In Sycamore, IL met a cyclist who told us about the Great Western Path that'd lead us into St. Charles, IL. From there we could get on to the Prairie Path that would take us into the suburbs.
Some where along the way we missed a turn, the cyclist said it was clearly marked but I guess we weren't paying enough attention. We probably put in an extra 10 miles. Once we got back to the correct path I stopped to ask directions lest we miss another turn and met a lock salesman. He said he was headed almost exactly where we were and would be happy to show us the way
Stopped at Taco Bell ate and talked to Heather for directions to her house.
100-mile day
No statistics
[Okay the emails are starting up again. I'm going to try not to drag out the conclusion too much. Only 15 more days worth of email to go.]
Woke up on the sidewalk in front of the grocery store at 06:00 as some construction workers showed up for work remodeling the store. We hit up the McAfee South End Restaurant in down town Maquoketa, IA and filled up on cheap tasty food. The owner came outside to look at our bikes and saw the"I Had A Malt At Yellowstone Drug" sticker on the side of my bike. She exclaimed that it was too bad that they didn't have anything like that to give me. She went inside and came back out and with a pen with their address on it and told me to send them a post card.
Around 11:00 we finally crossed the Mississippi into Illinois. The bigger bridges are always a little bit sketchy, they're most often two lanes, have no shoulder, and a metal deck that's awful squirrelly to ride on. It was a good thing we didn't have much traffic passing us, I had the phrase "East of the Mississippi" echoing in my head the whole way across. It was a real trip when I looked down thought the metal grate deck of the bridge at the water below. While the river isn't as wide as in Louisiana it's still a BIG river, definitely something to write songs about. Brad and I had a couple of stupid looking grins on our faces when we finally got across and took pictures in front of the welcome to Illinois sign.
Half a mile down the road from the bridge was Savannah, IL. Brad hit a payphone to call Erin and let here know that we would be arriving in Chicago on July 26th. When he was done I got on the phone and ordered two Model 490 Handy Horns from Wolo Manufacturing (www.wolo-mfg.com 1-800-645-5808). For $14.95 you get a 120-decibel (read LOUD) horn that fits in a water bottle cage. We looked around for someplace to eat lunch but nothing sounded good, and between the two of us we'd spent an hour on the phone. It was hard talking ourselves into getting moving into that headwind again but we still had 40+ miles to ride if we were going to make Chicago on time.
The afternoon was mind numbing, I spent most of the time trying to think of anything that could possibly distract me from how frustrating the hills and headwind were. When we finally did stop and buy lunch in Lanark, IL it really did feel like we'd earned it. A few frustrating hours later we camped in Oregon, IL, hidden in the middle of a clump of trees in a park that didn't allow camping.
andrew
Brad got up EARLY, those of you who know him understand what a notable occurance it was. He was packed and ready to get going by the time I'd put my sleeping bag up. I'd fallen sleep dreaming of breakfast and the only thing that got me moving was the thought of some pancakes, eggs and hash browns.
When we found that the cafe in town was closed I was really annoyed. I just wanted to start riding until we found a place to get some breakfast.
The Corner Bar in Walker, IA delivered. I gave it 4 stars--great food at super cheap prices. Brad's only complaint was that the coffee wasn't very good--but in its favor: it was free.
Down the road a piece we came across a 200 foot streatch of road that can only be described as a racoon killing ground. There were at least twenty pieces of road kill on both the sides of the highway. Brad and I spent two or three minutes staring at one corpse trying to decide if it was a cat or racoon. The long fingers and short tail convinced us that it was a racoon.
A few miles outside of Maquoketa, IA a tractor turned out onto the road. The driver's two sons were hanging on as they bumped down the gravel shoulder. I started to pass them but as I moved along side and waved the driver started asking me about the ride. I really wish I'd taken a picture of them before they said goodbye.
Just down the hill we stopped in Maquoketa, IA at around 19:00. Our intention was to just make a quick stop at the supermarket for some food. 15 minutes later we were ready to leave, but the clouds, which had been thickening all afternoon, looked like they were from The Wizard Of Oz's tornado scenes. As the wind picked up, announcing the front of the storm, we went across the street and hid under the awning of a hardware store and waited for the rain to end. After a half hour of torential downpour, we decided it wasn't worth going out in the rain to find another place to camp and rolled out the ground cloth. Half expecting a cop to show up at any minute, we settled down for an uncomfortable night's sleep.
andrew
[Sorry about sending that last email twice. The batteries in the PocketMailer died and it decided to resend the email when I put fresh ones in.
We're plugging right along even if these emails aren't. Brad and I are presently working our way down US 50 in West Virginia. DC is only 200 miles away, and we should finish on Aug 16. and be back the 18th]
We started around 09:00 from Williams, IA after waiting on the rain. It'd probably stopped around 06:00 but we wouldn't have known it. The tent was under a tree and every time the wind would blow the water on the leaves would fall down onto the tent letting us think the rain had started again and that we could go back to sleep guilt free.
The overcast weather made for nice riding and the light headwind didn't slow us down much but kept everything nice and cool. We spent most of the day riding through fields of corn and soy beans.
About the only thing we had to slow down for was road construction. They were extending a freeway across quite a bit of our path and there were detours abound. We bardged through most of the closed roads with only a wave to the flagger. We were't able to ignore a couple of the closures and were sent down gravel roads with asphault trucks behind us.
The mid-west has high clouds that make the best sunset and that night there was a gorgeous one. Just as it was finishing up the fireflies came out. I could almost convince myself that the grass along the side of the road was a bed of bright green coals and the hundreds of fireflies were embers rising up from it. Almost made me forget the tortures of the previous two days.
Pulled in Brandon, IA in the dark and rode around looking for a place to eat
and camp. I rode up on two kids making out in the middle of the street and
shouted "Hey! Can I ask you a question?" They looked like two deer
paralized by headlights. "Is there a gas station or anything like that open
around here?".
"In Independence" the guy offered.
"How far is that?" I asked.
"About 15 minutes..."
"Not for them, stupid" the girl scolded.
While they couldn't tell us a place to eat they were able to direct us to the city park. We ended the day at 95 miles. Getting into Chicago by the 26th of August would still be a push, 80 mile days at the minimum. It would be workable but we'd need to stay focused.
andrew
Woke up in Manson, IA in the park under the water tower. We hurried to get out of there, the No Camping sign was much more vlsible in the liqht of day.
