatsoever of where we came from, just plains as far as you can see in all directions. It's like a secret world that we've accidentally found the entrance to and is an extremely strange feeling. No wonder it all seems like a dream.

Ridewise Bert likes to dash and chill, I'm more of a constant trundler. The usual deal on long hills is that I'll work my way up slowly whilst bert will get stuck in with red eyes, and we'll meet at the top. My wheezing state amplifies this difference, giving bert a good 15 or 20 minutes free time at the top which he makes the most of by lazing on the grass in the sun admiring the lush green plains stretching all around.

It's a bit of a decision point. I'm feeling rough as hell, running at about 60 percent of normal, accommodation is either in 10 miles or 60 miles with nothing at all in-between. I'm used to pushing on so figure I'll go for it, we can always camp, that's what the tent is for.

Amazingly the next 30 miles are downhill with a tailwind, without pedaling we cruise along at 20mph, this is what it’s all about. Realising it’s Sunday, when almost everything is shut in these small towns (I keep expecting a sign saying ‘town closed, please go around’), we get a cheese toastie and our water bottles refilled at a diner. Most tasty.

The gentle downhill takes us through amazing valleys, past weird rock formations, along valley floors and meadows, strange junkyards in the middle of nowhere, abandoned barns and homes, fields of llamas, goats, donkeys, running deer, grassland waving in the breeze, a dust-devil forming, smooth empty road, wide shoulder. More dreamtime.

Riding through a cool little town (Dayton) a group of skateboarders is chilling on the main street. I like skateboarders, they feel kinda like wheeled cousins. In the pantheon of wheeled creatures bikes and skateboarders get on pretty well, we are much closer than motorbikes who seem to look down on us somewhat, although over here we do get the nod and wave from plenty of them, something I’ve never had in the UK.

One of the 10 year old skate kids is mounted on rollerblades and he breaks away from his buddies, racing me along the pavement. This is plenty cool, I love little episodes like this. As we race along the mainstreet, him dodging pedestrians, me dodging cars, we are grinning at each other, and both end up laughing out loud with sheer fun.

Time for another climb, I’m dreading this one as am still not feeling right. After a formal goodbye Bert heads off up the slope. I’ve been trying to teach him to ride slowly but he keeps failing the course by sprinting when he thinks I’m not looking.

Strangely my legs kick back in about half way up the hill, which is a few miles long, and I manage to stay only a few hundred metres behind bert. He doesn’t realise this, secure in the knowledge that the usually reliable kelv is not firing on all cylinders. As I reach the top I see him in the rest area taking off his helmet and dusting off the ground with his little hanky ready for a nice long snooze until I make the top.

But my legs are running well and as the gradient flattens I stand on the pedals, maximum acceleration, feeling the strong smooth power of the now fully functional main engines that I’ve had to nurse along all day. I take a wide curve through the rest area to stay out of his sight, using a passing truck to mask the sound of my tyres at about 25mph I pass an inch from his sleepy feet, shouting at the top of my voice “HELL YEAH BOY!” I’m rewarded with a startled squawk and look back to see his gangly arms and legs waving helplessly like a beetle on its back as he stares wildly around in panic.

This is enough to have me giggling spontaneously for the rest of the day and I enjoy the following descent to the next town. This is supposed to have a short gentle climb out of it, but the map makers have screwed up and it’s the 3rd decent climb of the day with loads of false summits. At the top we see a thunderstorm gathering with lightening playing about. We know we have about 12 miles to Walla Walla and it’s mostly downhill so we race the storm, staying just ahead of it and surfing the wind. We maintain a good 20mph into town, both enjoying the feeling of being able to pound along strongly after over 90 miles.

I still got the cough though.

Missoula MT to Lewiston ID

2008-05-25T06:40:00.002+01:00

Tonight we are right on the Idaho / Washington border in the small town of Lewiston. 3 States in 4 days isn't a bad average! Since we left Missoula in the cold and rain on Thursday we've covered 217 miles of Highway 12 - also called the North West Passage. The first 40 or so miles out of Missoula climb up from about 3250 feet up to Lolo pass right on the Montana / Idaho border at 5235 feet . Crossing the pass we reached the snow line again, this time in freezing rain. Just enough time for a quick photo at the PST sign before fast, cold, precarious descent down to the Lochsa Lodge. We've been yoyoing from wearing summer gear to winter gear so many times now. We even contemplated donating all our winter gear to the 2 guys we met riding Eastwards last week...

After a day riding in the rain Lochsa was like an oasis of heat, beer and good food. Our cabin had a big gas burner and after a little shenanigins and risk of detonating the propane tank we managed to get it fired up to dry out our kit. After wolfing down food in the bar, the lodge owners (one staunch Republican and the other Democrat) invited us along to their pool competition later that evening. The competition aspect seemed to be more about political arguing than pool and after 5 hours of drinking we reached a happy stalemate at 'Well you guys created America, so its all your fault'. This place was one of the best bars we'd been to so far and we had a good laugh with everyone we met there - could have easily fallen into the Missoula rest day trap and took a boat the rest of the way. We were however advised to stay on the road and off the river, it was 3 or 4 feet higher than usual from all the rain and snow melt. We've experienced nature in its rawest form out here, and the angry chaotic white waters of the Lochsa scared the shit out of us. There was a chance the river could rise enough for them to close the road ahead but luckily the rain stopped.

We some how managed to get up early the next day, still pissed eating breakfast and entertaining the waitresses with my lack of knowledge of egg cooking. The ride through the narrow Lochsa river valley (Canyon, must remember to call it Canyon) was a blur, in a dream like state we somehow managed 90 miles with huge hangovers. I think we both mentally retreated into our booze addled minds for most of it. The 100 mile river valley was another wilderness experience and almost every few miles there would be traces of an avalanche or landslide on the side of the road. Remains of huge trees lay by the side of the road completely shattered like they'd been hit by artillery. Rock falls seemed common and we were repeatedly dodging small boulders on the road. I even had pangs of claustrophobia at one point, feeling trapped by the seemingly endless river valley. It was 65 miles before we reached the first dwellings and the valley finally opened out when we entered the Nez Perce Indian Reserve 80 miles away. Bizarrely our legs still felt good and I'm sure we could have managed another few miles, but our heads were in pieces. Kooskia was the first town of any size so we decided to crash out. It was the perfect day for hangover riding - slight tail wind, sunny and downhill for 90 miles!!!

Today was more of the same, following the Lochsa until it joined the Selway to form the Clearwater. The ride was almost like groundhog day - after every spur of the valley we rode around, the terrain would repeat again almost exactly. It was like this for a good 50 miles. The scenery in the Nez Perce reserve along highway 12 is very similar to Wales, for a while again I was lost mentally thinking I was riding along the Dyfi river valley to Aberdovey. Must stop drinking.

We got into Lewiston early today after a 75 mile coast along by the river - no wind again, sunny and totally flat whole way. We've made the most of the last 2 days knowing they are probably our last days without wind before heading into Oregon and Washington. From here on in a nice strong headwind from the Pacific will be keeping our average speed well and truely down. Kelv needed some bits from the local bike shop and the owner told us that the Columbia river valley was one of the windiest in the USA and a mecca for sail boarding.

Portland is now only approx 340 miles away and the Pacific another 100 from there so we should make it for the weekend. Tomorrows target is Walla Walla in Washington at 102 miles, though we have a bail out option at 80 miles in Waitsburg if the wind is against us.

Here's some more pics from the last 3 days since we left Missoula:

Missoula to Lochsa
Lochsa to Kooskia
Kooskia to Lewiston

Heading to Lewiston, Idaho

2008-05-24T16:53:00.003+01:00

we're getting ready to roll along highway 12, about 70 miles to lewiston. Weather is fine and wind-free so far, supposed to be about 23 degrees today

should be another long river cruise, let's hope so

Half Way to Awesome

2008-05-24T07:04:00.003+01:00

I thought bert had been busily blogging for the last few hours as he was frantically typing on the laptop but it turns out he'd been chatting to people about dubstep, or as he puts it, he was 'busy'.

So here's just a quick update as we both got drunk last night, up until 2am, with a 90 mile ride today at about 17mph average, following the lochsa river all the way to Kooskia (pronounced koos-kee) where we are now.

I was still dragging my cold yesterday but managed to struggle on for 60 miles or so over the Lolo pass and along to the Lochsa Lodge, where the bar staff made us feel very welcome, with pints of Fat Tyre appearing as if by magic and the democrat versus republican arguments going on long into the night.

Today was a long ride starting out wearing everything we owned and ending up in t-shirt and shorts, we're well glad we didn't ditch our cold weather gear.

We're in Idaho now so are on Pacific Time, I think that's the 4th time zone i've ridden into now (eastern, central, mountain, pacific) so we are 8 hours behind. It's 11pm, I still have my cold, plus a hangover, and some sleep to catch up on. After all his hard work tonight bert is already in bed.

That's were I'm going now.

(Hi to Jesse at the Holiday Inn Reception Desk in Missoula, you know you want to do it, buy a bike and go!)

My Own Private Idaho

2008-05-22T16:15:00.003+01:00

We're leaving Missoula this morning, heading for the Lolo Pass about 40 miles away on hwy 12, then over the top and down into Idaho for the first time - and Pacific Standard Time! If all goes to plan we'll be staying at the Lochsa Log Cabins near the Powell Ranger Station, right on the Lewis and Clark trail.

Its going to be a soggy cold day - the 30+ centigrade heatwave is long gone, its now 6 deg C and will be raining all the way. We're ready though, wet weather kit is laid out, the bikes have been cleaned and lubed up, just leaves us to stuff our bellies at the cafe down the road and we're outa here.

Its a been a great week in Missoula, but I must admit I'm beginning to feel a little like Alan Partridge holed up in this Holiday Inn ('Have you got your big plate Alan?'). I've swam to the Pacific and back in the hotel pool, Kelv's scared the housekeeping staff numerous times, we've eaten our way through the rooom service menu, watched 20 episodes of Family Guy and even become members at the local video hire shop. Time to leave I think.

Today Idaho, tomorrow Washington! (hopefully...)

Pacific Plans

2008-05-21T18:28:00.002+01:00

Its been a while, not sure why I've not been bluging lately, I think I've been content to lounge in the pool and use the hot tub whilst leaving Kelv to it :) Now its his turn to lounge for our 5th day in this great town of Missoula, trying to throw off the lurg he's been brought down with. We could have probably ridden a few token miles further towards Idaho today but there is no point - we'd more than likely have to have another day off tomorrow somewhere much less comfortable and accessible as Missoula.

The town is similar size to Laramie and Helena, about 30,000 people and a University. What strikes you the most is how active everyone is - bikes are everywhere and in all flavours, single speeds, cross bikes, tri, roadies, mtb's, cruisers, kids in little trailers the lot. It doesn't look like the town relies on tourism for its active feel, I think the population is just generally health conscious and biking seems to be the major pastime, along with rafting, canoing, backpacking etc. We hadn't realised but its also the headquarters for the Adventure Cycling Association. This non-profit organisation create bike routes and maps, organise bike tours and help out with the national cycle network (like our Sustrans).

I went to their offices a couple of days ago and bought a few maps - their Lewis and Clark route maps roughly follow the same course I'd planned for the last leg of the journey from Missoula to the Pacific via Portland. These maps are perfect, lots of information on places to eat, sleep, get repairs, much more than you'd find on your average road map. We'll be using sections 6 and 7 for the rest of the trip. It also looked like and amazing place to work - Cartography, American History and Cycling under one roof! (Cooch maybe your perfect job?) I envied the staff there.

Before I left I was asked to sign into their book of visiting cyclists - the guy a couple days before me was a German chap riding round the world. They also took a Polaroid and stuck it on their wall with all the other long distance cyclists that had passed through Missoula. Was then offered free internet access from their computers and free pop and ice cream! Awesome! I was politely asked to leave after my 6th cornetto.

Plans have had to change a little with the time we've spent in Missoula. I was hoping to attempt a big solo ride from Seattle to Vancouver but I doubt I'll be able to squeeze that in now. Health and fitness permitting we should reach the Pacific on Sunday 1st June - 2 days before I fly back to the UK from Vancouver. The route follows Lewis & Clarks trail westward and is something along these lines:

Missoula (MT) > Lolo Pass (MT) > Hwy 12 (ID > Lewiston (ID) > Walla Walla (WA) > Umatilla (WA) > Biggs (OR) > Cascade Locks (OR) > Portland (OR) > Seaside (OR)

Thats about 700 miles approx. We'll be taking a day off to explore Portland and hopefully a day by the Pacific if we have time. I can't wait to see the sea, its weird we feel so close and yet 700 miles is still a good way to go. I'll miss Montana when we head into Idaho. Its been my favourite state so far and was nothing like I expected. Saying that, none of the trip has been anything I expected (not least the snow!!!). Montana's landscape has been the most varied and in the week of riding from West Yellowstone to Missoula we've seen some spectacular scenery with great people and friendly little towns on the way. We also had the best climb of the whole trip so far - the first pass somewhere near what you'd find in the Alps - Flesher Pass. Was good to get stuck into some switchbacks finally!

I've still got 2 weeks left of the trip but I can't stop now thinking of coming back to gritty reality when I get back to the UK. In some ways I'm looking forward to it, in others dreading it. I'm sure I'll forget about it when we get back on the road.

Map Update

2008-05-20T18:51:00.001+01:00

You can see our overall progress here. Red pins are ones we drove to with James.

View Larger Map

One more day in bed, frustrating or what!

2008-05-20T18:18:00.006+01:00

Bleugh, well, woke up with a cold this morning, all weak and hot and cold, so have scrubbed todays ride unfortunately. It's tough to take another day off like this, we're both keen to do the remaining 660 miles or so to the coast, but it's just not worth riding when you're weak and fluey, will prob just make myself worse.

So another day in bed for me watching family guy. We got room service breakfast and I embarrassed the waitress by lying around in my pants with my eyes closed, moaning softly in self-pity whilst Alan signed the bill. Alan is feeling ok now he's had a proper day's rest so has gone out on an unloaded solo blast up Lolo pass, I've told him I want an average of at least 17mph.

Yesterday we kicked around town, alan had to trawl the bike shops for a new saddle, and also went to the Adventure Cycling Association headquarters, where he now wants to work. I finished the antarctic exploration book in the sun by the river, providing a contrast to what they went through. There was some cool wave surfing going on with kayaks too, it's a cool town.

Hopefully I'll be fine tomorrow, we'll probably be off the internet for a few days though as there's not much in the valley and it'll take us a couple of days to get through it.

Bed

2008-05-19T17:50:00.004+01:00

Heh heh well we both felt pretty bushed when we woke up, having squandered our precious rest day yesterday on hangovers, which pretty much cancelled out any benefit of having a rest day, so we have taken the major luxury of pressing '0' on the little ole telephone and booking another day, shutting the door in the faces of the housekeepers and drawing the curtains.

This works out well 'cos alan needs to buy and test ride a new saddle to save his ass, and the bikes need a good clean 'n lube, and we are both enjoying the lie in. The only big decision of the day is whether to eat last night's leftovers for breakfast, or get room service, or stay in bed until so hungry it drives us out to get something. It is a tough life.

Helena to Lincoln then Missoula

2008-05-19T03:38:00.009+01:00

I’m sorry the blogging has been a bit thin lately, the rides have been tough for one reason or another leaving us both pretty worn out at the end of the day. I thought it was just me being old when I was riding solo, but bert is the same, and the two 21 year-old (or so) lads we met touring the other way say they’re pretty bushed at the end of the day, and struggle to get up in the mornings.

The other reason is that I’ve got well stuck into the story of Scott’s journey to the south pole, ‘the worst journey in the world’ by Apsley Cherry-Garard, and it’s hard to put down.

It’s actually very difficult to remember where we rode and stayed, the days blur together, each one seemingly taking much more than a single day in memory. Whenever people ask me where I rode from that morning I have to struggle to remember, each day is like an endless dream, and the morning seems a lifetime ago. Often I just have to say that it was about 50 miles to the southeast and then they’ll name the place, and I think “of course! That was only a few hours ago!”

Helena was a cool little town, but after the chicken sandwich I saw nothing of it as I holed up in the room and got room service. I was still a little weak as we set out the next day, but I’m used to pushing on endlessly now, it’s all mental really.

The tiny road wound along the foothills with the mountains in the distance, it was one of the most beautiful roads of the tour, rivaling the closed island road on the gulf coast. One house had a guy outside setting off explosives, I’m not sure what for, didn’t hang around to find out. Bert had to adjust his saddle so I cruised off solo, marveling at the scenery and enjoying the silence and isolation.

