The Beginning is Near

Final mileage.

And but so. I know I said that we’d be posting a wrap-up a month ago now, and we had the best of intentions to do so. I could go into detail about how busy we’ve been–we searched frantically for an apartment in SF before flying back to Maine for what turned out to be a wonderful, beautiful wedding, then Willow had a job interview (still no apartment) so she flew back, then we got an apartment (yay) while I was driving back cross-country with our dog (the speed felt INSANE), and we’ve only recently gotten some furniture and gotten settled.

I could detail this stuff, but it’s not the real reason we never got around to posting the final installment of the bikego blog. The real reason is that the transition from life on the road to our new life in San Francisco has been really, really hard. There’s a huge sense of relief, excitement about our new lives, and reunions with old friends, but there’s also a legitimate grief at the loss of life on the road. Biking across the country was difficult, but the difficulties were different, more novel, romantic, and direct, than the difficulties of domestic life. Even if we do it again, it won’t be the same, and it’s depressing to think about.

Those of you who know me well know that in my mid-twenties I spent about four years straight “on the road,” working temporary positions in Alaska and elsewhere for money, sleeping in the woods, on couches all across the US, or really wherever I happened to be when night fell and it was time for bed. I was letting loose my inner hippie. That journey for me was all about discovery, about finding myself and making peace with myself in the world. This time around, on our biking journey, it was different. I’m no longer obsessed with solving the problem of me. I wasn’t spinning my pedals to work through anything; I was just cruising, with my wife, slowing down and taking in life at 36 years old.

I still look back on the hippie years. Some of you know that I wrote a long, rambley novel about it, which features a protagonist named Elliott who travels obsessively and stops in many places, but never actually arrives anywhere in any sort of satisfying way. Elliott’s heroism is ironic; he convinces himself and those around him that abandoning normal life in the name of freedom is courageous when in fact it is a result of his being deeply unstable and afraid. Part of me, in my previous “on the road” days, was attempting to work all this out.

Willow and I have been together over seven years now, after meeting in a sharing circle at an ashram full of lost souls. We have, in many ways, settled down. Part of me still gawks in amazement at what can only be my (dumb) luck in finding her. Not only because she somehow seem to enjoy the Herculean task of tolerating me. What’s simultaneously simple and amazing is that despite the fact that our marriage is permanent and that this still strikes an ominous bass note of reptilian fear deep in my bowels, I’ve always known that marrying her did not mean giving up any part of myself, including the part that loves off-the-beaten-path adventure. I was thrilled when she proposed this bike trip, and I sensed right away that this was going to be different for me. It wasn’t so much a soul-wrenching search for meaning. This time around, it was much more a celebration. And now the chapter’s over. It’s really hard to let go of, but it’s time.

The 6-day ride down Hwys 101 and 1 from Arcata was poignant and scary. Poignant because duh, and scary because there were often sheer cliffs that dropped off from the guardrail-less road into the ocean. Willow has a height phobia, exacerbated by the fact that she was clipped into 70 lbs. of bicycle, and she was getting vertigo and having panic attacks. At one point I suggested that we stop and find another route, or hitchhike to a safer-feeling stretch. After a long moment of thought she shrugged, clipped into her pedals, and said “Scared and dizzy, that’s just how I roll.” For this and so much else I love her. Thanks also to all four of my parents, all..wait a minute…EIGHT of my brothers and sisters. And to Tess just for being Tess. To Mimi from Maine for taking such good care of our insane dog all summer. Thanks to all the folks and friends who helped us out with a shower or a place to stay or a kind word along the way. Also to all the people who waved from their cars or motorcycles–it really did give me a little boost. To Mimi, Misty, Tammy, and Theresa at NY Methodist, thanks for putting up with my coming into work a bit disheveled and possible a little odorous while I was in training, and to Jason and Maggie, thanks for the warm and generous welcome when we arrived (VERY disheveled and odorous) on the SF end. To all the people in RVs that I flipped off after you intentionally buzzed us, I meant it and still do. Peace out, everybody.

With love,

Lovely Bunny

PS: Oh! And Willow and I would both really like to continue blogging. We’re thinking of doing a sort of “Newbie in San Francisco” thing, which would be partly personal journal but would also give random people some info about the city. Got any suggestions for titles?

