Holy moly! What a @$%^ day!

View from Chukanut

So here's the thing about bicycle touring: you can have both the absolutely best day AND worst day ever, all at the same time. The way it works is this: nobody transports you to the start of a spectacularly scenic route or challenging climb. Nobody picks you up and whisks you away to your hotel when the road surface deteriorates, or you hit huge traffic, or you have to cross a bridge riding on the sidewalk against traffic going 60 mph. You handle all that crap on your own.  It's actually part of the appeal of touring; solving those problems and getting where you need to be is a source a great satisfaction and accomplishment. Doing it yourself is what touring is all about, after all. But . . . some days you can get just a little too much of all that.

Mt Baker, we think

Thus, we began our day with a sweet ride through the Skagit Valley. We had an incredible ride up and over Chukanut to Bellingham. We enjoyed coffee and the best pastries I have had (outside of France) in the cutest little coffee shop right there on the main drag. We passed through one charming, vibrant little coastal town after another. We even stopped for fresh cherries at the last intersection before the border. The weather was fine, winds were favorable. We were making good time and this day, like yesterday, was on track to be one of the great days on a bike you remember forever.

One of touring's sweet rewards

And then, following our crossing into Canada, we began a four hour descent through the cycling world's seven levels of hell, and the day became one of those you will always remember, but for different reasons. First, we lost our guidance system (map got funky due to our data plan issues); got lost (multiple times); got hangry (I told Roger I had to stop to eat something but it was really about him); got hot (nothing to do about that but dump water on ourselves).

Your route might be off-road

 Traffic was CRAZY (we were in city driving at rush hour for 35 miles); we had a deadline (we were planning to meet an old fried for dinner); and THERE ARE HILLS EVERYWHERE (oh Lord, not another one to climb!)

I mean, with 7+ hours in the saddle, and within 10 km of the end, you do not want to face a 10% grade on a 200 foot climb. If you are riding in the Tour de France, I understand that comes with the job. But c'mon - is there no way around this hill? Apparently not. Vancouver is built on the rocky hills and ridges left by the glaciers.  It's all up and down.

Photo does NOT do it justice. We walked this one.

By the way, did I mention that we also had to contend with the data conversion from meters to miles? Because of course, once we were able to get a map and route refresh (thank God for McDonald's and their universal WiFi system!), all the route keys were in kilometers. But my Garmin was running miles, so I had to do the math to figure where our next turn would be. If we missed something and got off course, it tried to recalculate the route, which it couldn't seem to do because of the data plan, and thus everything froze up, and we had to find another McDonald's. (Fortunately there seems to be one every few miles up here.)

We did at last make it in to our hotel, after 88.3 miles and about 7 1/2 hours. That's more than we thought it would be, and way harder than we'd anticipated. Our dinner with Elliott and his daughter was great, and we were happy to have a nice bed to sleep in. Most importantly, we knew that we had nothing to do the next day! Roger said, "I don't know how I can ride that bike in another day!" But of course we will. A day spent resting and refueling, and we'll be fine.

Done!

Mount Vernon to North Vancouver, 88.3 miles

3647 feet climbing, 11.7 mph

What a great day!

How could a day that begins like this be bad?

We headed out from Gaye and Ben's house about 7:40 this morning. It was crisp, and cool, and the weather today just couldn't have been more spectacular. Until after our lunch break, it was super - and even then, when it began to get warm, it was still cool as we passed through the shade. Just a perfect day on the bike.

A big part of our day was on two spectacular bike trails.  In Seattle, we rode the Burke Gilman trail from the University all around to the north side of Lake Washington and beyond. It was busy with cyclists, walkers, runners and commuters - a fine example of the adage: if you build it, they will come. What a fabulous public amenity. I considered one of the interesting ironies of our age: what would once have been a terrible impact on one's home value (i.e., a train running through your back yard) is now transformed into a great property value booster: proximity to a 15 mile trans-city bike path linking you to everything!  All the neighborhoods we rode through looked interesting and appealing to me, whether modest or spectacular. Shops and cafes were everywhere. Even in a city where winter weather can be cold and rainy, cycling connects communities. It was exciting to see.

Then, we spent about 25 miles on the Snohomish County Centennial trail. It's also a former rail corridor, and it keeps cyclists off the main roads. Great views, perfect surface, lots of pull-outs for picnic tables, parking every few miles. It was full of runners and riders, miles into the county.

Places that invest in trails like these see a benefit. Look at all bikes lined up at this eatery!