Leaving town I looked back in my mirror and saw Brad come racing up behind me. I thouqht something might be wrong. Turned out he'd just eaten his Luna Bar from Joe Lane's care package. The poor fool had fallen in love with them and wanted to trade mine away from me. Too bad for Luna Boy, I'd already eaten it. I tried to explain to him that even thouqh they were tasty they were chick power bars. He just waved it away, saying "Now that I know how the other half lives, I'm never going back".
In Ft. Dodge we were able to meet up with Brad's parents' friends, the Messmers. Sarah and Don really took care of us: we got breakfast, took showers, washed laundry and they even helped us plan a route into Chicago--all in three hours. It was the cycling equalivalent of an Indianapolis 500 pit stop.
The entire afternoon we were chased by thunderstorms. During a really bad streatch we stopped at a farm house to ask if we could stand under their tree and get out of the rain. They invited us in, loaned us towels, gave us a couple sodas and directions to a bike path in Webster City. Between their hospitality and the Messmers' it's made me think that people who live in Iowa are pretty alright even if they don't know how to build roads.
andrew
Going into Souix City, IA should have been no problem. Unless you didn't look at the map long enough to tell that US 20 turned into interstate. I picked the single worst way possible into town, instead of residential surface streets we got a few miles of divided highway followed by a few on busy shoulderless trucking routes. Brad's still pissed at me that we didn't get to take a picture next to a Welcome To Iowa sign because it was surrounded by four lanes of 80mph traffic.
The only upside was when we stopped at a supermarket for directions there was a music shop in the strip mall. We'd been wanting to buy harmonicas for a while so it seemed like the time. One of the employees was . . . you guessed it, a BikeE owner. He was able to give us directions to the only bike shop in town.
Now being the only bike shop in the town that 8-10,000 RAGBRAI riders would be departing from in two days, it was, understandably, completely crazy. Finding someone to show me pedals was tough, trying to get work done on the bikes was out of the question. Brad picked up a new derailer [which we still haven't gotten around to replacing as of 8/7/01 -am] and I left with a new set of Shimano SPD pedals (For the non-bike people they're clipless pedals. It's kind of like ski bindings, you wear special shoes with a very stiff sole. Each shoe has threads in it so you can screw a metal cleat in to the bottom. The cleat is what snaps into the pedal and connects you to the bike. And sorry I don't know why they call them clipless) We went to a park so I could replace the cleats from my old pedals with the new ones. While I was fiddiling with them Brad tried to call some of his parents' old friends who lived in Ft. Dodge, IA, a couple days away. He wasn't able to get a hold of them and I only suceeded in stripping the screws on the old cleats trying to get them off.
Back at the bike shop I gave them the poor touring cyclist sob story and convinced them that they should try to get the cleats off. Twenty minutes later they'd drilled the screws out and we were on our way.
RAGBRAI left the day after next but we had to pick up mail in Correctionville, IA which was to the south of the RAGBRAI route. We weren't totally sure we wanted to meet up with them. While it would be cool to ride with the qroup for a day or two Brad had promised Erin we'd be in Chicaqo, IL on the 26th. Joining the group meant we'd be wasting one of the five remaining days. Since we had to get the mail either way we started riding out towards Correctionville.
US 20 that had served us so faithfully since Bend, OR had changed. Iowa had corrupted our noble friend. The wide shoulders of Wyoming and Nebraska were gone, replaced by a two inch drop from the concrete onto a foot wide strip of gravel. "It's probably just this county", I told Brad trying to reassure myself while the sun sunk lower and lower, "It'll get better".
As we were stood on the side of the road debating whether to just pitch the
tent or push on to the next town a police car pulled up behind us, lights
flashing. I was actually glad, now I had someone to complain about the roads to.
I was a suprised when the cop just leaned out the window to ask us if we'd seen
any accidents.
"No..." Brad replied as a second cop pulled up behind the first.
"Well were going to keep going then" the cop said motioning on down
the road.
"Okay, I think that's a siqn we should keep going" Brad said as we
watched the liqhts disappear over the next hill.
"Uhh, I'm pretty sure it's an sign that we should camp here. I don't want
to be the accident".
andrew
7/21/01
From our bivouac on the side of US 20 it was only 10 miles to Correctionville,
IA where our mail was waiting. We had to hurry because the smaller post offices
have wierd Saturday hours and waiting until Monday to pick up the mail was out
of the question.
With meer minutes to spare before the 10:00 closing time, we pulled up to the post office. Brad got stuff from his mom and girlfriend. My dad had mailed me my wallet, which I'd left in the pocket of a pair of pants he'd loaned me back in Lusk, WY. Joe Lane sent us both a care package, in it was a mess of candy, some little bottles of booze, a climbing magazine, some mix CDs from a party we'd had a while back, a letter, some photos of Joe bouldering and on top of some 14,000 ft peak, a letter and two Luna Bars. The candy and booze were nice, the climbing magazine was just frustrating, the CDs were all Brad, the letter and pictures were super funny, but the Luna Bars, they were just insulting. He'd gone out of his way to send us the only power bar that's made and marketed specifically for women. Ha ha Joe we're all laughing now.
In Iowa there are two kinds of weather: hot or hot and raining. In the morning we got hot and raininq but in the afternoon we got to enjoy just plain hot.
All morninq I was bitching about how bad the roads were, how hot it was, how humid it was, how lame it was that all the RAGBRAI people were honking at us as they DROVE by in their RVs to a BIKE ride. Durinq all that bitching I determined the thing that I hate most about Iowa is they don't pave the shoulders on the roads. If you're on any kind of busy road you're either a foot out in the lane with tons of traffic wizzing close by or you'll be forced onto the soft gravel shoulder. Watching the mirror for cars all the time keeps you totally stressed out and the time and miles just crawl by.
When we finally accepted that the roads weren't going to get any better and the traffic wasn't going to die down, we gave up on our old friend US 20, and got onto the county roads that parallel it. While that did a lot to improve my views on Iowa, I still think that it's one of the worst states to ride a bike in. That's why the RAGBRAI is so popular, it's the only time you can ride across and not worry the entire time about getting killed.
andrew
[Yeah, so that last email wasn't really ready to go out but got sent accidentally, ignore the *s.
Up here in real time we're in Chesterville, OH less than 550 miles from D.C. ]
We woke up in the park in Inman, NE. Sand from the volleyball court we'd camped on had gotten into everything, with a double helping in the drive train of my bike. I cooked rice and beans for breakfast and then tried to defoul my bike while Brad went on a search for a faucet to fill up water. Leaving at 12:00, it was hardly the model departure.