We stopped at a post office in the hamlet of Canyon Creek, just a tiny general store and a few houses. The shopkeep lady shouted ‘I’ll be there in a minute’ from her garden, so we chilled on the steps until she came, stocking up on chocolate milk and stamps.

We knew a long climb was coming next over the continental divide, for the first 10 miles or so we wound gently up Canyon Creek itself through a mountain pine forest, the creek chuckling away beside us. Bert stopped again for another saddle adjustment so I had the road to myself again. It was even more isolated, and riding past a small cliff I heard stones skitter down from above, I was checking for mountain lions lying in ambush but my fears were unfounded, probably.

Bert caught up just before the climb steepened from gently ascent to proper switchbacks. He always goes ahead on hills, I’m a slow steady climber anyway, and my bike is loaded a lot more heavily than his, so he gets stuck in and I work my way up steadily.

Normally I love out of the saddle switchback climbs but I really struggled on this one, I think a combination of altitude, heat, the weakness left over from being ill the day before, and pushing myself up the gentle climb faster than normal as part of a road game with bert, trying to drag out the time before he caught me up. Either way I struggled up the switchbacks, getting a blinding headache that made me ride with one eye shut, that stayed with me for most of the next day.

At the top we were both too tired for the usual ceremonies, and we realized that what we thought was a stick was actually a chewed-off deer leg, quite fresh, so we got stuck into the descent. The forest opened out to show the road ahead descending through a long valley to distant snow-capped mountains, making us both grin.

After the descent it was a fast slog for 11 miles, my riding has definitely got stronger after having to push myself to keep up with bert, and we did a strong 16mph into a decent headwind. Lincoln was a pretty little tourist village (people here laugh if you say village, it sounds very quaint, they call them towns) and we bagged ourselves a cabin in the forest on the edge of town.

Do you have any rooms free?
Yes
How much?
60 dollars
Does it have wifi in the rooms?
Yes
Does the sauna work?
Yes
We’re yours

The forest smelled of fresh pine, I really love mountain forests, the trees were tall and strong, you could look up at them for hours. After a heap of food and a couple of beers in town we were heavily chilled and horizontal.

Bert has developed a monstrous appetite on this ride, whereas I’ve gone the other way. Usually he picks at his food and leaves half of it, now he wolfs it down then orders more. On leaving Helena we had a full cooked breakfast, 20 minutes later he downed a big burger in a garage, in the bar he has a huge beef and cheese roll with fries then a massive chocolate brownie covered in ice cream, surely a 2 person dessert but he sucks it down, whereas I was too full to move after my club sandwich and merely had a little taster spoonful, which he grudgingly let me have.

The next morning my headache is still with me and I’m seriously thinking about staying another day here. He’s feeling pretty wiped out too after the climb so we decide on a late start, getting a couple of hours kip, a decent brunch then heading out after changing his rear tyre which started shredding at the end of yesterday’s ride. We decide to always carry a spare from now on, that’s the 3rd tyre to die on this trip, one from being cut by debris and two from just being weak, touring tyres being hard to find in shops.

It is predicted to be about 89F today, but it turns out to be 100. Luckily the road is gently rolling along the Blackfoot river, the scenery changing yet again to become just like Switzerland with lush alpine meadows, rushing rivers and grazing cattle. To think that 5 days ago we were in semi-arid desert plains, 3 days ago we were snowed in at Old Faithful, having to break out in sub-zero temperatures, and now we’re in a baking hot Switzerland, it is almost beyond belief, no wonder the journey seems like a dream.

A roadside sign helpfully points out that it is wilderness all the way from here northwards into canada, a distance of a couple of hundred miles easy. Cool.
At a gas station we immediately spot a couple of guys in bike gear, and then see their touring bikes. Awesome. These are the first touring cyclists I’ve met so far, and I am jealous of their road beards, although they admit to having started them off early. They’ve been on the road a couple of weeks and last night was their first night in a bed, this makes bert and I a little ashamed. They are impressed at the idea of riding from miami to denver solo, saying that they struggle to get up in the morning as it is when they can help motivate each other. It’s great to chat, and we are really sad to say goodbye. A real pity they weren’t heading the same way, it woulda been a great laugh.

He accidentally torments me over the final 15 miles by wrecking my carefully constructed long-distance mental state by counting down the miles. My way is basically to forget about how far to go and just ride along without thinking about it, this is especially important when I’m tired, like the final 15 miles on a 100F day. Just as I’m forgetting about the distance and riding along he will say ‘only 12 miles to go now’, and I am brought back to the reality of 12 hot tired miles, nearly an hour’s worth, with who knows what hills to come.

He also plays the 'towing' road game, sometimes latching on to my bike so i have to drag him along, and as we get into the edge of town he grabs me by the scruff of my neck and drags me along like a child whilst berating me loudly. I can hardly stop laughing when he does this, and it's funny to watch people stare. We take a wrong turn onto the interstate slip road (no big deal) and do a u-turn, as we ride back up the wrong way on the shoulder a car comes past with 4 mouths wide open in shock and horror, clearly assuming we've been riding the wrong way down the interstate for some time.

We’re both glad to see the hotel, and Missoula turns out to have a cool downtown as it’s a small college town, we both like these. It has an undercurrent of violence though, Ben, who we met at Signal Moutain Lodge, has a brother who lives here. Him and his mate got put in hospital by 7 guys who jumped out of a car and kicked their heads in because they thought they were gay. There is also an ‘out’ policeman who regularly gets abuse scratched into his car, or stuff thrown over his house, or worse.

Still, this goes on pretty much everywhere, it’s a cool town just the same. The waitress likes our accents and brings her friend over to meet us, and gives us free large whiskeys. Downing the whiskey was a mistake I still feel. We leave about 1am and fumble our way back into the room. I somehow manage to order a pizza on the phone, one of the most difficult tasks of the trip after drinking so much.

After dealing with our hangovers we headed into town, checking out the bike shops and cool bars. Now it’s now, we’ve rented out some ‘family guy’ dvd’s, soon there will be some food. Tomorrow we have a hefty climb through Lolo and a couple of nights camping with the bears. The statistics all sound fine, but I suspect they will be little comfort lying in a tiny tent with bert’s feet in my face in pitch black listening to something heavy snuffling around outside.

Who is up for it?

2008-05-18T19:35:00.002+01:00

hmm, i'm thinking this might be the next trip, pretty hardcore though! Riding the continental divide off-road from canada to mexico:

http://www.adventurecycling.org/routes/greatdivide.cfm

why?

2008-05-18T16:58:00.002+01:00

why oh why did i drink so much last night? it is alan's fault, i fear the gleam in his eye when he orders a round of shots, the flirtatious waitresses didn't help when they brought over free whiskey for us, it didn't go well with the wine and beer i'd already had, or the rum

never again

Missoula, Montana

2008-05-18T02:26:00.002+01:00

hoooo well we made it to missoula, a stunningly beautiful ride along the blackfoot river through swiss scenery. It was about 100F, which is damn hot, and sapped both of us so we rolled in to town on empty.

met a couple of touring cyclists for the first time, 2 cool american dudes riding west to east, opposite to us, there was a lot of talk about the road, trail snacks, bikes and gear. Was great, woulda been cool to ride with them a while but as they were going the other way it would be kinda hard. They camp every night, whereas now that bert is here if there's no pool and wifi in the hotel we refuse to stay there, so that showed us up a bit.

we are off into town in a bit, we're in the holiday inn right in the centre, and we got a rest day tomorrow which luckily lets us avoid the 30mph headwind that's forecast.

expect an uber-splurge posted tomorrow with masses of pics and vids, hangovers willing.

Lincoln, Montana

2008-05-17T04:12:00.002+01:00

just quick post, both pretty bushed, bert in bed and sleeping at 9pm, had a good ride today, nice and warm, beautiful empty road winding up a canyon, crossed the continental divide for the last time, in pacific country from now on, climb was toughest yet, about 10m of gentle then 3 miles of quite steep switchbacks up to about 6500 feet, enough to feel altitude effects again, both got bad headaches

now we're in a cool little cabin in a forest, bert's back tyre started shredding just as we got into town so he'll be on the spare tomorrow as we ride into Missoula where we stay for a rest day on sunday. Should be about an 80 miler tomorrow, seems to mostly follow a river along so hopefully just a cruise

might stick some more up later

You too can be part of the Hamilton-Buttler Expedition!

2008-05-16T05:30:00.003+01:00

Yes! It's true! At zero cost you can support the expedition and help bring glory to our tattered remnant of the British Empire.

How?

With comments, that's how. We love comments. We're writing this stuff for you, and it gladdens our little lycra clad hearts when we log on at the end of a long tough day of weather, dangerous incidents, and sneaky road games to find interesting comments. It lets us know that people out there are interested in what's going on. It also leads to lots of gloating and snide comments if one of our posts gets more comments than the other. That's my favourite bit to be fair.

Chicken Sandwiches Are Not Your Friend

2008-05-15T23:43:00.004+01:00

Nice warm day today, about 20C, just got in to Helena, the capital of Montana which amazingly only has about 27,000 people, although the whole state only has like half a million people, and it's huge! We're used to isolation and tiny places now so this place seems like a metropolis.

We had a good ride today, although bert has responded to my post last night by wearing his ipod headphones all day so he doesn't have to talk to me. We have a new game now though, when there is a layby (or turnout as its called here) one of us will usually ride along the edge of it, whilst the other will slyly try to get the right speed to block the exit and force the other onto the verge. He is good at it, but luckily is pretty bad at the 'avoid the puncture' game.

We've been in summer gear all day, which is a nice change from sub-zero snow. We are well into lewis and clark country, I can't recommend their journals enough, an incredibly inspiring and interesting read from what seems like long ago but is only a couple of hundred years. OK that does sound like a long time. We crossed the missouri for the first time, the river they came up for something like 1000 miles before having to portage across the rockies, which took a month.

We were riding well until the chicken sandwich i had for lunch turned out to be perhaps a little dodgy, i rode the last 30 miles with zero energy in my legs, unable to eat, with a 50/50 chance of a double-ended wet explosion. Bert used my complete wiped-outness to strong-arm me into the most expensive hotel in town as he was hungry for a swimming pool.

But all is good, as always. Tomorrow we got a long day through a decent sized pass. Should be good. Hopefully there will be a long descent, these are a lot of fun, we often play in each others slipstream like dolphins, sort of. I hate to go in front though as I've seen bert crash on descents so often that I like to be able to see him all the time, otherwise i have to keep turning round to see if he's still on the road, which is kinda dangerous at 45mph. Our bikes are good descenders though, even loaded they're smooth and predictable.

OK, room service is on the way. I'm sure bert will stick some photos up later. Riding with him is a bit like being on big brother, you're never sure when you are being filmed.

Late Night Babble

2008-05-15T05:07:00.006+01:00

When touring with bert you must quickly get used to the sight of his skinny ass disappearing towards the horizon, as he rides as if he is in a race but just happens to have bags on the back, or alternately as if he has an urgent deadline to meet.

His chosen technique seems to be:

1. Rest behind me for a while making the most of the slipstream, babble on at me in a low voice about how things are 'mad' or 'insane' or 'sick' whilst looking in another direction so I can't hear what he's saying
2. Accelerate smoothly and strongly past me until about half a mile ahead, then stabilise at that distance without looking back once
3. After about half an hour drop back for a rest
4. Repeat

This is actually fine with me (apart from never being able to hear what he's saying) as I don't like riding in team mode, i like to cruise on kinda solo, sometimes ahead, sometimes behind. Sticking on someone's wheel, or taking turns in a road train is not for me. I like it when the rider group strings out over a mile or so, different little groups forming and splitting, i like to move between them all.

When bert is out front it looks fantastic seeing the little bike against the immensity of the landscape, it really brings it home what I'm doing, somehow it gives it context. Sometimes its fun to ride together, springing surprise sprints on each other, or trying to go the fastest downhill without pedalling, or sneakily sabotaging each other by forcing the other towards a puddle or horrible bit of road, or quietly grabbing onto a bit of bike for a free tow. Sometimes its cool to ride apart, content in our own thoughts. Sometimes we ride alongside, chatting and giggling (for some reason saying 'fuck yeah!... FUCK YEAH!' acts like a natural drug on me, it fires me up whilst making me laugh my head off). It's all good. When something goes a bit wrong, like getting a flat, it's great to have backup and a second pair of hands.

Yesterday he decided to stay in front of me for a while to take the wind for the last few miles into town. He would kindly get in front, then his eyes would go red and he would stick his head down and accelerate at a pace I could not match, after 10 minutes look back to double check that i was still there, appear surprised, drop back until just in front of me, put his head down and pull away again in race mode, repeat every 10 minutes.

The boy has oil in his blood I am sure, he is an incredibly fast and strong cyclist. Luckily my ego can take being wiped all over like this even after nearly 3000 miles.

For some reason the idea of ceremonial pissing, mostly by bert, has developed, and every significant sign is marked as our territory, particularly continental divide crossings. Today he took one by the side of the road, immediately a family car appeared round the corner, the occupants providing a mixture of grins, shock and cheery waves.

We are out of the high altitude area for a while now and the difference is tangible, breathing whilst climbing hills actually feels like it's doing something and we are both sleeping better.
Altitude has become extremely important for planning purposes, just like weather, you have to plan in slower paces, more water consumption, colder temperatures, chances of snow. It's really begun to feel like an expedition lately.

Montana is another beautiful state, each mile of this journey seems to become more impressive than the last. Riding along yesterday was powerful, we passed canyons, bluffs, buttes, with mountains streaming past either side, the geology clear as we followed the valley. The landscape here seems raw and on a huge scale. Sometimes wildlife will interact with us, a buzzard hovering above staring at us, deer bouncing along the roadside as if racing us, horses charging out of the hills and galloping alongside, herds of bison grazing the verge fixing us with a terrifying glare amplified by the large and vicious horns.

Bison turn out to be far more dangerous than bear, many more people are killed each year by bison, and it is unsettling to have to sneak past them on the hard shoulder. Bert spoke about the police warning us about a wild bull bison on the road, we pushed hard through that section, the roadside lined with rangers and police standing on their trucks, the bull hidden somewhere in a section of high scrub bushes. We were constantly scanning for it, waiting for it to burst onto the road and come for us as we struggled up the hill. Luckily we seemed no threat to it, or perhaps the rifles on the trucks put it off. A road crew a couple of miles later shouted out 'watch out for bison!' whilst giving us smiles and thumbs-up.

The roads are so empty out here it's unreal, after the road crew we rode for miles along a lake and into a canyon, the road was ours, and we practiced trying to ram each other off the road like bison. The valley was blocked and flooded by a landslip a few years ago and it still looks raw, half the mountain is like a raw scar, and the thought of the poor campers that were buried under it is sobering.

Life in the UK really is tame compared to out here. Everything is tougher, you have proper weather, dangerous animals, earthquakes, volcanoes, isolation, everything. I gotta admit I love it. No wonder everyone drives SUVs out here, you'd be crazy not to. Mind you, we overheard a guy yesterday saying how his car gets great gas mileage of 20mpg.

This morning on the way out of Ennis we climbed a hill steeper than anything in the Rockies, passing over them into a long valley that looked amzingly like high parts of wales, and for the first time this trip we experience a typical british day of drizzle, grey sky and light winds. Pretty cool really, and the dark skies make the empty landscape somehow even more impressive.

The rockies are quite suprising, the plains they rise from are so high that the rockies are more like a range of high rolling hills, the roads are at such gentle inclines of about 6% that they are not really a challenge in themselves, it's more the weather and altitude that make them a real barrier.

Many of the tiny villages (although they always call them cities) and towns we ride through have barely changed since the 1800's, just substitute horses for cars, slightly update the building techniques and it's pretty much like all the cowboy movies. A wide main street, a saloon, somewhere to stay and a gas station. Three Forks, where we are today, is the sort of quiet small town off the main road where you can walk down the middle of the main street without worrying about cars, and the kids hanging out say hello politely as you walk past.

Well, bertie is dancing in his sleep with his ipod on, bless him. I'm listening to kings of leon on headphones after a stint of sitting on the porch in a rocking chair. All is good. Only a couple of weeks to the pacific, I have a strong urge just to keep going to alaska but the budget is saying 'no chance'.

