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Tue, Aug 3 @ 3:56 PM - And then there were three
Pittsburgh, KS | 338 miles since last update | 2834 total so far
Kansas, believe it or not, is one of the toughest states we've ridden through to date. Sure, it's about as flat as a pancake, but riding across a pancake isn't easy! Especially when the pancake is sizzling in the frying pan at 115 degrees, the humidity is 100% and the fan from the stove hood is blowing a 25mph headwind at you! Not too mention wading through lakes of syrup! However, Kansas has two major saving graces. First, the people here are as nice as puppie dogs. Everyone waves to us from their cars (most use the one-finger "Kansas wave"), and people are always taking time to stop and chat. Second, almost every town we stop in has a cheap public swimming pool! To bring you up to date, after leaving Tribune, we spent the next several days riding hard and long days so we could make it to Wichita in time to meet up with the lovely and eager Penttilatron. Two days before meeting her, we intended to finish a 95 mile day in Great Bend, where we hoped for a shower, a meal, and a great deal of rest before another furious day before Wichita. However, at a little before 5 o'clock the entire northern sky turned the most terrifying shade of blue-black I've seen in quite some time. We rolled into Rush Center (a town of about 30 people) to look for groceries and were immediately approached by two or three pick-up trucks telling us, "Hey, you guys really should not be out when this weather hits! I'd find cover *right now* if I was you." The third guy to approach told us, with little room for debate, "Follow me right now! I'll let you into the fire house!" His name was Jeff, and not only was he a volunteer fireman in town, but he was also the Mayor, a mechanic down at the John Deere repair shop, and was on the county board helping to prepare for the upcoming fair. Little more than 10 minutes later we sat out one of the worst storms I've ever seen inside a little bar two doors down from the firehouse, after which we had a hot shower and nice night's sleep indoors. At the bar we met a 17 year-old from Utah riding alone from Virginia to California and back home before he had to return to school in early September. To date, I've never seen anyone eat more than this kid did (including Greg). The day before we pulled into Wichita was our longest (at 122 miles) and with time to spare we met up with Erica as she walked out of the jet way. I shall now turn this over to her, the newbie, so that you might gain a new perspective on this crazy journey. hello. after spending hours in my head i find myself speachless. this is day five and i think i'm getting the hang of it. mike and greg keep a resonable pace compared to some we've met. a little riding, a little visiting, and time to drink beer. but i need to reiterize what mike said about the heat here in KS cause i can't get over it. it's as if you're going to bake something delicious and then decide to climb into the oven yourself. i feel as though i don't deserve this. the kind people of kansas don't either. enough. as far as what's been going on... we're consuming every cool beverage that comes within reach. i'll swear by red bull but amp, sobe, and a couple others have come to my aid as well. food is not safe in our presence. on the day i arrived, not only did we have a large thai lunch, but the friendly menonite community in Newton fed us at their street fair. homemade strawberry icecream, nectarines, rootbeer floats, lemonade... that eve we hit a bar to celebrate and found ourselves with a couple extra rounds courtesy of the regulars. our night didn't end there. we crossed the street to "the bread basket" where greg tried to clean out the buffet. food won that fight. yesterday we spent a pleasant afternoon (we ride early, siesta, then finish after 5) at a public pool in Chanute. now this was one of the nicest pools i've ever seen. they had a two turn waterslide (wich rocked!) and several hts. of diving boards. the locals, aged 14+/-, impressed us with their flips and gags while we turned heads with our tanlines. we've met some folks who recommended we stop for tubing in Missouri, so i think that's the plan. moving right along. and soon we won't be in KS anymore. woohoo!
Wed, Aug 4 @ 11:38 PM - Not in kansas anymore
Fair Grove,MO | miles since last update | 2949 total so far
Ozarks=hard.staying at grist mill tonight.