A few miles down the road I saw a cyclist aproaching. I'd learned a neat trick from Jim, the rider we met back near Arco, ID. If you want to talk to an oncoming cyclist, just pull onto their side of the road and park in front of them. Unless they're a total jerk they'll stop and talk to you. This particular cyclist, named Ashley, wasn't a total jerk so she talked to us for a couple minutes. She was riding home from her waiteressing job at a milkshake place in Plainview, NE. Roger and Steve had stopped in while she was working. Ashley mentioned that she wanted to do a cross country ride but her sub-goal was to do the RAGBRAI-inspired ride across Nebraska.
Contrary to what I'd thought a few days before I'd really enjoyed Nebraska. They're paving a bike path called the Cowboy Trail on an old railroad bed paralleling US 20. When it's finished it will be one of the longest paths in the US. There are towns every 10 or 15 miles so finding services isn't a problem and almost all the towns have free campgrounds. Maybe I'll come back in a couple of years and ride it either way I've got no problem recomending a trip to or through Nebraska.
andrew
Brad and I were up early so we could get breakfast before the radio show. On our way out of the campground we bid Roger and Steve a good day. They told us if we made it to RAGBRAI to look for riders with cans of SPAM on their helmets, that'd be them and their friends.
After a quick breakfast and a short ride we found the studio. We were directed into Angie, the lady Brad met at the pool's, office where we spent a few minutes talking about our trip. She also asked if we'd remembered our recipe. Every morning on the show they give out a new recipe, we, being the "guest stars", were asked to bring one. In honor of our old roommate (the one we visited in Portland, OR) we presented Chris Larson's Spicy Thai Peanut Sauce. He'd made it often when we lived with him but neither of us knew the exact proportions. The night before we'd made some and came up with the following: 1/2 cup chunky peanut butter, 6 tablespoons soy sauce, and 1/2 tablespoon hot sauce all mixed together and spread over rice or noodles. They interviewed us between the classified ads and farm reports and let us present our recipe. Now if anyone asks if I've ever been on public radio in Ainsworth, NE I can say yes.
That afternoon we pulled into Atkinson, NE, home to one of the nicest swimming pools we've come across. They had fountains and one of the loopy water slides like at the big water parks. We got in for free because they were going to be closing for swimminq lessons in a half hour. As they closed I met the cutest life guard of the whole trip. After talking to her for a while she said she had to get back to work but that she'd let us in for free if we wanted to wait around until they reopened. Brad said he'd be okay with waiting around if I wanted to. It was a tough decision but I decided we ought to keep moving. Waiting around so I couId end up with another crush on a girl in a different state would have been a bad thing.
andrew
listen to the radio show (approx 30 minutes/19 mb)
I was woken up by rain and just as I was about so say something to Brad I realized he was already half done putting up his sleeping bag. Packing up seemed to take twice as long in the rain as it normally does. We decided to get some breakfast and let the weather move a little farther down the line.
The wind blew the rain out of town before changing direction into an evil head wind. It was slow moving and we had to deal with road work for most of the morning, jumping out of the way as waves of cars passed us on the one remaining lane.
In Johnstown, NB we stopped and got a pop and ice cream at this little antique/craft store. I got a couple things as gifts but as we were leaving the owner pulled a Dick Collins on us. It was a battle to get out the door before she could recount the life story of everyone who lived in the county.
That afternoon, a few grueling miles later in Ainsworth, NB we ran into Roqer and Steve riding off from the bar. While we were talking, the sheriff stopped to tell us that there was a tornado warninq in the next county. Brad and I decided to take a seat at the bar for a beer and call it a day.
In the city park on the side of town we found a free campground and right next to it, the city pool. The best place to spend your money on showers is at a public pool. You pay $2-3, get to shower, to swim, you can keep an eye on your bike through the chainlink fence and there are always cute lifeguards. At a campground it'd cost you $5 with no swimming or cute lifeguards.
The pool was great, it felt good to work some muscles other than my legs. Brad met a lady who did part of the morning show on the local radio station, she said she'd put us on the radio if we wanted to come by the station the next day.
Back at the campground we talked with Roger and Steve about Iowa. They were riding across as a part of a group ride called RAGBRAI (The Register's Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa). The Iowa Register has put it on for the last twenty-something years, it's 10,000 people doing a week-long ride across the state with a lot of partying along the way. If you've seen the movie The Straight Story you may recall several scenes with RAGBRAI riders.
As they kept talking we got more and more interested, eventually deciding that we'd like to do the ride if it was possible. It left Souix City a little later than our current schedule but if we could squeeze it in and still make it to Chicago on time it'd be the best way to see Iowa.
andrew
7/16/01
We'd pictured Nebraska as this flat state, it's not. It's thousands of small
rolling hills, up and down one hill after another. The 90*F heat and humidity
made it even more entertaining.
When our roommate, Joe Lane, finished his backpacking trip from Canada to Mexico on the Pacific Crest Trail he had hundreds of stories. He'd rattle of tales of people he'd hiked with, things he'd seen, peaks he'd climbed. One of the coolest aspects of the trail to me was how social it was. A couple hundred hikers leave from both ends of the trail and you have a good chance of meeting most of them, either passing in opposite directions, by overtaking them or being overtaken. If you didn't meet someone you'd often see their name in trail registers or hear stories about them from people you did meet. On our trip we've met lots of cyclists but it's always hello, some bike talk and then good bye have a great trip. We'd never run into the same people twice so it was a surprise when we stopped in Cody, NB, The Town TooTough To Die (according to its motto) for a soda and found a traveler register sitting on the counter at the gas station. In it were Roger and Steve's signatures, they'd passed through earlier in the day.
About 16:00 we crossed into Central Time, another large milestone.
In Valentine, NE we drank Fat Tire Ale and camped in the park. Not putting up the tent so we could get an early start made it easy for all of Satan's little angels to sting the crap out of me as I tried to sleep.
andrew
[We got to Chicago late the night of the 26th. As you can hopefully see I've been trying to get these emails caught up.
It's been a lot of fun hanging out with our friend Heather and Brad's girlfriend Erin. Too much fun really, it's got us thinking of all the things we'd rather be doing back at home. As a result we're going to cut a couple hundred miles off the ride to the coact by riding into Washington D.C. instead of Boston, MA.
We're ready to leave Chicago as soon as the rain stops.]
