Newest Future Coast to Coaster??

This fine looking young biker is my grandson Aidan Patrick who lives in Viera, Florida. A cell call from my daughter Kim while I was crossing South Dakota last week changed my plans immediately. I was graciously returned 90 miles to Rapid City by Cycle America staffer Matt to fly to Florida where my wife Susan had come down with an unknown, life threatening illness while visiting Aidan and his family. It has been a week of serious lows and slow but sure progress. After a week in the cardiac unit in Rockledge, Susan is now getting stronger each day. We bought Aidan his first "big boy's bike", a two wheeler, and he was off and riding! A future Coast to Coast rider? Maybe, because he wanted to go to bed with his helmet on the first night!!! If all continues to go well for Susan, I plan to rejoin my friends Sandy, Mike and Bob in Ludington, MI next week on Sunday to finish the final three weeks of the cross country tour. Thanks for all of the thoughts and prayers for Susan and me!

Hydration Critical

Here Mike and Sandy drink water left for us by our support staff of Cycle America. Since we are in such desolate areas of the country as we tour, obtaining safe drinking water is critical for our personal health. We consume about 32 ounces of water an hour (one to two water bottles) and we cannot take the chance of getting dehydrated. Sandy and I use backpacks that have water tanks that hold as much as two water bottles with the benefit of having a tube that we can get water from easy. Cycle America leaves the containers for us every 15 to 25 miles and we are told where they will be each day. This is the road leading to the Badlands.

Riding on the Moon

If you've traveled through the Badlands of South Dakota you'll recognize the moon like crust of the earth behind Sandy and Mike as they speed along the road into the interior sections of the Badlands. What is amazing is that just 100 miles west we had mountains and forests!

Entering the Badlands of S. Dakota

Here Sandy takes a moment to stop in front of the National Park sign for the Badlands. Sandy, Mike and I rode for 89 miles into Interior, S. Dakota to a camp ground. Temps were in the low 90s with little humidity.

800 Foot Climb for Two Miles - Worth It !!!

We decided to skip our lunch stop on this day and instead climb to the top of Mount Rushmore. I made it 1.75 miles before I just ran out of energy and walked the last quarter of a mile to the monument in granite. Here I am in front of this amazing structure honoring Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln. Any idea why Jefferson's head is tipped to the air more than the others? (Had they not tipped his head back some his nose would have been built over a huge crack that would have fallen apart quickly when weakened by sculpturing!). This day was 89 miles!

Needles Highway - Tall Needle-like Rock Formations

In all of my 30 years on a bicycle I cannot remember riding along such a remarkable highway as Needles Highway in S. Dakota. After climbing the highway pass for over an hour we started seeing these rock formartions everywhere, many with holes in them that made the structures look like large needles several hundred feet into the air.

Pig Tail Turns on Needles Highway

Here my riding friend Sandy comes under the bridge that is part of a pigs tail turn, one of three, that we had coming down from the 6,000 foot mountain top. To put these heights into perspective, our home sis at 700 feet and when we are in Cincinnati near the river we are about 400 feet above sea level. We climbed from 3,000 feet to the 6,000 on this mountain then dropped for a half hour, some 2,700 feet! These pig tail turns were necessary to make the road fit the terrain!

Herd of Buffalo Stops Traffic

What a beautiful sight we came across as we came to the lower portion of Needles Highway in South Dakota... a buffalo and a baby buffalo right at the edge of the road. As we looked more closely... a huge herd of buffalo had come into the area! The park rangers were moving us back because the buffalo go where the buffalo want to go! I stayed across the road, unlike one of our riders in the left photo, until the parent buffalo with the big horns and its baby moved back with the herd!

Tunnel on Needles Highway

Here Tony (L)(Netherlands), Sandy (R) and me get our picture taken by Dan, one of our great routers, in front of one of several tunnels made through the solid rock on Needles Highway in South Dakota. We climbed over 2,000 feet, often struggling with the steep hills but reached the top and then had a fast down of several miles. Some of us compared the up to waiting in line for hours to ride a roller coaster... and the "down" like a drop from a 2,000 foot roller coaster hill for over 35 minutes at 25- to 35 miles per hour through beautiful pine forest. The "Needles" actually refers to tall stone structures like in the next blog. If you look closely to the left you'll see Mount Rushmore's famous faces between the trees at the turn in Needles Highway!