Goats and Soap

We have arrived safely in the city by the bay. It feels very weird and very, very great. We are very lucky to have two lovely friends in Jason and Maggie, in whose lovely home we are staying. Both Willow and I plan to write a wrap-up post tomorrow, but until then I thought I’d post some photos from the past 86 days and 3622 miles that you haven’t seen yet. Check em out!

In Which I Unnecessarily Employ Four Semicolons

Howdy y’all, sorry it’s been awhile since I rapped at ya. As you know from Willow’s last post we made it to the west coast after a beautiful couple of days on some logging roads in southwestern Oregon. The locals on this entire trip have been very forthcoming, and as a result we’ve taken some beautiful back roads, eaten some great meals, and soaked in some beautiful unmarked hot springs. Sometimes locals like to keep their off-the-beaten-path spots to themselves, so it’s really rad to get the insider tips. Thanks again, Eric. Our logging road adventure was a wonderful way to end our westward journey, very private and scenic. It was the perfect build-up to our big turn south–the most momentous louie I’ve ever hung, to be sure.

Here’s me feeling grand:

The Pacific coast bicycle route spends most of it’s time on Hwy. 101, the road onto which we made our big left turn. It can be very bicycle friendly, with a broadish shoulder (I’ve always been a shoulder man), good signage, and amenities like this:

Then again, much of the route has very little shoulder, especially through the crazily windey sections in the redwoods. This is probably a concession made to minimize the environmental impact of the road, and i can dig it–I don’t want to see any more of these amazing forests removed. The frustrating part is that there aren’t more signs declaring our right to be there in this area; despite the many tourists who cycle the coast, many cars in this section seemed surprised to see us appear after they rounded the sharp turns. We were honked at, flipped off, and even intentionally buzzed (Top Gun style) by truckers and RVs. Later, we had some wonderful rides through some thoroughly majestic and less-populated redwood groves. But this first one was really a bummer.

Add to that that much of the coast is this foggy…

…and it felt a bit sketchy. But not to worry, Moms, we made it just fine! As Willow mentioned, we stopped in the town of Arcata, where we kicked back (I believe thats what the kids are calling it. Actually, I believed that’s what the kids were calling it when I was still a kid and very concerned with being cool, at any cost. Cool kids these days are probably calling it something completely different, in their texts written in l33t or whatever. But it doesn’t matter anyway, since cool is no longer cool–the nerds have won! Evidence: the Internet. I rest my case. But I digress.) for a whopping three nights. Our friends Jodie and Jhon, and their daughter Lillian, live there. We have missed them dearly and are thrilled to be moving so close to them! In typical fashion,we failed to get a photo of the three of them together. Here they are in pieces:

No, wait! Apparently we did get a family portrait:

They are definitely some of our best-looking friends. Here’s more of Jhon’s boy band photo shoot. First, the shot of Jhon, Jodie, and Willow that I took at the local swimmin’ hole. If you look at Jhon, you’ll see that he’s asking for it:

So I zeroed in on him. He was a bit coy at first:

But with my expert coaching (“Make love to the camera! You are nothing but a monkey with thumbs!”), he opened up:

Before long, we got the money shot, complete with empty beer bottle:

Then, finally, the exhausted model could relax. Here’s a special, behind-the-scenes shot from the b-roll:

Click to embiggen, then print it and hang it in your locker!

Anyway, we left the magical wonderland of Arcata a few days ago and have been making our way towards San Francisco. We are a mere 130 miles away at this point; we’ll be there on Sunday. We are truly exhausted, which is part of the reason for the dearth of posts lately. The other thing is that the journey, as they say, has been moved to the back burner, despite our efforts to the contrary; the destination–a home, jobs, our dog, our bed, a life where we aren’t compelled to pedal hundreds of pounds of gear slowly over mountains–is occupying much of our headspace. All the towns that we pass through have lately become future weekend vacation destinations; the people we meet, we may actually meet again. It’s sweet and sad and thrilling. We’ll be sure to post a wrap-up once we land in the city by the bay. Until then, dig the awesome coast:

With love,

Lovely Bunny

P.S.: If you have any leads on apartments to rent in SF, hit a brother up: willjoebikego [at] gmail.com. Thanks!

