So to say, it's quite brown and yellow actually. Maybe when I'm farther north.
Keeping up to schedule, 85 to 100 miles/day. Ahead of schedule in fact: I pushed ahead to Vegas today instead of stopping at the Hoover Dam (Lake Mead Nat'l Rec'n Area) which now lets me spend the heat of the day doing email instead of perspiring and expiring outside.
The train ride was an Experience. Two troops of boy scouts entertained us for most of the 30 hours from Chicago to Flagstaff -- wonderful insights into human nature, but I'd rather not repeat it. I'm curious what Dad has to report on his bus ride from Vancouver to Toronto...
When we arrived just before midnight, I built the bike in a motel room. Conveniently a Mailboxes Etc. store was across the street, and the bike box is probably in Seattle by now, for reuse on the Seattle->Champaign train. The ride north from "Flag" to the Grand Canyon is only moderately travelled, considering it's heavy tourist season. Steep climbs and long descents (pff! no oxygen at 7600' for this prairie-dweller) alternate with gorgeous plateaus, mountains on the horizon. Halfway (where rt. 180 runs into rt. 64) I talked with a couple of characters whose sense of time is as slow as the growth of the Pinon Pines pleasantly punctuating the landscape. In some places they're absent, in others they're thick, but mostly you can see 100' into the forest, occasionally double that. And at a rise, you can see over them for 30 or 40 miles, the air is so clear.
The Grand Canyon is full of vacationing Hollanders. (Let me rephrase that!) It's immense. What I got the most from it was "to do this justice I need to study it for a whole summer." Then again, I could spend a whole summer studying one drawer of the microfiche stacks just ahead of me in the university library where I'm typing this. Or... well, more examples aren't needed. Darn well *anything* in creation, human or divine, stands up to intense study. Not "how deep do I go", but "where do I go". Or: "how do I choose where to go?"
I'm taking the Italian tempo now -- siesta in midafternoon, on the road again the few hours before sunset. Much easier than plowing on in the midst of exhaustion. KOA's and their showers are nice -- guaranteed quiet, a shower/quick swim after this heat, no fear of wildlife messing with my food or equipment or anatomy. The motorhome crowd tries me, though. I haven't yet found a way to converse meaningfully with them.
I-40 from Ash Fork to Kingman has shoulders with grooves in them every 50 feet, to within inches of the white line. Along one of the descents down to 5000' I lost a full waterbottle to the rattling -- it was 60 miles between truck stops and I *needed* that bottle. Eventually a policeman pulled over to my armwaving (everyone else just waved back) -- I suppose I'd have walked into the middle of a lane or built a cairn there and *forced* someone to stop. He kindly gave me a liter bottle (chilled! Heavens!) which now serves as the lost one's replacement.
Kingman to Las Vegas. Yeah. The first 80 km blasted along -- U.S. 93 has just been resurfaced, and I had the grandmother of all tailwinds blasting along the basins between the mountain ranges 93 winds between all the way to Banff. Stopped at a picturesque truck stop with various representatives from the last ten decades frozen in time (a Boston "upright grand" in decent condition, *original* space invaders, typical drinking memorabilia, zillions of business cards stapled everywhere). Barrelled on to the Hoover Dam, the southern approach of which alternates with short steep climbs and enormous drops. I could not drink fast enough to keep my internal cooling system stable; pouring water on myself was more scalding than cooling. (Sipping the water, it was an acceptable substitute for very weak tea.) Later on I found out the temp. there was 120! Without goggles the descents would have been impossible. The hydraulic brakes also helped.
