This is really the end

My bike is gone now.  I shipped it away in a big cardboard box with almost all of my belongings, save my fiddle, and some clothes.  Just like going to the Florence waterline, my last moments of my bike-trip-with-a-bike found me carrying Grandpa, this time wrapped up snug in a box and down roads instead of sand.  Physically it was just as difficult, symbolically just as potent.

The last time we'd be together, Grandpa and I, until New England

In many ways I am taking a more confusing route to go home than I did coming here in the first place.  I will leave Eureka tomorrow morning around 5am via a rideshare, and so as not to bore you with details, after: 6 days, two groups of relatives, three airplanes and a Subaru, I will be back in Nelson, NH.  I already feel the jet lag and carsickness creeping up on me.  And of course, I will not be getting a good night's sleep tonight because our host in Eureka is taking us to a blues dancing place.

The trip down the coast was worth it and I wish I could continue onward with Chelsea.  We have had incredible moments on trail, both biking and exploring towns and beaches.  We've biked through a redwood forest at night, massive trunks emerging from the shadows and darkness like freighters before a rowboat, then disappearing behind us like a half-remembered dream.  We spent half a day in a church, baking and cooking up a storm.  We've had long and hard discussions about the vegan lifestyle.  I've explored many deserted, hard-to-reach beaches with an unfortunate lack of shells- they make up for that with incredible views and lack of tourists.

A dryad in her tree

A happy wood nymph

I am writing this last blog post from Eureka, CA at a WarmShower host's house.  I went 5954 miles.

This is my last post.  I have had loads of fun writing this blog and I have loved hearing back from so many people, via letters, email, facebook, packages, phone calls, and even just the feeling you get when you know someone you like is reading your blog.  Like a really fuzzy cat walking across your bed when you're under the covers.  Soon I'll be back on the right coast and I look forward to seeing so many of your faces again.  Until then, stay warm.

Love,

Oliver

Down the Pacific Coast

What kind of society is this, where I can bike up to a house, knock on the door, and after brief introductions with the homeowner, hop in their shower, put my dirty clothes in their washer, eat their food, and sleep in their bed?  I feel like Goldilocks, only I asked first. Still, I did invite myself in.  I don't fool myself into believing that this experience is truly a representation of American society as a whole, but it is fantastic that I have found these kinds of people across the entire country.  We are only brief guests in their lives as well as in their homes, but these hosts always find time for us.

Staying with Tonia and Hal a second time!
Two of the best people.

Making myself at home has become natural.  I think nothing of rifling through a fridge (if they offered it), or stretching out on their couch.  As I write this in my journal, I am sitting next to my host Lauren, who I met 10 minutes ago, sharing contented silence as she reads and I write.  There is a lot of observation and imitation as well- do they wear shoes inside?  Are smart devices used or ignored?  Are feet acceptable on the coffee table? It is a fun balance to try to be the perfect guest while being able to relax and have fun.

At the same time I am learning what it is to be a host, taking mental notes on what I love from my hosts so I can pass it forward in the future.  Offering lots of tea.  Being able to listen and tell stories.  Knowing and articulating my own needs and boundaries.  One host said "you can interact with us as much or as little as you want.  If you want to eat and hit the hay, or stay up talking, we're happy with it."  At that host's home we found time to both be separate and take care of our own needs, as well as learn a great deal about the geology of the Oregon coast, looking at maps and bike routes.

Sometimes the host is like an aunt or uncle, treating us with wonderful food and asking about our trips, and sometimes the host is like a good friend, and we go exploring or stay up late talking about hopping trains.  The best method is to be open for anything, ready to accept and give, talk and listen.  You never know where you will end up.

Hiking around Blacklock Point with Kenny,
Caleb and Quinn, three great hosts

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So much has happened.  In a departure from what this blog usually contains, I feel a larger need to describe where I am and what I am doing, now that the coast to coast trip has finished.  This will be a larger post.