Ennis to Three Forks, Montana

2008-05-15T01:33:00.003+01:00

After the raw country side of Yellowstone and the Madison Valley, today was to be a traditional touring cyclist’s slog. Slight headwind, rain, total cloud cover and miles to be done. Our target today was Three Forks, where the Madison, Jefferson and Gallatin rivers meet to form the mighty Missouri. At only 50 miles today was going to be relatively comfortable after yesterday’s 105 mile wonder ride.

The route today took us through the rolling valley floor into the foothills of the Tobacco Root Mountains, over the Madison River, the Jefferson River and then finally to Three Forks. The Missouri forms about 5 miles north of town on the route we follow tomorrow to Helena. It’s definitely getting hotter down here and the weather for the rest of the week looks awesome. By the time we reach Missoula on Saturday it should be up in the 30’s, an insane contrast to a few days earlier in Yellowstone.

Short days now and then help keep things enjoyable instead of being faced with 100 mile slogs day after day. We arrived in Three Forks early, sorted accommodation and hit the nearest cafe for a big lunch and a round of micro brews (though Kelv had Bud, heathen, we're not in the Buck now). I've been loving the beer here, every state so far has had awesome booze. So far Moose Drool (Missoula, MT), Fat Tyre (Fort Collins, CO) and the Discombobulator Maibock (Jackson Hole, WY) have been staple diet. Best name has to go to the Discombobulator, try ordering a round of those bad boys after a few double rounds of Tuaca (you know the rules).

Three Forks has some history, being the point where Lewis and Clark pondered which one of the three rivers would best guide them westward’s over the Rockies to the Pacific. It was also the tribal home of the only Indian and only female member of their party – Sacagawea. The hotel where were staying in Three Forks is named in her honour - http://www.sacajaweahotel.com/. It’s nearly 100 years old and looks right out of the Walton’s with its rocking chairs out on the porch.

We’re now in deep Lewis and Clark territory for the rest of the journey, so expect to hear lots of references to them :) For some reason these 2 explorers seem to encapsulate the drive of the whole trip for both of us. I’d read their journal after Kelv lent it me a few months back when he was planning the tour. Reading about their epic journey of discovery up the Missouri into uncharted lands whetted our appetites for travel. It still amazes me how much this country has grown in just over 200 years considering that at the turn of the 1800’s, the furthest west that had been populated by European American’s to any extent was St Louis.

This extract from the National Parks Service site should give a good taster for what they got up to:

Lewis and Clark traveled more than 8,000 miles in less than two and one-half years, losing only one member of their party, at a total cost to the American taxpayer of $40,000. The significance of the Lewis and Clark Expedition was far reaching. It strengthened the United State's position in the struggle for control of North America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. Lewis and Clark's trek also inspired explorers, trappers, traders, hunters, adventurers, prospectors, homesteaders, ranchers, soldiers, businessman and missionaries to move westward--spurring a century of rapid settlement which peopled the West with European-Americans and disrupted the cultures and lifestyles of countless American Indians.

Lewis and Clark contributed to geographical knowledge by determining the true course of the Upper Missouri River and its major tributaries while William Clark produced maps of tremendous value to later explorers. They forever destroyed the dream of a Northwest Passage (a water route across the continent), but proved the success of overland travel to the Pacific. They made the first attempt at a systematic record of the meteorology of the West, and less successfully attempted to determine the latitude and longitude of significant geographical points.

Through the Expedition's peaceful cooperation with the American Indian tribes they met, they compiled the first general survey of life and material culture of the tribes of the Missouri, Rocky Mountains and the Northwest coast. Lewis and Clark also made significant additions to the zoological and botanical knowledge of the continent, describing at least 120 mammals, birds, reptiles and fish, as well as almost 200 plant specimens. By any measure of scientific exploration, the Lewis and Clark Expedition was phenomenally successful in terms of accomplishing its stated goals, expanding human knowledge and spurring further curiosity and wonder about the vast American West.

Anyway, that’s enough history for one night or else I’ll be stealing Cooch’s thunder! Time to head to the bar for another Discombobulator injection I think….

Old Faithful Breakout to Ennis, Montana

2008-05-14T06:24:00.005+01:00

Today was D-Day. Weather reports showed that there was to be a window in the spate of blizzards which had closed off our escape route out of Yellowstone. In the last 24 hours there had been 18 inches of snow and the mountain pass we’d climbed the day before was closed for the 2^nd time in 3 days. The weather yesterday at Old Faithful hadn’t been as bad as at Dubois, but experience put us off trying anything foolish. The decision was a good one, we braved the weather and explored the various geysers and springs in the park, even got to wave back home on the webcam as Old Faithful predictably roared away.

The area around the geyser park is like nothing else I’ve experienced, it almost feels prehistoric where nature is at its rawest. Wild buffalo trudge around nonchalantly whilst geysers splurt superheater water into the steaming river. We are amazingly lucky to experience the Grand Geyser launch into its 15 minute eruption, right at the end of its 5 hour window of prediction. Running low on our miniature bottles of wine bought for the tour of the park, the rest of the day was spent in the bar looking at the snow continuing to fall.

Back to this morning. Blue skies wake us early and after a full breakfast we’re defrosting the bikes ready for the evacuation. The plan today is to get as many miles between us and the Park as possible, aiming for the town of Ennis in Montana approx 105 miles northwest.

I’ve got every item of winter clothing on and am feeling toasty, even though it must be subzero. Definitely a good move getting the right kit. Leaving Old Faithful in glorious sun shine we ride out through the park passing steaming vents all over the landscape. It looks like a cross between some prehistoric b-movie and a scene from Vietnam. I expect to see a herd of Brontosaurus fending off a flight of Huey’s at any second.

We’re both scanning for Grizzly’s subconsciously as we ride – yesterday we were told there are 6 in the immediate vicinity of Old Faithful. The park rangers have been shooting them with rubber bullets to keep them away. A slightly obscured Buffalo scares the living shit out of us as we spot only its torso moving through the trees. No more taking a quick piss by the side of the road here, instead I find a bear proof WC in a layby, where I take my first tumble of the trip wiping out on black ice. A friendly park ranger helps me up and we chat to him about the bears. It appears Buffalo are a more serious threat and he tells us of a section ahead where onside the road is a drop to the river and the other is the cliff face. He’s had to scale the cliff face to avoid buffalo’s in the past…

Riding on we reach the river and thankfully avoid any Buffalo or Bear incidents, but 10 metres ahead of us a wolf wanders across the road. A mile later we pass a Bald Eagle sat above its eeire. This place is great but seriously I’d feel better in the SUV. To take our mind off things the scenery now seems to change dramatically every 10 miles or so. We’re almost out of the Yellowstone Caldera and into a deep river valley which opens out westwards to West Yellowstone. The horizon is lined with snowcapped peaks about 50-60 miles away – judging by the map our destination is the other side of them.

Crossing from Wyoming into Montana we enter West Yellowstone where we stock up on food and supplies - our last chance before reaching Ennis 71 miles away. In the towns bike shop / video shop / model shop, the owner tells us the Madison River valley should have a nice tail wind all the way, oh and Black Bears. Riding out of town we follow the 287 northwest following the side of the frozen Hebgen lake.

A little way ahead a park ranger slows down with his lights flashing to get our attention. A buffalo bull is loose on the road ahead and with an anxious look he advises we best get through the next section at full speed. And not to stop. Powering past a large congregation of rangers alongside a large stock wagon we pass a sign ‘Earthquake Area’. Ahead is Quake Lake, created by earthquake caused landslide in the 1950’s. The landslide obliterated a campsite killing over 20 people.

All this aside, the place is absolutely stunning. Hebgen Lake is still completely frozen and the 287 is totally empty of traffic. In fact is quieter than Yellowstone itself. We cruise through the valley enjoying the slight downhill and tailwind taking in the wide vistas of this immense state of Montana. The first 60 miles flies by and soon we’re out of the deep valley and into the plains beyond. The mountains are by no means behind us though with a 360 degree ring fence of snow capped mountains penning us in.

The snow has all but vanished from the roadside since descending the 2000 feet from Yellowstone. It’s almost summer time here in comparison and we’re riding in our short sleeves for the last 30 miles on the dead straight road. We reach Ennis and book into the first motel we find with WiFi. Yellowstone supposedly has no internet access at all in the park so after being starved for 2 days we’re hungry. Using maps is fine, but having google maps, accommodation searches and being able to get accurate weather reports takes away a lot of the headaches. Looking at the forecast, where we'll be in a weeks time is expecting temperatures of 30 degrees centigrade... anyone want to buy some subzero bike clothing? Only been used once...

I’ve been working on the route plan for the next 3 weeks to Vancouver. It goes roughly something like this:

Ennis > Three Forks (where the Madison, Jefferson and Gallantin form the Missouri)

Three Forks > Helena > Lincoln > Missoula – rest day in Missoula

Missoula > Lolo Hot Springs > North West Passage > Lewiston (Idaho)

Lewiston > Walla Walla (Washington)

Walla Walla > Columbia / Snake River Valley > Portland (Oregon) – rest day in Portland

Portland > Fort Clatsop & The Pacific!!

Fort Clatsop > Pacific coast through Olympic NP > Port Angeles > Ferry to Vancouver Island

Victoria > Nanaimo > Ferry to Vancouver!

That’s about 1250 miles to go! Priority is to reach the Pacific and we might not have enough time for me to ride to Vancouver before I fly back on the 3rd June.

Old Faithful > Ennis pictures

Old Faithful pics and vids

Grand Teton to Old Faithful (Bert)

2008-05-14T04:22:00.007+01:00

Written at Old Faithful - 11th May 2008

I think we need to change our reading material. Kelv's powering through the tale of the Donner wagon train, a group of 80 or so emigrants who in the 1840's attempted a new trail over the Rockies to a new life in California. They were misled about the route and endured a hellish winter in the high mountains where half died and many resorted to cannibalism to survive. I'm reading 'The Worst Journey in the World', the story of the 1912 Scott expedition to the South Pole. Scott and his companions reach the South Pole only to find that Amundsen had beaten them to it by a couple of weeks. After a series of disasters, Scott and his companions eventually froze to death only 11 miles from their camp. Great reading when there's been over 1000 inches of snow in Yellowstone and there is another 10 inches forecast.

Last night we said goodbye to James and the Suburban SUV lifeline. We both felt very alone and isolated seeing him drive off leaving us in wintery Teton. The day before he'd saved our skins as we rode out of Dubois in subzero temperatures and into a howling blizzard. We'd learnt a valuable lesson that day, i.e. not to underestimate the weather even though it's mid-May. On the pass when we stopped for a few moments it was so cold our chains froze. Later in Jackson Hole we stocked up on full winter gear - lobster gloves, hiking socks, thermals and foot warmers.

We rode out of Signal Mountain today fully prepared for what ever the weather could throw at us. About 5 miles out, we stopped and stripped off the first outer layer and downsized our gloves - already it was getting hot and the apocalyptic weather hadn't yet materialised. Best to be prepared though. Following Jackson Lake with the Teton's towering above we headed north towards Yellowstone. The scenery here is the best I've seen so far, like a slice of the Dolomites dropped into Wyoming. Riding along the strip of tarmac carved out of 8 foot high snow drifts I still can't believe that only a few days ago I was suffering from heat stroke on the ride to Laramie.

Climbing out of Teton the terrain begins to change, the rivers drop down into deep canyons and forests close in on the route. After a long gradual climb we reach the Continental Divide again, taking us from the Pacific side back into the Atlantic. Kelv has another ceremonial piss on the Atlantic side whilst I slap another Pedal House sticker on the sign. The Park Rangers must be loving them. Looking closer at the map it appears we cross the divide 3 times on the 66 mile ride today - that means at least 3 mountain passes.

Once

Twice

Three times...

Dropping down into the Yellowstone park from the divide we pass another completely frozen lake - Lewis Lake. The snow here is insane with 10 foot drifts either side the road. 2 days ago it was still closed and the Ranger at the park gate informs us we are the first cyclists to enter the park. Clambering up one of the drifts I see we're missing some great scenery - the Snake River follows the road some way, roaring down to Lake Jackson before making its way through the Rockies, eventually to Portland and then the Pacific - our exact route westwards to the coast.

After a series of climbs we eventually arrive at the Yellowstone caldera, a vast bowl in the landscape left by an ancient volcano. Almost straightaway Kelv spots steam rising from a pool on the side of the road. Like someone flicking a switch the air smells and tastes different, warmer and more moist. Passing a layby a guy says there are bears ahead, thinking he's joking we smile and ride on, but he isn't - a mother and 2 cubs have been spotted near the road about a mile ahead. What the hell have we let ourselves in for here. 3 ranger cop cars drive past seemingly unbothered by the fact 2 loaded down tired cyclists are riding towards their certain death at the hands of a pair of bear cubs goaded on by their mother. A nice US Mothers Day treat.

Thankfully there are no bears in sight, just more climbing and we reach the divide for the second time. No pissing or stickering this time round, we just pause and catch our breath. Its been tough today riding at over 2600m for the majority of the ride. The third crossing of the divide is even less celebrated, Kelv stoops over his handle bars breathing deeply whilst I take one token photo, one eye on the camera, one eye on the woods looking for bears. The layby is full of unidentified animal droppings. Its got to be bears. Do bears shit in laybys? I take some comfort in the fact that Kelv's little mobile tuck shop he keeps in his handle bar bag makes him a far tastier target than me.

We reach Old Faithful about 4pm just as it starts to snow again. Time for a room upgrade. The only problem with doing a good days riding is it costs you dollars. You think, shit we worked really hard today, we deserve that High Rate Room with its own bar. Kelv has this system of organising his dollars in his wallet so they are easy to differentiate. I have my own system - spend them as fast as possible. They take up weight anyway...

Grand Teton to Old Faithful pictures on picasa

Back on the Bike, Dubois, Wyoming to Old Faithful, Yellowstone

2008-05-14T00:51:00.008+01:00

Dubois to Jackson Lake

Dubois. I pronounce it the French way, doo-bwah, but it doesn’t cut any ice out here. Apparently it was named after a French trapper, but he annoyed the inhabitants so from then on they pronounced it doo-boys to annoy him, and it’s still pronounced that way. I kinda like the way things like that stick for hundreds of years.

Although we drove here through semi arid desert heat the snow has arrived overnight, it is a blizzard outside, visibility about 50 metres and a couple of inches on the road. Bert and I are wary but up for it, despite the horrified advice of the mountain-biking hotel owner (“I wouldn’t do it“). Having an SUV support truck gives us options though, and we agree to ride out for a few miles with james providing support.

4 miles of slipping and sliding along the shoulder is kinda tough, our clothes are not up to it, feet, thighs, hands, faces freezing, passing trucks throw buckets of sleet over us, the slipstream tries to steal all our grip. This is not good riding weather, the risk is high, and my spider sense is telling me to call it quits and get in the truck. But you have to have a good attempt or the road will scorn you, so we push on.

James pulls past and I wave him to stop, at a minimum I need to grab some extra layers from my kit bag. Whilst deciding what to do we see a snow plough approaching. I think only of the suction of a passing truck so grab onto the side of the suv, with my arm through the open window for grip. James thinks only of the buckets of slush being thrown up by the plough so closes the window ruthlessly on my arm. Bert thinks of both and wisely disappears behind the suv. The plough driver takes pity on me and half raises the plough so I only get half spattered, my arm in the window has delayed james’ window closing so he gets half a faceful, and bert comes out tops.

Bert and I look at each other, both thinking about one of those going past us in the full-on snow of the pass, we would probably be thrown off the road. Time for the truck, I have no shame in these matters and wave the bail-out card. Truck is warm and dry. Truck is good.

10 miles later, quite a bit higher and amazingly the road is clear. We add several layers and jump out of the truck onto our bikes again, with several layers of fallbacks agreed onto james, who is going to scout out the pass.

We ride up and up, the slope is gentle, the temperature drops, the depth of snow by the road increases and suddenly we see the continental divide sign. Amazing. We walk on top of about 6 feet of snow to get photos, bert and I ceremonially providing water to the atlantic and pacific too.

Rolling along the top of the plateau we become aware of the inadequacies of our clothing, we are both getting cold, can barely feel our hands and feet, and there is a 20 mile descent into the next town. Descents sound fun because you just sit there zooming downhill, but you’re not doing any work and there is a sub-zero 25 mile an hour wind into your face, and you will suffer if you don’t have the right clothes.

We don’t have the right clothes and start to suffer. After some road works we stop to add any remaining layers, digging into our emergency kit, and are shocked to realize that our bikes are covered in icicles, our chains frozen, nothing working properly, brakes a joke. We descend with caution through the atmospheric thermal layers, gradually the bikes, our bodies and brains start working again and at some point we stop to look at the view.