The coast, the coast!

Ta da! We made it to the coast! We’ve been cruising through some beautiful and remote places and really enjoying ourselves.

Here I am making it up over our last big mountain range, the cascades.

We took a day off at an amazing lake that was formed when lava clogged up a spring fed river. It is filled with beautiful clear 43 degree water.

We found and ate a ton of blackberries (and also pie and ice cream).

In Eugene an awesome bicycle enthusiast named Eric confirmed that there was a backroad way to get to the coast. He sent us up into BLM land on logging roads. It was really beautiful and there were no cars! Thanks Eric, we had an awesome time.

There was also an amazing hand carved sign, which was confusing because you may notice that north is actually down on this map.

We finally crossed into California, our last state. As you may know, San Francisco is in California.

We rode through the redwoods, which were amazing. It has actually been pretty tough riding down the coast, there are lots of pretty long and steep climbs, and then you fly right back down to sea level.

We are still wearing the same clothes. Also, it’s cold here, lots of fog!

We made it to our friends house in Arcata where we’re spending 3 nights. I realized it’s the first time we’ve spent more than 2 nights somewhere since we left NYC back in June. It feels luxorious!

Arcata is full of characters. We met this guy at the Trinity river yesterday, I think he believes he’s a one man boy band.

One week more to SF!

A Good Bonk

Well, I’m happy to say that I’m back in the saddle of my steel high horse again. Today I learned from none other than the New York Times that the doldrums that we hit is a phenomenon known among touring bicyclists as “bonking.” So you’ll be no doubt pleased to know that Willow and I bonked, and it was a grueling bonk that lasted several days, but now we’re done bonking (partly thanks to a lovely pep-comment from my mom (thanks mom!)) and we are going to get on with our lives. And (yay!) it’s beautiful outside again:

We’re also edified (is that the word I mean?) partly because we’ve stumbled upon the Trans-America bicycle route, famous among touring bikers, and so we have some sympathetic company. The TA runs between I think Richmond, Georgia and I think Astoria, Oregon. A few days ago we began noticing many loaded-down bicyclists sharing the highway, and upon us it dawned. Here are two of them, known affectionately as “The Germans”:

This creative moniker refers to the fact that they are from the faraway land of Germany. It was given to them by the proprietor of the Fish House Inn, an establishment where we all stayed in the tiny town of Dayville. Dayville is lovely for many reasons, including that it’s residents seem to fancy themselves as stand-ins for the Village People:

Being German, these two bikers are as good at getting things done as Americans like me are at stereotyping. That’s why I only have a photo of them from the rear. We’ve chatted a lot about biking but we still don’t know each otherseses names. They depart in the morning earlier than we do, but bike very slowly, so we have been catching them on the road each day. Something I think is pretty great is that all the experienced touring bicyclists we’ve met on this trip tend to go a lot slower than newbies like us. It’s a wonderful thing to strive for, IMHO.

Part of my edification or whatever from bonking is also derived from the amusement I get from saying “The Germans” in a funny accent each time I see them. I say it kind of like this: “the chur mince.” On the road, where the wind is whipping past along with the cars and trucks, you can say whatever you want out loud, or sing songs at the top of your lungs, or try–right out loud–to think of a third thing to put here to make this sentence feel complete.

Today we ran into the Germans stopped in front of this shoe-tree:

Weird.

Also, here’s another photo in the “moon over recreational vehicles” series:

Anyway that brings us to now, and Mitchell, Oregon. We have about a week until we hit the Oregon coast, and then about two more until we hit our new home city of San Francisco. And then, holy smokes, we’re really gonna bonk.

With love,

Lovely Bunny

SPECIAL BIKE-NERD SECTION: The Germans’ bikes

Koga-Miyata “Signature” series! Rad.

Aluminum, but sturdy-looking aluminum (aluminium?)

Rohloff 14-speed internal gearing hub. And fatty tires.

Adjustable-angle stem.

Some complicated rim-brake system I haven’t asked them about yet. Hydraulic?