I overate (was overfed by a kind well-intentioned family, let's blame someone else) at the lookout at the dam, which I didn't realize until I started the climb out of the valley at 4 PM. With 4 hours to sunset and only 30 km to Vegas and feeling still fresh, why stick around here? By 6:30 PM I'd finished the first 10K climb with numerous pauses -- just couldn't get my heart rate up. (well, it was still 110 degrees at sunset.) After that the legs went on autopilot and somehow I ended up in Vegas. Supper: a liter of orange juice. Breakfast today when my appetite returned: lotsa pasta. Pity I can't take advantage of all the $3.99 buffet prime rib dinners in town! Though I'm told they have decent vegetarian choices. Report on Vegas itself: the neon and glitz is exactly the same in real life as it's advertised elsewhere. (They call this a "service industry"!). The residential areas reminded me strongly of parts of L.A. -- money with a whiff of happy disrepair.
So I'm now at UNLV, on a genuine PS/2 (ooh ick) for the last 3 1/2 hours through a hacked version of telnet that sends me straight to Illinois instead of to a local computer. Having done this once, the next time should be easier -- stay tuned for the next report probably from the Bay area!
Another 2 or 3 hours to go, fixing and cleaning various bike gadgets and then it should be under 120 again and my supper/breakfast should be mostly digested -- an easy 70 km to Indian Springs in the beautiful desert evening.
Blessings,
Camille.
A cyclist once said in an interview that racing success is about 25% physical strength, 25% equipment, and 50% psychic strength. Riding out of Vegas, I can agree to the last number -- riding for five miles westward directly into the low sun was as tiring as any mountain pass. I continued riding at night until the "headlamp" got too heavy (Petzl halogen, strapped over my helmet -- a handlebar-mounted light doesn't adequately clear the front fairing, and a head mount lets me see anywhere) and the glow from "the town around the next bend" turned out to be the sunset, even at 9:30 PM! Camped far enough from the highway that the headlights wouldn't reach me.
Variable terrain and wind the next day. I realize: the road is. I ride on roads. Thus, I ride. Nothing more. In particular, my feelings about what direction the wind's blowing in and what angle the road is at to horizontal are irrelevant. The wind and the road don't care. Like I'm returning to a State of Nature here, pre-human, pre-will, pre-language. To borrow a phrase from Herbert Brun, humans are unique among animals in wanting to survive as well as needing to survive. Here: I need to ride. My wants don't come into play.
Death Valley. Americans are smart enough to avoid it in the summer. It's swarming with Europeans this month -- the mishmash of German, French, Dutch, Italian reminded me strongly of Rome. The atmospheric conditions did not. I rode in in the morning, arriving at noon: 115 and rising. For $55 the motel room at Stovepipe Wells was both the best and the worst place I've ever stayed at. No phone, tv, cold water, in-room drinking water; but it had A/C (which took it down to 90)! The only way to really stay cool was to plunge into the swimming pool every five minutes. I hit the road at 4:30 the next morning to climb from negative elevation to 5000' before it got that hot again. Fastest breakfast yet: pour drinking water directly from the faucet outside onto instant oatmeal flakes in a motel plastic cup. I was surprised by the next valley over: a psychotic drop, more flying than cycling, then another climb. Nothing like hauling your ass two vertical miles first thing in the morning. Stayed at 5000' for a while, finally a descent to 3000' as the majestic Sierra Nevada loomed ahead, parts covered with showers, all with cumulus spilling over from the west.
Not Only The Japanese Dep't.: a wacky Italian family camcorder'ed me with the front seat passenger standing through the sunroof of their rentacar as they drove past, several still cameras clicking away also. So far it's been 3 to 4 groups per day making me "vereeuwigd op de gevoelige plaat" (immortalized on the sensitive plate).
The Nevada/California desert is silent except for the occasional boom from a jet fighter. Desert plants are all stiff and prickly and don't rustle even in strong winds. Finished the day in Lone Pine, in the shadow of Mt. Whitney. Cute little prairiedoglike squirrels chirp artoo-detoo warnings to each other at my approach.