Our camp for the night was five miles past the state line. It's 430 something miles across Nebraska on Hwy 20 and we'd decided to try to cross the state in 96 hours.
We got an early start and by 13:00 we'd picked up 55 miles, lunch sounded like a good reward so we hit up the Pizza Hut. Two problems with the all you-can-eat salad bar: it takes too long, we spent two hours trying to fill ourselves up, aud all salad and no carbs isn't the best riding lunch, it takes for ever to turn into fuel.
Every time we had mentioned Nebraska to someone in Wyoming they'd made the same face and said "Ewww, not much to see there 'sept corn fields and hog farms" then they'd pinch their nose. After passing our first hog farm I'd say the nose pinching was warranted. Because of the direction of the wind I saw it's siqn before I smelled it, but once we I did start smelling it the wind carried the scent to me for half a mile. I'm not looking forward to passing more of them.
We camped a few miles outside of Gordon, NE on the side of a corn field. There were storms out in the distance but because we didn't want to be visible from the road we didn't put up the tent. Around 23:30 the pre-storm winds kicked up and it was pretty clear it was going to rain. Brad and I struggled to put up the tent in the gusting wind for 20 minutes before we were able to get it up and get back to sleep.
andrew
I got up early to work on my bike. I'd ignored some pretty nasty sand in the drive train for too long and I wanted to put one of the tires we'd purchased the night before on. It felt good to just proj out; cleaning the chain and taking apart the derailer. By the time I was done it was humming, I was stoked.
We went to breakfast with the fathers and I had the best pancakes of the trip along side some of the worst home frles. Back at the hotel we packed up and then went for yet another free meal with our dads.
The dads followed us in the car a mile out of town with the video camera rolling. It made me very self-concious of my riding, Unfortunately they vldeotaped me turning the wrong way at the junction in town, the other three times that'd happened Brad was the only witness.
It was only 20 miles from Lusk, WY to the Nebraska border so made it a few miles across before we camped.
andrew
I woke up half expectinq to see Roger and Steve ride by and shout
"Nice place to camp!" again. We did end up seeinq them twice later in
the day. Once when we were stopped at a general store in Shawnee, WY and later as they were leaving the 3 Sisters Truckstop in Manville, WY.
This was the day our fathers were flying into Casper, WY. Via email we'd aranged to meet up in Lusk, WY at 15:00. Both parties had cell phones so the plan was to call when we were in town. Brad and I had pulled off mid-way through town and were dialing the cell phone number when they pulled in behind us. It was a real trip to see them.
At the motel we got a shower, breakinq our 9 day streak. My dad had brought a suprise from my grandmother, an auto bingo game. It's just like reqular bingo except instead of numbers it's got road side sights (cop, dog, stop sign, etc.) you mark off as you encounter. We've decided to use it instead of flipping a coin for future decisions. Brad's dad had brought some of his mom's cookies and a couple of CDs he'd decided he really needed to hear
I coveted the cookies.
After the whole Great Tire Debacle we still needed to find a bike shop. Our fathers had stopped by Dr. Spokes in Casper to try and pickup the tires I'd ordered but the bike shop didn't have a clue what had happened to them. A local guy told us that Two Wheeler Dealer in Rapid City, SD sold BikeEs. He gave us directions and a phone number and after calling to confirm that they'd be open, we decided that maybe Rapid City would be a nice place for dinner too.
The hour and a half drive into South Dakota went quickly, Brad and I weren't used to seeing the mile markers going by so fast. At the bike shop we found almost allthe gear we needed, they even recommended a place to eat.
I have no idea how to spell or pronounce the name of the Italian restauraunt we went to but they had good food, probably the best meal of the trip and we didn't have to pay for it. After dinner we did a little walking around downtown. We even got our pictures taken with their George Bush and Ronald Regan statues. All in all a pretty enjoyable evening.
andrew
As we were dryinq the morning's dew from our sleeping bags Brad noticed two cyclists riding by. "Nice place to camp!" shouted one of them. They were probably riqht, the oil refinery across the street from the field we'd camped in did smell pretty bad. But, it was much better than the bridge Brad and I had considered camping under, trying to find a spot near a city after dark is always a challenge.
The cyclits, Steve and Roger, stopped to talk for a few minutes., The two of them were also doing a TransAm but they'd left from Seattle, WA and were headed to New Jersey.
Since we were expecting mail we went into town in search of the post office. Downtown we found a post office but general delivery was done at the other one, a half-mile from where we'd camped. The wasted half-hour wouldn't have been that bad if when we'd gotten to the second post office we'd had mail waiting for us. In the future, we decided, we'd only do mail drops in towns to small to have a second post office.
Around 15:00 we took a leisurely lunch brake under an overpass. We had a sandwich, and some crackers, and some sweets, and when we were good and ready we put on sunblock and came out into... a whole lot of mean looking rain clouds, coming our way. They were dark black and fast moving, trailing tentacles of rain behind them. Now not being totaly stupid, contrary to what all that un-needed sunscreen might make you think, we got moving.
Though I've only surfed once, I'd say riding in front of a storm is a lot like it. The storm has a wave of wind in front of it. If you stay too far ahead of it you end up pedaling more than you have to. Fall behind the edge of the wave and you lose the leading winds and end up soaked. Some where there's a perfect point that will whip you along at 30+ mph while keeping you completely dry.
Unfortunately we didn't manage to stay ahead of them, they caught us as we neared Douglas, WY. We took shealter at a gas station until the weather cleared then got back on the interstate for the last ten miles of the night.
andrew
[Yesterday I got a email from Clarence Whetten with a great tip for cyclists that I wanted to pass along. Clarence is a BikeE owner I met in Orem, UT on my ride across Nevada last year. He was at the bike shop, where my bike was being boxed up for the trip home. We got to talking and he offered to give me a ride to the train station in Salt Lake City. On the way he took me and my gear over to his house where he loaned me his other BikeE so we could take a ride up a nearby canyon. It'd been a great trip and he put the perfect finish on it. But back to the tip, he writes:
I know this is a little late but here is a tire tip. The best tire boot that I have found to carry is a piece of Tyvec. This is the material that most 5 1/4 inch floppy disk envelopes were made of. Stop by anyplace that does FedEx shipping and grab one of the FedEx overnight envelopes and you have the makings of a great tire boot. When you have a weak sidewall put a piece of Tyvec in the area and it will likely save your tube and help the tire last long enough to find a new one. I carry a 4 inch by 8 inch piece in my touring tool kit all the time.]