Our beloved team manager pulls up as if from nowhere, the SUV spattered with mud, he’s been off-road and has enjoyed it. It feels absolutely awesome to have a team manager looking after us, he gives us water, food and accurate information on the road ahead. We decide to push on to our lodgings through awesome scenery, frozen lakes and rivers, friendly Australians (I let bert do all the talking to savour what I’ve had 10 times a day for 2 months), until we get to our lakeside cabin looking out at the jagged mountains.

After stocking up on cold weather gear at Jackson we are in the bar by the lake wondering what to do. It is clear what to do. James is leaving tomorrow, it is our duty to get absolutely hammered to send him off in style. There is no discussion, it is one of those perfectly formed plans, and wine, beer and shots are soon landing on the table.

It turns out to be the first Friday of the season, and the bar is not full of tourists but full of staff, all getting blasted. We are the last to be kicked out, in a friendly way, chatting to the bouncer about where we’re from, where he’s from, what it’s like to work here, the usual stuff. Outside we meet up with Ben, who bert was chatting to at the bar, he’s a cool dude so we bring him back to the cabin with the promise of beer. One of those all night sessions follows, discussions ranging through jack Kerouac, cannibalism for survival, the civil war, life in Montana, and it turns out his uncle wrote one of the standard textbooks on the civil war. At 3.30am he staggers back to the dorm, hiccupping as he goes, and the night is over. We will regret it tomorrow, but never forget it.

Jackson Lake to Yellowstone

Man oh man, so here I am, snowed in at the Old Faithful Inn, 10 inches last night, 8 inches today, pass closed behind us , 30 miles to the next accommodation, sitting at the bar with bert chatting to the staff drinking red wine, bert is on beer. We saw old faithful last night, something I’ve wanted to see all my life after reading about it in the primary school library way back when I was like 6 or something.

We rode out of the Grand Teton national park yesterday, me and bert after waving goodbye to james, man it was sad to see him go, we both watched the big suburban pulling out of the carpark, both of us scanning for the last possible view of it through the trees alongside the road, when it was gone there was a thoughtful, sad silence as it settled in to both of us that we were really on our own. You’d think I’d be used to that, but after a week of buddies and truck support it is like jumping into cold water. Not to worry.

We haul slowly out along Jackson lake, over a small pass into Yellowstone national park. The ranger on the ticket station tells us we’re the first cyclists through this year, and cheerfully warns us of a 10” snowstorm coming tonight, we’ll be fine if we can make old faithful, but this means crossing the continental divide 3 times today. Luckily this is our plan anyway, our legs are strong and we are confident. But we can feel the weather coming in, black snowstorms chase us, and we push through the passes feeling the sure sign of bad weather chasing us. It is lucky that we push on, for we get to old faithful inn, pushing through the snow showers, feeling the pressure, and about an hour after we get in it is like a switch is flicked and the trees bend over as the snow howls in on a gale.

Reading about the donner party is not a good foundation for this section, I can feel the trap springing shut behind us, and I can see that there is not much meat on bert to last me through the winter. Luckily the lush hotel has a bar and a restaurant, and there are plenty of chunky guests, so I think I’ll be ok. Summer is not far away.

We’ve both been feeling the altitude today, it builds up, we’ve been riding all day at over 8,000 feet, and although the first continental divide goes past without problem the second one is tougher, and by the third one we are both feeling it, I’m nauseous but need to eat for the energy, bert is feeing “a bit kind of fluey, really” (verbatim), and by the time we clear the divide for the third time I’m really suffering, trembling and gasping by the time we nail it.

This is followed by a long descent into old faithful, feeling the air get warm and moist, staying loose over the streams running across the road in case they are ice, passing over the keppler cascades and into old faithful. A strong cross wind hits us, I’m so used to these after crossing the plains I barely notice it but bert is blown straight onto the gravel verge, he frowns and curses as he fights the bike back onto the road.

The entry to the old faithful inn is through a geyser field. We’ve been riding through a massive volcano caldera (crater) for the last 20 miles, and it hits home that we’re in an active volcano when we see the steam and bubbling pools leading up to the inn.

The inn is an incredible building, straight out of a fairy tale, but with loads of cyclists and hikers hanging around outside, some of which come over and give us good advice about our route, and also warn us about bears on the route. For an out of the way hotel in the middle of nowhere in a park that opened only 3 days ago it is heaving, loads of outdoors folk hanging around with a cool vibe.

I should describe the Inn to you, but it is beyond me, something straight out of a grimms fairy tale, a building made out of wooden antlers, branching and soaring 5 storeys to reach the sky with a roof layed gently over them.

It is very different having company. Normally on a ride, or a rest day, I spend the time thinking about what I’m going to write, but with company I’m just having fun, my mind is empty and happy rather than churning out babble.

To see old faithful was amazing, it’s something I’ve always wanted to see but never thought I would, but suddenly I’m here. We wandered out into the snow along the boardwalk, it looks kinda familiar from television programs but not over familiar. The wind is strong, snow is blowing past us, and distant thunder rumbles from the mountains. Perfect. Bert has forgotten his waterproof and is cold and grumpy, but I’m all kitted out and excited, jumping up and down as we enter the plus/minus 10 minute window of the ‘eruption’. I daren’t take my eyes off it, I’ve wanted to see this all my life and soon It’s gonna happen. It’s not like normal scenery where you look at it and go ‘cool’, you can’t summon this on demand, it happens on its terms and nobody elses.

A whining american brat provides the background noise to the natural grandeur, whining and moaning, its parents indulging it, making me and bert think about the safety sign near the geysers warning succinctly of ‘dangerous thermal area’.

A strange guy notices me standing on a bench to get a better view and gradually works his way closer until he’s standing on the next bench only a few feet away. He tries a couple of openers, ‘looks awesome doesn’t it’, but each utterance has the watermark of the tagalong guy, who will latch on to you for as long as possible. My force field is well established, bert’s is more verbal, but either way the message gets across and the guy eventually wanders off. I think for a little while that really he’s just followed the pattern of the extremely lonely person, but the sad truth is that loneliness begets loneliness, and lonely people have a big warning sign over their heads that repels people, a sad truth but a truth just the same.

Old faithful teases us, sometimes bubbling, sometimes shooting small jets of water into the air, sometimes the steam builds up and up until you’re sure it’s gonna blow, before dying down again. But suddenly the water boils, there is a ‘whumpf’ just like lighting a gas cooker, and a jet of steam and water shoots high into the air, the jet roaring and growling, tourists ducking for cover.

I have a natural high after this, bert compares me to an excited seven year old girl but I don’t care, I am hyped. I taste the water running from old faithful in a steaming stream, somehow I just have to, it just tastes of water but it feels right. Bert is worried about chemicals, but what the hell.

We plan to ride the next morning but wake to a winter wonderland, bison (buffalo) wandering past the window, cars with 8 inches on snow on top slipping and sliding along the access road. We can barely walk let alone ride so quickly decide on staying put, effectively we are snowed in, with another 8 inches on the way. Luckily the hotel has a room for us so we kill some time wandering out into the geyser field. It is full-on end of the world, a post-apocalyptic twilight showing the drifting steam and falling snow, the valley appearing and disappearing through snow showers, black clouds surrounding the valley. We mean to walk along a path but a big sign declares ‘bear area, safety can NOT be guaranteed’, this gives us the fear and we take another route.

Bears sound fine when you read the statistics, one death a year from bear attack, but when you are by yourself on a heavily loaded bike in the middle of nowhere on a lonely mountain road it is a very different matter, we both feel it.

Never mind. We slip and slide along the boardwalk marveling at the huge variety of geysers, hot springs and mud pools. We’ve bought some small bottles of wine and find a warm spot downwind from a hot spring, the steam has melted the snow and dried the boardwalk so we sit on the floor and drink our wine, marveling at our trip, which has changed from normal hot country tour through the south, through mental slog through the plains, to ‘boys own’ adventure through snowy mountain passes with dangerous wildlife.

After watching a herd of bison grazing along the river side we camp out at grand geyser, which is apparently the biggest ‘predictable’ geyser in the world at 180 feet of water and steam. It has a 5 hour window when it may erupt, we are right at the end so are not hopeful, but after reading the signs it seems it may go soon so we sit for a while, chatting to some american dudes who are conducting a grizzly bear survey. They warn us to stay well away from bears, we don’t need telling.

Without warning the geyser erupts, a rumbling howling jet of water and steam shrieking high into the air, we stand in awe. The runoff is hot and I have to touch and taste it, luckily I don’t immediately die from dissolved chemicals. The american dudes are inspired by my example (and survival) and do the same, eventually bert overcomes his inhibitions and joins in. Nature is raw and powerful, and sometimes you have to get as close to it as you can.

The blowing snow is taking its toll and we head back to the bar, an oasis of wine, local beer, friendly staff getting drunk on their time off (hey I checked you guys in!) and snug views of horizontal snow.

Made it out of Yellowstone to Ennis, Montana

2008-05-14T00:50:00.002+01:00

made it out ok today, so beautiful, can't tell you how amazing it is round here, saw a wolf and loads of bison. More later

Dubois to Signal Mountain, Jackson Lake

2008-05-10T03:01:00.011+01:00

It's sub zero, snowing heavily, 7:30am, and Kelv and Bert are just finishing breakfast at the hunting lodge, fully kitted out (or so they think) to tackle the 60 mile ride to Jackson Lake, via the Togwotee pass (9658 ft). The owner of the lodge thinks the SUV will be lucky to make it in this weather, let alone the bikes. With the SUV as backup they decide it's worth a go, and set off into the blizzard.

I spend 10 mins sorting out my kit, and then follow on. I can easily see their tracks through the snow and slush on the hard shoulder, but I'm travelling slowly as visibility is poor. I catch up with them and wind down the window to check they are ok. Kelv signals a stop and I pull over onto the hard shoulder. Both of them look well wrapped up, but Kelv doesn't have a peak on his cap, and seems to have a face full of snow. A mixture of the melting snow and mucus dangles and sways a few inches down from his distinctly blue nose. Bert grins from behind his sunglasses, but doesn't say anything. I get the distinct impression neither wants to be the one to suggest that it's too much. My mind wanders off thinking that Kelv's blue nose matches his outfit.

Kelv breaks the silence and mutters something to no one in particular about liking the idea of a lift. An enormous snow plough bursts into view through the blizzard, heading straight for us. Bert legs it around the front of the SUV and Kelv rather bizarely decides to flatten himself against the wrong side of the SUV. I hit the window up switch, but I'm not quick enough, a wall of snow, ice and salty slurry slams into the side of the SUV, and a fully stretched out Kelv gets a proper drenching. We all agree it's not worth the risk to continue cycling, and the bikes are duly loaded into the back. We continue tentatively in the SUV, but after a few miles both the weather and the road clear, and all traces of snow disappear from the road. The bikes are unloaded, and the ride continues:

I scout on ahead to see what state the pass is in, and find that the blizzard conditions must have been reasonably localised to Dubois - the pass has been snowploughed recently, and the grip on the road is good.

I report back to the guys who have made good progress and are now only 5 miles from the pass (which is also the continental divide). I head off for a spot of offroading and discover that the SUV is in fact pants, and handles like a Vauxhall. Even the wildlife stops to stare at the incompetent animal with the round legs:
Meanwhile the boys are over the pass and speeding down the far side of the mountain, towards the lakeside lodge that we are staying at tonight. I make a final check on them, and then park up at the lodge which has a balcony overlooking the completely frozen lake, with snow covered mountains as a backdrop - this place is stunning.

Kelv and Bert arrive, and immediately insist that we drive to Jackson Hole to find a bike shop to buy more cold weather kit... Yellowstone National Park tomorrow, where they've had 1000 inches of snow this winter so far .....

Boulder CO to Laramie WY

2008-05-09T00:46:00.003+01:00

About a week before I left for the USA, I made a drunken impassioned speech about road biking (and biking in general) to Michal. I can’t remember exactly what I droned on about but it was sufficient enough to influence Michal to buy a brand new Tricross a few days later. In sober reality, the emotions I felt on the ride from Boulder to Laramie are exactly what I was blathering on about to Michal.

Leaving Boulder at 8am in glorious sunshine, I set off through town, past University bikes onto Broadway then directly north towards Lyons following the route I’d taken with John the day before. Tackling long distances is as much a mental challenge as it is physical. I like to break a ride up into thirds, do 40 then take a break, eat some food, do another 40 and have lunch and a longer break, then the last 40. This worked pretty well in Ireland, but the ride to Laramie made me realise it was gonna be a different story in the USA.

The first 35 miles or so were pretty good, great road surfaces and plenty of room, nice accommodating traffic and a very gentle descent. The whole time the Rocky Mountain National park was to my left, with the snow caped peaks glinting in the sun. I stopped at Loveland and stocked up on water and snacks, had a black coffee and surveyed the route whilst sitting in the sun for a while. By this time it was getting pretty hot and I made a big mistake, leaving my sun cream behind on the sidewalk after topping up.

Loveland to Fort Collins was pretty fast, still feeling good and the weather still looking great – no wind, no clouds in sight. About 10 miles out of town Highway 287 becomes single carriage-way and more rolling with the first few long inclines appearing. The change in terrain brought a change in weather – a strong head wind which was to remain until I reached Laramie 85 miles later. What clouds were now appearing were blowing by so fast that any respite from the sun would last only a few seconds.

Beyond the initial climbs out of Fort Collins the 287 follows a long valley floor, penned in on either side by high hills - a perfect natural wind tunnel. The road followed this valley for about 20 miles, totally straight with no protection from the wind or sun whatsoever. I was crawling along about 10 mph, headache from the sun, split lips from the wind and watering eyes. The valley was straight out of a western, where you could imagine a long wagon train snaking out and a thousand Cheyenne Indians lining the cliffs either side waiting for the pefect ambush.

My next scheduled stop was going to be at Virgina Dale, about 50 miles from Laramie, but I was running low on water and food so decided to stop sooner at the Three Forks. On the map this place appears like a town but the reality was just one run down restaurant and few farm buildings. Stopping here was the best decision of the day. I stocked up on water, had a good meal and rested about an hour or so in total before heading out into the sun again. I didn’t realize at the time but this was the last place I’d be able to get food and water for the next 60 miles to Laramie.

By now I was really beginning to struggle with the effect of the sun and altitude. Simple operations such as calculating the mileage to the next watering hole or working out how many more hours riding took total concentration and many retries. That combined with the fact I’d got no phone signal, had minimal spares and hadn’t seen or heard from Kelv and James for 60 miles, I was really beginning to wonder whether I’d make it at all. It was at this point that the immensity of the country really hit me. I literally had no choice but to carry on regardless. There really is no where to hide out here. I now look at what Kelv did in the first few weeks in a totally different light. I switched on my ipod to find a world for my mind to escape to instead of it running into overdrive muddling calculations about time, distance, water and weather, not to mention the seemingly never ending straight road ahead.

Holst’s The Planets wasn’t the best choice, with the Mars piece being the first track played the terrain just seemed even more colossal and I even more insignificant. Another hard 10 miles or so later I reached Virginia Falls, 4 miles from the Wyoming border. What I expected would be another sorely needed rest place materialised as a bordered up shack at the foot of another long climb. I sat down for a while to ponder the situation. I’d got 50 miles to go and a foreboding wall of black clouds closing in from the south. On the plus side, the scenery here was amazing, with wind blasted stone stacks and little streams running through canyons beside the road. A change of music took my mind back to Brighton and I jumped back on the bike and carried on towards the border.

Kelv and James finally appeared when I was 90 miles out of Boulder and about 2 miles from the Colorado / Wyoming border. I stocked up on water and food and discussed whether to pack up or carry on. It was roughly 45 miles to Laramie with still no sign of the wind changing, the terrain still going up and the storm closing in. We decided I’d carry on riding whilst they’d tank it to Laramie and sort out accommodation before heading back to check how I was getting on. The mental boost it gave me knowing they were in the area was unbelievable. There was no way I was getting a lift home.

The next 45 miles I experienced something I’ve only found on the bike a handful of times, when the mental and physical combine to make you draw strength from unknown reserves. This is what I was trying to convey to Michal those couple of weeks ago. Its an insane feeling. Reaching the border gave me a another huge surge of energy. I split the remainder of the route into mental blocks. 20 miles from the border to the settlement of Sidings – like riding home from work. Then another 10 from Sidings to Red Buttes, like the fast ride out to Newhaven, then another 5 to Laramie, just like Llanwnog to Caersws and back.