Eastern Yosemite is stunning: a slow grind up the Tioga pass to 10000' (yes that's four zeros) through beautiful valleys whose colors changed as the afternoons wore on. Camped around 9000' in the park -- finally, cold! Yosemite Valley is if anything more gorgeous yet (even if it's busier than Manhattan at lunchtime). Such a variety of birds, trees, ferns, wildflowers. Got a great photo of El Capitan reflected in a still portion of the river. I battled for far too long with a slow leak in the front tire (pinched tube after ??? miles where the overlap in my Mr. Tuffy flat-tire protector was -- Murphy Lives!). But I can think of worse places to fix a flat than Yosemite Valley.
Then downhill, wavy foothills, San Joaquin valley (infinite acres of almond and walnut trees! flat flat cornfields -- Illinois again?!), two more 1300' passes; finally, I see the Ocean! feel its cool breeze! smell it! hear the surf distantly over the traffic! Tired feet, tender knees -- stopped in Capitola (Newport Beach State Park) beside Santa Cruz. The moon's most cooperative: now a half moon, glittering and sparkling on the surf; 2 weeks ago a new moon, perfect for stargazing in the high desert. Wonderful Italian dinner at a beach cafe, peoplewatching, sunsetwatching. Still haven't found good tiramisu in America, though the pasta and bread was excellent. Santa Cruz is to the universe what my recumbent is to the other touring bikes I finally see, now on the coast: tripped-out and most laid back.
Ah, the infamous northwest breeze off the Pacific. Thought I'd have a light day today, riding only 60 km to Half Moon Bay. Well, closer to 80, and at two thirds my regular pace. Edwin and I disassembled the bike, loaded it into his car and drove to his place in San Mateo from which I'll leave tomorrow morning, through San Francisco across the Golden Gate bridge. We'll see how the knees and the wind hold up in the coming week -- I may go behind schedule and get "rescued" by David Schilling when he meets me in southern Oregon in another week.
Skin side up, rubber side down!
Camille.
Things are going well. Camille is currently about 50 miles south of the border between Oregon and the state south of Oregon. The name of the town starts with a K, but I've completely forgotten it. Sorry. Then again, checking Camille's itinerary, it's Klamath. Happy now? :-)
David Schilling is no longer currently en route to rendezvous with Camille. I assume they have met at an RV park already, as it's after midnight PST. They will be meeting for breakfast, lunch and dinner each day (David is driving a nameless car -- I don't know what its name is) and they will be traveling at their respective (different) speeds between meals. I guess that for Camille, size of meal corresponds directly to bike velocity. As meal size tends to infinity, bike speed tends to zero. So on the speed - food graph, there is a vertical asymptote at speed == 0.
Ahem.
More interesting stuff: a hippie with long hair (is their any other kind?) leaned over a fence and called out to Camille regarding the recumbent. Ok, what the heck. Let's pull over and chat. It turns out that the hippie was Michael Hedges, a prominent guitarist on the Windham Hill record label. So, the inevitable question is asked of Camille: what do you do (in real life)? Answer: I'm a composer. 2 hours of dicussion later, Camille had another contact in the musical world, and a copy of Michael's latest CD. Michael will also be receiving copies of Camille's work, on CD or tape or whatever. It's amazing where networking sometimes happens!
Well, enough silliness for this issue. To all those who aren't familiar with my email style, well, I hope you enjoyed it.
Closing remark: *Be* a little kid out there. Life's more fun that way.
Funny, I have this strong urge to not bother with furniture in making myself comfortable, find the nearest gas station to fill water bottles and relieve myself, and be keenly aware of landscape features that block the prevailing wind. Civilization's great, but it's fun to ignore once in a while too.
So David met me at an RV park in Klamath last Sunday as reported. Complete with camcorder, to record both me and the things I didn't visit intensely along the coast, which he could visit in between meeting points. Suddenly the bike's handling improved as the center of mass moved forwards, as most of my camping gear moved from my trunk to his. Hey, I'm not proud. Perhaps the sudden change of environment of the rear tire caused it to wear out the next morning. Spent a pleasant lunch break installing the spare tire casing, patching the tube I blew back in Yosemite, liberally smearing the whole schmoo with talcum powder (avoids friction between tube and tire) and cleaning otherwise inaccessible bits of the bike. At this point I had a good patch kit and no spare tube -- no big deal, the Mr. Tuffys have given me about one flat per thousand miles so far, and it's about 500 miles to Seattle. (Hold that thought...)