We did a bit of coin fliping to decide who'd go into town, I won or lost depending on how you look at it. Brad wouldn't have to do much but sit in a hot tent and eat peanut butter out of the jar while he read The Lord Of The Rings. On the other hand I'd get to get a restauraunt lunch if I ever made it into town. I put on a clean shirt, packed up some water, applied some sunscreen and got started walking with my thumb out.
After walking about 1/2 mile I got picked up by a trucker named Vic. He was in the business of moving houses and mobile homes. I told him about our trip and the string of bad luck we'd had with the tires and he said that he'd take me all the way into town to a bike shop.
At Dr. Spokes they ordered two new tires for me that should be in Friday (7/13/01). I got one cheap tire and four tubes to get us riding and still have some backups. Vic gave me a ride back out of town to the mobile home dealer he was working for.
I walked the mile or two up to the truck stop I'd seen in the morning. After enjoyinq lunch, I started asking around trying to find some one who'd give me a ride back out to the tent some 40 miles out of town. After giving up on asking and just making a sign, Josh and Lee, two climbers going to a climbing festival in Landers, WY, offered to give me a ride back out.
They were a blast, talking with them reminded me how much I've missed climbing durring this trip. I entertained fantasies of going to the festival with them and taking part in the week long climbing and drinking binge.
After they dropped me off at the tent Brad and I got our bikes fixed and gear packed up and were rolling by15:00. It was about 40 miles into Casper, WY and we really didn't want to spend another night to the west of it.
We rode into town in front of storms that never caught us. Everything was closed by the time we rolled through down town Casper. Dinner seemed like somethinq we'd earned so we worked across town with an eye open for a restaurant. When we came across the Chinese buffet we didn't even have to discuss it, we just stopped, went in and completely stuffed ourselves. It was definitely not the middle path of the Buddha. Riding out of town to camp was painful.
andrew
[I should have made it clear that these are really back-logged, as the date below shows, these events happened almost two weeks ago. In real time we're in Maquoketa, IA. We'll be in Illinois tomorrow morning on our race to Chicago so Brad can see his girlfriend Erin.
We'll be at Heather, our friend from Reno,'s relatives house from some time in the next two days until the 1st of August:
c/o Heather Larican
16W651 Therese Ct.
Hinsdale, IL 60521 ]
As we were packing up to leave Brad noticed his tire had gone flat during the night. As you'll recall we had no more tubes of the correct size and no more patches. After standing around for a while we decided that for lack of any better ideas, a piece from the tire with the sidewall blown out might work as a patch. We covered it with the glue left over from the old patch kits, let it dry and prayed. It looked too stupid to work but, amazingly, it held.
Giving the tire no time to start leaking, we lept on the bikes and began pedaling furiously. On the bike it made for a funny ride; the tire bulged out on top of the patch so Brad bounced up a bit every time it'd touch the ground.
The miles wore on and without the constant wump wump wump I forgot all about the "patch". I sped up so I could get my camera out and take a picture of Brad as he rode by. The picture didn't take right so I started riding to pass him and try again. UHMP! It felt like I went over a speed bump, the back end of my bike starts fish tailing all around. I was not stoaked to have a flat, I flagged down a car and asked them to tell Brad to turn around so he can help me boot the tube with duct tape.
I sat there for quite a while waitinq for him. I had time to pull off the wheel, remove the two inch cotter pin from tire and clean the dirt off most of my drive train before I saw his head appear over the rise ahead. He didn't seem to be moving very fast so I got up and started walking toward him. 50 ft later I realized he was pushing his bike, "You aren't pushing that out of sympathy are you?" I asked him. He had been half way up the next hill before that truck caught him. After he turned around and started coming back up the hill the patch finally went out and he had to push the bike back.
Brad and I were so sick of it all we just moved our gear down from the highway, over the barbwire fence and into the sagebrush. We pitched tent, sat through that evening's rain and tried to figure out what to do tomorrow.
andrew
We woke up in a park at the mouth of the Wind River Canyon, just outside of Thermopolis, WY, in a light rain. After we packed up, we ate the left over pizza from the night before and got going.
The low clouds stayed with us through the gorge, sprinkling us occasionally. To our left was the Wind River, it was the most unbelievable shade of green I've ever seen, mountains and cliffs faced both sides. Going through the Canyon was like flipping through the pages of a geology book. Some of the rock was so pretty I wished I'd brought Joe Lane and a bunch of climbing gear.
At the other end of the canyon the Great Tire Debacle began. The tire with the weak sidewall blew out taking our last slimed tube with it. After determining the tire was trash, we put the mystery tube in the backup tire and began praying. We had no spare tubes for the back wheel, no patches and no backup tire.
Shoshoni, WY, is home to 500 people, more mobile homes than fixed structures, a whole hell of a lot of tacky lawn furniture, and Yellowstone Drug which clames the best malts and shakes in the state. Brad and I stopped in and had a shake and some food, they were good, possibly the best in Wyoming but there's not many towns in the state.
Emails back and forth had confirmed that our dads were going to be flying into Casper and meeting us at some point east of there depending on our progress. Not wanting to end up way beyond Casper we decided we could take it a easy for part of the day. We sat in the park for a couple hours doing emails and postcards. Once it started looking like it was ready to rain we got packed up and headed out.
We were riding hard trying to stay in front of the rain. Lightning was striking all around us and then CRACK, it hit about a half mile from the road. I was ready to camp for the night right about that point. We stopped and setup the tent in a hurry--I didn't want to be waving aluminum tent poles around for long--and then it proceded to dump on us. Brad and I just sat in the tent and listened to the rain hitting and the thunder rumbling for the next hour or so, only interupted by the tent blowing down once.
After it got past us it was even crazier, we just stood there and watched 180* of the sky flicker with distant lightning. Whole clouds, thousands of feet tall, would liqht up illuminating the clouds in front of them and then the lightning would seem to cartwheel from cloud to cloud. I tried to take a picture of it but like so many of the most memorable things in life, a picture can only be a pale shadow of the actual event. A more able writer could explain the awe it caused me but it'll always be one of the images that come to mind when someone asks me why I'm riding cross country.
andrew
The morning was georgous the clouds were low, keeping the sun off and temperatures cool. It would have been perfect riding weather if it hadn't been such perfect sleeping weather.
