More Photos

I will add additional photos from the trip here. Click Links to view slide shows.

Bonnaroo, Manchester Tennessee

That’s All, Folks

First I want to apologize to anyone who still may be looking to read this blog for the completely unacceptable delay in this update, I have to excuse except that did not want to admit to the blog, and to you readers that my trip is over. By now I’m sure most of you know or assumed that I am no longer riding so I will explain as best I can why.

So on the day I rode into Washington D.C, I got a flat half way into my ride. It was on the rear tire so I unloaded the gear and got to work but then noticed a far more concerning problem: the frame on my bike was broken at the rear dropout where the rack attaches. The eyelet brazeon essentially had just snapped off. Luckily this happened today as I was approaching a large city where I would be taking time off and not in the middle of Mississippi, but it put a damper on my mood nonetheless.

Anyway, I had a blast in D.C. and traveling to Manchester Tennessee for the Bonnaroo music festival. Instead of making this entry even lengthier, I will make an album of all those pictures and whatnot and post a link soon ( and I mean soon this time.)

Before leaving, I had to figure out what to do about the frame. After a frustrating and expensive, but ultimately satisfactory ordeal with D.C. bike shops and the Trek warranty department I ended up receiving and brand new frame in time for me to leave on schedule. Like I mentioned before, my friend Colin decided to join me for the ride to New York city, which we optimistically planned to do in 4 days. The first day out was both some of the most challenging and enjoyable riding I have ever done. The rock creek trail that leads out of D.C. into Maryland is gorgeous and I would love to go back and do some riding around there sometime when I don’t have 75 pounds strapped on the bike. And then the hills started….. so after two weeks of no riding, the hilliest day of the trip was more than I had anticipated. Me and Colin rode about 75 miles to a friend of his’ house outside of Baltimore. Towards the end of the day I was feeling pretty dead, and unfortunately Colin was feeling worse. He ended up re-aggravating a knee injury from a while back and while he rode strong all day, he knew that night he wouldn’t be able to ride any more. I was bummed, but Colin decided to take a bus and meet up with me in NY so I plotted a route, completely off my maps to make it to Brooklyn in 3 days. I felt surprisingly fresh the next morning and rode strong for about 80 miles and stealth camped that night behind a cemetary somewhere in Amish Country, Pennsylvania. The next day I rode an even 100 miles into New Jersey and felt pretty proud of that.

So at this point I am feeling great about the ride and without any doubt about quitting, which I will now admit snuck into my head once or twice before earlier on int the trip, only briefly. The next day was not so uplifting. I woke up and noticed the rear tire had gone flat during the night. I cussed a bunch and changed it in the comfort of my Super 8 room and then set off for the 40 mile ride into Newark, NJ to catch the train into NYC. About 10 miles in I get another damn flat. I cuss more and unloaded and then, OF COURSE, noticed a much larger problem. In 4 spots on my rear wheel, the rim was cracking around the spokes. This is actually a problem I had read a lot about on the stock wheels they put on the 520, but before leaving decided it wasn’t worth the investment for better rims. Let me take this moment to tell anyone out there that if you are planning any kind of long distance ride, get the strongest, best wheels you can possibly afford. There is probably no other component as important. Sacrifice elsewhere on your bike if you have to. You don’t want to be on the side of a major highway in Sketchville, NJ, staring at your crumbling rim and wondering if your rig is going to collapse beneath you at any moment. Trust me.

So I had a miniature breakdown there by the side of the road and it was now that doubt started to creep in. I had just shelled out the cost of rebuilding the bike on the new frame and now I was looking at replacing my wheels, not to mention having to deal with that on my couple days off in New York. I started seriously thinking about my financial situation and whether or not I was cut out for stress of possibly much worse problems. I was getting a toothache and had a suspicion (which has now proven true) that I was developing a cavity that needed work and began to accept how hard it would be to stay away from some people in my life for such an extended period of time to come.

I did my best to put all of this out of my head and got to New York late that afternoon. I met up with Colin and we stayed at another friend, Miguel’s, place in Brooklyn. I hung out with a few other friends I hadn’t seen in a long time and enjoyed myself thoroughly but in the back of my mind the case for quitting grew stronger. I felt bad talking to everyone about the trip while at the same time knowing it might be over but I wasn’t ready to admit to myself or anyone else that I was going to stop. The next day It was decision time. After looking around New York for a adequate replacement wheel and coming up with nothing (which I thought was insane, aren’t you supposed to be able to get anything here?), that was the last straw.

