Changing seasons, changing landscapes

I've begun to feel the summer transitioning into autumn. It can be subtle sometimes, piercing others: a flaming red tree contrasting with the foliage of its neighbors; shade, once so vital for cover, has become chillingly cold, even in the high afternoon sun; the noticeable loss of precious minutes of daylight. Last night the temperature got down to 36˚. I feel positively jubilant about the onset of fall, but a little worried, too; in terms of time, my trip is barely even half over (if that), and in the waning hours of light and the growing cold, I fear I have a hard month or so ahead of me.

Wisconsin has udderly (yes, udderly) stolen my heart. Every facet I've seen of this state has been something to love. (Well, last night I was disappointed by a locked Trader Joe's dumpster, but that's really my only complaint.) I entered Wisconsin from the outer suburbs of the Twin Cities, and wended my way along the Mississippi river. The land was unexpectedly and uncannily similar to how I imagine the river's delta region: warm, boggy, slow and expansive; an alligator would not have been out of place. At some point I serendipitously happened upon a bike trail that split off the highway and into rural marshland. This one trail ended up connecting to a whole network of rails-to-trails bike paths that I've been able to follow for almost the entirety of the state. By the time I leave Wisconsin, I will have spent more than half of the miles here passing through back-country forest and w

etlands. The Sparta-Elroy trail passed through three ancient train tunnels blasted from the hillside, the longest of which was three-quarters of a mile long, freezing cold and containing

nary a photon of light, save for the pinpoint exits at either end.

Entrance to the world's coolest bicycle tunnel

I was hoping to make it to Madison for critical mass on Friday night, as I previously mentioned. Didn't happen, not by a long shot, but arriving Sunday morning proved to be magnitudes better. The city just happened to be throwing their first annual bicycle celebration day (I'm sure it had some more official and impressive sounding name), with giant swaths of city streets and highways open only to bicycle traffic, and replete with street bands and a procession of species and food and bike booths, and much more. I met a couple of other cyclists who have done long-distance tours before, including a great guy named Scott Stoll, who rode more than 25,000 miles circumnavigating the globe, and wrote a wonderful book about it. Another fellow, Keri, rode the Trans-Am route with his son a few years ago, and most graciously shared a round of beers and stories with me, and even showed me around campus.

Penny-farthings owning the streets of Madison

Madison is a beautiful town, strangely sandwiched between two lakes on an isthmus the width of my forearm. It has something of a reputation for being the Eugene of the Midwest, or, as my Couchsurfing host put it, "seven square miles surrounded by reality". I'm beginning to realize that Seattle is not really a bike friendly town at all; sure, it has gobs of cyclists, but is almost totally lacking in supportive infrastructure. (To any of you who defend Seattle by pointing out the existence of the Burke-Gilman trail: boooooo.) This whole damn state seems stitched together by well-maintained bike routes, both in and out of cities. I've really only ventured through the southern parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin, which are not exactly renowned for their aching beauty, but from what little I've seen, I am already planning my next trip to come back and explore the northern lake regions and into the U.P.

Enough. To Milwaukee! I am determined to find some good beer in that city, and salvage its reputation in my mind.

South Dakota, Come and Gone

Number of miles: 2,435
Fastest speed: 45.6 mph

Total number of hours spent riding: 223

Equivalent number of consecutive viewings of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (extended versions): 19

In the proverbial blink of an eye, South Dakota has come and gone. Bland as a state it may be geographically, it completely surpassed my expectations, to the point where it might be my favorite state I've passed through yet. It was a welcome relief after a month of serious mountains to have a straight, flat shot, with the wind at my tail much of the way. And contrary to the generally surly attitudes of Wyomingites, South Dakotians have been above and beyond friendly and helpful; I've been given taken out to breakfast by strangers who approached me while outside a grocery store, I've been offered places to stay, showers, ice cream on a hot day, and a hundred other kindnesses.

Welcome to South Dakota

I took my first rest day at a couch surfer's house in Rapid City. Arik, the host, was wonderfully generous with his house and food and instruments, and his place turned out to be something of a hub of activity in the city; four other couch surfers were there with me, along with any number of neighbors and friends and even dogs that seemed to drift in from the bushes and hang out and tell stories for a spell. I walked into his house dirty, tired and sunburnt; after finding myself a mason jar of water and noting the NPR on the radio in the background, I knew I'd be staying a day. Rested and rejuvenated, I set out for the Badlands.