And lastly, Seattle has lots of twisty roads through lovely neighborhoods. To keep speeds down, many of the intersections have planters, like the one below. Great idea to both beautify the street, and slow the cars racing through.

Well, I will find that photo later. In the meantime, here's Roger.

Seattle to Mt Vernon, 80.5 miles
Climbing, 2760 ft
Avg speed, 12.1

So, how's that working for you?

Hah!  Obviously, not so well.  Here I am, 5 or 6 months later, and I still have not put any of my other stories into place.  But I do think about it, and I am about to get on a bike again, and that seems to be the thing that inspires me, and so here goes  . . .

We are now on stage 7 (or maybe 8) of a multi-activity, multi-state, multi-focused adventure.  Roger and I left home over a week ago to visit with Dana and the girls, driving to Tahoe to see them in a summer theater production.  Then, after just a day's visit, we took the girls with us to Texas to meet their extended family on my side (including a whole passel of cousins.) That leg in itself included driving down to Waco to visit with Mom and Dad - the girls great-grandparents - before spending the better part of a week at my sister's home north of Fort Worth. Flying back to Reno, we returned the girls to their mom and then drove up to Seattle, where I write this.  Tomorrow, we'll head off on the tandem to Vancouver, where we will meet up with Mark Friis for another great Wheeltales tour through the San Juan Islands.  Then, of course, we'll have to get ourselves home again.  We figure to be away for at least three weeks.

Before we left home, I had to gather our biking and camping gear and get it over to Mark to come in the van from Redlands.  With us, we needed clothes for Tahoe, and then the Texas leg of our trip. I had made jam from our plums and apricots, and was carrying that, plus fresh lemons, for my mom and sisters.  Back in Tahoe, I sorted and repacked, moving the rest of our gear and clothing into the bottom of the suitcases so that we'd have what we needed for the bike portion of our trip ready at hand. Now I am stuffing the panniers, hoping to balance the small load of items we have needed all along and therefore couldn't send from home with Mark. 

Clothes and gear on us, packs and panniers ready to load

I am looking forward to getting on the bike tomorrow and pedaling away towards Vancouver, in no small part because once we head off, we are GONE.  Whatever we have with us, we've got. If I have forgotten something, too bad.  And that is one of the really beautiful things about touring. I can't remember if I have ever written about this before, but it's truly a wonderful thing.  You have what you have.  If you need something, you figure it out, but you just can't take it all with you, so you don't.  You get to leave a lot behind.  We don't do that very often in our lives.  Turns out it's very liberating, and I can't recommend it enough.

Put this back in the car - for later!

So here's to leaving *most* of it all behind, and following the open road. I'll write if I can.

A different discipline

Sometimes this stuff keeps me up at night.

I might talk with a bunch of people about ideas, and I'm often composing things in my head during the day when I am around others. But I can't actually write unless I'm on my own. It's hard to concentrate enough to put a sentence together - so I find that I'm not very successful if I'm in a room full of other people. I tried that once or twice during my Makers' group (when my creative friends get together to work on our projects), and it was just a bust. It took me the full four hours to compose one essay, and I don't believe I've ever even gotten back to the blog to post that one. So what is the point of this post? What has kept me up tonight? Well, I want to answer one of the questions that we got frequently during our trip and that we continue to get now that we've completed our journey.

"How did we do it?"

"How did we find the motivation to continue on the trip when we ran into obstacles?" 

"What kind of problems did we run into and how did we keep going for all those months?" 

Maybe that's a couple of questions, but I think it's really just one. And it's one that Roger and I both struggle to answer, because the simplest thing to say is, "we always had a plan B." We knew if we had to, we could ship the bike home. We even joked from time to time about shipping the bike to France, where I could make up the blog by using Internet resources to find and post photos and do research about the places that we would have been riding through had we been back in the States! 