We stopped in Meeteetse, WY, made some lunch, had an ice cream cone, called home, and spent way too long examining the map in an attempt to avoid riding in the heat of the day. An hour outside of town the clouds moved in, cooling every thing down, and a tailwind came up.
Brad got out the head phones and started rocking out so I rode up ahead looking back occasionally to make sure he was still there. At the crest of a hill I looked back and saw him, then dropped down the other side a mile or so before I realized he hadn't crested it yet. I pulled over and sat a minute before a couple in a Volvo slowed down to tell me my "buddy's back there with a flat". I started pumping back up the 6% grade now going into a 10 mph headwind hoping he wasn't just changing CDs.
Brad most definitely had a flat, he'd pulled off the tire and had determined that the tube was shot. The side wall of the tire had started to come apart and put a half inch gash in the tube. We put the backup tire on with the "mystery tube" in it. It'd been in the parts bag for a while and we had no idea where it came from. We only by tubes with slime in them (Slime is a brand name of self-sealent) and this wasn't slimed but since we're good about patching holes as they happen it should have been fine.
25 ft later we realized that it wasn't fine and went through the whole procesess of takinq the wheel off and patching the mystery tube. "Where are those extra patches we got in Boise, I've only got one left?" Brad asked. After a few seconds I realized exactly where I'd left them, in Boise. "Don't worry about it I've got that other patch kit" I told him.
A few more miles down the road Brad picked up another flat. The backup tire had a bad looking spot on it that we were afraid would cause another flat so, when we swapped in the known good slimed tube, we put the first tire with the weak side wall back on. When I went to patch the mystery tube I found out that the extra patch kit only had one patch left in it. With only no patches left we started praying for a bike shop.
Entering Thermopolis we saw our 1st Wall Drug sign. If you've ever been near the state of South Dakota you've driven past a sign for Wall Drug. I'm sure that back forty or fifty years ago the drug store in Wall, SD was a standard small town shop but some time between now and then it turned into a self promoting tourist-trap. When I stopped in on a family road trip a few years back it was the size of a small mall. My brother and I'd been seeing the signs for a couple of hours and demand that my dad stop in Wall, SD so we could see this exciting place the signs kept talking about. We were very disapointed with what we found, they had every imagineable Wall Drug branded souvenir but every attraction was just a shadow of what the signs had promised. None the less the signs are such a part of the mid-west experience that I made the number of Wall Drug signs a new statistic.
We had dinner at Pizza Hut in Thermopolis, WY. The bro biker we met back in Bend, OR was halfway right, it'e all about salad bars but not at Wendy's go to Pizza Hut. Only the newer Wendy's have salad bars, all the Pizza Huts do and they're every where.
One thing that hit me while we were there eating was the thought "this place is run by kids". I guess that's when you can start to consider yourself old.
andrew
Dead Indian Pass (8048 ft) was a whole lot of climbing but it was a light grade with plenty of switch backs. Brad's grip shifter had gotten messed up at some point *cough* West Yellowstone Bike & Video *cough* and wouldn't stay in a gear without him holding it to prevent it from slipping out. We tied a bike tire tube around it to provide some extra friction, that improved, but didn't fix it. At about 11:00 we topped out and got a picture taken and started dropping into Cody, WY.
In Cody, WY we hit the Albertson's for food then found the post office where I proceded to start cooking up a mean batch of hash browns and eggs and Brad went to check the mail. Turned out the post office had closed at 12:00 but being the resourceful fellow he is Brad found an unlocked door, entered the post office, hunted down an employee and convinced them to let us have our mail. In the mail I got a half pound package of AAA maps from my dad (I'll be mailing some of those ahead) and the pins for the trailer from Bob.
Olde Faithful Bike Shop was closed on Saturdays but had an after hours number. Brad was sick of the broken shifter so we decided to try to get a hold of them. While we were waiting Andy, the EZ Racer recumbent owner next door, came out and started talking to us. Doug, the shop owner, rode over soon after that and got started on Brad's bike. Doug is the coolest mechanic we've met on the trip. He played guitar in some band so he and Brad rock talked it up, he wanted to sell the shop and just play all the time. Brad's favorite quote: "A bike just doesn't sing out like a guitar... About the best you can do is make it quiet".
On our way out of town we got distracted by a Burger King. My cell phone plan has 1000 minutes of long distance on the weekends. The only hitch is my phone's battery lasts about half an hour so you've got to plug it in--but the Burger King had electricity. Brad sat on the phone for almost an hour talking to Erin and I talked to my grandma for almost five minutes. When we finally did leave it was 19:00 so we had to move quick to get out of town and find some Good Old Government Sagebrush(TM).
andrew
Jackie got us up around 11:00 so we could get to the cafe across the street before they stopped serving breakfast. Everyone felt pretty good, we'd kept up on the water drinking last night so no one had a hangover. Breakfast was good, especially the hash browns. It remided me how good they are when you put onions and peppers in and how easy they are to make.
The highlight of the day was taking the short hike up behind the cabins to Silver Falls. There wasn't much water cominq over but that meant we could get up real close and into the spray. It was so relaxing to just sit and watch the wind blow the water around as it fell onto the rocks below. In the fifty plus foot fall the column of water would visibly accelerate and turn into vapor, very cool.
Jackie had to work a half day so while she was gone Brad and I entertained ourselves by reading and sending postcards. I even got to help Carey (I'm not sure what his role there was but he was the acting computerguy) get some stuff fixed on their computers. They started watching Rob Roy, I was tryinq to get caught up with these emails but I got interested in the movie and spent two and a half hours watching it. I'd offered to help Brad make Jackie dinner but it ended up being Brad helping Jackie make dinner. What makes it worse was it was a stupid movie too.
If you'll recall my web server went down, the long and short was the hard drlve went out. My friend Chris Petrell had offered to bring the computer and a new hard drive up and meet me. I was a bit suprised by the offer but he seemed up for the drive so I wasn't going to argue. I wasn't sure where we'd be when we tried to meet him but it worked out pretty well. I got a room for him at the motel next to the YES cabins and he rolled in after midnight. We chitchated a bit and then I started trying to get the data copied off the old hard drive onto the new one. It didn't go well, by the time I started it was too far gone, the only thing left was my MP3 collection.
andrew
[New mailing address till 7/19/01 or so:
(Andrew Morton
c/o) Brad Bynum
General Delivery
Correctionville, IA 51016 ]
7/6/01
I woke up with all of four hours of sleep and got back to work on my computer.