As fortune would have it, the weather was on my side. Normally the Badlands are, well, bad, nay, hellishly scorching this time of year. Turns out, though, that this whole region has been having the mildest summer on record, and I headed out to them under a welcome cover of clouds, and passed through with a gentle sun. The Badlands are truly other-worldly; I really think at least one away mission from an episode of Star Trek should have been filmed there.

Heading into the badlands...

...and the subsequent citation.

The nightly storms have been incredible, far and away more violent than anything I experienced in Wyoming. With the sprawling openness of the land and skies, you can see a storm coming from far away, but they roll in fast. There have been nights where my tarp simply did not provide me adequate shelter, but one of the more fortunate features of the landscape of South Dakota is the abundance of abandoned barns and houses; I've slept in several of them, and I really don't know what I would've done without them. (Consequently, I've found an old abandoned pot plantation on more than one occasion.)

Some of the local weeds.

I'm in Minneapolis right now, staying with a Mennonite intentional community, whose members are quite well-versed in the arts of dumpstering and biking and all those nifty city things. I think I'm going to stay for a day and explore the city, and then it's off on a whirlwind metropolitan tour of Madison, Milwaukee and Chicago by way of the Mississippi. I was kind of hoping to be in Chicago in time for Critical Mass next Friday, but that's still a good 500 miles down the road, so probably not this time.

The Roadkill Chapter

In my roadside journeys, it is only natural that, over the miles, I should come across many a squashed animal. Here is a brief photo essay* of the more interesting ones I've come across so far:

Ironically, this was probably hit while picking at some other roadkill. Any ornithologists out there care to identify (Lanie, I'm looking at you...)?

Okay, seriously, wtf? No body, no nothin'.

Apparently this coyote wasn't quite Wile E. enough.

That's vun! Vun batty bat! Ah ah ah!

I bet that made a terrible sound.

...and with her last dying breath, she coiled herself into a message dicipherable only to those amoungst us her are blessed with the gift of parseltongue. Thus began the mystery of the corn snake...

I really hope that this porcupine popped one of the tires of the car that hit it.

Pepe Le Mort

Any minute now, it'll jump up and start singing...

*idea for this photo essay graciously borrowed from the illustrious Ms. Katherine.

It's all downhill from here...

Wyoming has been a rather challenging stretch, I must admit. The land and scenery has been unsurpassed by anything I've seen yet, but the towns really, well, suck. It seems like a constant struggle to do the things I need to get done while in town, there doesn't seem to be much information around to help people find what they need, and it always feels like swimming against the current for as long as I'm in city limits. I've said it before, though, and I'll gladly say it again: thank heaven for libraries and librarians, surely some of the most knowledgeable and helpful people on the planet.

It looks like I spoke too soon about the Tetons containing the tallest pass I'd go over; I crossed Granite Pass in the Bighorn Mountains yesterday, at 9033 feet. I think that's it, though - aside from some hilly residue, I'm through the Rockies, and it's smooth (read: boring) sailing from here. My body did pretty well with riding at high altitudes. For the most part, I never noticed any shortness of breath while pedaling, except when I tried to sing or play my harmonica at the same time; usually, that works fine, but I could scarcely manage to belt out three notes before I was sapped of all my air. Not terribly surprising, really, given that I'm only taking in about 75% as much oxygen as sea level with each breath (thanks, Boyle's Law!).

The Rockies at 9,000 feet

The stretch from Cody to Greybull was stunningly desolate, and I was a bit worried about a thunderstorm rolling in (like it has every other night), given that I was pretty much the tallest thing and the only piece of metal for miles, save for the occasional car. It never came, though, thankfully. As I was cooking dinner that night, I noticed a herd of wild horses watching me from a nearby hill, so I went for a walk and watched them as the sun set.

Ye olde wild horses...

...and the sunset.

There are throngs of flying grasshoppers literally covering the roads here, and it's a little unnerving to here the inevitable crunch crunch crunch as you cruise down the pavement. Not as unnerving, however, as the ones that like to fly up and get stuck between your eye and the lens of your sunglasses, or the fact that they are highly cannibalistic, and for every one that gets squished, five more pounce on it to chow down. A note to all you bug-eating reptiles out there, there's a serious niche to fill here.

I accidentally slept in the spot of a deer last night, and it showed up around midnight and coughed at me for a few hours. I felt bad, and even invited it to sleep next to me, but given that it was pouring rain, I wasn't inclined to move. It was still around come morning, though, and it looked happy enough, so I won't worry too much.