That was never a very real option for us, but it illustrates the degree to which our resources provided us with opportunities. We didn't have to do this trip - it was our choice - and we didn't suffer while we were doing it. In fact, Roger on this last leg just a couple weeks ago made the observation that we really had not had to "rough it," as he put it. This wasn't the first time he'd said that.  It came up frequently on our trip.  And every time this topic came up, I had to laugh. Maybe he had some romanticized notion about the hardships we'd endure as we traveled the country, but I told him multiple times that at the age of 58, I wasn't really interested in sleeping in a ditch! I didn't have any driving desire to experience some incredibly raw and taxing hardship or deprivation just to continue on this journey. That's not why I did it.  I'm old enough, and well enough set in my ways, that I enjoy my creature comforts. I was interested in the trip and I wanted to experience every day as fully as possible, but I don't feel the least bit deprived because we never had to camp on the side of the road!  Although we did have some discussion about whether that might be how we would cross the desert and complete this final push. And I carried an extra water bladder for 6 months in the expectation that I might need to fill it so that I could sleep in the desert off the side of the road. But we'd sent our camping equipment home before reaching Kingman two years ago. We figured to just blast across the long stretch and make it to the hotel in Ludlow - no camping. So there wasn't going to be any sleeping off in the desert the first time around. And the second time around, of course, we knew it would be really, really cold if we tried that, and we weren't planning to do so.

So, when I think about how I would respond to that question, what actually comes to mind is not how I found motivation to ride my bicycle everyday. That was fun and that was why we were there. That's what we set out to do. What actually impresses me the most about my own journey is that I found the discipline to maintain my blog, night after night, for six months. I kept that going because I really couldn't sleep if I didn't put my stories down everyday. It really was kind of a need in me, something that I had to do in order to make room the next day for the new experiences that we were going to have. And since returning home, there have been so many times that I have wanted to tell more of my story, to try and at least keep up with the things that were happening as we tried to get back out there and finish the ride. And yet - months would pass and I wouldn't write a thing!  

The most telling example of this is in the drafting of this particular post.

I had it in mind nearly 2 years ago. I often composed parts of it in my head, without writing them down, and finally one day last August when I was visiting my brother in Texas, I drafted what comes next and sent it to myself. I had a very strong desire to get it into the blog last fall so that I could post some catch-up stories before we actually got out there and finished the last run. And yet - I came home from Greg's house without posting the draft . . . and fall passed, and Christmas came and went, and then the first week of January . . . and I still hadn't gotten that draft posted. 

Yet when we did the ride itself, I managed to record each night of it!  I didn't have the computer - just my phone. But I wrote each evening before going to bed, capturing the events, thoughts and feelings of the dayl  But before that part o the trip - nothing. And since the trip - nothing!  Nearly a month has passed since we got home, and finally here I am, trying to put this to bed. It's 2:30 in the morning. And I'm sitting in the living room dictating this to my phone, with the anticipation that I'll get upstairs at some point tomorrow and flesh it out and find that second part that I wrote at Greg's, and put it all together and post it. But I don't know that I'm actually going to find the discipline to do it and that's ultimately what this post is about. We did this trip which many people view as an amazing accomplishment. They respond to our adventure with a sense of awe about how we mustered our will and found the motivation and determination to carry on. And I'm here to tell you -- taking a big chunk of your life to go do something specific like the bicycle trip we took, is nothing compared to harnessing your discipline to deal with something like this blog in the midst of the life that we all live everyday.

Perhaps it's best to just say it's a different kind of discipline. It requires setting aside the things that fill our lives every day when we are actually working, or caring for a home, or engaged in our communities, looking after children, visiting with family or friends, or taking care of obligations. Even keeping up with friends on social media, or trying to pay attention to the news, or enjoying a program on the television consumes time in our lives every day. We have to prepare meals, we wash our clothes, we clean our houses. If you are off on some great adventure, you don't do many of those things. If you have decided you're going to ride 50 to 60 miles everyday, then that's what you do. But you're not being distracted by committee meetings or sweeping up the kitchen or emptying the dishwasher. You ride those 50 miles because you don't have anything else to do!

I have at least half a dozen topics that are part of my story that I haven't written about yet, because I have not developed the discipline to get myself at the keyboard to capture those thoughts, to craft them, to edit myself, to find a photo, and to publish the post. I have a thousand reasons everyday why I don't do it. And if there's anyone reading this post that wonders whether or not they could take a trip like we did, whether or not they could ride a bicycle 10,000 miles - the answer is: sure! Anybody who has the time to spend and the financial resources to be away from their "real life" for a couple of months could do what we did. Because it's the real lives that we live that are so amazing to me.  Taking a 6 month vacation - how could any of us fail at that?! It's how any of us manage to accomplish anything at all given all the demands on our time while we're just doing what we do to "live" is the real mystery.

How did I feel about all this a couple of months ago, when I penned the following at my brother's house?  Read on.