I was going to have to ride out of town on a wheel that I was extremely concerned about, and ride for 7 more months when I knew that the money I had left wouldn’t take me even half of that. Which brings me to an important issue, pardon the digression. Before leaving I was a bit delusional about how much this was going to cost. Perhaps I have an unrealistic Ideal notion that in this huge country crammed with road that travel could still be done cheap, but I soon realized this was far from reality. I am the first to admit that I could gone cheaper, especially early on, but I was by no means living large. It wasn’t just the occasional motel that did me in. State and private campgrounds on average run 20 dollars a night, did you realize that? $20 a night for a 10×10 spot of ground to lay down a tent. I know most places have free or near free primitive camping locations, but most of those aren’t reachable by bike. I quickly realized I was also not cut out for asking permission to sleep on someone’s front lawn every night. The few times I called a city park department to request permission to stay overnight, I was turned down. Food, of course, was a constant struggle. Being able to take in enough calories every day meant that huge portion of my food was complete crap, because Hostess is cheaper than Dole, folks. It’s no mystery that this same predicament is a major cause for obesity and health issues in the U.S., but I won’t go into that. With gas at ridiculous rates, and air travel more expensive than ever, it’s sad to realize that travel and the chance to see this country  is simply not an option for many, if not most, people living here. Maybe it’s my born and ingrained Western spirit, or maybe I have just read to much Kerouac, but that  was probably the most disheartening realization of this experience.

I was not trying to make it on pennies a day, but my modest budget, it turns out, was not going to suffice to complete my trip. So in the end it came down to doubt. Up until my last day in New York, I had no doubt that I was going to be able to continue on my trip until completion. I could have continued. I could have decided that this experience was worth going into much debt that I would deal with late on, I could have arranged a way to get a new wheel in the next few days and I could have kept going, but I was no longer fully confident that I would be able to finish. I felt it was better to quit on a high note, ending in New York City after 3,500 miles (1/4 of the original trip) and having a great time with friends than to keep going until I was broke and something forced me to end on less ideal terms.

The next morning I took my gear to UPS, took my bike to a shop and had everything sent back. I spent most of the next 24 hours wandering aimlessly around Manhattan wondering if I had made the right choice. The next day I took an early morning flight from JFK back to my parent’s house in Houston, TX, where I have been since, planning my move to Ann Arbor to be back with my girlfriend, Sandy and jump back into the real world.

Of course I am disappointed that I quit. I had set myself up to be gone for a year and see so much more, and I hadn’t really contemplated not completing the trip. At the same time, when I consider what I did I am proud of the accomplishment. 3,500 miles and across many states, going places I had never been. I met so many great people on my trip. Actually practically everyone I encountered was at the very least pleasant. Thank you so much to anyone reading this who let me stay with you or gave me advice or helped me out along the way. Thanks to everyone else who read this and contributed kind comments and encouragement. I haven’t decided what I am going to do with this blog, if it will continue or if I will start new blogging about something else, but I enjoyed the experience and in some ways it helped keep me sane during my three months of near solitude. I will be adding stuff from the trip, pictures and other thoughts in the next few days. Thank you again.

-Robert Ford

I’m Not Dead

So sorry for the lack of updates. I rode into Washington DC and was so overwhelmed by the temporary return to the real world that I stepped back from the blog for a wee minute. Expect a huge update full of broken bikes, bonnaroo and photos galore. Hope I haven’t lost all readership, back to normal operation real soon!

-Robert

Trying Not to be Cursed

Took my time getting out of the motel this morning, as usual, and hit the road. The weather was great which I was relieved at. The goal today was only 35 miles or so. Still, the route has been getting hillier than usual and a short day was appreciated. A few miles in a black cat crossed my path and hid in the field. I stopped to get a picture and he ran back across the road, therefore canceling out his own curse, right? I stopped at a gas station later on and ran into a group of three guys from Ann Arbor, riding from Savannah up to Maine.