Eugene:
All in all, I spent almost three weeks in and around Eugene.  I went blues dancing three times, contra dancing once, made lots of food, ate lots of gelato (Talenti No. 19, Salted Caramel, the best flavor), made ice cream, upgraded my bike, and spending lots of time with Kyle and Adrian at the Gooble Dell.

Chelsea and me at the Florence coast, at the
culmination of her ride.

Trip #2: Pacific Coast Trail
Chelsea and I are heading down the coast now on Highway 101, which is often only a hundred feet or so off the ocean.  We are treated to giant surf, foggy sea stacks, and incredible views.  It feels good to bike south and take time to see what is here on the left side.  I feel now like it would have been an insult to the beauty of the this section of Oregon to have only spent one day on its shore, and only in one spot at that.

Looking out over mushrooms and sea stacks

I finally bought a plane ticket home.  I will be flying out of Oakland, CA, on the 16th of November.  That said, we have decided not to make a goal out of it and to take time and have fun.  If I need to make up distance to get there on time, I would take a bus rather than rush this section.

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I am writing this from the Stansell's, in Gold Beach, OR, with Chelsea's host brother from her time in Belgium (he is spending his year abroad in Oregon), and I have traveled 5800 miles.

If I had biked on interstates, and gone in a relatively straight line, I would have already hit the coast and be back in New England.

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Highlights:

• Staying with Tonia and Hal twice because I returned to the Florence coast with Chelsea
• Exploring Blacklock Point for a day with Kenny, Caleb, and Quinn, a host and his two best friends, finding shells, exploring cliffs, climbing sea stacks, and getting lost.
• Spending the night on the second most western point of the continental US
• I cannot explain how incredible it is to bike along the coast, with mountains our left side and foggy sea stacks in the incredible Pacific Ocean on the right.  Tied for the number one view of this trip with the 12,150ft view from the top of Rocky Mountain National Park.

Chelsea at Florence,
contemplating the infinite

This is where I get most of my jokes

Spoiler Alert- Chelsea's head is about to be submerged

The cliffs on the far side of Blacklock

The sea stacks of the Oregon coast.  I didn't know this kind
of place existed outside of New Zealand, Ireland, or Halo

A trip of land, defined by the sea

"You've got to ask yourself if you want to find a more romantic storyline for your life."

One of our hosts threw out this comment and it has been echoing in my mind ever since.  I do!  This is what I talk about when I talk about seeing magic whether it is there or not, searching for mysteries, saying yes!  One of the larger intents for this trip was to create opportunities for adventure to enter.  I wanted to set myself up for the archetypal Hero's Journey.  I have left the familiar, met wise old men and women, faced dragons of weather and toxic plants, been brought so low all I could do was sit and bear the pain.  I have been helped by a stranger who had no name, both rejected and accepted temptation, and I have reached the far shore.  And then there is the reluctance to return, leading to my epilogue with Chelsea.  Beyond that, all that remains is the actual return, and hopefully finding myself able to find balance- in my case, between the nomadic and settled life.

A friend asked me if I felt any different.  A trip like this, with a bike like mine, almost guarantees an increase in technical skills.  A trip like this, in a country like mine, seems to universally surprise and impress the travelers with the hospitality and kindness of strangers.  I feel different in those ways, but I do not feel like I am a changed man.  I feel as if I have filled a need within myself, and I'm ready to look for new adventures.

Me and Grandpa

Alexander and
Mike "The Bike" Johnson

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Highlights:

• Well, reaching the coast, obviously

but also:

• Staying with Tonia and Hal, coming back from the coast.  They made us amazing dinner and breakfast, were great conversationalists, had an amazing home, and were good people.  They also gave us a bunch of canned food which we happily accepted despite the weight of glass.
• Going blues dancing again, back in Eugene
• Talking with Adrian, my host in Eugene, about everything from the sacred commitment that is owning a house, to how he spends $75 a month on food (that's what I spend in five days!).  He said the quote above, and sometimes refers to his own life as "my story."

And, as a extra bonus, a forelight!  (foreshadowing highlight)

• Chelsea arrives in Eugene today, and we're going contra dancing! My first time since New Hampshire!