My plan was just to get Windows 2000, Apache and the SQL server going so I could
restore from an old backup. The whole thing was pretty silly; before I could
even get Windows halfway installed, the floppy drive went out. I gave up on the
computer, packed it up and started working on the backup plan. [Chris has come
through yet again and setup a new website for me. I'm not sure what's up there
now but you might want to check out http://www.armory.com/~drewish/ ]
Chris drove Brad and me into Cooke City and I bought him lunch for all his trouble. We stuck our heads into some tourist shops and I got some post cards that I won't get around to mailing for a while.
Back in Silver Gate I said good bye to Chris and started packing up my stuff. We'd been looking at the map and decided that we'd rather not go back out through the park. To the north was Beartooth Pass, at almost 11,000 ft it was a Big Hill. I asked myself "What Would Joe Lane Do?" but there was no obvious answer. Would he ride back through the park to see Old Faithful and Yellowstone Lake which while amaizing are covered with tourists? Or would he push up the evil 3000+ ft climb for a new highest point of the trip on a sketchy two lane winding road that would take us 40 or 50 miles out of the way? The more I thought about it the less I was sure.
We went down to ask Kevin, one of the researchers, what he thought. He told us about a road that wasn't on our map. The Chief Joeseph Highway was actually the fastest way to Cody and Dead Indian Pass was only 8048 ft. Now I didn't think Joe Lane would go for that but since the weather wasn't looking good I didn't think he'd want to be stuck half way up Beartooth Pass in a storm either. The extra day it would take to get through the park was soundinq worse and worse so Dead Indian Pass won by default.
We met up with Jackie in Cooke City and as we were saying goodbye it started to rain. It stayed with us for a few miles but as we dropped into Wyoming the weather and the roads got better.
The scenery was mind-blowing and best of all there were almost no cars. I don't think I can even begin to describe the sunset. We pulled off the road looking at a possible camping spot but ended up standing there staring at the sky until it after it was dark. Being in between those towering mountains really puts you in your place. You're just this tiny little ant on the floor of a kitchen. But as big as the mountains around you are, they're just little bumps on a big ball of rock floating out in a lot of nothing. Some how we got it into our heads that we'd like to look at a picture of that ball of rock and say to ourselves "I moved myself across that little piece of that".
andrew
I woke up in a where-am-I-and-who-are-these-people-walking-around panic. While Brad slept I said hi and related the story of our late arrival to a couple of interested people that walked past, everyone else seemed pretty busy getting ready to go out in the field to work, they had to put in a half day in spite of the holiday. I finally saw Jackie walk in, she was a bit surprised to see us but gave me the micro-tour anyway. The group of cabins had been purchased by YES to house researchers year-round while they were working in the park, any unused cabins were rented to tourists. Jackie and the rest of the small mammal team left at 05:30 so they could get out there before the squirrels woke up, I went back to sleep.
While everyone was out working Brad and I got cleaned up. I was so hungry that nothing sounded good to me but we made some rice and that got me going, I was craving all kinds of food in no time. Jackie got back as we were starting the second pot of rice. She introduced us to a bunch of people, everyone working there was super cool.
Jackie borrowed a truck and took us into Cooke City. We walked around a bit, bought some beer for that night and a round of ice cream cones for immediate consumption. The Miner bar had pool and air hockey tables so we played a three way game of pool and then had a mini air hockey tourney before heading back.
Everyone was sitting around taking it easy some people had gotten into the beer. It was a nice way to relax after the previous day/nights 90-mile death ride.
Some poor sucker had been hard at work getting the volleyball court setup all durring the day and we recognized their efforts with two 7-on-7 games. Brad and Jackie were on the wrong team and got destroyed by my non-looser team in both games. I heard Brad mumbling some thing about being pool champ for the day afterwards, it seemed to make him feel better.
The towns of Silver Gate and Cooke City have a combined fireworks show put on by the Volunteer Fire Department, who by sunset are completely drunk. They were firing them off 100 feet away from the YES cabins and you could actually see the firemen staggering around. As the fireworks started someone turned on Bruce Springstein's Born In The USA, we all rocked out and sang along.
After grabbing another beer we all walked down to The Range Rider where some country cover band with a Texas flag hanging behind them was playing. Dawn Adams is the only other person I've been around who was as stoked to get drunk and go dancing as Jackie was. When I visited her in Spain all Dawn wanted to do was go dance all night at Etchacalte, Jackie had been telling us all day that tonight some dancing was going to happen. The two of them should get together in Reno and go rock out. It was fun taking turns dancing with everybody, contrary to what my partner may say I had nothing to do with the dropping of that beer. [Brad reminded me to mention that they played a Rolling Stones cover. Annoyingly they knew no Johnny Cash though, I asked.]
Once the band finished up we walked up stairs (this is the second largest freestanding log structure after all it's got two floors) and looked at the signs with the old prostitutes' names over the doors of their rooms. People were getting tired so we went back up to the cabins. At 02:30 we were the only two still up. Sitting in the kitchen listening to the Grateful Dead we decided that this was the last 4th of July we'd of expected to have but that we were pretty all right with it.
andrew
[A correction to the last email: Targhee Pass on the border between Idaho and Montana was only 7072ft not 8000+ft as I'd mentioned in the Day 32 email.
I'm a bit behind in these emails again. I'd hoped to catch up when we stopped over the 4th--obviously, it didn't happen. Currently (7/9/01) we're in Shoshoni, WY and headed to Casper, WY.]
Waking up only two miles from West Yellowstone we were able to get in and have breakfast before the bike shop, West Yellowstone Bicycle & Video, opened. It was a strange combination, as the name implies it was half video store, half bike shop. They rented all kinds of bikes: upright and recumbent and were even a BikeE dealer. While his rear derailer was being fixed, Brad perused the movie selection, eventually giving the store a thumbs up and calling it the second best video shop of the trip. We signed their touring rider log book and set out in search of cheap postcards. It was 12:00 by the time we hit the park gate to be charged $10 each to get in. I felt the fees were a bit unfair, a car or RV pays $20 and they're the ones taking up all the parking spots and putting all the wear on the roads.
Riding on into the park we were making a good 20 mph with the tail wind. We literally flew by a cycling couple that I'd met earlier in the day, they were doing the matching gear thing and a whole lot of it was bright orange. They looked like a rolling construction site, Brad's dad would have been proud.
There's a group called Adventure Cycling that leads tours and puts out maps of a route across the America. Their first and probably most popular route travels from Astoria, OR to some place just outside Washington DC and, importantly, it passes through Yellowstone. We'd seen more cyclists in the park than at any other time on the trip and most--including the construction-site couple were using Adventure Cycling maps.