Another two days up the Oregon coast. Stunning vistas of beaches, waves spraying against enormous offshore crags, seahawks and various gulls playing with the wind, fog rolling in or burning off in the cool dewy mornings... and the incessant northwesterlies pounding my bike! The fairings help, but the powerful afternoon gusts push my handling skills to the limit. Thank goodness the shoulders are always present and wide. I still know the wind doesn't care about me, but something's wrong when I'm cranking my granny gear even on the downhills while the gulls whiz by on the updrafts from the first range of hills to my right. I'm fighting nature here, and that doesn't work in the long term. In Bandon we disassemble the bike enough to get it into the hatchback and use the higher reactivity of gasoline as compared to Fig Newtons to move up the coast and inland to Portland where the wind will be less fierce. We stop at the Oregon Dunes to be silly in the sand, take peculiar photos and video clips, and watch the sun set.
Starting just north of the Columbia River, a blessedly innocuous 10 mph headwind keeps me cool as I ride through a valley of orchards in the morning, continuing on I-5 to Longview for lunch. Lunch is sampling the many excellent desserts at a local bakery. (And I'm still only 125 pounds!)
North from there, I'm heading northwest into the setting sun so off go the glasses and on go the cycling shades. I'm cool but distance vision suffers. Enough that I don't notice the scattering of building materials over the shoulder ten miles later -- a big nail embeds itself in my rear tire and has punctured the inner tube in more places than I have patches before I shimmy to a stop. (Remember -- no *spare* tube!) Oh well, the Long March to the next freeway exit, click-click-click cleats, kathump kathump kathump rear tire... ... yay! it's not yet six and there's a hardware store in this little town (Kalama) and it's still open. boo! out of 20" tubes. "Can you think of anyplace else I can get a tube? I'm stuck here." "Umm, nope." "Do you have a phone book? I'll call local families at random until I find someone with a kids' BMX bike who's willing to sell me a tube for $10." That works. In 2 minutes the store owner's driving me back to Longview where they have some tubes in stock. Hey, even Americans are nice sometimes :-). He tells me that Portland can't keep a major-league sports team because if it's nice enough to play a game outside, people play themselves or go waterskiing or hiking instead of herding into a stadium or immobilizing themselves in front of the TV. Few museums out here too because there's so much else to see in the landscape (Illinois's plethora of museums -- visit Chicago for an extreme example -- proves the point).
Fifty miles short of Seattle, I feel a sharp pain in my upper thigh. Weird, I've never even felt a twinge there, and it's not an overworked joint. Maybe something stung me? Ten miles later I catch up with David near Puyallup, and sure enough there's a little red dot with a pink quarter-sized swelling around it. I guess something flew between my leg and the seat, and as I inadvertently crushed it it had its revenge. Well, riding with only the good leg is nauseating because the bike oscillates forwards/backwards (think about it, it's a recumbent), and using the stung leg is at least as nasty as anything my orthodontist ever inflicted on me, so we pile the bike in again and head home. We visit a hospital -- good thing, as it turns out I'm allergic to whatever stung me (somehow I've avoided bee-ing stung for the last twenty years or so). Now my arms are sore because the nurse couldn't find any subcutaneous fat to inject various drugs into, but the tightness in my breathing and general body has eased.
A day later I'm riding again -- around Lake Washington from David's place in Redmond to Queen Anne Hill, where several of us are going to enjoy the concert following this week's international piano competition in Seattle.
Thanks to Bill and Kevyn for providing this week's net connection! I'll be online spradically until Thursday when I'm back in Urbana.
By the way, a Starbucks double espresso macchiato is worth riding almost 2000 miles for! I'm civilized again.
Camille.