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Trip Statistics!

5281 miles
111 days
July 2nd to October 19th
Hampton Beach, NH to Harbor Vista County Park, OR

47.6 average miles per day (with zero days)
62.1 average miles per day (without zero days)
26 zero days

Cost per diem- $22.90
Food cost per day- $16.30
Total bike costs- $735
Lodging costs- $25
         (Includes campsites, hotels, motels, B&Bs, rustic cabins, and tent spots)

Met 2 other E->W cyclists
Hitchhiked once

This is a wonderful print done
by our last host, Tonia Blum.

We were joined for the last 70 miles by
India (aka Dr. Jones), Alexander's partner

I went way out onto the pier.  This is right before the
waves got terrifying, three times as high,
and I made a mad scramble for shore

A cool palm tree and a gigantic crab shell

Photoshoot at the beach!

Super cool snail.  

The Pacific waves just kissing my front tire,
111 days after the Atlantic lapped my rear tire.

Dancing to the Finish

 Another kind of hospitality

I read somewhere, once, that some people go through their entire day without touching a single other person.  No hugs, handshakes, not even a jostled shoulder.  The idea has stuck with me as deeply sad, even though I am occasionally one of those people.  We all are.  Today, however, was not one of those days.  Today I went blues dancing.

When I haven't been dancing in a while I forget how much I enjoy it.  Contra, swing, ballroom, contact-interpretive improv... they're exciting and interesting, complex and personal.  Think back to your early romances, the feeling of flirting.  Excitement, tension, synchronicity, nervousness.  Finding someone who thinks or moves like you do.  Partner dancing is flirting with every person you dance with, a set of strangers and friends deciding to raise the intimacy of their mutual interactions for a time so they can collaborate with the music and each other in new ways.  It was my first time blues dancing, and I loved it.  In blues dancing you lead or are led, you strive to move together, motions complimenting motions, steps falling so close they are nearly simultaneous (at least, that's what we tried for).

On a bike trip it is simple to be alone, even as you move through cities and towns.  It's easy to keep interactions at a superficial level, since you will only know someone for a hour, a day.  And yet even as strangers to Eugene, dancing let us immediately connect with people.  It's fun to watch, even more fun to join, and the most fun to dance patterns together.  I would never have gone but our friend in Eugene invited us along, and it was a great time to say "yes."   It's always hard to get out the door, but once we were their I remembered how much I love to move with other people. In the end, for me, it boils down this- dancing makes me want to dance. 

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A section about plans, because suddenly I'm not just biking right to left.

Eugene, Oregon.

A mere seventy miles from the coast, we have taken several days off to rendezvous with Alexander's partner to travel the final distance.  I am restless in this rest.  We will head out on Saturday, and by Sunday I will have successfully traveled, the slow way, from one coast to the other.

It is amazing that this chapter is already drawing to a close, but there may be an epilogue.  If all goes as planned I will meet up with Chelsea (her blog, and our first interaction, can be found here) in Eugene and travel with her to Astoria, OR, the official end of the TransAmerican Cycling Trail.  I am notoriously lazy about planning, but so far jobs and adventures keep sliding into place at the last moment.  I didn't know what I would do after my and Alexander's end in Florence until I was two days from the completion of my trip- it's nice to see the lucky trend continue.

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After

Before

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I'm writing this at Kyle Brown's house, in Eugene, OR.  I am 5186 miles in, 70 miles to go.

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Highlights-

• Mackenzie Pass was our route over the Cascades, at 5335 ft and the last time we would be over even 1000 ft.  Even without that glory, it stands as one of the most rugged, beautiful, and inspiring points of this trip.  Top three.  Lava fields and jagged, snowy peaks and an incredible "observatory" on the top.
• I really wanted ice cream when we stopped in Riggins for the night, but the smallest container was 1.75qts (the most Alexander and I have ever managed is 1.5qts, and we were hungry that time).  Even so, I really wanted ice cream.  In a moment of to-hell-with-it, I asked the cashier if we could buy the ice cream, eat half of it, and then keep the rest in the store's freezer for the night and eat the rest tomorrow, since we were just passing through and camping.  Without blinking an eye he said of course, let him get a box so we could write our names on it.  I did blink in surprise, and this nice cashier happily went about this task as if it happened every day.  Never hurts to ask.
• Not a highlight necessarily, but we saw a lot of controlled burns, and sometimes we rode by forest that was still smoking, stumps right off the road that were still on fire. 