Road Issues Make it Tough

Sometimes even when you drive a car the roads seem to disappear into the sky as does this road in South Dakota, but the real issue with this road and several others is the pavement surface! This one is gravel...11 miles of it and some up and down hills! This takes considerable concentration by our riders because one false move and the rider is eating the stones. On a couple steep hills I simply dismounted and walked for a quarter mile or more! Later in South Dakota we came to newly paved roads (some with asphalt being laid right next to us) and the tar that is put down collected on our tires and then picked up stones! On one gravel road my gear changer (derailleur) was damaged and had to be repaired so the gears would change properly. The repair and a new chain cost me $60 after that one day!

Camping in the Sky

The photo to the right is a look down to the van that carries our camping gear FROM the camp site in Lead, South Dakota. 88 stairs had to be negotiated to reach the football field that was at the highest point in the area...thus... it was aptly referred to as "Mile High Stadium." The winds at 5,000 feet were quite high until about 2 a.m. before they settled down! Lead, South Dakota, was a gold mining town over a century ago and it is literally built into the hills of the area with many streets extremely steep!

"Luxury" Living with Views

Every 7th day we get a day and a half off to rest, work on our bikes, do laundry, e-mail others and of course work on our blogs. We decided early on when we registered for the 4,250 mile adventure that once in a while we'd get out of our tents and into something with a hard cover over our heads. Here Sandy stands on our cabin's front porch at Devils Tower, Wyoming. The cabin is a little larger than by backyard shed with three beds, two electrical outlets and a ceiling light...but it had a roof that was not made of plastics! We had three great views from the cabin: back window to a pasture with a broken dead tree; front door to the Tower, and here a side view to a bluff along a river with the reddish rocks.

Beautiful Western Scenery

The states we have biked across have some absolutely beautiful

scenery. So far we have cross Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota totaling over 1,800 miles ans 80,000 feet of climbing!

Flying the Flags

Earlier in Wyoming Sandy and I purchased small USA flags to fly on July 3 and 4. We received many nice comments about our patriotic displays. Here at a brief rest stop I snapped a photo of our flags in front of the Grand Tetons.

Come and Go After the Grand Teton Mountains

While we are riding for 9 weeks there are those participants who join the tour for one or more weeks and then leave us. Here are Erika, Laurie, Brian and Jim who we came to know well for the first three weeks before saying good-bye to them in South Dakota. Jim, Laurie and Brian were known for stopping and smelling the roses (actually the coffees) in each town. Some riders take off early and ride hard to arrive in the next location but others, like me, take considerable time to enjoy the beautiful land in the west. We wish these four friends good health and success as they return to Texas, Iowa and California. They stopped here for one last look at the Grand Teton Mountains in Idaho.

Morning Preparation - South Dakota

Week four has us in South Dakota's City of Custer. The air is dry, nights cool, and days warming to 80's. Here a Cycle America volunteer loads bikes on the top of one of the three large Ford vans used to transport everything. Many riders "SAG" portions of each day for a variety of reasons. The mileage is usually 80 or more per day and day after day riding takes a toll on riders. I sagged one day for 6 miles with another rider after we learned the lunch stop was about to close. I finished the 90 mile day after lunch. This was the day we climbed the Powder River Pass at 9,666 feet which was a climb of 30 miles at 6%.

National Monument at Devils Tower

Devils Tower is the National Monument featured in Close Encounters of the Third Kind by Spielberg several years ago. We camped just below the tower for two days while the weekly riders left from week two and we were joined by week three riders. The Tower is 900 feet high, 1000 feet across at the base and 200 feet across at he top. The structure was formed when the earth around it eroded away. Clouds hide the top of the tower frequently. Unlike my first ride across the USA, our KOA campground was quite green this time. In 2001 it was all brown from a severe drought.

Jamboree & Horses in Moorcroft, Wyoming

We happened to enter the Wyoming town of Moorcroft just mintes before their annual Jamboree Celebration featuring horse and buggies, horses and riders carrying flags, girls and ladies riding side saddle, antigue cars and more. Where we were situated for lunch happened to be right where the lead horses and riders carrying he USA flaf, state flag and city flag gathered to finished their part. The town people were so gracious to us and I got to speak to several who asked us questions while we asked them about the event. With no more than 12 in a graduating class, there were "class floats" for each year of graduation followed by class picnics in the park!