In Which I Bore You to Tears

As you people are no doubt are aware, potato society is hopelessly traditional. Nowhere is his more true than in the great spud state of Idaho, where all the license plates are adorned with the simple phrase “Famous Potatoes.” Case in point: an Idaho potato of marrying age was recently set down for a conference by her father. He told her that three young male potatoes had come a-courtin’, asking for her hand in marriage.

“One’s a russet,” he said, “the other’s a Yukon Gold, and the last is a fingerling.”

“But Daddy,” she replied, “I want to marry Ted Koppel!”

Her Father answered: “Ted Koppel?! He’s just a commontater!”

This horrible joke is meant to soothe the place in your soul that is so direly in need of soothing as a result of our lack of posts lately. Truth is, we’re TIRED. We’ve pedaled 2613.5 miles across this rugged country, and between that, setting up and taking down camp, eating copious amounts of ice cream, pie, peanut nut rolls, and breakfast sausage, we have little energy to tap away at an annoying and crash-prone virtual keyboard. I am not an iPad fan.

We also took almost zero photos during our nine days in Idaho. But we must have taken some. Hold on, I’ll look.

Oh yeah! These two ladies (the not Willow ones) work at Idaho Mountain Touring, a bike shop in Boise. Weirdly, they had no touring bikes there. These two were super excited to get Willow behind the counter so I could take a picture. It was weird.

Boise was kind of weird in general, filled with pale-skinned rich people eating organic food. We fit right in! Also, and I do not say this lightly, Boise has the best Indian food I’ve ever had. And I’ve had lots. Strange but true.

Perhaps our blog running dry has something to do with our environment as of late. Much of Idaho and eastern Oregon (where we are now) is high desert country. Here’s a boring photo of that:

This landscape lasted a long time, and was quite grueling. Then it gave way to the mountains of eastern Oregon, which were/are also quite grueling! Everything is grueling lately. We can figuratively smell the coast, and I find myself counting the days and miles, which is not like me.

And thats about the size of it. Oh, wait, there’s this–somehow I summoned the creative energy to compose this amazing photograph of the moon over an RV from the 80’s. I’ll leave you with it, and try to get back on the high horse so I can post something less boring in a few days.

With love,

Lovely Bunny

Idahoooooooo

Hello! This is Willow reporting live from the Mountain Home, Idaho Kampground of America (it’s not camping, its kamping is the motto here if any of you can make sense of that).

We’ve been in Idaho for about 6 days now, which I’ll get to, but honestly my heart is still in Yellowstone, which was really beautiful. So here’s some more photos:

This is some crazy algae growing in one of the 10,000 thermal features.

This is a crazy thermal feature.

This is Joe using his finger to demonstrate scale, what a tiny mountain!

It seems impossible, but this is Joe demonstrating a different combination of his 3 articles of clothing than has so far been seen.

This is lake Yellowstone, which was giant and really beautiful.

This is Joe’s evening routine, where he tries to squash his giant limbs into a tiny silk sleeping bag liner.

This is some of Mammoth Hot Springs, WTF?

Vogue.

Joe demonstrating advanced bear-box organizing technique.

Ok, enough Yellowstone. We spent the last couple days riding across the high prairie of Idaho (just below the sawtooth mountains), but first we had to traverse 71 miles of desert from Idaho Falls to Arco. There was nothing in this desert other than Idaho National Laboratories, which is some freaky x-files shit, and the EBR-1 museum. EBR-1 stands for expiramental Breeding Reactor #1. We stopped to check it out.

Not only was it the first nuclear power plant, it was also made entirely out of asbestos.

How’s the temperature Captain?

Bruce Nauman artwork?

Who’s a Yo La Tengo fan? If you push that button, your ass has got to go…

This has nothing to do with EBR-1, these are our campsite hosts in Arco with their giant tin foil ball. Notice that I am holding two cookies and an ice cream bar, hence the giant smirk.

Arco was pretty cool.

We checked out Craters of the Moon.

It is basically a whole ton of lava that pushed up through the earth (there’s no volcano or anything). It was huge and very otherworldly (hence the name).

These wonderful people let us stay in their guest house in Fairfield, plus they made us an awesome breakfast this morning. Thanks Randy and Laura!