They are doing all stealth camping (without tents!), so much more intense than I, and were caught in the same storm in Fredericksburg. I rode to the Prince William forest park where I had to walk the bike for ¾ of a mile through a hardcore muddy fire road.

The park was really nice and I was pretty much the only one there. The predicted storms never developed overnight and I was glad to have a break from dealing with the wetness.

Twister!

Baby Christmas trees

Apparently this year has been a ridiculously record shattering year in terms of numbers of tornadoes in the US. So far, I have had tornado watches or warning on about 5 different occasions. Tonight was a little more interesting. I made the relatively short ride from Ashland to Fredericksburg in the early afternoon. It was a nice ride, I am surprised by the quality in general of Virginia’s roads. Best since Florida. I had planned to stay at the KOA, but after last night I figured I might want to take a day and let everything dry out. I called the motels in town and the Motel 6 was like 1 dollar more than the KOA so the decision was easy.

looked and had the texture of brains. Delicious, gooey, blueberry brains

I rolled into town at about 4 o’ clock and the sky was beginning to look a little precarious. At around 7, checked in and showered and getting settled, all hell broke loose. A tornado warning was issued lights started to flicker and a crazy downpour started followed by constant thunder and lightening. After maybe 30 minutes, the motel fire alarm went off and the employees were running around outside in the storm trying to figure out what the deal was. Something with the storm set off the false alarm, but within 15 minutes of that the power went out. And stayed out until 2am. After the storm subsided I went to talk to the hotel manager who spent the night outside smoking, turning away weary travelers because he couldn’t check them in. He heard that at least 4 tornadoes had touched down in the area, and power was out for the majority of the city.

Image taken from NOAA

I am very relieved that I decided on the motel over the KOA, and I hope the weather decides to settle down a little bit in the near future.

The Plot (Beard) Thickens

So about two months ago, I announced I would keep you updated on the progress of my sketchy beard growth, as I don’t plan on shaving during this trip. 60 days later and I look pretty much as I would have guessed. Scraggly, too long on the chin, and refusing to connect in the dimple areas. It is less itchy than I had anticipated, which is a good thing. One thing I am surprised at is the color of the beard. In some lights I look almost like a redhead, and in all lights I look a little bit crazed. The head hair is also getting too long and I need to get a haircut asap.

April 4

June 4

I’m an Idiot

After getting camp set up, I took inventory and realized I have absolutely nada for my food stores. I decided to make the 2 mile trek to McDonalds for an unsatisfying dinner and to use the wifi. I noticed it getting cloudier as I sat eating my nuggets and browsing CNN, but I paid $3 for 2 hours and damn it, I was going to use every second. Sure enough, the minute I pack up to leave it starts to drizzle. Always the most prepared, I of course had just taken my laptop in my backpack and unloaded all my waterproof panniers and everything else at my tent. At this point, it is 6:30 and I figure I can ride out in a light rain or try to wait it out but risk darkness and heavier rain. I grabbed a few McDonalds plastic bags, wrapped up the comp and took off. Within 30 seconds, a hardcore downpour began, with intense thunder and lightening. There was nothing I could do, I was soaked instantly and there would be no point in turning back. I flew through the flooding streets and back to camp, where I immediately got everything soaked by throwing around wet clothes and frantically removing the computer from the bag. I am now sitting in my tent, which is segregated into a wet half and a semi dry half. The laptop was fine thankfully but these intense storms are supposed to continue throughout the night and tomorrow morning. I am pretty much stuck inside my tent with not much in the way of clean or dry clothes. I have a feeling the waterproofness of this tent will be tested tonight, especially since a lot of the inside floor is already saturated. I have a hard time sleeping when worried that I might get washed away, so it will probably be a long night. The ride today was from Pocahantus state park to Ashland, VA. As usual, the adventure cycling maps were horrendous with their city inserts for Richmond. Also, Richmond just wasn’t a fun city to ride through. I hit the downtown business district during lunch hour and everything was just kind of crazy. Terrible roads and construction and people darting across the road for hot dog stands, oh my.