The miles started to decrease slowly still with the headwind not letting up at all. By this time it was easy to calculate – 10 miles an hour and 45 to go, 4.5 hours. Still a long long time in the saddle after leaving Boulder 8 hours earlier. I started to fade a little again and the signs ‘Strong Winds Ahead – next 10 miles’ didn’t help matters, plus it seemed the storm was about to finally catch up with me. Then I remembered what a chap back at the restaurant at Three Forks said – it was uphill all the way to the border, then the a descent down to Laramie. A couple of miles later the 20^th incline I reached the peak of finally proved not to be a false summit.

The plain below dropped away with a 70 mile view in every direction. In the middle was Laramie basking in the early evening sun. I can’t quite put into words the feeling I had seeing Laramie, other than I cried, then started to roar at the top of my voice whilst accelerating up to 35 mph for the first time in 10 hours of riding. I The moment needed a change of musical pace on the pod and Luke Slater was to be my sound track for the last 30 miles into Laramie. Averaging 20 mph down into the plain I could visibly see the miles clocking up on the cyclometer which seemed to make me ride even faster. I could have thrown my bike in the air and screamed I was so filled with adrenaline knowing that I was going to do it, to ride 120 miles in the hardest conditions I’ve yet experienced (and I’ve no doubt at all that there is more to come on this trip, if not worse). What Kelv has achieved so far is not to be underestimated at all and he deserves a week being lorded around in a $50,000 SUV. James appeared in the truck with 7 miles to go. Like riding from Llanwnog to Newtown. Easy. He knew I wasn’t getting in.

Reaching Laramie I stopped for a moment to get a picture of the bike with the city limits sign. Looking at the bike there glistening in the sun I can honestly say I am totally in love with it. No other sport brings out such raw emotions in me. To achieve something like that under your own power, battling and overcoming mental and physical barriers, you almost become one with the bike. Like its an extension of your body. You feel it, you know its strengths and weaknesses, you know it will save your ass and won’t let you down if you respect it. I think this is what I was rambling to Michal about J And I’ve not even started about what its like to ride in the mountains yet…

A Day of Days

2008-05-08T07:36:00.006+01:00

Man oh man oh man. Today has been a day. Just got back from tequila slammers at 3rd street bar in laramie with Carl, Sam, Nathan and Bert. Carl owns a bike shop called The Pedal House which we spent some cool time at before and after the tequila, Alan's bike is booked in for a checkup first thing tomorrow.

Our little expedition has been suffering from a combination of altitude sickness, sun, heat and over exertion today. James has altitude sickness, hasn't been able to sleep or eat much, and has spent all day in bed. I came back to the room to find him in his underpants trying to walk a straight line, one foot in front of the other police style, with a deadly serious expression on his face. Lots of rest has done him good though, and he managed to eat some of his burger king whopper.

Bert got in last night more tired than i have ever seen him after a ride, it was like someone cut all the bones out of him, he was too tired to go out to eat so we ordered a massive pizza and stuffed it. His 120 miles in the sun, heat, headwind, isolation and alititude pushed him to the limit and today was quickly agreed to be a rest day so we've stayed in laramie.

Alan and I headed off in the APC with the bikes, driving to the foot of the mountains to do some serious climbing. We took a gravel road and got completely lost, ending up at a dead end with an off-putting sign. Pulling a quick u-turn we took another trail which turned into a couple of ruts leading across a field, the massive suburban bouncing and juddering along. Alan was scanning ahead with the binoculars trying to figure out the way ahead to the road, without luck. Eventually it became clear that our rough trail was heading into a very isolated farmhouse, and Alan got 'the fear', mewling and crying like a little girl until i turned around.

We eventually found our way to the road and got to Centenial, population 100 ish. We ditched the tank and got on the bikes, a sweet climb ensued, we quickly turned off the main road, which was closed in 7 miles due to snow, and turned on to a wee lane heading into the mountains. This gradually got more and more snowed over, until we were often hiking with the bikes on our shoulders over snow fields. The road has not been used all winter so was covered in rocks, after we were forced to turn back at around the 10,000 foot line we descended at max speed through them, dodging the rocks with all senses and reactions maxed up.

The country here has to be seen to be believed, you can see for 70 miles or so, plains surrounded by mountains, storms hovering over parts of the plains, hardly any settlements or houses, it really makes you feel insignificant.

Plan for tomorrow is to drive along the plains to the foot of the mountains at Dubois so that we can maximise time with james in Yellowstone. I've crossed the plains so feel no need to continue trekking north along the foot of the mountains for another 300 miles in a 40 mph headwind, and both me and alan are hungry for mountain climbs not plain slog, so we're treating this week as a proper holiday and road trip and will be climbing up to the continental divide and yellowstone on friday, riding and hanging with james on saturday, then the trip proper resumes on sunday when james drives back to denver.

Laramie, Wyoming, 7165ft

2008-05-07T03:23:00.010+01:00

Compared to Bert's 120 mile slog though the hills into a headwind, Kelv and I had it easy today. We drove about 200 miles through the Rocky Mountain National Park, which is absolutely stunning:

I did actually get some riding in - only about 6 miles at 8000 feet (mostly downhill though). The uphill bits were really really difficult, I couldn't get anywhere near enough oxygen into me, and the lactic acid was building up fast. On one slope I was down to just about as slow as I could go without falling off, my throat dry and chest heaving. Kelv pulled up along side with the SUV and thankfully we swapped over.

Mentioning SUV's, ours is of the 6.2 litre V8 variety. It might well make an environmentalist have a heart attack - which is slightly ironic, seeing as most people I've seen driving them look like they should have had one themselves long ago.

This picture is of Kelv wondering just how the snakebite kit should be used if one of us was bitten by a rattler... he has now read the instructions, which involve cutting the victim open with a scalpel, unless the bite is on your toes or fingers, where no further advice is given. I guess we'll just have to be careful walking over the rocky crevaces.

One of my first tasks when we arrived at Laramie was to buy some beer, so I headed for a large supermarket - K Mart I think it was called. Surprisingly (to me) none of the supermarkets in Laramie sell beer, you have to go to a liquor store, I still have no idea why that is the case - does anyone know?

Tomorrow we head up towards Rawlins - Kelv and Bert cycling, and me in the SUV. I'll be taking a longer route so that we can meet up in the late afternoon. I found some off road tracks on the map nearby so I'm going off to investigate them. I will not be taking on anything that I would consider proper offroading, firstly as I want to return the hire car in one piece, and secondly because the idea of getting stuck 30 miles from anywhere, on my own with no mobile phone coverage in bear country seems like a bloody stupid idea.

James

Allez Allez!

2008-05-07T01:29:00.004+01:00

James and I have been touring the rockie mountain national park today, stunningly beautiful it was, we drove up into the snowline to where the road was closed a few miles short of the continental divide.

Bert rode solo today, i'll be riding again from tomorrow now that i'm well rested and a little fatter, although the weather is for the usual mix of strong headwinds, thunderstorms and snow showers. Gotta be done though.

Below is some video of bert having a tour de france moment, 90 miles done, 50 of them into a big headwind, 30 to go, looking at finishing just before dark. James has also been doing some biking, i've been throwing him out of the truck at the top of the hills on my bike, and he's been descending and climbing the smaller hills like a fiend, despite feeling some altitude effects as we were at about 8000-9000 feet all day.

(Click on the videos to play them)

Right now Jimbo Jammer is out in the truck tailing bert for the last few miles into town in case bert burns out. We caught up with him at mile 90 and you could see he was feeling it a bit, but still going strong.

Left Hand Drive

2008-05-06T05:44:00.006+01:00

Today I've had my first real taste of the mountains here and a tough workout for the legs. I left at 7:30am to meet John, leaving Kelv shunning his hangover in bed like a regretful one night stand. Today was John's birthday and every year he rides out the same number of miles as his age - this year 65 was on the clock.

In perfect blue skies we coasted up the plains north as far as Altona, then taking the road westwards up Left Hand Canyon. What follows is a 15 mile climb up to the old Goldrush settlement of Ward at just under 9,500 feet. 200m higher than the Galibier, this was the highest point I've been. The first of many by the look of things! Here's a map of todays birthday loop.

A coffee and a cookie set us on our way southwards on the Peak to Peak highway past the snow capped peaks of North Arapaho (13,508 feet) before dropping down into Nederland. What I've seen so far is awe-inspiring and I'm getting slightly excited about what the rest of the Rockies will be like. After a great lunch in Nederland we descended the 28 miles all the way down Boulder Canyon back home. A perfect ride and a great start to the trip.

This evening young Jammer arrived in a nuclear powered land monster resembling the Nimitz. I think its called a Suburban. You could start a war with this thing, seriously just looking at it gives me the fear. So thats to be home for James and most likely Kelv for the next week. Our aim is to hit Yellowstone by Saturday, a tough challenge as its over 600 miles from Boulder, but we have the Meat Fucker Mobile on our side.

Tomorrow I'm setting off early, saying goodbye to Boulder and heading for Laramie about 110 miles north. Jammer and Kelv are heading up to the Peak-Peak highway in the armoured personnel carrier destined for Estes and the Rocky Mountain National Park before chasing me down and rendezvousing in Laramie. The panniers and all the rest of the shit will be in the truck all this week, so I'm gonna make a most of having the bike in race mode and get stuck into the miles between us and Yellowstone.

Tomorrow we reach Wyoming!

The Foot of the Mountain

2008-05-05T05:11:00.012+01:00

Writing my first state-side entry on 'Only Forward' I kinda feel like I'm imposing. So far all I've done is hire a behemoth SUV and drink a load of beer. Dr Hamilton however has reached this great town of Boulder not via supersonic speeds but by human power. Strangely, after my third glass of this moreish 'Fleur' wine Kelv bought from an off-license the size of an Asda, that feeling of imposing is diminishing rapidly.

So this is where it gets even more interesting. Mountains. Snow capped, bear infested, lion prowled, wind ravaged. Still seems hard to imagine sat here in a warm little mountain hut in Boulder, but tomorrow I'll get a proper taste of whats to come. An old friend of my Dad's lives most of the year in Boulder, when he's not on the Continent reporting for his magazine VeloNews. I'm meeting up with him at 8am outside a popular bikers coffee shop on Broadway, where we head out for his birthday ride into the mountains. A nice 60 miler to knock out the cobwebs and test out the bike thoroughly.

Today's been spent in various bike shops parting with some serious dollars and using the well used but expensive mantra 'a trip of this scale warrants the best equipment'. I did a couple of short rides today to get the jet lag out my legs, following the Boulder creek offroad from the motel, then taking the Four Mile canyon up into the hills. I still can't begin to explain how good the Tricross is, it excelled again on the offroad sections and ripped it up on the tarmac. Sell the car, sell the kids, sell the house. Buy one. You'll never look back :)

For those that are wondering, I can confirm that Kelvin is still pretty much as sane as he was when I last saw him, though he does seem prone to bouts of laughter at his own jokes. Not a great deal new there, but the jokes appear to be formed in his own head without him actually speaking them aloud.

Plans now are swinging between spending the next month in Boulder and sacking off the whole trip, or more likely starting out on Tuesday for Fort Collins then onto Laramie. We've changed the route before hitting Vancouver, instead of Seattle being the final goal in the USA, we're switching to the Pacific and Lewis & Clarks Fort Clatsop. We're aiming to ride the NorthWest Passage over the Rocky's into Idaho, so Clatsop couldn't be a better final destination before heading north for Vancouver.

I still can't fathom that at some point in the next month that we'll actually be in Vancouver, after passing through Wyoming with the Grand Teton and Yellowstone parks, mountainous Montana, Lewis & Clarks Idaho, then finally Washington state with the Nez Perce Indian reserve and Christ knows what else in between. How Kelv comprehends it I've no idea, though I have a suspicion he's been snorting his chain lube to cope with the immensity of it all.

Back to now. We're crashed out in the hut after a filling meal and interesting chin wag with some locals, second bottle of wine near empty and some deep techno on the laptop. I'm totally blown away of what I've seen of Boulder so far. Bob why did you ever leave?! Its a cyclists paradise, where all fanatics go to die after sacrificing themselves in the mountains to the God that is Gravity. If tonights drunken ramblings are anything to go by, we're both moving here...

Chillage

2008-05-03T20:20:00.001+01:00

Thanks for all the comments everyone, it was great that night when i was getting stuck into a bottle of wine and chilling out, hearing the 'email received' going off (set to the US Navy Warship Collision Alarm) on the laptop all the time. I was a bit drunk so had to read them all again in the morning.

Macken, great to hear from you, and was good to catch up at christmas, it's been too long. I don't know how you've managed to stay looking exactly the same all this time. Glad it's providing some relief for you.

The beard is now gone, as it was getting a bit unruly and doing my head in.

Have spent the last few days doing as little as possible. The heavy snow has cleared now, it was about 3 inches down here, 15 inches on the passes! Went into denver yesterday for a look around and met curly bob's mate Mark Torres, had a great hour or so in a bar and swapping interesting curly bob stories.

Bertie gets here in a few hours, so I've just stocked up with wine, and the fridge is full of beer. Very tempting to get stuck in, but I promised to drive him back from the airport. Dang.

Denver (Castle Rock)! Long, long haul. 6,200 feet high, passes of 12,000 to come!

2008-05-01T00:06:00.006+01:00

ok well i made it, man it's been a long few days doing over 100 miles a day, really need a break, just checked in to a best western surrounded by restaurants with a view of the rockies, about 10 miles south of the denver ring road, there's a bus into denver itself just down the road so i'll go visiting on saturday

will stick up more later, but the solo part of the epic is officially over! Here is me yesterday, half way through a 110 mile ride, 50 miles to the next anything, hot dusty and windy, tumbleweeds rolling down the streets of this tiny village, no idea why i'm smiling:

(if you look closely you'll see my white hands, i got white feet too, and look like i'm wearing a blinding white t-shirt and boxers)

Colorado! Lamar, 3,625 ft

2008-04-28T23:37:00.003+01:00

105 miles today into Lamar, Colorado, decided to stretch my legs a little and let the mule have its head. Wind was quite kind to me. Crossed into Mountain Time, which means I've ridden clear across a time zone, I entered Central Time when I left Florida, and left it today. So now I'm 7 hours behind you lot, not 6.

Early night for me, good wind tomorrow gonna try to make the most of it, north to kit carson or maybe even limon if things go well, or camp somewhere in between

Ulysses, Kansas, Alt: 3,051 ft

2008-04-28T01:12:00.004+01:00

Vertically half way to Denver. Today was a long slow 8mph slog into a freezing cold headwind, it was -2C last night and didn't get above 10 in the day so I was in cold weather gear all day, although the sun shining made it a bit nicer. I found that the best way to get rid of most of the horrible bits of the headwind was to wear a trusty bandito mask:
This stopped my face being sandblasted, and helped me detach myself from the discomfort of having wind blasting into me all day, so it made riding much easier and I managed 67 miles, way further than a normal headwind ride.

It had the interesting side effect of greatly reducing the number of friendly toots and smiles from passing vehicles though, I guess it turned me from friendly, approachable-looking cyclist struggling along, into a hardcore post-apocalyptic road warrior with a disconcerting stare. Or a muppet. Who knows.

I found a working ipod nano lying on the road today, looked like it had fallen off a motorbike. Will pass it on to someone as I go. Later on a state trooper pulled over for a chat to see if i was ok as I was on a rest break by the roadside, which was cool of him. Absolutely everyone talks to me about the wind here, always in sympathy.

The land was totally flat today, and barren too. I rode over a couple of dried up river beds, it all looks very western, especially with the tumbleweeds blowing everywhere, I figure they are plant versions of me.

After looking at the maps I've decided to ditch the pueblo plan and ride straight to denver, makes things a lot easier as I don't have my credit card until bert shows up, so can't hire a car. Denver is about an extra day's ride over going to pueblo, and I've found a great site that shows all the bike routes into the city so I can get in safely. Depending on the wind I should arrive friday, then will have a few rest days before heading off on the final stage with bertie and james.

Rough route plan to denver is Syracuse, Kansas, 50/385 to Lamar, Colorado, up the 287 to Kit Carson, 40 to Limon, 7 miles on the interstate (generally safe and quiet in countryside), then 86 and finally 83 north into denver and the bike paths. It's about 300 miles, so 4 or 5 days ish.