Leaving Wyoming and ENtering South Dakota

We have now left Wyoming and entered South Dakota but this photo is from the plains of Wyoming where we did get some tail winds enabling me to put the hammer down and move along at 20-30 miles per hour for a couple hours! One of the problems we are leaving behind is having to dress with multiple layers in the morning and peeling them off as the day warm. Now that are in S. Dakota, the winds will pick up but so will the day time temperatures. Morning temps are no longer 35 to 45 and are now 50-60.

Day time temps are 80 to 85. Skies have been sunny.

Beauty and Energy Abound Here

It is so hard to believe that this whole area was, and still is to a great degree, considered a barren waste land. Wyoming is home to elk, moose, big horn sheep and many other creatures but due to the low annual rain fall much of the area is covered with sage brush, grasses, and some hardy flowers. This is July in Wyoming yet the flowers are out like we had in April in Ohio. Oil, natural gas, and low sulfur coal are huger in this state and we have read that 60% of the energy used in the USA comes from Wyoming! There are over 100 miles of canals that feed irrigation ditches just so some vegetation can grow.

Sandy the Mechanic

My riding partner Sandy has become quite the bike mechanic. When we are in our home town of Hamilton we both tend to rely on our bike shops (Sandy's is The Bike Center in Oxford and mine is West Chester Cyclery) but out here we are very much on our own. In week one Sandy assisted a couple from Australia when their chain broke. He assisted another cyclist with a flat tire and here he has to repair his own flat tire after hitting something sharp on the road berm!

Powder River Canyon - Wyoming

These photos are of the huge canyon called Powder River Canyon. The vastness of this territory is amazing and the pictures only show a small amount of what the eye sees!

Leaving the Big Horns

This has been a challenging week as we climbed up and over two high mountain passes including Teton Pass at 9,300 feet and then Powder River Pass at 9,666 feet. The views have been absolutely spectacular! Of course, we only look on the way up because our descents require our intense attention to the road at 30 to 50 miles an hour!

Our Homes - Facts

Sandy and I search multiple tent manufacturers before we settled on the Nemi Losi 3 Tent from REI. We wanted tents with sturdy construction and of course, tents that were easy to put up and take down since that may have to be done suddenly if severe storms are threatening. We also wanted two exits, not one so that if it is rainig hard from one direction we could get out the other door. Large vestibules on each door are important so that we can place our bags under them without bringing the bags in the tents. The tents are well ventilated with screening but have "flies" that completely cover the netting to protect us from the elements of wind and rain.
Inside temps of the tents can be as warm as 10 to 15 degrees more than outside temps which is great on cold nights, but a problem on hot nights. Our plans are to move our tents farther away from others on the hot and clear nights and not use the fly covers.

The tents are tall enough inside so that we can sit up and are largew enough for us to move about easily in each tent.

Morning View from My Home

This was the few this morning as I awakened to 48 degrees in my tent and 31 degrees outside it in a camp ground just 8 miles outside of Jackson, Wyoming. The air was fresh and crisp. The dew on my tent and waterproof clothes and tent bas was frozen. Within a few hours we were in shorts at 75 degrees.

This was our day off so folks did their laundry, e-mailed friends and associates, and most visited Jackson for the wonderful town parade for the Fourth. Sandy had to buy new touring shoes because the ones he had simply came apart. He says from age....I say from spinning those pedals on his bike so fast!

Teton Pass at 8,400 Feet

As we all struggled to climb the 1,800 feet up to the Teton Pass summit at 8,400 feet, some walking and riding (like me!), it was all worth the view of Jackson Hole, Wyoming! The descent was just as steep with 10% grades. My bike easily shot to speeds of 35+ as I applied the brakes and stopped three times to avoid overheated tire/tubes on the five mile downhill! This was a warm-up for the next week where we will c limb TWICE over passes close to 10,000 feet (2 miles) high! Temps have been good in that the weather has been cooler than normal (topping at 78 degrees) which keeps us from overheating as we climb the steep mountains of the Rockies.