On multiple occasions, both while we were on our journey and afterwards, I've been asked by people, "how did you do that?" Since I am usually standing right in front of the questioner, I can be pretty sure their focus is a question about how we got up every day and rode a bicycle for 50 to 60 miles. I mean, if that's not what they're interested in, they'll correct me as I begin to respond.

So I have been able to reply that we didn't consider it a burden, but rather an opportunity. Throughout our trip I usually experienced a real sense of freedom as well as luxury, perhaps something akin to the freedoms one might have experienced at the age of 20 taking a three-month backpacking trip across Europe. Make no bones about it, Roger and I understood that we were essentially on a six-month vacation. Who gets to do that? So it wasn't all that difficult, once you wrap your head around the idea that you're going to take a long vacation and spend it riding a bicycle, to recognize that everyday you're going to get up and ride your bicycle!

Granted, there were days when we were very tired. There were days when we looked at the weather or the terrain ahead of us and recognized it was going to be a very difficult day. But that's kind of like the joke about fishing. A bad day fishing is better than a good day in the office. If what you enjoy is fishing, then it is the act of fishing, including the challenges of finding the right spot, the right lure, the right casting technique, that turns you on. Those are the things that bring you joy. You also have a lot of joy when you bring in some nice fish, but there are people who fish all day and put the fish back in the water. So it's the accomplishment of having done what you set out to do that brings you the deepest joy and satisfaction.

Moving our bicycle, ourselves, and our stuff around the country for six months felt like that to me. There was comfort in the routine, even as there was recognition that each day would bring something different - some new puzzle to solve, some new crisis to avert, some disaster to remedy. My appreciation for Roger's MacGyver skills grew weekly! There wasn't anything we experienced that he was unable to fix. I myself got very handy with needle and thread, and made repeated repairs to our jerseys, our bags and our equipment. Duct tape and zip ties became our best friends! And so we made it around the country, stopping only when we were forced to by the accident that ended our trip.

We are trying to get back to Kingman to finish our trip. It's more than symbolic. We both feel a deep need to complete this broken circle. It is hard to believe that it will be 2 years soon since our accident. One of the advantages of having shared aspects of our trip through Facebook is that I often get a reminder of our time on the road from those silly "remember this?" postings that Facebook brings back to you. I know from those that we were at Ashokan Family Camp about 2 years ago. Soon we'll be traveling through Tennessee and making for the Natchez Trace. By September we'll be approaching Texas and our visit with friends and family there. And the largest part of October will include our trip back along Old Route 66. Good times for sure! And bittersweet also. I know this because I got to relive all of it last year when the memories were just one year old.

So, what is this different discipline? What do I mean by that? Well, the first discipline is just sticking with the task, in this case a monumental one perhaps, and doing something everyday because it's what you set out to do. But that's the easy part! The harder discipline, it turns out, is managing what happens in your real life. Taking care of all the stuff that needs to be done when you maintain a home, or have a job, interact with friends or raise a family. Anybody, and I'm pretty sure I mean anybody, could take a 6-month vacation and do exactly what they want for half a year. Really, where's the challenge in that?

The challenge comes in just living your life and in that frame of reference, accomplishing anything at all! As an example, examine my own efforts. I have wanted to continue my tale. I have any number of stories to tell about our path back to Kingman over the last two years. To my mind, those stories may be more compelling, may be more inspirational, than the story I could tell about how we played for 6 months. And yet, I have not been able to find the discipline to put myself in front of the computer and capture my thoughts. My days are so full with the mundane activities of life in this time and place that I haven't been able to break through that detritus and do something very simple that I figured out how to do almost every day for 6 months running. With pictures! So I'm struggling to get the wheels turning again. 

I'm going to give it my best shot. I'm going to try and go back through the things that have happened in the past year-and-a-half and bring my story up-to-date. I want to try and capture what happened after the glory of the bike ride. Because in the past two years, roughly, Roger and I have had had two bicycle accidents. I fell, and broke my wrist, prompting a later need for surgery to correct carpal tunnel syndrome that flared up in my recuperation. I've had a trigger finger release surgery (and need another one!). Roger has had another bicycle accident of his own. I was diagnosed with sleep apnea and AFib. I began a new career, teaching at the University. All this!  In two years! To be honest, the accumulation of these injuries and illnesses make me question how we ever made it around the country on a bicycle! But we did, and we're going to go out there and finish the trip despite these setbacks. It's just taking so long! And in the middle of those accidents came recuperation, recovery, training to ride again, and finally - joy on a bicycle. That was a long time coming, but it did come back. And I'd like to celebrate that as well as lay out what this part of the journey has been like.