I went through and uploaded some more photos to my previous posts, and added some captions to already-posted ones, so if y'all have the patience to wade through the old stuff, you might glean a bit more context.

Bison, Evangelists and Teddy Bears

I'm in Cody, one of Wyoming's ten largest cities, at a stunning 8,000 people. Yellowstone was beautiful and great and all the adjectives you'd expect. I came within about fifteen feet of a truly massive specimen of bison, while it was crossing the road; I'll tell you that the empty space of air that exists between a 2,000 pound bison and a person sitting on a bicycle seems quite a bit smaller than said animal and a car. The few seconds of mutual consideration that we shared was enough time to play through just about every imaginable outcome in my mind, many all of which, at that moment, involved me getting trampled; fortunately, I think Mr. Bison was thinking about the grass on the other side of the road. Oh, how I love the ruminant mind.

The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone fame

I met my first evangelist while camping in the park. Two other cyclists my age were camped there, doing pretty much the same trip as me (except backwards), and we spent the evening together. It was impressive how quickly the conversation turned to god, and kept on coming back to god no matter what we talked about, and how god is missing from my life, and everyone else who hasn't accepted Jesus into their hearts. I argued for a bit, but quickly realized that there was little point in doing so, because you can't reason with lack of reason. They wanted us all to spend some time hiking the next day (me and some other women camped nearby who were on a cross-country road trip), but I graciously made a hasty exit come morning. I'm happy for them that their beliefs inspire them so, but the minute that they start telling me what I'm doing wrong with my life, it just becomes insulting and offensive. Ugh. I hope I don't meet many more of those. Nice guys, though.

Geysers: more proof of the existence of God

The weather has been wildly unpredictable, with ten-minute storms with the ferocity of a hurricane blowing through without warning. Last night I shared a campsite in Shoshone Canyon (just east of Yellowstone) with a grisly, gun-toting motorcyclist from Utah named Chuck (who, by the way, slept in an adorable pair of jammies with a well-worn teddy bear). Just as I was getting ready for bed, I found myself in the most intense windstorm of my life. It scooted Chuck (who was inside his unstaked tent) across the ground. With my tarp almost acting like a sail, I'm shocked that it didn't get torn away, or at least torn up some, but it did an impressive job of keeping me dry. As I was falling asleep, I gladly realized that the wind was blowing in the direction I was headed. (Of course, come morning, it had turned into a headwind.)

I'm going to be making my way more or less across northern Wyoming, but I'm not really sure what I'll do when I get to the east side of the state; if I'm not careful, I'll end up in Sturgis just in time for the biggest motorcycle rally in the world, which, if possible, I would prefer to avoid like the plague. We'll see what happens...

Happy birthday to me

Number of miles: 906
Fastest speed: 42 mph
Estimated number of pedal revolutions: 292,147
Number of completed trips around the sun: 26

I'm kicking up my feet at the Snake River Brewery in Jackson, Wyoming, after a beautiful morning of riding. I climbed two passes this morning, Teton being the second and more difficult of the two, all 8,431 feet of it. I haven't crossed the continental divide yet, but it will likely be the most difficult pass I'll do on this trip. I saw a moose and her foal on my way up, mucking around in a stream. At the top of the pass there was a sort of hidden road that used to be the main road up the pass until the highway was completed in 1969. Now it's abandoned by cars and a bit overgrown, but is perfect for cyclists that know about it; I got a completely deserted and car-free trip down the mountain, passing through forests and by glacial ponds.

The ride down Teton Pass

I don't really like Jackson; it seems phony. Much in the way that Leavenworth is "Bavarian", Jackson is "Ol' West". I'm sure it has a rich and wild history, but it's hard to see it under all the kitsch. I think I'd rather camp somewhere in the Grand Teton Nat'l Park than stay here tonight, but I also really want to avoid arriving in Yellowstone on a weekend, so maybe I'll just take a ridiculously slow day tomorrow. But oh! The last day has been the most achingly beautiful part of by ride yet, and I'm sure it will only get better from here; I can't wait.

One of the many proud displays of Jackson's lack of shame

Sorry I haven't updated the map or posted pictures in a while, but I can't do that unless I fond myself an actual computer to use, which doesn't happen very often. Soon!

P.S. No wonder I don't like this town! This is where Dick Cheney is from!