For some reason we took absolutely no pictures, but we also spent a night in Picabo where we camped in the town park. The park was lovely, but we failed to locate Everett who is they guy who controls the sprinklers. We had a man-made rainstorm that night, fortunately we were dry inside our tent. There were also alpaca’s, a really cute donkey, and a cat named Boaz. Sorry for the camera fail.

Tomorrow we’re headed to Boise for a day off in the big city!

Out of Wyoming

Why, oh why, Wyoming? Why did it have to end? We honestly considered staying in Wyoming for another couple of weeks, then hopping on a bus to Oregon to finish our trip down the coast. But in the end we decided to stick with the plan, though we’ll definitely be back to see more someday. At least we finished with a bang–our 5 days in Yellowstone were incredible. Pictures could never do the place justice, but we took 371 of them anyway.

Those last two shots are of some of Yellowstone’s thermal features, a result of a giant volcanic eruption some 650,000 years ago. There’s good old Old Faithful for one, but hundreds more smaller geysers, steamy acidic pools, lakes of boiling water, and other weirdness. It’s all very otherworldly and primordial.

In addition to the landscape, Yellowstone is filled with large mammals. We saw bison, a black bear, elk, a coyote, and many, many, many enormous tourists in enormous RVs.

I got right up close to this guy:

Then, later, saw this sign:

There was another well-illustrated sign re: the thermal features, which actually injure more tourists every year than the animals do:

Being out in it on a bike was a wonderful way to experience the park, though there was very little shoulder on the park roads and those tourists in their enormous RVs can be quite aggro. The climb up the Rockies was actually a piece of cake, partly because we felt so grand and capable after making it successfully up and over (mental jukebox selection: “Yamo Be There”) the Bighorns. The Rockies are also graded much more forgivingly (grammar superstar). Here’s. Willow making the climb:

Once we were up into the caldera (look it up, slacker) it was mostly rolling hills around the park. On the way out we were thrilled to climb up the continental divide, because we figured it was all downhill from there to the coast:

But then after a short descent, we were climbing again. This sign appeared…

And then this one:

We were very proud of ourselves.

And that pretty much brings us to Ashton, Idaho, where we’re camped tonight. Next time we do Yellowstone we’re going to do some backcountry hiking, to avoid the tourists. We did have one tourist-free moment riding out of the park, when we spotted this elk cow:

She started across the river, and Willow and I watched for a good five minutes while she got in, took a drink, then started making her way towards us. Then the tourists started pulling over, parking all akimbo, and chattering loudly. We weaved our way back onto the road, and soon, our brief affair with this beautiful state was over. It ended sweet and simple, with exactly this much fanfare:

Until next time, Wyoming.

Questions and Answers

You may have been asking yourself some questions about our trip. Well, you’re not alone. I will attempt to address some below.

Did you camp next to a store in Clearmont, WY?

Yes! It was full of the nicest people I have ever met.

Did anyone in Clearmont let you come over to their house to take a shower and show you their amazing trophy room (full of many kinds of taxidermy)?

Yes, Gary Roebling invited us over, gave us showers, lots of advice for then road ahead and introduced us to lovely wife Cheryl and friend Mike. He had a crazy collection of animals in his den, alas we did not have our camera.

Did you actually ride your stupid bike into the Big Horns like an idiot even though Gary offered to drive you?

Indeed. It was really steep, but quite pretty.

Did you eat any creek-caught fish?

Well, Joe looked good fishing and caught some trout, but we were invited to dinner at our site-host Pat’s that night. We had an amazing home cooked meal instead, including back strap venison and lovely conversation with some neighboring campsite hosts, Shawn and Jeff. Thanks for the giant bag of cookies and the lovely meal Pat! (and sorry for another camera fail), and thanks for the pets Pooh and Diesel (their cute dogs).

Did you have to climb even more after taking a day off in the Big Horns?

Well, I had a nice view from my 3 hour nap, but yes we had to do more climbing. Fortunately it looked like this:

How high was the f-ing pass?

This pass? About yay high:

Did you convince Joe to do a snow angel?

Yes, Joe does whatever I say.

Did he look cute with all the snow and the views?