So buckle up. If you're interested in the story, they'll be something more to read. My hope is to clear my mind of all these things that I keep feeling like I have to capture. My hope is to be able to discover that discipline that I was able to exercise during our trip until I manage to tell the rest of the story.

Day 197, Part 3: There's no place like home

Traveled the country, but hard to find a more stunning sight

While we were visiting with our friends, the rains ended, the rainbow came out, and we were able to change into dry clothes and enjoy a dry but cold ride home.

What a beautiful day it turned out to be. What an excellent adventure it was!

Apple Valley to Redlands, 63 miles

Day 197, Part 2: Escape!

Heading through the pass

Roger made a comment at one point while we were riding through San Bernardino. We really hadn't had anything too much to deal with on this trip, so riding home through a pounding rain was just about par for the course. We had to have something to overcome!

The trip through the Cajon Pass was not quite as awful as I feared it would be. We had a lot of room on the shoulder, and it was not raining when we started down. Plus, trucks are supposed to go 45 miles an hour and they are in the lane adjacent to the shoulder. So we had a little bit of a buffer from the faster moving cars in the main line of traffic. Even so it was dicey, (probably the scariest 30 minutes of our entire trip) and I was extremely relieved when we were able to get off at Cleghorn and conclude our trip on the old portion of Route 66 that winds through the canyon. It's kind of amazing to realize that there's such a beautifully scenic portion of that old route right here in my own backyard!

Old Route 66 through the Cajon Pass

We got rained on a couple of times, but were mostly able to dry out in between the sprinkles until we approached the San Bernardino Airport. Then the sky just opened up on us! We were soaked! The clouds were incredible. We almost never see storms like this here in this part of the world.

Weather's coming

And then we arrived! We had lots of friends who came out to greet us and welcome us home. The newspaper was there to take some pictures and they've published a story in our local paper. It was fun, and wonderful to feel the accomplishment of reaching our town.

Soggy, but safe

But we were not yet home . . .

Day 197, Part 1: McDonald's Ho!

It was comforting when we left this morning to not be in the rain. We pulled out from Anita's house after our goodbyes at about 7:40. Just a few minutes later, at 7:52, the first couple of drops fell on my jacket. But this is the part of the world where a rain forecast might be five hundredths of an inch in an hour, and we made it another hour and a half before having any problem with the drops again.

Anita and Archie

There were even brief moments with sunshine, causing our hopes to rise. But as we got higher up, we ran into the rain. It's just a slight rain falling now at about 3,900 feet. Roger needs to charge his Garmin watch! So we pulled into a Starbucks, where we are watching the weather and hoping for a brief break.

Not looking good

We nearly fell over getting into the parking lot. He came at it with a little bit too much angle, and it was very slick, and it had one of those bumps, and the bike truly did tip over but we both pulled our right legs out and caught it before we fell! Crazy.

Anyway, with the weather being even worse on the other side of the pass, no one is coming to meet us at the McDonalds. So we're spending a little bit more time here, making this our stop. That way we won't have to get off once we are on the interstate. We'll just stay on through the two exits until we can get off at Cleghorn. No McDonald's for us!

Joshua tree

Day 196: Morning, noon, night

How about that? 

7 am: I'm getting anxious about these last two days on the road. Apprehensive about going through the Cajon Pass, and weather could be a factor. At the same time I'm becoming nostalgic for the end of our trip. I asked Roger this morning when we were having a sip of coffee in the room what his thoughts were. He said, "I'm ready to be home." I agree! Even though we've only been riding for a couple of days, through some kind of magic I feel like we've picked up all the road wear of the six-month trip that brought us here. My face is puffy, I'm windburned and sunburned, my legs are aching, and I'm getting sore in the saddle. I just need to make it two more days!

The bottle tree place along the road

2.30 pm: We're just chilling out for a little bit, having a coffee and waiting for a text from our hostess before heading over to her home for the night. We made it in to Apple Valley without any problems. Although, the last stretch of the road coming into town was pretty dicey. There's really no shoulder. And for some reason, way more cars are on the road on this Friday than we expected. They did give us plenty of room though, and for that I am thankful. The portion of 66 that we traveled today is kind of gritty. That's a word we use for places that aren't particularly scenic, or have other attributes that make you shout out for joy!