Mon, Aug 9 @ 12:41 AM - In the Land of Lincoln
Murphysboro, IL | miles since last update | 3255 total so far
Well foks, we've had some tough riding, but we're still chugging along. After our last post, we stayed the night at a cool hostel in Golden City , Missouri, across the street from a restaurant with some excellent pies - if you've never had Chess Pie, I recommend you jump down to Cookie's restaurant and have a slice or two. Right after Golden City, we hit the Ozark mountains - or rather the Ozarks hit us. It's a little-known fact that Ozark actually comes from an old French phrase, "Aux Arcs", which means "beat your legs into a bloody pulp and watch your heart explode." The maps liken riding through the Ozarks to a self-propelled roller coaster ride, and that's pretty accurate - think riding up a steep, steep hill, struggling to reach the top, and then being greeted by the next steep, steep hill staring you down. The only thing to do was to race as fast as you could down one hill in the unlikely hope that your momentum would carry you most of the way up the next. Of course, some of the hills just popped up like a wall off a flat spot - then you just have to crank and crank till you reach the top, or your tendons explode, whichever occurs first. Anyway, that day we came upon two other cross-country travelers- one was a old guy in his seventies who looked like santa claus. He had begun in South Carolina, went up to Wisconsin, and was headed to the west coast, where he planned to veer south, go through the southern states, down to florida, and back up to South Carolina - a nice 6 month long trip. Shortly after meeting him, we met a woman who was traveling with her husband - she was riding a bike, and he was running. They started in DC, and were going to San Francisco, doing 35-50 miles per day. The guy was pushing one of those jogging strollers full of water and supplies, and said he planned on going through about 13 pairs of shoes. We stayed that night in Fair Grove, where we were put up at a renovated steam-powered grist mill from the 1830's. We got to stay in the blacksmith's cabin, which was sweet. I also sampled chocolate-dipped cheesecake on a stick there. Onward from there, we continued our up-and-down journey. Along the way, Mike invented a new taste sensation, "Hotwiring the Sun", which consists of peanut butter and peach slices spread on a tortilla. Not only is this sure to start a craze across the small-town groceries of America, but is likely to spawn a Jerry Bruckheimer blockbuster movie. The script would go something like this... Bruce Willis - "Now, once this thing starts, you've got about 3 minutes to get off this rock" Ben Affleck - "But Bruce - what about you? I'm not gonna leave you behind!" BW - "Tell Liv Tyler I love her!" (Begins sparking wires together) "Now GO!" BA - "Bruuuuuceee!" Ben Affleck narrowly escapes in alien spacecraft that Will Smith fixed by uploading anti-virus software. Meanwhile, the sun starts, and Bruce Willis dies as scenes from Aerosmith videos flash before his eyes. Right - well, the next day we took some time off to go tubing down the river in Emminence. Well, Mike and Erica tubed, I'm too obsessive to comepletely relax, so I got a kayak. I can't tell you how nice it was to just float lazily down the river, doing nothing. It was especially nice because we floated right into our campsite, and the folks brought our bikes there to meet us. More soon - computer time is up....
Mon, Aug 9 @ 3:08 PM -
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...Continuing where Greg left off... Having floated into Harvey's campground in Eminence, MO, we met up with four other cyclists from New Jersey with whom we shared pizza, beer and war stories from our common journey. Oddly enough they've been about a day ahead of us the entire trip, and it took us 3200 miles to run into them. We ruined an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet the next morning and tore thru another day of Ozark madness before pulling into Johnson's Shut-ins State Park (no, there were no reclusive bitties haunting those woods; I guess the name refers merely to the river water, which has been "shut in" by the rocks). There we mingled with a group of teachers and their brood of 60 card-sharking youngsters, who left Greg wearing nothing but an oaken cask. He complains now that those kids haven't even a use for bikers' shorts, but I tell him he shouldn't have gambled with his dearest (read only) possessions. Erica and I did not eat three cheeseburgers between the two of us. We also didn't finish a bag of rice crispy treats or a tin of oatmeal cookies. It was those wily Shut-in raccoons, come for their final reckoning. The next day we woke up to the glory of another beautiful Missouri morning in the Ozarks and asked ourselves, "What should we do today?" After discussing a multitude of possibilities, we decided to ride our bikes. Greg now ignores me when I ask, "Didn't we do that yesterday?" Into Farmington with our heads full of fire, we fixed a boy's flat tire in front of the bike store (the owner told his mother it would take him a week to fix) but managed to leave its peg-adorned fork a veritable shambles. Some bike mechanics we are. After relying upon the same crazy bike store owner's directions, we arrived at the ferry in St. Genevieve (on the Mississippi) three minutes before it closed. The ferryman instead gave us a lift in his pickup (in which Greg rode in the back with the bikes, at the near cost of his life) down to the next crossing, after which we stayed in Chester, IL-- home of Popeye the Sailor Man. We got there just in time for a swim and to down a pitcher of Margaritas. Good bye.
Thu, Aug 12 @ 3:59 PM - gored in goreville
sebree,ky | miles since last update | 3423 total so far
greg fell down boom. gashed knee. s'okay now.
Tue, Aug 17 @ 10:12 AM - New Photos!!
| miles since last update | total so far
Greg sits awed by the notorious Kyle Dean Lynnyrd Skynnyrd Moldonado Smith |
Penttilatron joins us in Wichita! |
The Muffler men of Kansas never rest |
Penttila struggles up one of the wicked Ozark inclines |
Three Thousand Miles |
Penttila fords the river |
Wed, Aug 18 @ 2:52 PM - Take me home,country roads
danville,oh | miles since last update | 3937 total so far
g going solo to Mogadore.wind is at my back.
Wed, Aug 18 @ 3:42 PM - Our trip's pleasant journey is nearly at its end...