Work is Never Finished

Cycle America has a staff of a dozen folks who help us each day. These volunteers are cooks, routers, mechanics, and the like who make sure we are pointed safely in the right direction each day, have a delicious lunch for us just after the halfway points in each day's ride, and when the riding is simply too much for some, lift the bikes to the roof of the van for a ride into camp. The volunteers get up early and stay up late to make sure we have water available every so many miles.

So far, while we have walked a couple miles to rest our weary legs at times, Sandy and I have not ridden in the van for support purposes. Our goal is to ride every single foot of our 4,250 mile trip.

A Beautiful View from Friends

Sandy and I had the great fortune to be invited to dinner at Lynn & Craig Larson'svacation home in Jackson, Wyoming for a warm meal, showers, and to do our laundry on our break after 13 days of riding! We met their super children, Matt, Lizzy, and Kelly who all helped prepare the meal we had together. This view of the Grand Tetons is from their back deck. The Larsons are from

Wyoming, Ohio. Thank you Lynn and Craig!!!!

Mary Grace would Love This!!!

Here are Deputies Monique and Rod in Jackson, Wyoming as they patrol the tourist town on their beautiful horses. My granddaughter Mary Grace would simply love this part of the USA with horses everywhere!!!

Looking for Trade

This young man stopped his four-wheeler near the Snake River in Idaho and asked about our adventure. I asked Tim if he was interested in trading his machine for my fancy bike. He said yes and we shook on it..but he sped away! Many people stop and ask us what we are doing and are amazed that we are traveling across this continent. One traveler who was with his two teenage sons in Montana asked about our ride and while I was putting on my helmet a few minutes later he came up to me and handed me $20 for National MS! What a great example he set for his two teens!

Beautiful Cheerleaders in Montana

These two University of Montana Cheerleaders were along the main road out of Missoula as we entered week two and they had signs for both Sandy and me!!! Barb Burns and Ingrid Sanders were helping to make sure neither Sandy or I quit after the gruelling week of 610 miles in seven straight days of riding!

(Sandy and I were very fortunate to be able to spend our one night off with Craig and Barb Burns who are from Hamilton, Ohio, but live just outside Missoula, Montana. Their hospitality (great food and drink, beds and not sleeping bags, beautiful scenery, and friendliness made the long week a short memory! Thanks Craig and Barb!!! )

A Great Young Rider

We have a very nice young man, Nathan who had this great jersey made with Cycle Across America printed on the back. We asked him to allow us to take a picture of his shirt from his best side! Nathan has a great sense of humor so we of course did take his best side from the front. He who is riding with his parents Larry & Kari, and is a college student. Nathan is also a very strong rider and takes after his parents!

Another Divide Conquered

Here are Sandy and me as we leave Montana and enter Idaho. I am personally pleased to be leaving the Great Sky country with its winds, rain and traffic. We will be in Idaho for just a day before entering Wyoming.

Stormy Weather in Montana

This is what we have encountered several afternoons when the skies darkened, the wind howled and the rain and hail came down hard!

I took cover one day in an abandoned antique shop that was not locked. Another day it was an office to as camp ground, and then a garage of a farmer who was also a County Commissioner!

Nights it has rained and we have ridden in rain for several hours on and off. The biggest worry is the truck traffic that give us little room on the roads at 70 miles per hour. Adding to the difficulty are the rumble strips that keep drivers awake but take the berm of the road away from us to ride. When trucks pass we get thoroughly showered with water and road grime!

Two For Awareness

Everyone knows I am raisin funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis Association and on this trip with 47 coast to coasters there is another person, pictured here with me, who is raising awareness for organ donor participation. Dan Olson of Wisconsin, received a heart transplant at age 37 after a virus essentially destroyed his heart. Now in his 50's Dan is traveling with us to help people see what a heart transplant can do!

Dan's donor was a young 15 year old girl who died in a car wreck.

Two Continental Divides

Mike and I met on a bike ride from Pittsburgh to Washington, D.C. in 2009. We kept in touch after we crossed the Eastern Continental Divide in Maryland. We have now crossed the Divides on the East and he West Coasts! We will cross the West Coast Divide one more time on his trip as we leave Montana and head east. This weekend we will celebrate July 4th in Jackson, Wyoming.

Crossing the Western Continental Divide

This week we climbed Flesher Pass with an elevation of 6,300 feet. Not an easy task since some of the ascents were 7% grade. The nice part was the 10+ mile descent!!