We think these are the radioactive waste cars

For instance, this section of Route 66 has a concrete plant, an electric switching station, some run-down ranches, little houses off the road that barely look weather tight, and trains! Boy, are there trains! We even saw some that we recognized from yesterday by the graffiti on them. They didn't travel any faster than we did for the last 24 hours!

The last bike shop?

Roger made a comment as we approached Victorville. He said, "you know, we could get home today." Given the time of day, I'd say that was technically possible, although it would have required riding through the Cajon Pass in the teeth of the rush hour. No way I'd have done that! Besides, there's a certain symmetry associated with staying tonight with the woman who had agreed to host us when we were headed home two years ago. Our first night out on our journey we stayed with a Warmshowers host, and I was anticipating doing that on our last night also. It's really, really cool to be with people who understand why we have done what we have done. They understand it, because they enjoy this pursuit themselves. I wasn't willing to give that up, and I'm so glad that Anita was available to host us this time around.

We stopped in a bike shop to get a spare tube and master link, just in case we have trouble tomorrow.  Last bike shop visit for this trip? Let's hope so! Kathleen of Apple Valley Bikes was very helpful.

I gave my mom and dad a call, and let them know we were okay. They're pretty excited for us also. I'm starting to get a little bit emotional about the prospect of actually finishing this trip.

Looks cold over there. Where we're headed.

8:30 pm:  We are headed to bed after a nice supper and a bottle of wine, sharing stories with our host, Anita. Clean laundry for the final day, with a spare set for changing out in case we're wet when we arrive at the brewery. At this time, only one of our friends has indicated he'll be at the McDonald's to ride us in, and he's kind of crazy! Forecast is for rain and temps around 40. Shades of Oregon! Should be epic.  I may fall apart before we get there. Coming in to Anita's house, I was starting to feel like I might cry. I hope I can hold it together tomorrow.

Barstow to Apple Valley, 44 miles.

Day 195: Desert Stories

Michael, of Erin Brockavich fame

Everyone has a story. As we traveled, I always enjoyed chatting with folks to get their stories. Desert people tend to have really good stories, for some reason. Today, we met Michael when we stopped in at the Bagdad Café. He has been out in the desert for many years, but has only worked at the Cafe for 23 weeks.

The Bagdad Café is the name of a movie staring Jack Palance. Michael said it was the winner of the Cesar for best foreign movie. (Note: no fact checking for this story). We asked if he'd seen it (neither of us have), and he said it had put him to sleep. Moved kind of slow, I guess. Anyway, it was set at this café, which is right on Route 66 and has become a must-see for tourists, particularly from Europe. A couple of French girls were there, taking selfies and posting their photo on the wall. Another couple from France had just left. The place was plastered with stickers, business cards, signed bills, and photos posted by fans.

Momentos everywhere

But Michael's story is not about the Café.  His story is about Erin Brockavich. The movie, not the person. Seems he was an extra in the film. Two scenes, I think he said. You can catch him in the scene "9 months later" when he walks over to the barbecue to get a piece of chicken. He is a tall, pretty distinctive- looking guy, so I figure some late night when I am channel surfing, I will catch the end of Erin B and there he'll be, getting his fourth piece of chicken! (There were four takes, he said.)

And so it goes, in the desert. You never know who fate, or Julia Roberts, will smile upon! The other guy we met at the café, Zak, sells souvenirs and tchotkes to the shops along Route 66, who sell them to the tourists. Thus helping to keep the little places alive. His real claim to fame, though, is his sprinter van. He said it had 471,000 miles on it!

Zak and his 471,000 mile van

Next to that, the Silver Queen is just a piker. But she's holding up well, our Ship of the Desert. Better than we are. Roger and I are both whipped. We can't help but feel that this leg of the trip would have been easier for us when we were in arguably the best shape of our lives, having completed 6 months of daily riding. 

Kathy and the Silver Queen

We actually met some other tourists today. I did not expect to see anyone, but John and Robbie were headed east as we went west. They stayed a night with Anita, the Warmshowers host we'll stay with tomorrow. We were happy we were not headed their way!

John and Robbie

Ludlow to Barstow, 53 miles. Most of it into the wind. 