Liberal, Kansas, Alt: 2851 ft

2008-04-26T20:41:00.008+01:00

Just rolled into Liberal, Kansas, staying in a brand new super8 motel, nice big room, free internet and breakfast, heated pool and spa, 60 dollars (30 quid). Awesome. Liberal roughly marks the halfway point of my long journey, I've done 2,100 miles so far.

Road signs round here seem to be calculated to give parents nightmares:

It's been getting more and more desolate and isolated out here, I see why they used to think of the great plains as a desert now. No trees anymore, just stunted grassland. The air is getting drier and colder, you can feel your mouth getting dry as you breathe, and water consumption has gone up. Better carry a bit more on the bike from now on. Pretty sure I saw a baby rattlesnake on the road today too, didn't stop to investigate. Also, a cool moment, I saw my first ever tumbleweed! Rolled across the road right in front of me, and after that I could see plenty of them sailing across the fields.

It's due to be below freezing tonight, and it wasn't far off last night, I had to buy some warmer gloves today to stop my fingers falling off. In the cold weather the rattlesnakes are renowned for coming into your tent to get your body heat, which along with the high winds kinda puts me off camping. If I wake up to see one of those things in my tent's porch I'm gonna be slitting the back of the tent and escaping sharpish.

After fighting a 30mph headwind all day yesterday I finished up in Laverne, Oklahoma, a tiny 1 bar town, it was quite run down, lots of stuff closed or abandoned. I went to the bar, after accidentally calling at the christian youth centre called 'the spot', which sounded like a bar to me. Wasn't my scene at all so went round the corner to the branding iron, which was just like the bar in the deer hunter.

After Laverne I rode 75 miles through the Oklahoman Panhandle here to Liberal, crossing the border into Kansas as I did so. Saw about 3 settlements in that time, each of them tiny, with long long stretches of empty land in between. I like it. The rolling hills have disappeared, laying bare the underlying structure of the land, a gentle staircase over a thousand miles long, running from the gulf of mexico to the rockies. This is exactly what i wanted from this trip, new experiences, and to feel the geography changing across a whole continent. The panhandle is so empty that almost every car and truck waved or tooted, which felt pretty good.

Strong winds are the norm out here, as people tell me every time I stop, so I'm just going with the flow, less miles in a headwind, more on a tailwind, sit back and relax. Everyone also tells me I've come at just the right time, as in a few weeks it'll be over 100 degrees F (nearly 40C), which I've been in before in India but can't imagine riding in it. It's still snowing around Denver though, which I'll be at in a few days time, so things are gonna get interesting! I saw a house and outbuildings today that I'm sure had been hit by a tornado in the last year or two, it was utterly devastated. Luckily I'm pretty much through Tornado Alley.

At lunchtime I met a cool little dude called Jared, here he is showing off his Mongoose, which he's had for 8 years even though he's only 6. We had a long session of serious technical bike talk, and he rode through the village a little bit to see me off ("well I guess I'd best let you go then, mister"). I wouldn't be suprised to see him welding bottle cages onto his bike tomorrow, and hitting the road the day after:

I was really sad to see him go, it was cool to have a bike buddy for an hour.

From here I think I'm gonna head north to Garden City, then due west to Pueblo, where I'll hire a car, drive to boulder, chill for a few days, pick up Bert on sat night, let him acclimatise on sunday with perhaps a supported ride, then ditch the car on Monday and head off. That means I miss out all the big city hassle and finish my solo adventure without hating the last 30 miles or so. That's about 300 odd miles from here, so should be there mid next week. Batteries felt a little low early this week, but they seem to have suddenly recharged after the short day in Watonga followed by a swim and spa in Woodward's Holiday Inn. So I'm feeling good to go for Pueblo, then have some quality rest time there. I admit it will also be good to go somewhere cosmopolitan and outside the bible belt! Religion can get a little oppressive here, it's everywhere. Restaurants within a few hundred feet of churches aren't allowed to serve alcohol, in fact it's at least a week since I was able to get booze with my meal. So now I'm craving wine. Lovely wine.

Cooch, thanks for all the route info, i gotta get me a colorado map and digest what you said, I can stand some more isolated regions though no problem.

Woodward, Oklahoma, Alt: 1908 ft

2008-04-24T21:04:00.006+01:00

Another awesome day riding across the plains, I think Oklahoma is my favourite state so far. Just rolled in to Woodward and treated myself to a holiday inn with a pool. The kind manageress' parents live on my route so she's arranging for me to stay with them in Beaver, Oklahoma. Awesome!

Gained about 800 feet today over the 75 miles as I slowly climb through the high plains towards Denver, which I was shocked to find is at 6000 feet. Woodward (here) is about 1900 feet. Although the climb is obviously very gentle you can feel it, every rolling hill is a little higher up than the last one, and as the whole landscape is tilted a little it's almost impossible to tell by eye if you are climbing, flat or descending. Times when I thought I was on the flat with a descent coming up by eye were actually climbing slightly with a flat bit coming up. Bit weird.

It's so beautiful out here though, you really get a feel for the immensity of the country and the plains, looking to my right I know that the plains go all the way to canada, forwards they go to the rockies, and behind me and to my left they slope gently down in a series of gentle steps to the gulf of mexico.

It was good to have a tailwind today, in the morning I had to ride under a threatening looking region of cloud, like a dark lid, and I got all my rain gear ready, but i got through it without anything more than a strong cross wind, then the sun came out, the birds started singing, and i had a beautiful ride across the plains.

Oh yeah, for Junior, Meddler and anyone else who has seen 'Into the Wild', you can imagine how i felt when i saw this:

Bert and James are getting ready to come out, it feels great to see the planning emails flying around between us, I'm really excited about it. I think I'll head to colorado springs and hire a car to pick bertie up, drive to boulder and ditch it there ready for the final leg. James will be our support vehicle for the first week, I'm really looking forwards to riding light for a little while.

After that I'll be trying to talk my pa into flying out and driving a support RV for us to vancouver.

Right then, chillage and chow coming up.

Archers for Christ: Crossing the Red River from Texas into Oklahoma

2008-04-23T22:19:00.015+01:00

There’s nothing to remind you better that you’re in America than to walk out of a Walmart into the gentle warmth of an Oklahoman day to see Elvis, singing his heart out selling cars in the massive carpark stuffed full of smoking bbq grills and customized classic cars, against a strip-mall skyline of American franchise signs. No pics sorry, I was off-duty.

Elvis was in his rhinestone jumpsuit phase, before the burgers and pills finished him off, but after the rural deep-south swivel-hipped youth that my mother loved so much, she cried when he died. People say that’s one of the things where you remember exactly what you were doing when it happened. I think the recent British equivalent was Princess Diana dying, the death of a pampered, over privileged socialite provoking a weird national event of official grief, newscasters using their ‘serious story’ tones, the tv and radio networks all but playing constant martial music for most of a week, people who had never met her crying and emoting. Truly bizarre, it made me angry for all the other young mothers who die every day without a word said about them. I remember where I was though, drunk as a skunk with my friends in Cardiff.

Turns out the pedals on my bike are ideal for opening bottles of beer (not whilst riding). Result. Shiner Bock will be happy.

Woke up this morning to a strong urge to stay snuggled up in the comfy beds of the Holiday Inn. A quick call to Clint on the front desk sorts it out and I am into a rest day after covering about 320 miles in 5 days from Natchitoches, averaging about 65 miles a day, ranging from 90 down to 40 ish. It’s been a really cool week, I am loving this trip, the only thing that could make it better would be for James and Bert to come out, which is cool because they are in 2 weeks. I asked the waiter dude last night where a good bar was, and he said the only decent bar was 20 miles away. The family at the next table offered to tow me there, but that seemed a little dangerous so I declined.

After my brush with fame in Mount Pleasant, Texas I left the campsite early and headed towards Paris, Texas. The pine hill forest fades out into more and more open grassland. There is a tail wind, the road is fast, flat and smooth, and I tear along the highway at 20mph or so, reaching Paris by noon. A quick pit stop in a superstore and I’m in the centre. It’s a nice little town with a square, but I’m not in a stopping mood so head on through, finding my exit road easily enough and heading North-west towards Oklahoma.

It seems people are ready for the crusades around here, I pass a sign declaring that it’s the home of Archers for Christ. I’m not really sure what they do on their weekends, but it doesn’t sound healthy.

I have to admit, as I sit here writing this with my laptop playing cool tunes, my bike next to me ready to open more beers, and a 6 pack of shiner bock steadily decreasing, that I am quite liking my new life. Now I just need to find a way to make it pay.

Highway 79 from Paris leads me to the most isolated section I’ve ridden so far. The land is open grassland, incredibly beautiful and stretching away to the horizon. Imagine a lush, fairytale meadow, full of wildflowers, streams, lakes and birds, then drape it over gently rolling terrain and cover it in a blue sky.

There are hardly any houses, many of them are abandoned, the car count drops to one per hour and all is peaceful. Unfortunately, the houses that are around usually have at least one dog, each of which is outraged at the thought of a cyclist using the public road, and the dog attack count soars. Each one howls in disbelief when it spots me, then comes bounding several hundred meters from the house to the road, barking aggressively and snapping at my heels, growling and baring their teeth. I notice that my body hair fluffs up every time, a hardwired reaction from the days when we were hairy like chimpanzees and fluffing up made us appear bigger to put off an attacker. It doesn’t do much to help me though.

I really hate it when dogs harass me like this, and although I must have gone through several hundred of these encounters each one feels like they are gonna start tearing through my leg and pull me off. I get sick of it real quick, especially when the owner shouts something like ‘he’s only playing’. Yeah right lady. I like dogs, but one of these days I’m gonna buy some pepper spray and see how fido likes it. No doubt the owner will be horrified at me spraying their lovable family pet, just like whenever someone gets attacked the dog was always ‘provoked’. Having seen my friend George being bitten on the ass whilst jogging through the park I know this is rubbish. At one point I have 3 dogs harassing me as I ride along, no fun at all. I have a big knife in easy reach on the handlebars just in case it actually does turn serious and one of them drags me off the bike and goes for my throat, but hope never to use it. I guess I look a bit like a stray herd animal on the bike, but I wish people would keep control of the damn things.

Packs of wild dogs are even more scary, I haven’t seen any here yet, but several times when riding across Spain I would be in a remote area, hear excited barking and the pack would come bounding through the countryside at top speed. I would have no way of speeding up being in a dip between hills. This is quite a scary sensation, the only thing that kept the fear down was that if they were a problem the Spanish would have shot them immediately, not having the British qualms over such actions. But the packs seemed to be more happy to see me than anything, and would stop at the roadside barking excitedly without harassing me.

After at least 30 angry dog encounters I roll into Telephone, a few miles before the bridge over the red river into Oklahoma at Sowells Bluff. I can feel it’s going to rain, I’ve done 90 miles and the next campsite is still 10 miles away so I take a little cabin at the Telephone Travellers Rest. It is utterly deserted round here, tiny little communities of a few houses, everything quiet, the gas station a haven of tranquility. The people here speak with German-American accents, making it feel even more isolated.

Later on the wind picks up, the sky darkens and I can hear distant thunder. Suddenly the rain starts, and the world is lit by a long, blinding, ultra-white lightening flash that seems to go on for at least a second, not the quick blink of a british storm but a long, drawn out white-out. Then the thunder, not the boom and rumble of a British storm, but whip-crack shockwaves shaking the building, I can feel the air in my lungs being pummeled, and the crack-boom is so loud I have to stop myself dropping to my knees and putting my hands over my ears like a child.

Well, I wanted proper weather on this trip and it looks like I’m in for it. The rain moves in properly, so dense it looks like a fogbank approaching, cutting off the outside world as it sweeps before the wind. All the land immediately disappears under about an inch of spattering water, everywhere is so flat there is no time for it to drain, and I see places I would have happily camped in turning into massive puddles. A big truck drives past, sending up plumes of water on both sides that reach way higher than its cab. I can’t imagine any tent standing up to this onslaught and am glad I took the cabin.

People often ask me what I do when it rains, and I rather glibly reply that I’m British and used to rain so just keep going. I’ve changed my mind about that now, the road would be no place to weather a zero visibility downpour like this and I’ll seek shelter wherever I can.

The storm is so intense it’s actually quite frightening. Doobie from Marley’s Marina said that when he first moved down south the storms scared him and I didn’t think much about it, but I understand now.

But my little wooden cabin is keeping me dry and safe, even though the constant massive lightening strikes are a bit of a concern, and the thunder keeps trying to trigger my animal reflexes. My apprehension is upped significantly when I look round the side of the building and see the unmistakable shape of a tornado funnel reaching down from the clouds, with dirty dark patches of cloud forming in the gap between the funnel and the ground. I stare in disbelief and horror, it is only a few miles away and I can’t see any lateral movement which means it’s probably heading towards me. I go inside and turn on the tv to see if there are any ‘get inside’ warnings going on, but after a minute or so the satellite tv goes dead. Hmm.

I look outside and to my horror the funnel has got a lot bigger, well defined, and closer to the ground. After seeing many of those ‘extreme weather’ and ‘storm chaser’ programs I know that most of these things don’t actually turn into tornadoes, but some of them do, and it’s just over there! I consider running to the nearest house and telling them about it, but the occasional car driving past doesn’t look panicked, and there are cars going both towards and away from the storm, so I figure it’s probably quite a common occurrence. Just in case I identify the safest bit of my cabin, the bathroom, and get ready to take the table and mattress in there to cower behind. I grab my wallet so that my body can be identified, my phone to call for help, and my camera to take cool pics. Happily the funnel gradually gets wider and moves away to the northeast, dissipating as it goes, and I relax, keeping a wary eye out for other funnels and being impressed by the atomic lightening. The tv comes back up and has a special on a tornado formed by this very storm shortly before, about 100 miles away in Forth Worth. So these things are real, and scary, and I don’t ever want to be anywhere near one.

The storm marked the passing of a front, and the next morning my usual tail wind turns into a headwind, a river of chilled air streaming down from the still-frozen north. I figure I’ll get breakfast at the next little town but have underestimated the isolation and it’s 30 miles before I find hot food, a very welcome bacon cheeseburger and fries in a gas station (where y‘all from?), it sure is tasty. I cross the Red River into Oklahoma, the river really is red from cutting a deep channel through the red earth of the plains, and very beautiful, but the bridge is no place to stop and take photos. Just before I crossed the bridge I rode past a run-down house with a couple of decayed animals hanging by the neck next to the road. Unsettling to say the least. Best to keep riding.

The bridge over the Red River into Oklahoma:

Oklahoma calls itself ‘Native America’, which I take as a bad joke after reading up on Native American history before I came out here. Ethnic cleansing, brutality and colonialism is no stranger to the country that prides itself on freeing itself from colonialism and standing for liberty and human rights.

The sun is welcoming here on the plains, the colour of warm golden honey, the sunlight feels almost tangible, enveloping you in its soft embrace when you step out of the shade. Further south it had a much harder edge to it, you felt like it was shining straight through you. An old lady worked in a Florida Walmart on the door, ostensibly to meet ‘n greet, but really to keep an eye out for shoplifters. I asked her where a cash machine was, to be greeted by a long blank stare, later I realized that I should have asked for an ATM. Her face was deeply lined, cracked and expressionless, like a sun-baked mudflat, covered in foundation with rosy cheeks painted on. Her long vacant stare made me feel that the harsh sun had shone through her eyes too much during her life, tracking daily across the back of her once-lively skull, bleaching out the joyful colours of a human mind and turning it into a faded sepia photograph locked in a dark and empty attic.

I gladly end the day early in a holiday inn in Durant, Oklahoma, the freezing headwind and long cold hours without food destroying my urge to camp rough in the prairie.

Watonga, Oklahoma

2008-04-23T17:58:00.006+01:00

Just quick update, more will follow later. After an awesomely beautiful, quiet and isolated ride I camped just outside Geary, Oklahoma last night, in a campsite behind a Cherokee Trading Post. Good buffalo burgers. Rode 30 miles north this morning with what started out as mist turning into more and more fog, didn't think anything of it until i heard thunder rumbling, luckily got into Watonga just as it kicked off properly and hid in a friendly cafe, discussing rattlesnakes, cockroaches, cougars, camping rough and travelling in general with some of the good ole boys, who were just like the lead guys from mythbusters. Was a good laugh. Turns out it's severe thunderstorms all the way to the texas panhandle, and tornado watch south of here, when the power started going out in the town figured it was a good day to stop early in the nice cheap motel next door.

Check out weather underground for some good weather stuff of where I am, heres the link for the closest town:

http://www.wunderground.com/US/OK/Woodward.html

I'm gonna chill for a bit, get some eats and stick up loadsa photos.