Cincinnati, OH | 380 or so... miles since last update | Around 3800? total so far
Wow! A whole lot has happened since we last posted! I, Mike, am currently in Cincinnati, staying with The Dude in his quaint and lovely suburban cottage. We arrived here the day before yesterday to a very warm welcome indeed. Having picked up Swish Risch near Bardstown, KY, the four of us pulled into The Dude and Annie's driveway only to be greeted with hot showers, Ale 8 and multivaried munchies. In celebration, we all ate hearty helpings of skyline chili together, stopped for ice cream and then smoked melon-flavored tobacco out of an enormous hookah long into the night. We talked over our travels, our respective plans for the future and our mutual hatred of our country's current administration. What wonderful company can do to cap a wonderful trip! After we left Chester, IL, we had a pretty tough day. Coming up and down the rolling Illinois hills seemed at first like a quaint joke compared to the saw teeth inclines of Missouri's Ozarks. That is until our first real scare of the trip. Greg and Erica were riding about a hundred feet ahead of me when Greg hit a big patch of soft, loose construction gravel at the bottom of the hill I had just crested. From my vantage I only saw the beginning of his descent, heard a great yell, and then watched as Greg came tumbling out of an enormous white cloud of gravel dust. I'll admit I was immediately happy to see him running in circles like a beheaded chicken; people whose legs or heads are broken don't go a-runnin', screaming and a-howling like that. So we found some poor bastard to give Greg a ride a lift to the nearest gas station, and when we caught up to him he was already eating an enormous ice cream sandwich. We hitched another ride into the aptly named Goreville, IL where the cycling Dr. Porter had an office. He told us Greg didn't need stitches, charged us $55 for a bandaid and then called Greg a sissy boy. When Greg called him a misogynist he threatened to kick us out of Illinois. Where he was granted such authority we didn't ask, but since Greg still wasn't feeling up to riding that day we left peacefully. Perhaps the real tragedy was that Greg had left his helmet and gloves in the back of the first pickup, and so we were forced to call up local bike shops (the nearest of which was 25 miles away) to see if they'd overnight some gear to us. Luckily, the bike store owner volunteered to drive down with the goods, and we were set before the day was out. We should thank the people of Goreville who fed us a free meal with pie, local lore and travelling advice while we stagnated in the town. The only unfortunate thing was that all the local swimming holes, they said, had been dry for the past couple days. For the next couple days we planned on making big miles, but were once again detoured by lady luck, who reminded us that this is not a race. As noses to a grindstone-- an endeavor that should seem to lead only to a great loss of blood. I reminded him, of course, that you can't stop and smell the flowers without a nose. In Sebree, KY we spent a wonderful evening in the care of Violet and her congregation at the first Baptist Church. Not only did we get showers, and a place to sleep, but the basement where we stayed had an entire game room, a full kitchen, big screen television and an enormous pile of teddy grahams! Violet, the preacher's wife, was alone that night (her husband had left on a spur-of-the-moment trip to help a former-member of their congregation who had been kicked out of his apartment in St. Louis) and made us all an enormous home cooked meal. Then Violet, who is one of 16 or 17 children, told us the story of growing up in the south with one of the more dysfunctional families I've heard of. What a wonderful, amazing lady. Later we met Swish Risch at a grand Catholic Abbey near Bardstown, after which we stayed at the My Old Kentucky Home state park. More Mexican food was eaten, more margaritas imbibed, and I went to bed feeling lovely. The night before we arrived in Cincinnati we stayed in another baptist church that Swish told us he'd had premonitions about years earlier. The basement of the church was exactly the way he remembered it in his dream, and he refused to tell us the way the it ended except to say that "they always end terribly." We all hid behind the couch that night and I slept not a wink as I worried over dark endings to bright adventures. If there is a god, would he want us to be have as much fun as we've been having? So now, I'm in Ohio, and yesterday I finally got the nap I'd been waiting on for two months. It was lovely. I suppose I'll wander around this place until I grow tired of it, or until the real world begins to sound appealing once more. Then it's back on the road up to Chicago, where the party really starts. I'd really like to do one 200-mile day in the flats of Indiana while I still have the ability to crack walnuts between my thighs, so the jog back seems like a good time. Greg just called, and it sounds like he'll be in Mogadore by noon tomorrow. I'm sure he'll fill you in on what details I've neglected. Since this is merely a momentary hiatus, and my trip won't finish until I've stepped up onto my front porch, I'll try to keep you posted from the what my friend Scuddy calls the land of racism and good Indian food. Peace out. By the way, if you'd like to see what the internet peanut gallery had to say about our journey (we were featured on
for the original link, or for the smarmy remarks from the armchair statementists.
...More soon...
Wed, Aug 18 @ 3:46 PM - Our trip's pleasant journey is nearly at its end...
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By the way, if you'd like to see what the internet peanut gallery had to for the original link, or page for the smarmy remarks from the armchair statementists. ...More soon...
Wed, Aug 18 @ 3:48 PM - Our trip's pleasant journey is nearly at its end...
| miles since last update | total so far
Sorry, the last two posts got a bit screwed up. I keep forgetting that I can't use colons. To repeat that end part- By the way, if you'd like to see what the internet peanut gallery had to say about our journey (we were featured on FARK.COM a while back go to- for the original link, or page for the smarmy remarks from the armchair statementists. ...More soon...
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