Saturday, June 28, 2008

P.S.

Please click on some of these photos to do them some justice. A few have great colors and show the angry storm. Or someone's big funny face, I won't mention names.

The Beautiful People in Illinois

Here are some of the
beautiful views of Illinois.
I think.
It might be somewhere else. But it must be...Anyway
There's a lot of corn and dramatic clouds.





I think that the photo of me infront of the Chicago skyline accurately depicts that I am both relieved, happy, grateful, annoyed, frustrated, and excited to be in Chicago. It was a real difficult endeavor to get into the city. The routes proposed by others and the way that we enevitably ended up going was all awful highways with no shoulder and evil drivers. I feared for my life. Once in Monee, IL. Maya and I took a break (= went to a dive bar for a beer). We debated our options for getting to the city and opted for a brief train ride from University Park to Downtown. Yay!











Where's Waldo in the bean?








Over here Over here we have the McDonalds Cycling Center. Pretty Cool. Never thought I would say "Good Job McDonalds". But here it is, because I support bicycle advocacy. You can rent, repair, and shower. (It's on Randolph Street-What's Up Randolph!??! Saw you all over the city. There was a Wallace Street too, ya know).

Here is Maya with a forced preggers belly. We had just consumed a delicious salad and split a pepperoni pizza at Gino's East Famous Chicago Pizza. Deep Dish. Did I say Delicious!?




Our second night staying with Adam Heenan, he took us to go see blue grass music. It was awesome awesome awesome! We went to the Hideout Bar. I even got to meet someone from Western Washington University who is also transferring there in the Fall: Tara. Super nice.

We made some friends at this event. We started talking to Aaron (blue family reunion shirt!). Lots of good conversation and he introduced us to Joel, one of the members of the band (they're cousins) Joel plays a mean steel guitar.

Aaron bought us the bands CD! Thanks Aaron, you are awesome, we are very happy to have met you. Hope you are checking out our blog and that you stay in touch about moving around the country and stuff.
We all had a real good time and Maya and I were so happy to get to listen to some good live music. Finally!

There is still a lot to be said. Adam Heenan is as much an amazing Couchsurfing host as he is simply an exceptional human being. Chicago could be renamed AdamsTown. We really enjoyed his company and are forever indebted to him for taking us in on such short notice, PLUS hooking us up with such phenomenal company across the state of Illinois!! Big shout outs to Cisel and Ellen (De Kalb, IL) and Curt, Veronica, Nathan and the whole Fam in Rock Falls, IL. Super great people who inspire me to share the community love.

Maya and I are currently in Rock Falls. We are two days outside of Chicago and meeting up with Papa, Roland Buelow. He will be driving out to meet us this evening! WooHoo!! Get your engines ready (bicycle engine legs), the bicycle adventure continues.

Signing Off,
Lara

The 1000 Continued...

I will try and start at the beginning. All this traveling and meeting people...the rest days have been surprising unhelpful in getting us caught up on the blog or our journals. Maya and I stayed on someones lawn and passed out at 8pm. We woke up early (before 5) to some thunder. But as you can see the sunrise was lovely and the weather was perfect for biking. This is the morning of our 1000 mile marker.
We stopped to celebrate this great day in Buffalo. That's Buffalo, Indiana. It so happened that this day was Buffalo's community day. There was a lot of food being made like Buffalo Burgers and Biscuits and gravy. The people attending the event were amazing. We quickly got to know the volunteer firefighters of the area who were interested in our trip and eager to feed us and tell us stories of their own. Thanks Walt! And all the other firemen who were so helpful and generous! We appreciate it.
A storm was quickly approaching so Maya and I got to steer our bikes into the fire house and stay dry. We ate lots of biscuits with gravy and watched the storm rage outside. It even began to hail briefly.
Maya and I were not scared. We made ourselves comfortable and toured the firehouse. There were lots of interesting things to look at and play with.
This is me running to the fire truck. Emergency!!!! BIERNOD!!!!