Severe Storm Warning

2008-04-22T02:38:00.003+01:00

check this out, locations in the warning below are about 20 miles from me. Looking out the door I can see the 'supercell' cloud that can produce tornadoes, an evil looking thing towering over the horizon, a big boiling block of white cloud like a flattened mushroom cloud, flashing with internal lightening, looking like something out of the end of the world.

A local just came out and said "Man look at that cloud! That's a hell of a supercell, right there!"

Here's the storm warning:

.. A Severe Thunderstorm Warning remains in effect until 900 PM CDT
for northern Garvin and southwestern McClain counties...

At 829 PM CDT... National Weather Service Doppler radar detected a
severe thunderstorm 5 miles west of Maysville... moving east at 15
mph. Another severe storm was located 8 miles northeast of Payne.

Hail up to the size two inches and winds of 65 mph are likely.

Severe thunderstorms can produce tornadoes with no advance warning.
Move immediately to a storm shelter... basement or sturdy building if
a tornado is sighted.

Route for next few days

2008-04-22T00:54:00.003+01:00

Things are getting quite isolated out here, it's about 150 miles between bike shops from what i can see. The landscape is getting less and less populated, pretty much all the side roads i saw today were unsurfaced.

Rough route from here is weatherford, woodward, beaver, liberal (kansas), which seems to have a bike shop, then johnson city or ulysses (kansas), then across colorado somehow. Will cross the Canadian River in a couple days. I'm about 650 miles or so from Denver, although there is a rumour that bertie wants to meet in boulder, which is northwest of denver, so i may skirt denver and go via colorado springs instead as i hate riding in big cities.

land is also getting drier and drier, can see that it will turn into desert west of here, it's still beautiful though

bike is going no problems, hope it stays that way

heat was in the high 80's today, no wonder i was struggling a bit, it kinda sneaks up on you cos you're out in it all day, but when i left my room just now, man it was hot

Chickasha, Oklahoma

2008-04-21T20:56:00.003+01:00

just quick update, wifi real dodgy in this cheap motel so prob not gonna be able to upload pics. Stayed in a campsite in Sulphur last night, shoulda been 25 dollars but kind lady did it for 5 as i'm only in a wee tent. Long hard hot ride to Chickasha today, plains look flat but actually loads of short sharp hills in and out of creeks. Gonna do some laundry and have a good feed, will try to write more later. Really appreciate all the comments, I well look forwards to getting some internet so can read them, keeps me going up them hills!

have had a lot of dogs harassing me, but when i mentioned i was riding in a sandwich shop they started telling me how one of their friends got attacked by a mountain lion (cougar) whilst cycling! Apparently there's loads of them around this way. Scary.

might have another rest day tomorrow as knees are twinging a little from all the climbing, we will see, in good shape really

laters

Updated Map

2008-04-18T20:13:00.002+01:00

Well this shows quite clearly how I'm getting on!

View Larger Map

Durant, Oklahoma

2008-04-18T19:30:00.009+01:00

Just a quick post, stayed in Telephone, just north-west of Paris, Texas, last night. Experienced a 'severe thunderstorm', which was damn scary, especially as I could see a tornado forming only a few miles away - could clearly see the funnel forming, and dirty bits of cloud appearing between the bottom of the funnel and the ground. Doesn't really come out in the pics as it was so dark, but it was quite a shock to see it when i stepped outside.

Turns out this storm produced a real tornado an hour or so before it got to me, in Fort Worth, about 100 miles away.

Luckily it dissipated before becoming a full-on one, but it's as close to one as i ever want to get. The thunder was so strong and close it was shaking the building, and when the rain started all the land immediately disappeared under an inch of water. Luckily i'd taken a little cabin rather than camping rough, so was snug and dry.

Been a real strong cold headwind from the north today, i been slogging along at 8mph, so have called it a day after about 50 miles and checked into a holiday inn. Crossed the Red River, which really was red into Oklahoma. More laters.

Frequently Asked Questions

2008-04-17T03:47:00.002+01:00

I've been asked a lot of questions on this tour, so i thought I'd put them up to give you office workers a little insight into my new life. I've stuck up another big post below this one full of pics, so you may wanna skip straight to that.

Hey man, where y’all from?

I’m from the UK.

Huh?

I’m .. from … the … uk. You may have trouble understanding my ‘thick british accent‘, as my mate Brandon describes it.

Oh man I love England!

Actually I’m from Wales. Wales is one of the states that makes up the UK, along with England, Northern Ireland and Scotland.

Oh, I thought England was the UK!
No, that’s like saying that Texas is America. Wales, Scotland and Ireland have their own languages and culture too. It’s the same sort of setup as the USA, but with a bigger difference between the states from what I’ve seen so far. England is by far the biggest state in terms of population though.

They really have their own languages?

Yep, celtic languages, different from latin languages like Spanish, it’s all very old. A good percentage of the population in wales/Scotland/Ireland will speak English as a second language.

Is the culture very different from here?
Umm, no not really to be honest. America is a more right wing, religous and conservative, Britain is a more left wing, secular and liberal. But they’ve got a lot more in common than apart I think. Also, we are a post-imperial declining power, and you guys are the major superpower at the moment.

At the moment!
Well, yeah, nothing lasts forever. Empires rise and fall.

We’re not an empire!
Lets leave this discussion for another time, it’s a bit deep for a cycling faq.

Where you riding from?
I’m riding from Miami to Seattle, started out a few weeks ago, it’ll take me a couple months in total to ride.

Miami, FLORIDA to Seattle, WASHINGTON???

Yep

Man! I drove across Florida once and thought I was never gonna get there! I can’t imagine cycling all that way!

It’s a different experience, I feel the same way as you when I’m driving, but on the bike you have a different mindset, once you got the fitness you just sit there and watch the miles go by. It’s not like a car where you get bored, you’re always doing something - dodging potholes, managing your body, looking at the road kill. Quite often I find I’ve done about 20 or 30 more miles than I thought I had. Even weirder, sometimes I’ll stop to think about whether to carry on or stop for the day, and while I’m engrossed in that my body saddles up and starts riding again, and when I come out of my deep thought mode I realise I’ve ridden a few miles and the decision has been made for me by my body!

Where you going after Seattle?

Vancouver

Huh? Where?

Vancouver, Canada, it’s just across the border from Seattle. I’m probably gonna drive from Vancouver to Toronto, where I’ll meet up with most of my family.

How do you choose your route?
Well, I know I gotta aim for denver then seattle, so I basically draw a line on the map and take the smallest roads I can find that stay as close to that line as possible. So every night I plan a detailed route for the next day, and I have a rough plan for the couple days after that, and a very rough plan for the couple weeks after that.

Don’t you use the interstates?
No way! Too dangerous, and anyway the little roads are way nicer.

Do you have a gps or something?
Nope! Too big and heavy, and you gotta have batteries, you can’t use it to plan a route, and it’s no fun. I use a map on the handlebars, and I’ve got a compass there too

You really need a compass?
For sure, it’s really handy, especially when you get into a city and there’s a roundabout with 6 exits and none of them signposted for where you want to go. I didn’t take a compass on my last trip and regretted it, it’s none too easy navigating by the sun in a city. Seems crazy in the 21st century, having to rely on the sun and a compass, but there you go.

What do you take with you on a trip like this?
As little as possible, weight and volume are crucial. I’ve got a small tent, weighs about 1kg / 2 lbs, shorts and a couple of t-shirts, some cold weather bike gear, emergency spares and first-aid kit, sleeping bag, that’s about it. You don’t need much to live really, it’s surprising.

Have you been planning this a long time?
Initially I thought people meant ‘did it take a long time to arrange the logistics’ as I’m a literal minded guy. Eventually I sussed that they really meant “have you always wanted to ride across america”. Disappointingly, it’s always been something at the back of my mind behind a lot of other stuff, and it just suddenly leaped to the front one day whilst lying on the sofa at my good friend Bert’s house in Brighton, UK. I’m quite spontaneous, so booked the flights as soon as I’d determined when the weather window was. From deciding to flying was about 3 months, and a lot of that was waiting for the weather window.

Where do you sleep?
A mixture of campsites, motels, camping rough in a field somewhere, and kind people putting me up. I was struggling with the heat for the first few weeks so stayed in cheap motels mostly, then I stayed with my buddy Brandon for a couple of nights, since then I’ve mostly been camping. From now on will be a lot of camping, either rough or in a campsite. It’s good to have a motel on a rest day though, so I’ll be in a motel a couple nights a week.

How do you find somewhere to stay?
Just ride for about 70 miles then look for somewhere. I usually have a rough idea of where motels and campsites will be from looking at the map, and I ask locals as I get close, they always know where stuff is.

What about all the crazy people/serial killers/muggers/criminals?
Travelling solo does sound scary, there’s nobody to look out for you, and if you disappear nobody will look for you for a while. But it just isn’t like that, pretty much everybody along the route looks out for you. I’ve been through some pretty rough areas and met nothing but kindness and offers of help. You also develop a pretty good sense of danger. In fact, the only time I’ve felt at all uncomfortable on this trip was when I was cornered by some full-on evangelist born again christian preachers, who as soon as they found I was a non-believer (well, I actually said I was a militant atheist) subtly blocked my exits, went into aggressive body language and wouldn’t let go of my hand! But they were nice really, just concerned about my soul. Good luck with that.

Don’t you get lonely?
Umm, not really. A little bit sometimes, but in the same way that if you travel a long time with someone you can get a bit fed up of them and need a little time on your own. There’s usually a low point about a week into a solo trip where you see a beach full of people having fun and you feel a bit left out, but it soon passes. Luckily I’m a bit of a loner anyway and am quite self contained. It’s great to have good friends along, but it’s also great to travel solo for a while. A mixture is best. Going too long without seeing anyone you know, or having time to build friendships, is not good for your mental health though.

Why are you doing this?
It just felt right. I know you’re expecting me to say I’m doing it for charity, or to make a statement, or something like that, but really it’s just because I love doing this stuff.

How can you afford to do it?
Saved up, sold my car, rented out my apartment. Camping is cheap, so I get by on about 40 dollars a day or so, more if I’m in a motel or have to fix the bike.

Don’t your parents worry about you?
Yes.

How do you keep in touch? Do you have a laptop or something?
I have a prepaid cellphone that lets me make international calls fairly cheaply. I didn’t have a laptop for the first month but just bought one as wifi is everywhere and it’s dead handy to have one, even though you pay a significant penalty in weight and size. I think it’s worth it, although the rockies may change my mind about that. If you see a laptop floating in a river somewhere it’s probably from a touring cyclist.

Do you really throw stuff away like that?
Yep, big time. At the end of the first day I threw away my trousers, t-shirts, sunglasses, books, maps, camping stove, cooking pots, normal size bottles of shampoo and toothpaste (I bought some tiny ones instead), some spares and tools, and lots of other stuff I’ve forgotten about for now. For the next few days I ruthlessly shed stuff until I reached my happy minimum. It’s no joke that touring cyclists really do cut the handles off their toothbrushes and the labels off their clothes.

How fast can that thing go?
Down a big hill you can do about 60, it gets pretty scary though. On the flat you can sprint up to about 30, but cruise is usually about 15mph.

How often do you wash your bike clothes?
Erm, well, it usually turns out to be about once a week! After that they are usually greasy and horrible, although for some reason the strong sun seems to stop them stinking too bad (you may disagree, I saw you take a step back when you got close), maybe because the sweat evaporates immediately.

You’re very brown
Check out my farmer’s tan! (Lift t-shirt sleeve to show blinding white skin). Quit laughing!

Well you look great, look at those legs!
I get quite shy when you are gawping at me in my skintight lycra.

It must be a great way to lose weight
Yeah, for sure, I’ve lost about 13lbs / 6 kg since I started, and that’s on a constant all-you-can-eat diet of pizzas burgers donuts fruit snack bars and chocolate muffins. In fact, I’m a bit sick of eating so much now! But no eat, no miles.

What’s the longest you ride?
Usually I do about 70 miles or so at a fairly steady 15 miles an hour, which works out at about 6 hours including breaks. I usually stop for 5 minutes every hour just to get off the bike, and chopping up the ride makes it a lot easier. There are usually supermarket and gas station stops for food and water too. The longest I rode in one day was 137 miles, which was 12 hours, dawn until dusk, but that was too much to do every day. These days I’ve taken to having a decent, hour-long break for lunch with some solid food, and have something light in the evening. Breakfast is usually a quick carb-fest stuffed down as I’m getting ready to roll.

You will be real careful on those roads, won’t you?
I promise. I’m way better in traffic that I was when I started, and I was pretty good then. You kinda develop a sense of danger, and I’ve only had to jam my brakes on about twice in 1300 miles, and each of those times I’d spotted the potential danger and was well prepared for it. I’m mostly on tiny wee roads anyway. In general, american drivers are quite courteous and considerate, often giving me an entire lane when they overtake as long as it’s quiet. If it’s busy then things get a bit more hassled and they tend to squeeze past, which is why I avoid big cities and rush hours.

How long have you been cycling?
Well, I rode a lot when I was a teenager, dropped it when I got a car at around 19, and took it up again about 10 years ago when I started commuting to work, and did my first bike tour in spain.

Don’t you have a mirror to see what’s going on behind?
I keep thinking about getting one, but it’s extra weight and it’ll probably get broken soon enough. My main objection is that your main method of communication with the other drivers is your head movements. Arm signals come a long way behind, you only use those when you‘re about to turn. Looking over your shoulder (or usually just pretending too, cos I can tell whats going on behind using my ears with a suprising degree of accuracy) is a clear signal to the driver that you know they are there, and you’re not gonna do anything stupid. Once you have a mirror you tend to stop doing this, and drivers get confused as you seem to be cycling along obliviously. I’ve noticed this myself when following cyclists with mirrors, even with all my cycling experience I find mirror cyclists very unpredictable. The best way to get a driver to give you space is panicky looks over your shoulder in traffic, that comes across clearly and they will almost always back off and give you space. So, in short, I don’t really like mirrors, which I guess puts me in the hardcore-purist category, which I think is the only time I’m ever in that category. Go figure.

Do you have a camera?
Yeah, I have a little one that I keep in my back pocket, which I mostly use to take wobbly shots of striking bits of the road and scenery without stopping. Some of my friends like to stop all the time and take pics, but I have serious miles to do, and they’re not here. This usually leads to minor but amusing friction when they come out to ride with me!

Whas sorta gas mileage you get with that thing?
About 10 miles per chocolate muffin, or about 40 for a large bacon cheeseburger, fries and a coke ;-)

Man, you must have seen some interesting things!
This one has given me the most food for thought. The cycle touring life is actually quite focused and monastic: get up at dawn, ride all day, eat, sleep, repeat. I’m usually too tired at the end of the day for wild adventures in bars and clubs. So mostly what I’ve seen is roads, road kill, wildlife and friendly people.

Are you running away from something?
Good question, but not really, unless you count running away from a life that had gone a little stale. I’m more drifting with fate to see where I end up, and having lots of fun on the way.

Don’t you worry about your stuff being stolen?
Umm, not really, no. I have a little lock for the bike that will stop an opportunistic thief running off with it, but as it’s covered in mudguards/fenders, racks, bottles, bags, grease, sweat, dust, it’s not the most attractive bike for a thief. Most of the time I’m in tiny towns and villages where I happily leave it outside shops and restaurants without locking it, you can generally feel how safe a place is. I never leave it too long though, and I carry my wallet on me. Basically, if you care about something, you shouldn’t take it on a bike tour! That is the best defence against theft.

Daily Tribune

2008-04-17T00:10:00.002+01:00

heh heh, well just got interviewed by the Mount Pleasant Daily Tribune http://www.dailytribune.net/ they said they'll email me if they use it. Cool. Take that County Times!

North from Louisiana into Texas

2008-04-16T22:57:00.010+01:00

I don’t know if you’ve seen the film ‘Into the Wild’ yet, but if you haven’t, go see it, because it’s pretty much where I’m at. I’m having an incredible experience, it’s just what I dreamed about. If you are my parents don’t watch the movie, you won‘t like the ending. A few people have told me they find the blog inspiring, which is the biggest compliment I can think of. Thinking of all my buddies reading it whilst stuck in an office helps stop me taking this incredible journey for granted.

Travelling north from Brandon’s has seen some cool changes in the landscape. Lafayette marked the end of the coastal swamps, and I entered lush green meadows sprinkled with colorful wild flowers, each one calling to me to come camp there. I think there will be plenty of rough camping coming up.