Duh.

Did you get to ride down hill really fast after all the climbing?

YES!

Was it fun?

Joe couldn’t even make a sad face when he tried.

I heard ten sleep canyon was really cool, how’d it turn out?

No comment.

Where there enough kitties at your campsite in Ten Sleep?

No.

Did any of the cats attempt to stow away with you?

Yes.

Are people in Wyoming into taxidermy?

Not sure.

Did you really want those cowboy boots?

Yes, but they don’t fit on my bike.

Is Wyoming your favorite state so far, due to the incredibly kind and friendly people and the awesome nature?

Yes.

Range Life

Wyoming, we love you!!! We crossed the border three days ago, into the land where the buffalo roam, and the deer and the antelope play. Proof (I swear I saw her playing right after this photo was snapped):

Not the greatest photo, I realize, but usually they (pronghorn antelope) usually skedaddle away onto the prairie as we approach, providing us with only blurry shots of their fleecy buttocks. I like this photo also because it gives you an idea of how remote we are right now. We’ve opted to take the scenic route out of the city of Gillette. We could have ridden on the interstate, which is legal west of the Missouri river. We’ve already done it a few times out of necessity, and it was quite safe–the shoulder is very wide, and separated from the traffic by a rumble strip (“Braille for ‘ditch,'” as one local told me). But the interstate is loud and a bit unnerving, so we find ourselves drawing a parabola to Buffalo on US Hwy 16.

Taking these back roads adds time to our trek, but is almost always more rewarding. The other day we stopped at a small cafe and shared a table with two men wearing ten-gallon hats, farming substantial moustaches, and talking about “dudes” a lot. Those of you back in NYC might be thinking that we somehow stumbled into Wyoming’s version of Williamsburg. But these were real ranchers–I would reckon they don’t put much stock in irony.

That was in the town of Sundance, where we lunched and renewed ourselves after a long 30 miles or so of headwind-heavy riding. After lunch we put in another 25 or so, a feat that was rewarded by the beautiful digs we landed in:

If you can see past the blinding white light reflecting off my torso, you’ll spy just a small part of Keyhole state park, near the town of Pine Haven. Close enough, in fact, that we could cart a few beers (Fat Tire, which seems to be stocked in every little dive bar west of Minnesota) to our campsite. We stretched our stiffened muscled, I fished in the gorgeous lake (one small smallmouth bass) and we swam. Here’s Willow in the H2O…

…then relaxing afterward next to our clothesline:

Bathing in beautiful bodies of water, relaxing, and fishing have become something of a routine when we arrive in a new place for the night. We definitely put the tourist in “bicycle tourist.” We both laughed when we saw this in a cafe/bar/convenience store in the town of Spotted Horse today (population, no joke, 2):

We are doing a lot of dicking around, and mostly having a great time. Morale sometimes dips, but the scenery has a way of picking us back up. Here’s our first glipse of the bighorn mountains, still two days away. Click to embiggen this photo, then look closely at what appear to be clouds, way on the horizon, just left of center:

That’s the Bighorns’ snow-capped peaks. The other morale booster is the people. Its always nice to chat with locals, who have been almost unfailingly generous and kind, particularly so in Wyoming. And running into Mike and Anne and their family, as detailed by Willow in the previous post, was a great surprise, and totally trippy, one of those road stories that I’ll be telling for the rest of my life. It was less trippy (because we told them our route) but no less delightful when they pulled up next to us two days later, as all six of us descended into Spearfish canyon two days after our random campground reunion. Anne snapped this great photo from their car window…

…and they drove off, on their way to Glacier National Park in northern Montana for Mike’s Dad’s 75th birthday.

Now i’m in a convenience store, which i believe is the sole customer-service oriented business in the town of Clearmont (pop 142). The owner invited us to camp in a beautiful little grove next door–there’s no official campground within 40 miles or so. We knew what we were getting into when we set out this morning, and also knew that we’d figure something out. We crossed our halfway point in terms of mileage today, a landmark we noticed after the fact. Willow’s out in the tent, reading Cormac McCarthy, and I’m about to go gear up and see if I can pull a trout or two out of the little creek that runs through town. Here’s to dicking around!