Day 194: When bridges are Outlawed, only Outlaws will cross Bridges

Scoflaws that we are, we went right on

Well, live and learn. We thought it would be more comfortable camping at Fenner than Amboy, and maybe it was. We can't know, since we didn't stay both places. But what we do know is that the Fenner Oasis is right by the BNSF rail line, and those trains are going through just about every 5 or 10 minutes. The government may be shut down, but by golly -- the trains are running! Plus, the trucks come and go all night.  And the gas pavilion is lit up like day. Thank goodness I had a knit cap to pull down over my eyes. And as it turned out, I was cold enough that I never got up to use the bathroom, so that advantage evaporated also. I DID really enjoy my burger last night though, and the breakfast sandwich this morning was great. So who knows? If we come again, we'll try Roy's in Amboy next time.

Speaking of which, they were great. Manny, the manager, was headed off site but saw us ride in and turned around to say hi and welcome us. Farrell, who runs the register, was just as nice as he could be. We had a bag of chips and a soda, filled our bottles, and enjoyed a chance to chill out for a few minutes at this iconic stop. Sure would love to see them bring it back. 

Farrell has 40 acres in the desert he'll sell you

We had no trouble riding through the closed section of the road. I counted 37 bridges in the dead zone.  About 7 of them are outright done. But there are gravel passages to walk around, and we got through with no problem. They're not kidding about the bridges, though. These guys are in serious trouble. Best we could tell, two have been redone. No sign that anyone is working on the others. (Maybe the shutdown?) Locals say that no one will bother the cyclists, but if you drive in and get caught, you'll be ticketed. I guess that's the advantage of bike transit.

This one's toast

Speaking of the shutdown, we met Paul at the Oasis. He is a government employee, and had planned a vacation prior to the shutdown. He's now just furloughed until it ends, so trying to decide how close to home he should be - just in case he gets an order to return to work immediately. It was interesting to hear some of his thoughts on how this mess might get concluded.

The desert was beautiful today. We had our first full-on sunny day, and by mid-afternoon we had to stop to remove our final inner layers of clothing. More than once, we commented on how we would not want to be doing this ride in 100 degree heat. (Or 106, as was forecast for the week we initially planned to come.) I don't think I could have done it.  I would have had to stop every ten minutes. Even today, when my Garmin said it was 79, I felt a little wonky a couple times. So here's a big Thank You! to our friend Vicky, who said that I should not expose myself to that heat, particularly in such a remote location. 

So quiet and beautiful

We're headed to Barstow tomorrow, then Victorville and then home. Today, peeking over the closer range, we could just see snow-capped mountains. Probably the San Bernardinos, or maybe Baldy. But here's the thing: We are going to be riding toward that range for three days! That's what sets bike touring apart. You have a chance to truly appreciate a destination - since you can see it on the horizon for days!

There's not a lot in Ludlow, but the cafe is excellent 

68 miles yoday. Fenner to Ludlow.

Day 193: A slight change of plans

There's a whole lot of open road out here

One of the coolest characteristics of bike touring is that it's all about flexibility. You do what you expect to do as long as you still want to do it - or you are able. If the circumstances change, or perhaps you wear out sooner than you thought you would on a given day, or maybe you feel great and decide to keep riding further than you expected to - it's all good. You're in charge, so you decide.

The Fenner Oasis

And thus it is that we decided to pitch our tent with the good folks at the Fenner Oasis, rather than continuing down the road to Amboy. A couple of factors played into this decision. First, this was a day that felt long enough by the time we stopped for lunch. We didn't go all that far, but we began by climbing a very long gradual grade and we were tired. The first 25 miles or so was uphill, with a snappy little head wind to boot. It was beautiful, remote country - we pretty much had it all to ourselves - but after riding toward this little rise on the north end of the Piute Mountains for two long hours, I was pretty done. I was really looking forward to reaching Goffs, where the road tipping south and tipping down were both deeply anticipated. That gave us a bit of a tail wind, (whoohoo - we hit 20 mph!) and allowed us to reach Fenner just before lunchtime.

Second, they have a grill here, which means that we can have a hamburger for dinner instead of carrying one of the cold sandwiches to Amboy to eat later. For some reason that seemed like a really good idea!

You are here!

Third, the Oasis is open all night, which gives us access to a real restroom. That's not a bad thing. While the idea of camping at Amboy has been part of my mythic anticipation of this part of the trip for several years, I really am NOT sorry at all to substitute my cozy little tent here for a cozy little tent there.

Home sweet home

And last, in the morning, we are assured of coffee here. Plus something to eat before we head out, maybe even something warm!

We will still go through Amboy; in fact I have corresponded with the manager there to let him know we'll stop in for a snack tomorrow. We just aren't going to stay there overnight. So I will get to post a photo of that iconic sign out in the middle of nowhere, never fear.