Fires right off the road

After a dinner of beans, sometimes we opt to sleep
in separate places.  I get the hammock

Modeling cycling clothes without taking off the warm layers

We are suckers for sweets and deals

That is the rain shadow of our tent, and this
is the puddle that Zander slept in

A photosphere of McKenzie Pass

An awesome compass rose capstone that
gave bearings for the peaks you could see

The observatory, Alexander waving goodbye to the east.

If a bike could speak...

On this trip, I've learned to read other cyclists by their bikes.  I can tell a lot about them by the model, the accessories, as well as by what and how much they are carrying.  A Surly says money and quality-consciousness.  Clip-on pedals say old-school cycling attitude.  Tofu bucket panniers say they probably started in Portland, OR.  I look for what stands out as unusual, which tells something of their values, or a story of their trip.  There is a tendency to add mementos of the journey onto our bikes: everything from stickers, to pirate flags, to antelope skulls.

The stack of gear behind me is getting higher and higher.
I sent home my deer skull when I got the fiddle.

Before my trip I planned to bring my fiddle, but after an hour of strategizing how to affix it to my bike I decided it was ludicrous, both too long and too fragile to be feasible.  To make a long story short, I finally obtained a fiddle in Missoula, MT, on day 94, and it has been one of the best choices of the trip.  It is ungainly, heavy, and too long, but so far it hasn't fallen off my bike or rattled to pieces.  So far I've played it in fields, along rivers, in towns, in haylofts above horses, and I love every moment of it.  I am a novice, but playing brings me such joy, and practicing and learning on trail is one more way I am learning to integrate my settled life with my nomadic one.  After all, if I can bring a fiddle on a bike trip, I can bring it just about anywhere.

Playing for rivers and fields.

On a bike every pound counts, and the form of what you carry is somewhat preordained by pannier shape and attachment areas.  I am taking a harder road.  I am declaring my willingness of suffer more work for what I love.  I couldn't be more delighted.

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I am writing this in Baker City, OR, at 4799 miles and in the last state of my trip.

Highlights:

• Watching an anime movie at a WarmShower host with their middle-school aged son.
• Staying in a bedroom in a barn above the horses, and playing music for them.
• Leaving out a saucer of milk for the Tomten of the barn.  It was dry in the morning.

An Experience Without

I had, and have, many plans for this trip, activities I wanted to do and areas I want to see.  Friends to visit, books I want to read.  Ways to make this journey more fun and bring it to a deeper level.  One of the latter was to spend a day in a small (think 10'x10') area without food, books, Oracle, journal, anything but layers and water.

A friend of mine in Missoula, MT, Kate Stanley, helped by driving me out to Rattlesnake Creek one morning (thankfully free of rattlesnakes) and dropping me off, making plans to pick me up in 24 hours.  I hadn't eaten since midnight the night before.  I hiked up a small mountain and chose a spot.  

A photosphere of my spot, just before
I started and turned off my phone

It was an interesting experience all around, and I would do it again if next time with a journal and pen, or watercolors, so I don't spend the whole time sleeping.  The most intriguing aspect of this experience was the hunger.

I expected to be bored, have revelations, think of nothing but food all day, or seethe with bottled energy.  In truth, I slept most of the day.  I paced back and forth a bit on an animal path that bisected my area; I sat and thought; I wove a small basket out of grass, and I took many naps.  I was never once hungry.  At one point I tried to think of banana bread and sandwiches, just to try to elicit some bodily response, but it held no interest and my mind soon drifted to other subjects.  I believe that it helped that there was no food to be had for miles, and my body and mind knew that.  When I returned to Kate's house the next morning, I eased into breakfast without haste, or urgency.  This was my first time fasting, and it was illuminating.  How often does my stomach ache with hunger after a mere couple of hours without food or snacks?  I never realized that in the same way that the urgency to poop increases with the expected proximity to accommodations, my hunger is tied to expectation of food.  I would like to press this point and see when hunger truly makes its face known.  I halfway expected that it never will, and when I do decided to break fast and eat, it will be in response to bodily weakness rather than stomach pains.  But that is a trial for another time.