Another storm was on the way. Maya and I contemplated staying in Buffalo for a while. Walt invited us to stick around for beers and more 1000 mile celebrating. We thought long and hard and decided that we needed to continue our journey. We got back on our bikes and drove right into the belly of the beast! We asked ourselves "Are we stupid?"
But we biked out. The storm was right on schedule. The wind howled and the rain poured down with a vengeance. I was almost blown off of my bike when it really picked up, so we stopped in someones yard and stood behind the trees. I was momentarily afraid of being struck by lightening when we biked across the flat plains (the only thing more than 2 feet of the ground and the bikes are steel, great).

Maya and I arrived in Brook, Indiana unharmed. We had pushed on and put in great mileage. Feeling accomplished and exhausted, we parked our bikes in an alley and headed into the only bar in town. After changing in the bathroom, we downed Corona's and made friends with the bar tender and the few locals seated at the counter. Warney was sitting to our left and told us about his life growing up in the area. He offered us a place to stay and we readily accepted. We also made friends with Chris, Nick, and Pop. They had driven into Brook from somewhere farther south for a Fight. The Community Center was hosting a boxing match and all the parking spots in Brook were full. We examined the postcard advertising the event at the bar. Intrigued, we agreed to take a peek once we had set up camp at Warney's house. Chris, Nick, Pop- thanks for the beers and the company! Hope you guys had a good time at the fight. We did show up at 9 'o clock, but never found you. The security gaurd told us that we couldn't stand by the door and we went away. However, not before we got this shot. Hard core fight club!

Luckily, Warney's house was just around the corner. We went home to him and Fritz (the dog). We slept well on the carpeted floor and enjoyed a nice breakfast in the morning. Warney, it was wonderful meeting you and we appreciate your hospitality. It was great meeting you!! Say hello to Fritz for us.

Back on the road, Maya and I meandered towards Illinois. We had to go on some busy roads here that were awfully annoying.
Tractors on top of Cilo's? That's like the cow in the belltower. How did they do that?

This still needs some editing, but to be continued...

Lara

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Friday, June 20, 2008

Flatter


We finally took a rest day – a much needed break for our legs. We stopped in Wooster, OH and had a whole laundry list of things that we wanted to take care of, but in the end, didn’t get to do because everything in Wooster is closed on Sunday’s, old school style =) Oh well. We took the opportunity to eat a great pizza, wash our clothes and clean our bikes, which were much dirtier than we were.
The night before, Saturday, we went to Javapalooza, hosted by Seattle’s coffee shop and it seemed like everyone in town was there. Ages 2-90 came out to enjoy the local bands.
After our restful Sunday and after loading up on allot of free breakfast foods at the Super 8 we were staying at, we set out and did a 60+-mile-day. We are finally starting to see some flatter terrain, but the wind is picking up! Not a moments respite! Riding into the wind is like swimming upstream or constantly riding uphill, with out reward and the added discomfort of loud rushing in your ears. Imagine biking up a hill with someone blowing really hard in your ear! How annoying is that!
Anyway, we saw a bunch of other cyclists that Monday. GOBA, I think it was, is an organized cross Ohio tour and then we ran into a group riding LA to Boston! Woah. They were doing 80 miles a day, but they did have support vehicles. Cheaters =).

Monday night we stayed in Jim and Dagmar’s yard and also enjoyed the company of Mike and Melissa (We'll lighten this photo, when we get a chance!). Not only did we get to enjoy their lovely company, but also their lovely pool, outdoor shower and tasty PiÑa Colada’s. Talk about luxury camping =) Thanks so much guys! And thanks for breakfast Dagmar! Vielen Dank!




On Tuesday we biked through Carey, but didn’t stay long and then on to the Indian Trail Caves. Which were, closed =( Yup, just our luck. But don’t you worry, we didn’t let that stop us =) After using our fence hoping skills and our headlamp skills, we managed to see the first couple halls of the cave anyway.
That day was officially dubbed Bike Hell in my journal – we did 65 miles into the wind and the caves were closed. When we finally stopped at a field near some trees that looked like they might offer some shelter from the wind, our luck took a turn for the better though.
Grant stopped his mowing for a moment and took a chance on some scraggely cyclists and introduced us to his sister, June. June has a bunch of boys, but we only really got to hang out with Brandon (who has declared Lara to be straight off the Sunny Up show – see reference below: Kelly on the Sunny Side Up Show). June, Brandon and Grant fed us an amazing dinner of ribs and mashed potatoes and VEGTABLES – mmm, lacking in our lives at the moment. They set us up on their campsite (how cool is that! They actually have a campsite on their property! It has oil lanterns and a port-o-john and a fire pit and a bunch of chairs and old car seats =) so great. We soon also got to meet Beth, June’s partner, and some friends and family. We would have loved to hang out longer, but after our disaster day, were ready to hit the hay. Beth and June also made us breakfast, which I am really sad I don’t have a picture of, because you should have seen the mountains of sausages and bacon! Intimidating, really. Thanks again to all of you!