Creosote bush

The only downside to ending our day so early is that we don't really have very much to do. Roger and I took a walk over towards the highway to check out the road for tomorrow, and we sat in the convenience store watching an episode of Chip and Joanna's show. But it's just now getting to be four o'clock. It's too early to eat dinner, and until the sun goes down we can't hope to fall asleep! So that's the trade off: you keep pedaling because it's what you're here for, or you stop because your bottom side can't take anymore! And then you just end up sitting around anyway.

39.5 miles today, at 10 mph. Climbing 2267 feet.

Piet Mondrian in the desert

Day 192, Take 2: Two years, two months, and one week late

We're pretty tired. I'm busted, in fact. But we've done it - got over Sitgreaves Pass and made it back over the Colorado River to enter California - just a couple of years behind schedule!  It was a gray day, and pretty cold. But I will confess that it's possible it was not just the cold that made my eyes water as we got underway. Bob and Norma followed us just down the road a bit, and snapped our picture in the spot where we'd ended our tour two years ago. I was happy to ride away from that spot this time.

The starting descent I was concerned about was not that big a deal, but it's the case we were never "too warm" today. We started out with all our layers, and though we shed some for the climb, we put them back on after lunch in Oatman and even then, Roger was freezing for the descent.

Fabulous scenery on the climb up

This is a spectacular pass. It was fun to imagine the early motorists chugging along the road. What must they have thought as they crested each turn and viewed the savage landscape opening before them?  A local said they call it "the sidewinder" - with 192 switchbacks over the top to Oatman. We're not sure about that, but if you are counting the changes of direction, maybe so. It does twist and turn through the rising buttes. Even in the gray morning, it was beautiful.

Once over the top, you descend into Oatman, an old mining town. The donkeys in Oatman are reknown. Turns out they not only wander the town, vamping for handouts, but also patrol the hillsides and roads in small posses. I would hate to witness the carnage had a motorist come quickly around the corner where we found these handsome fellows!

A PS to yesterday's post: We had a couple little "this is touring" events yesterday when we were driving in that helped set the stage for our friends. First, Roger and Bob were having a great conversation in the front row and completely missed our exit to Barstow . Then after turning around to go back, I glanced up just in time to see Roger miss it again! This gave us a chance to share some stories about missed turns - which are much harder to correct on a bike than in a car! Second, at a stop, I noticed that the front rack was wobbling on the bike, which resulted in Roger recognizing that one of the bolts had shaken loose on the rough roads. We had to find a hardware store, pronto. The one in Needles had closed by the time we arrived, so we detoured north to find an Ace Hardware. Problem solved. But we went 20 miles out of our way. Again, much easier to do in a car than on a bike!

And, what's a tour without a flat? We have not had a flat since we got the bike rebuilt. Something must have happened when Roger changed the tires, as we had one 9 miles in to the ride this morning. We decided the tape at the valve hole was cutting the tube after a second one failed. Chewing gum in the hole seems to be holding. We'll see.

Tomorrow, we head for Amboy. No idea if we will have any service, so if you don't see a post check for it the next day.

65 miles today.

Go!

It's go time! We headed out today to Kingman, AZ, ready to do this thing. We are riding out with Bob and Norma Clark, our friends from Redlands and the first who offered to bring us out here, over two years ago. We've had a great ride over, taking stretches of the Mother Road to see how they were (and frankly, because Bob and Norma were game and it's more fun than the Interstate!)

Bob and Norma offered to bring us out here two years ago, and the offer held.

It's pretty cold out here, and we're thinking that we'll be freezing come morning, but once we begin the climb over Sitgreaves Pass we should warm up. Funny how we did not notice that this first day was going to begin with a 14 mile descent! Brrr!

View from the pass

We are staying just a mile down the road from where we were hit. We drove past the spot on the way to dinner tonight. It feels weird, but like it's finally time to put that behind us. I asked Norma to follow us down the road when we head out, and get a photo when we begin tomorrow. I guess that might be a bit macabre, but I think it goes to my sense that we really do have to pick this up where we left off, and that means closing the circle here in Kingman. You gotta face it to overcome it.

Tomorrow, we should be back in California and maybe I will get that shot of the state flag that we missed when Jeff drove us home two years ago. Since we've only been away a day, it won't have quite the emotional resonance - but it will still represent our return home. And so the journey continues.

This Roy's in Barstow IS open, and a great stop for lunch