1.75 quarts of mint ice cream

I recommend something like this experience.  I recommend taking time to find what is left of you when you remove everything external- computer, phones, company, food, places to explore.  As Oriah Mountain Dreamer said, "I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments."

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Typed this up in Riggins, ID, at 4583 miles

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Chelsea Cash, if you read this, the hill right after Stites is the godfather of killer hills, and Stites' water supply has E Coli. Fill up early.

A disgruntled post, about

Tires

Because it's on my mind and it just happened.

We made it to Missoula, MT!  This is the city that hosts the Adventure Cycling offices, where we got our maps for both the Atlantic Coast Trail and the TransAm.  Hundreds of cyclists come through each year and stop at these offices, where they are greeted by a ritual of smiling faces, a weighing of the bike, a taking of a photo, and the giving of some ice cream.  On this day, when the cloud cover seems so low you can almost touch it and the temperature enough to turn our ears to icicles, the ice cream was not as high on the want list as it might have been, but the rest of the ritual was fun.
I am actually writing this while I wait for Alexander and Eric (another cyclist we had the pleasure of joining from Yellowstone to Missoula- more on him later).  On the road today I got a flat which, after waving Eric and Alexander to go on ahead, confident that I would fix it promptly, became quite a situation.  Without moving more than 10 feet I went through the "fix-a-tire routine"... five times.  This entails taking all the gear off my bike, stripping out the tube, patching it, replacing everything, and beginning to ride only to feel it flat once again.  By the sixth, I was pulling off old, brittle patches and replacing them with new ones.  Each time some new problem arose, compounding my irritation as big rigs roared by, obfuscating the telltale sound that would let me know there was yet another hole.  When I finally put in a tube that held its integrity, the tire somehow had gotten out of whack and added a bump to my bike with every wheel rotation.  Imagine Chinese water torture, but with a small kick to the testicles every half second.  I still had 40 miles to go, but was unwilling to do any major adjustments lest another tube burst.  After three miles and mild nausea, I threw in the towel and stuck out my thumb.  Within 10 minutes a nice but cautious man let me ride in the back of his pickup as he drive me to Missoula, a bike store, and new tubes.

Poplars and others changing colors

This is another cyclist we met on the trail

Yellowstone Nation Park, WY

I have a great many thoughts about Yellowstone, but I don't know how to put them into words.  I have tried; started on paper at least twice and in my head many more times than that while riding.  So let me wax poetic and wane description and say that there were a great many cars and tourists, and occasionally while I would stand in silence contemplating the mystery of the earthen origin of these boiling pits, I would turn and see a veritable horde of Asian tourists stream out of a tour bus and, like a wave, crash over me with cameras and phones, cheerfully shouting to each other over the roar of the disturbed earth.
We didn't see Old Faithful, or any geysers at all because they were repairing a bridge that would mean an 80-mile detour.  An annoyance for a car, a two-day dread for cyclists considering the increased traffic and narrow roads, plus the endless scenic summits of small mountain ranges.  We did see many bubbling mud pits, and a super cool feature called the Dragon's Mouth Spring.
To keep on the bright side, it is beautiful country and we saw grizzlies, bison, elk, antelope.  I would love to go back in the narrow window when it is closed to cars and open to cyclists.  That would be heavenly.

Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.

Yellowstone

I am writing this in the Adventure Cycling cyclist's lounge in Missoula, MT, and I have gone 4420 miles.