Heading out towards Alexandria, where I camped behind the bike shop, a piece of rusty wire comes from nowhere and wraps itself around my wheel, nearly tearing off the mudguard and making me skid to a halt, I’m glad I’m on the shoulder not a busy road.

I saw my first live snake the other day, about a foot and a half long and green, it came wiggling frantically across the road at me, I figured it was just trying to cross and managed to dodge it, looking back I saw I had and it disappeared into the grass. How many times in life do you have to dodge snakes on your bike!

The ride out from Natchitoches to Shreveport was pretty awful, a 20mph+ headwind reduced my average speed by a third, and even though I tried to just sit back and take it easy it’s still soul destroying to put in all that effort and hardly move. Amazingly, I’ve pretty much had a tailwind for all the time up until now, almost as if the wind has decided to help me, so I think of the headwind day as the wind drawing breath, ready to keep blowing me along. Amazingly, that’s exactly what happens, as the last 2 days have been a strong tailwind. I owe you one wind, big time. This ride makes me think about the old stories, where people dare the wind and get awful experiences in return, so I’m doing my best to keep all karma in the green. The day of the headwind I actually found myself trying to figure out what bad thing I’d done recently to deserve a headwind!

Crossed into Texas yesterday, that was a hell of a moment. I thought to myself “I’ve ridden to Texas!” and had a huge grin on my face. Louisiana was the south, but Texas is definitely the west. Immediately the road smoothed out, I entered beautiful pine forest, and started riding through rolling waves of hills as I begin the long, gradual climb to the high plains, which are actually higher than the mountains on the East Coast!

I unknowingly ride past the only natural lake in Texas, apparently all the others are dams, which is incredible as texas is huge and has loads of lakes. It is really thought provoking when you realise that a couple hundred years ago this land was inhabited essentially by nomadic tribes, then the settlers came, and have had a huge impact on the continent.

After 1400 miles of flat land the hills are a welcome relief, it’s great to stand up in the pedals and work the bike up the hills, then get the ‘free’ miles rolling down the other side. Even with the full camping load I still haven’t dropped below mid-front and mid-rear on the gears, so I don’t seem to have lost my welsh hill climbing ability.

The hills are mostly of the short and sharp variety though, which are kinda tough to make miles through, so after 55 miles I call it a day when I spot the beautiful and inviting Marley's Bullfrog Marina at Johnson's Creek, Lake o' the Pines, which has a board up showing that it takes tents, a big relief as many campsites only take Rvs.

It turns out to be closed, but Doobie (the boss) and Billy take pity on me and tell me to go camp anyway, and when they find out I’m riding from Miami to Seattle they refuse to take any money, tell me to camp anywhere I want, install me on the porch with some beers and chew the fat for a while, before filling a coolbox with more beers for me and offering me a free breakfast! Awesome! Time after time on this trip I’m blown away by people’s kindness, I always try to say no as I don’t want to inconvenience them, but they usually insist, and so I am grateful to accept their generosity, it would be insulting not to, and I‘m genuinely glad that they want to help me.

I camp on a deserted point sticking into the lake, it is beautiful, birds of prey are circling around, there are fish in the lake, I already don’t want to leave. I take a quick swim then sit there in the sun, taking it all in, laughing like a crazy fool with the sheer joy of life. As soon as the sun sets I fall asleep snuggled up in my tent, certain that this is how life should be. I can quite imagine spending a summer working here, chopping logs, clearing brush, fixing boats, cooking burgers, drinking beers.

I wake early and have the urge to do some miles, so pass on the free breakfast offer, wave goodbye to Billy as he opens the store, and head through more hills, these ones getting longer and longer as I head towards the plains. For the first time since Miami I get to the top of a decent hill, where the road disappears, the wind changes and all you can see is blue sky. I love these moments, it’s what makes me ride, wondering what I’m gonna see when I get to the top. I’m not disappointed, I see rolling lush green forest stretching to the horizon, with a sprinkling of white water towers marking settlements. The descent is a dream, the bike heavy but stable, the tyres scything over the road, the bugs bouncing off my grin.

A few more miles, a bit of grief with a bulge in the tyre, soon sorted by reseating it, and I’m into Mount Pleasant, which has a sweet little downtown district with a plaza, then into the campsite and straight out again for lunch. Service in the restaurant is slow, real slow, and orders are forgotten. An ex-schoolteacher lady has had enough, and organizes a diner’s rebellion. She marches off to the kitchen and breathes some fire, the staff are soon jumping and giving generous discounts. On discovering my ride she whips out her mobile and rings the local paper to see if they are interested in doing a piece on me! It turns out to be a bad time as they are in the middle of breaking news - the swat team is busting all the restaurants for illegal immigrants, an action to make the conservatives happy. But not the ladies at the table next to me, who have Mexican family members who crossed the border years ago when it was legal, have kids who have grown up here, and are now facing deportation. They are waitresses themselves, and so I ask for tipping advice, as it’s a bit of a mystery to me who to tip, when to tip, and how much. I am horrified to discover that waitresses earn about 2 dollars (one pound) per hour! When they say they live off their tips, they really do. I’ve been sticking to the 10-15 percent, but I’ll up that a lot for good service now. 2 dollars an hour, man, that is no joke at all to live off.

Mount Pleasant, Texas

2008-04-16T19:30:00.004+01:00

just arrived in the wee town of Mount Pleasant, Texas, staying at the KOA campsite and hoovering up all its wifi

finished early today after a couple of long hard days slogging through headwinds and hills. Gonna go grab some scoff, then spend all night sticking stuff up for you lot

Shreveport, Lousiana

2008-04-15T01:27:00.003+01:00

ok people, sorry for no comms last week, had a few rest days in natchitoches, lousiana, got fed up of wifi everywhere but no internet computers so bought a wee toshiba laptop, a satellite u305, it's awesome, 13" screen, light, small, built-in webcam, so am writing this in my tent using the campsite wifi

was great to have some rest time, it was actually hard to force myself to stop riding, but 4 rest days has done me the world of good, am not sleepy all the time anymore. spent the first night in a 20 quid motel, man it was horrible, dirty, dead bugs on the floor, and live ones came out at night, so moved to a big new ramada with its own pub, room service, etc, and for only 30 quid a night! crazy

spent some quality time with the bike, giving it some hands-on lubed up lovin', which it really needed, is running sweet now i degunked the chain and got all the sand and salt out of its vital parts. No problems with the bike at all even though it has had an absolutely incredible pounding on these roads. I'm pretty much out of the hurricane zone now so the roads are much better, and in texas they are supposed to be super-sweet for bikes, with massive smooth shoulders. I'm looking forwards to it.

Before the sweet lovin'After, it is clean, but I am filthy. By the way, the green thing is a 'dumpster', not a skip.

Red River Runners

2008-04-08T22:58:00.003+01:00

ok, left brandon's early on monday after 2 days of being a zombie, rode to lafayette yesterday, and am in alexandria now, a local bike shop is putting me up for the night, camping out back of the shop, and letting me use their internet until they close in an hour or so

bike shop is http://www.rrcbicycles.com/Products.htm

people been amazingly kind, a supermarket manager gave me 5 bucks to buy me lunch, and the subway manager gave me all the bottled water i could carry plus a 25 dollar subway voucher! Awesome

ok i gotta go sort stuff out, more in a couple days

My very own dog pound:

The Journey So Far

2008-04-06T21:17:00.029+01:00

Just a skeletal post with just the pics in, will flesh it out a little later. Some of the pics can't be clicked on for enlarging, not sure why, will have a look at the html. It's pretty rough and ready so please live with the poor formatting for now.

The bike, chopped, stripped and ready to go:

The bike in naked race mode in the hotel in West Palm Beach, man it looks sweet:
Riding out from Arcadia on Day 3:

Woulda been a nice place to camp:
Da wee beastie!

Heading into the swamp, didn't take this road but stayed on the tarmac instead:

Not everything is bigger in America! This is just by Zephyrhills:

It's a good way to cross a continent:

Clearly, someone disagrees:

This bike trail made me glad i bought a tricross, it was gravel with patches of soft sand, but the bike ploughed through both:

Construction roads no problem either:

The cockpit:

Reaching the Gulf Coast after about 400 miles or so. This was just after lunch on the awesome 137 mile day:

Yep, riding along the gulf coast sure is purty:

The mule poses seductively:

Just trying to make y'all jealous with some scenery:

Beautiful waterside hotel in Apalachicola, they gave me 50 percent discount too, and the room was amazing, ride over the water. I was very happy:

Crossing from Panama City to Panama City Beach, bridges are impressive and scary for a cyclist:

Riding from Navarre Beach to Pensacola Beach, road was closed, looked very post-apocalyptic, had about 20 miles to myself!

Post-apocalyptic refugees! Keep them outa my island!
Bike lane leading to the Fort Morgan Ferry (which never came) just south of Mobile:
Camping on the beach waiting for the ferry:
On a jetty in Gulfport, Missisippi
Gulfport beach:
Hurricane Katrina damage just north of New Orleans:
Crossing from Missisippi to Louisiana:
The Sunshine Bridge across the Missisippi, the scariest moment of the trip so far. Doesn't look like much, but it was like daring a monster:

Baseball knockaround, very professional stance, no?

Ross for some reason decides to play in his underwear, whilst Tyler does a mean Steve Irwin impression:

Cajun cookout, that's a table full of tasty crawfish:

Brandon, Hallie, Me and Heath:

Brandon, his truck and house:

Buy the ticket, take the ride.

2008-04-05T19:16:00.005+01:00

After a couple of months of uncertainty, I can now look forward to joining Dr Hamilton in Colorado in just under 4 weeks time. I finally sold my flat last week and to celebrate ordered my very own Tricross :) After seeing Kelv's before he left for Florida I knew there was no other steed for this trip! Initially I was going to get the Sport and just upgrade a few bits, but the kit list somehow got out of control very quickly into a dream spec Tricross Comp.

Kelv put me onto the Specialized Concept store at Fort Dunlop in Birmingham and I fired them over a rough custom spec. With helpful advice from Hannah and Danny at the store, the baby you see in the pick came to life. I picked it up today from Brum and haven't let it out my sight since!!! Here's some more snaps of the beauty: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=105043&l=b9372&id=836440719

Next job is to sort flights and the slight issue of fitness. I've done 200 miles so far this year and have 4 weeks till I join Iron Man Hamilton in the high Rockies. Would be fairly ok if I didn't have to move house and attend a 3 day Techno festival in the middle :D My only hope will be that Kelv's 'heart muscle' legs will have deterioated from the immense amount of burgers and other trash he seems to be funnelling into his face.

Tomorrow the Tricross gets its first outing, back road to Llanidloes, back road to Llangurig, back road to Rhayader and home through Pant-y-Dwr and St Harmon. Can't wait!!!

Brandon

2008-04-05T03:39:00.005+01:00

First leg complete! 1100 miles from Miami to Morgan City to see my good buddy Brandon, who is kindly letting me crash in his house. Caught up with Travis too, and have spent the night at Brandon's girlfriend's dad's house scoffing bbq steaks and listening to firefighting stories - he reckons he can set me up with staying at firehouses on my route maybe!

Well here's some photos, me at the start of a ride, look a lot less perky at the end:

Brandon and Travis:

Brandon demonstrates how proud he is of his new boat:

I'm a bit disappointed actually. I thought i stank of sweat and oil, but Brandon tells me when I got in his truck there was a strong smell of coconut butter from the suncream! Also I met some fire ants for the first time today.

Brandon lovingly serenades his girlfriend Hallie with his rendition of that song from Top Gun:

He's promised to lend me his laptop so i'll sort out some pics later. Oh yeah, i also had the most dangerous part of my ride today, crossing the mississippi (or however you spell it) on the Sunshine Bridge which had zero provision for cyclists. Terrifying.

Laters!

need ... more .... sleep....

2008-04-03T15:59:00.002+01:00

man am sleepy today, can't wait for a rest at brandon's, he tells me he's bought a boat so it's gonna be fishin' on the gulf for me!

late start today as caught up on some z's, and it's already hot as hell out there

Mobile and Beyond to Bay St Louis

2008-04-03T00:55:00.005+01:00

man, well, too much stuff has happened to get down in the last couple days, only got 30 mins on this machine

rode through mobile yesterday, lots of horrific dual carriageway causeways and bridges covered in broken glass and debris with trucks howling past, i'd just cleared the last massive bridge and just had some suburbs to get through when i hit a bit of rusty metal that pretty much cut my back tyre in half and killed the tube. Nightmare. I thought I was about 20 mins walk from city centre so rather than doing a field fix i figured i'd just push it into town and go to a city centre bike shop.

Riding over the causeway into Mobile, you can see the battleship USS Alabama and the city centre skyline behind it:

The last obstacle, the Africatown-Cochrane bridge, it looked intimidating, and the bike lane was covered in broken glass and junk:

View from the Africatown-Cochrane Bridge, just before losing the rear tyre:

a quick call to UK Support Base (Bert) found that the nearest bike shop is about 5 miles away, so i figure i'll get to a bar, cool down from the heat, and get a taxi.

Centre turns out to be an hour and a half walk away through dodgy industrial area, was like something out of robocop, but every one is friendly as usual, giving me directions, wishing me well. Brandon is kindly standing by on pickup duty if needed, it's tempting but i decide to fix the bike. It feels real good to have support though.

bar orders me a taxi, but it doesn't turn up for an hour. Homeless people recognise a kindred spirit and drop by to give me advice on the cheapest way to the cheapest tyres and tubes (walmart), and how to avoid jail if I have to sleep rough in the city centre. A alabaman babe called JT, who was at the bar, asks me where i need to go, turns out the bike shop is right next to her house, so she organises her friends Jess and John to get me and the bike out there! Awesome! I go from a low to a high pretty quick, these are cool people.

Bike shop is great, full of good gear, and Nathan the resident bike mechanic wizard dude sorts it all out pronto, spending about an hour tweaking things and fixing things, now it rides like a brand new, slightly more expensive bike than i had before! Cheers Nathan, I owe you one! Also meet some cool young lads who build their own old-skool bikes from scrap and sell them on ebay, interesting stuff.

Nathan, the resident bike wizard at Cadence-120, showing off his work:

Head next door to buy the girls a beer for giving me a lift, JT sorts me out with a place to stay with Josh and Chris, two alabaman dudes with a cool house including its own bar! Chew the fat late into the night with Chris, it was a cool and interesting time.

Rode out through the fog at dawn, Josh's directions see me straight onto Highway 90 heading west for New Orleans! It's grim though, thick fog, the hard shoulder is rough as hell, covered in glass, debris and stinking roadkill, but it's either that or a dual carriageway lane, none too friendly. I get a puncture but sort it fast.

Into Biloxi and the massive bridge has a closed-off bike lane. I ask the road crew if it's possible to get across, they say 'sure man just go through the sign', and a fit helpful friendly dude walks over and moves it for me, wishing me well as I ride up the slope. Awesome.

But the next worker on the bridge is unimpressed, telling me if the boss sees me it'll be a police matter, and the first crew shouldn't have moved the sign. He tells me to keep going though, and stomps off to have strong words with my friendly dude. Good karma begets Bad Karma. Nightmare. I ride over the bridge sending a ripple of bad karma backwards as this experience is repeated with several other workers.

Now I'm through Biloxi and heading for Gulfport, I spent a week here just after 9/11 so I know it quite well. Hurricane Katrina devastation is evident, plenty of buildings have just foundations left, the hotel I stayed in is rubble, my favourite beach restaurant completely gone.

Katrina also wrecked the road, for nearly 30 miles I'm riding through roadworks, there's no room for me on the narrow lane, I get horns blasted if i hold them up, so i have to pick my way through the coned off areas, riding on stripped back surfaces, dodging diggers. For a while I ride on top of the sea wall, which is only a foot wide, but it's too much and i go back to the roadworks. Am well glad I chose a rugged bike, it has had a pounding today.

Another big bridge and into Bay St Louis, roadworks over, and a very welcoming motel. 92 miles or so today, kinda have to stop myself riding these days, feels unnatural to just stop.

It looks like about 140 miles to Brandon's house just outside Morgan City, so I may push it and do it in one tomorrow, or split it and get there friday lunchtime. Am not going through New Orleans but heading north around the lake then down the west side through donaldsonville, i know the road as I stayed there last year with work.

OK i gotta go get something to eat, will stick some pics up later assuming the pc is free and i'm still awake. Don't count on either!

Kelv