UPDATE: I’m writing this from the laundry room/spectacular 80’s game room where I will be spending the night, since I got flooded out of the tent. Turns out not even my hardcore REI tent can hold up sitting in and inch and a half of standing water, due to the awesomeness of campground layout. Thanks, Americamps, for putting the tent camping area in the far corner, lowest lying area of the campground. Still, I have internet connection and a somewhat comfortable leather and wicker recliner to wait out the morning. It could be worse.

Off the Maps

For the last 3 days, and the next 2, I have been off of the Adventure Cycling maps. It seems like for this section approaching Richmond and DC, the route is unnecessarily complicated and skips over lots of places to stay including a bunch of cheap motels, and the state park South of Richmond that I headed to today. For the most part my (with Sandy’s help) Google mapping skills have been very decent and I have been surprised by the pleasant riding conditions along most of the highways I have been on. For about an hour today I cursed myself for going off route, though, when I missed my exit and somehow then ended up on the interstate for a good 4 miles. I made my way to a gas station and had a mini conference with two other customers, using no less than 4 maps, to get me headed in the right direction.

Still wishing a happy New Years? Don’t trust that .99 cent hot dog.

As luck had it, just outside the state park I enjoyed the best hamburger of my trip so far. This is no minor feet. I have eaten around 20 burgers since setting out and 5 Guys Hamburgers wins out for sure. Thanks to DC native, Colin Brewer, for suggesting them. They are a small regional chain and for a “fast food” burger, I don’t think it gets much better. Add the malt vinegar they provide for the awesome fries and I could pretty much live there. The state park was a good one. Finally a state that allows collecting of downed wood for firewood. Texas and Louisiana were the only other two that I have come across. Other states are two protective of their precious, rotting wood.  67 miles today and the hills are starting to come, though very mild for now, it does take more focus than the straight, flat roads that I have just come off of.

2 Months? Crayzay.

The last month kind of flew by. I have started to get into a noticeable groove in my riding and spend less of my time worrying about where I am heading and overall paranoia. Which is good. Today itself was a short 35 miles that lead me to a very strange and pretty vacant RV park  in the middle of nowhere, VA.  When you look at the map it sure looks like I have a long way to go. Still 2,700 miles seems almost unreal and I am starting to become pretty comfortable with this homeless/insanely physical activity lifestyle, for good or for bad.  Today was also the first reappearance of any kind of hills since Mississippi. It should get pretty intense in the next few weeks, and I will soon know how big of a mistake 50 pounds of gear, all on the rear, really is.

Had to Happen Sometime

**Sigh** I got a flat. My first flat of the trip, to be specific. I guess it had to happen sometime, though I do put the blame on these new Panaracer tires, which I haven’t been a fan of since I got them back in Charleston. This was actually the first time I have ever gotten a flat on a loaded bike and I was surprised how quickly I began to lose control. I was just entering downtown Chesapeake after 70 miles, so I was lucky it happened right next to a large grassy median area in the middle of a very busy intersection. I would guesstimate that about 400 people got to see me change a flat, it was like a mini performance art skit. At least I got to try out my touring flat strategy, which is pretty solid. Pop off the tire and tube, slap on a new tube and the spare tire, Co2 the sucker and keep going. 5 minutes and you are back on your bike. I will save the tube to patch at the end of the day, and inspect the tire then too. Replace the Co2 with air, etc. Too often it happens that you patch a tube and then get a flat 2 minutes later when another thorn you didn’t see in the tube screws you again. This way, all the hard work is saved to later and you spend less time on the side of the road, which can be pretty precarious depending on where you are. Anyway, I was bummed out it happened one day before my 2 month mark and after changing the tire I had to navigate through some really sketchy sections of Chesapeake, trying to find my motel that I had Hotwired.

The ride up to then was good. I crossed into Virginia, stopping at the border to try out some North Carolina BBQ, which has nothing on Texas BBQ, for the record. It got super hot mid-day and I drank more fluids today than any other. My motel tonight is an Extended Stay America, which is actually really nice. Nicer than I had anticipated. It was the only place to stay in town, no camping around. Plus I only paid $35 using Hotwire, and the rooms usually go for $79, so it was a steal. I took full advantage of the in room coffee machine, toaster, internet and everything else. A good end to month two; a long ride, roadside repair, followed by an excellent night’s rest.

Random British phone booth in Rural Virginia

Even more random scary clown hawking a 10 year old fad.