Highlights of the last few days:

• not paying for camping in Yellowstone, due to some nice folks who let us share their cabin, and the next day our puppy eyes to a ranger at a closed campsite at 9 pm.
• seeing grizzlies, even if they were just spots in a field (probably a good distance)
• luxuriating in true hot springs, where the 140 degree stream meets 40 degree river, and finding the perfect mixing pool to relax for hours.
• taking two zero days with Joe Chirchirillo at the ranch he works at in Montana
• riding with Eric Morton, a cyclist who has been out for 13 months, over 10,000 miles, and works at bike shops and bars along the way to earn money for food and gear.
• being treated, each, to full-size New York strip steaks with a couple in Helena, MT

Grand Tetons

Red Rocks

Huge steaks for dinner with WarmShower hosts, Zander and Eric

This water is 140 degrees F.  The Boiling River, it's called

Bison!  I almost walked into these guys.

I found a dinosaur bone, I think

I know nothing about Wyoming

Zephyr

I have lost track of the number of people who have told us that we are going the wrong way.  I always laugh and give my reasons, some of which are posted here, and say that it hasn't been so bad.  Truly, it hadn't.  Throughout the flats of Kansas we had a south-southwest wind.  I figured that if we did experience bad headwinds, they would be the west wind, the zephyr, in the unending flat plains of the middle country as we headed due east.  Wrong.

Our first chance to put our teeth to the wind came in the Rockies, as a serious north headwind slowed us to a crawl of 5 mph on flat ground.  Now, in the high desert of Wyoming, I finally feel like I'm going the wrong way.  We are bearing NW throughout the entirety of the state, from corner to corner, and we have ceaselessly contended with strong, steady NW headwinds.  It is too late now to turn around and go the other way, but it is worth noting that for all my brave talk, the wind is still going the wrong way.

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Rain

The forecast for scattered showers and thunderstorms for the whole day, so I made sure my panniers' rain covers were secure, and dried off during the dry periods.  But the wind started to pick up- guess what direction- and I watched as a large flashing cloud made its swift approach.  In the flatlands, you can tell which clouds in the distance are precipitating. You can see a hazy veil beneath the cloud that looks like a windblown curtain. This one had a wall.

I put on my rain coat and soon enough it hit, rain lancing my face and body.  The wind was so strong every raindrop felt like a needle stab, through my clothing.  In spaces between towns in Wyoming, there are no buildings or trees to offer even minor protection.  So bowed was my head to protect my eyes, I could only see three feet ahead of my bike.  After no more than two minutes of this I succumbed, pulling off to the side of the road and sitting with my back to the wind.  Thunder boomed, and I felt truly helpless as the greatest extent of protection I could offer myself was to sit down and let my back bear the pain.

This is called Type II Fun. Look it up.

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I am writing this from the Lander Public Library and I have traveled 3956 miles.

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Recent Highlights:

• Staying with the Hettlemen's in Fort Collins for ten days, very fun people and a very fun town.
• Pulling in late one night to the O'Tooles in Laramie, WY, to a huge baked-potato supper after traveling a full day's ride starting at 12 pm
• Camping one night in a mysterious crop circle in 10-foot high grass one night, and the next night in the high desert, nothing taller than my knee for miles around.
• This last highlight requires some backstory.  Since Virginia, we have been 2-3 days behind a fellow cyclist named Chelsea.  We know this from log book entries and east-bound riders.  We have been trying to catch up since Virginia.  In the 3956 miles that I have been travelling, I have met just one other rider going the same way as me, and her trip ended after 300 miles.  Despite our efforts she kept pace ahead of us, and we finally let our hopes die when we detoured to Fort Collins for 10 days so Alexander could see his sweetheart.  Imagine our surprise when we get back on the road and a east-bound cyclist tells us that Chelsea is only two days ahead of us!  She must have stopped in the Denver-Boulder-Fort Collins area, same as us, for the same length of time.  Our hopes rekindled, we hope to meet her yet.

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The views are so majestic and grand in scope here that I haven't even tried to photograph it.  I feel like I diminish it just by trying.  That said, here are a two photos.

An antelope skull

From our highest point before we dropped down to Fort Collins