In Canyon Village we met a cyclist from Buffalo, WY named John Egan. He WAS a tourinq cyclist, he rattled off 10 or 15 side roads to take and places to eat along the way. John said he liked to spend 60 to 90 days a year on the road and with a job teaching at a community college he was able to do it. We had an ice cream and talked for a while.
Heading north we crossed Dunraven Pass which at 8859 ft will probably be the highest point we'll hit on the trip. Coming down was unbelievable, the road dropped 2000+ ft in 12 miles and you could see for miles. The road was pretty chewed up so my mind would be wandering while my body's trying to find the one line that will go through the turns at 30 mph without hitting any of the hundred pot holes in the road.
Our friend from Reno, Jackie Fecteau, is interning for a research group called YES (the only part of the acronym I rember was Yellowstone Ecosystems ...) counting squirrels. She's living just outside the park in a town called Silver Gate, MT and was encouraging us to come spend the 4th there. Our plan was to get to one of the campgrounds near the edge of the park and get into Silver Gate the next morning.
The sun set just as we hit Tower Junction in the northern part of the park, we still had approx 10 mi to get to Slough Creek Campground and 30 mi to Silver Gate. Traffic was in our favor, most people were trying to get into the park not out, so most cars were going the opposite direction. We'd jump off the road and wait for the cars coming up behind us, the shoulder wasn't wide enough to hope they'd give us some room. As we neared Slough Creek a Park Ranger stopped and asked us how we were doing and where we were going. We told him we were headed for the campground. He told us it was full and the next place was Cooke City but that our style of guerilla camping along the road isn't appreciated here in the park so just keep on moving. Trying to ride all the way out of the park was something that we'd joked about back at the junction but now it seemed like we'd get to try it. I broke out the cell phone and called Jackie's number for directions and to let them know we were coming.
The full moon was two days away so seeing was no problem. Going along Soda Butte Creek I spooked a herd of buffalo along the side of the road. It was one of those things I'll remember for the rest of my life, they started running along a little in front of me, these gigantic black outlines against the dry grass on they valley floor. I started to wonder if they were getting closer to the road, I didn't want to be there if they came onto it. I stopped and by the time Brad pulled up next to me the buffalo had all slowed to a stop so we were able to ride past.
I'd started out strong, but by midnight I was ready to crash out. Brad was all fired up to do the remaining 15 miles so he started recountinq the plot of Empire Strikes Back to me to keep me awake. By the end I was seeing stuff in the road that wasn't there and had the crap scared out of me by the one car that came through but some how we made it out of the park. The last mile from the park gate to Silver Gate was the worst, I pretty much sprinted on in and parked in front of The Range Rider. It's the second largest free standing log structure in the US, currently it's a bar and motel but in the past among other things it served as a brothel. Since it was 02:00 a beer sounded like a great idea then we went and found the YES cabins and finally slept.
andrew
Statistics
Days: 33
Bags of Sunflower Seeds: 7
Loafs of Bread consumed: 20
Motel nights: 1
Paid camping nights: 5
Nights staying with friends: 7
Showers: 8
Flat tires: 8
Payphones used to check PocketMail: 57
We stopped at the post office in Ashton, ID and picked up some replacement
parts, BikeE had mailed to us general delivery. I filled out a change of address
form so anything sent to us that arrived late would get forwarded or returned.
It then occured to me that if everything was sent to one person we'd only need
to have one of us go in and only need one change of address form. Hence the
new Andrew Morton c/o Brad Bynum at General Delivery style addresses.
The matron of our campguound recommended that we take Hwy 47 out of Ashton, it'd meet up with 20 but there'd be a lot less traffic and a much more scenic ride. She was absolutely correct, we had the road to ourselves and saw some georgous waterfalls. One thing that suprised me was the smells, in a car about all you ever smell is a skunk or dairy farm.
We passed through a field of flowers and my first reaction was "Wow,THIS is what toilet bowl cleaner tries to smell like". After reflectinq on that though for a little while I was a bit disappointed with this modern world, instead of being able to describe the scent in terms of the flowers that compose it I can only describe it as the artifical scents used to mask the smell of harsh chemicals. My new job idea for next summer is to work in a national park and meet some cute botanist girl and convince her to teach me to identify the flowers.
When we were stopped at a gas station filling up water I broke out the cellphone and made some calls. Bob Trailers is now sending us new pins for the trailer and my dad may be meeting us in Casper, WY.
The Continental Divide forms the border between Idaho and Montana, we'd been a little worried about the pass crossing it. At 8000+ ft. it would be the
highest point we'd been at to date.
We knew the approximate mileage to the top and kept getting a bit more
apprehensive as we got closer and closer but didn't gain any elevation. I was
envisioning this evil set of twenty-something switchbacks at an 8% grade. We
finally started climbing just a mile from the border and I was relieved and then
disappointment quickly followed. I felt a little cheated, we only gained about
500 ft and that was it, take the picture by the Montana sign and drop down. It
was truely the most anti-climatic pass ever. In Brad's own words "No, I did
not climax".
andrew
Oh how I hate mosquitoes, I woke up on the baseball field in a state of misery. My sleeping bag was wet from condensation, I was covered in salty dried sweat and insect repelent. The mosquitoes stung my forehead, ears and lip, I was pissed and ready to get riding.
Along Hwy 33 we met a cyclist named Jim from North Carolina riding a sweet looking Cannondale with a Bob trailer. He was not happy with the wind, there was only one day he'd had tailwinds. We exchanged addresses and wishes of good luck and rode off our oposite directions.
In Rexburg everything closes on Sunday. We were able to find an Albertson's that was open and took a two hour lunch break in it's shade. There was no reason to hurry through the hot part of the day when we couldn't pickup our mail in Ashland, 20 miles to the north, until the next day (Monday).
Hwy 20 sucked going out of Rexburg, the Idaho DOT had marred the perfect six foot wide shoulder with a six inch long rumble strip every 15 feet that covered the entire width of shoulder. So when we saw the Jessen's RV Park and Bed & Breakfast as we started to come into Ashland it seemed like the perfect place to stop.
It was run by a couple that seemed like the archetypical grandparents, she'd dote on you and he spent his time fixing stuff. This was the best campground we've been at, they had marshmallows and let us make smores that night. I'd love to be able to stay there again.
andrew