Wednesday was more bike hell. We really wanted to make it to Monroeville, Indiana and so we committed ourselves to doing the 70 miles in one day, but it was SO WINDY! At least when we finally got to Monroeville, we had the amazing comfort of a cyclists-only free lodge.Every town should have one of these. Free shower, free laundry, and a free place to rest your weary head! What more could you ask for? I’m definitely taking this idea to city council in Palo Alto.
Here is a picture of the ‘feast’ we had for dinner. I know it doesn’t look very appealing, but it was truly delicious. Beans, rice, corn, and Jack and coke. Hot damn!

The next morning – Thursday, we packed up and had breakfast, set out and went to a café in Monroeville and had a second breakfast (!! this is why I really love biking) and ran into the most awesome group of old men, who dominated the scene at the coffee house. I’m definitely doing that when I’m old. Anyway, we biked out to Huntington, off-route, since I’ve been having allot of neck-pain (and elbow and shoulder pain – hence “bike-of-pain”) and we knew they had a bike shop. We finally got there (40 miles into the wind, again) only to find that they were celebrating ‘Heritage Days’ and everything was closed! The bike shop was actually going out of business anyway, so I don’t know if we’d have had better luck with out Heritage Day festivities.
We were pretty worn out at that point and so we did what we always do to brighten our spirits – EAT! The mother of all sandwiches! The sandwich to end all sandwiches! So delicious.
So I continued in pain and we finally got to Salamonie Forest State Park. On the way we passed a sweet house that was in a hill, or under a mound of grassy dirt anyway. It had a façade on the front, but the entire rest of the house was just a grassy knoll =). We also saw baby ponies! Not baby horses, baby ponies! They were so ridiculously small. It was really like My Little Pony come to life. Sorry no photo =(
I’ll end this novel of a post on a bright note. The pain is coming to an end! We went off route again today and are currently in Peru (Yes! Peru, Indiana). We went to a wonderful bike shop, Breakaway Bike, and there I got all set up with a stem extension and new tape on my handle bars (Thanks a million guys!), so hopefully this will cure the crick in my neck and if not, at least my handle bars are an awesome shade of blue =)

Happy travels,
Maya

PS – we are soooo sore!
PPS - Tomorrow we are going to hit the 1K mark!!

Bike For the Rest Day

Ah, well, where shall I begin? It's been a while and so many things have happened since Washington, PA. Maya and I had taken a half day, but as soon as we left the Washington Public Library we zipped right over the rest of the Pennsylvannia hills over into West Virginia. Seeing as it was already 6 'o clock at the 30 mile marker, we went up someone's long gravel driveway and got permission from a man (Jim?) to stay on the lawn near the road.

Soon there after, Kathy, Jim's wife, came blazing down the gravel path on an ATV to meet us, their golden retriever bounding alongside. Kathy unlocked the little house that stood on the edge of their property and brought us some towels so that we could shower and use the bathroom. This enabled us to go to bed clean and make tea in the morning! Thanks Kathy and Jim! Hope you got our note and our blog site. We really appreciate you letting us stay at your place.
This is us crossing the PA/W.VA Border. Very exciting moment because it felt like we have been in PA forever. And lucky for us, the part of West Virginia we were going through was really skinny, so we got to cross another state line the very next day! Through Wheeling, we peddled on to Ohio, our 5th state. Though Eastern Ohio still has plenty of hills, the landscape was definitely starting to change (we prayed for flatland). After a long hot day of rolling hills with little shade (Ohio is not as shady as PA), we came across a Rail-to-Trail: The Conotton Trail off of 151 West. It took us all the way to Bowerston. As soon as we got off the trail we began to survey people's yards, which one might be a good place to pitch our tent.

Just then, a man and his wife pulled up to the stop sign and asked us if we might need any help. After explaining our situation, Larry and Bev, invited us over and gave us directions to their house. They were extremely friendly and made it clear that we were to make ourselves welcome. Showers, Soda's, a hot meal, and some T.V. later, Maya and I were fully relaxed. It was hard to get up off the rug in their living room, but we had practically consumed two dinners in one sitting and needed to get to sleep.
Larry, Bev, and Family: You guys are great! I love the bike collection and I am grateful to have met you that day on the road!


More biking! We went to Dover, Ohio to have snacks and tea. Maya took a real spill on her bike. Pulling up onto the curve to get some directions, in slow motion Maya toppled over and scratched up her knee. It's OK - we got out the neosporin and patched her up real fast. Another biker coming our way stopped to chat. Dave is 71 years old and had brain surgery last month. You would have never of guessed either one of those things because he's one of the sharper tools in the shed and is a great cyclist.
Dave took us over the a nice big park and told us about his life. He also gave us a few tips: the next place he took us was the Warther Museum: http://www.warthers.com/


WOW! Ernest Warther = Genius. Seriously, check out this site and see what this man has done. Also, if you are ever in Dover, Ohio, please please please go to this place. Inspirational. Plus, his wife collected buttons and made super awesome patterns with them, which are also great to look at. It'll blow you away.

After leaving the museum, we passed Breitenbach. A lot of the names out here are German, by the way. http://www.breitenbachwine.com/ I made Maya stop at this great big shingle-roofed, purple building to do some wine tasting. Ice Wine. Deeelicious! They had a meat and cheese counter as well where we sampled practically everything they had. We chose to take a pound of the beef sticks, they taste just like LandJaeger (german version, basically the same thing) that we had when we were kids.



We went all kinds of out of the way to avoid the highway and ended up on some steep gravely roads. Don't ask me how it happened, but there was no GPS or Map that was going to stop us from finding, or loosing our path. It was a bit terrifying, zooming down the hill, rocks flying in all directions, trying to hold on for my life, but realizing that I should really just let go of the handle bars to avoid all the fish-tailing. Getting back onto asphalt and coming back onto a main road, Maya and I pulled over on a lawn for a rejuvenating snack and a nap (calm the nerves).


Oh, almost forgot: Early in the day at a [red] traffic light, a curious driver started asking Maya questions about what we were doing. As the light turned green, he hastily asked if he could give us $20. He pressed the bill into her hand and sped off. Thank you random man for the donation, it is greatly appreciated and we are happy that you can contribute to our journey.

As it got later in the day we were going by an Amish shop that boasted freshly baked bread. Bread has often been the topic of conversation (have I mentioned this already?) I am sorry, USA, but you just don't do bread like Germany or the NYC Farmer's Market (MM, Kalamata Olive!!!), and it just isn't as good. So, intrigued, we went to pick up a few things at the store and try the bread. Though the bread we bought still lacked anything resembling a real crust, it turned out to be yeasty, squishy, and very tastey. Especially when combined with Beef sticks or walnut chocolate icing.

The Amish man, Valentine, who owned the store ended up inviting us to stay in his yard. YAY! Him and his family were awesome. We got to shower, AGAIN (woo, showering streak! so fresh and soooo clean), and we were also given home made Cinnamonbuns!! After dinner in the yard, the wind picked up real fast. Valentine said that if the weather got really bad we could take our things into the office room separate from the house because there was space in there to sleep on the floor. Well, the weather wasn't just bad, it was horrible. And scary. Maya and I grabbed the tent (already set up with stuff in it) and pulled it through the door into the office. Wind, lightening, thunder, loud, purple, gray, leaves, branches, horses getting spooked- that kind of storm. Pretty intense...happy not to be In Tents (margie, you get it). To make the evening even crazier, we were awoken in the middle of the night. Valentine told us that his daughter had had a miscarriage and that the ambulance was there. We're sending our best wishes and good energy their way, they were a great family to have met and we hope they are doing well.
This is a photo of the office we stayed in.


June 14th: We left Baltic, OH (Amish Fam we stayed with) and headed towards Mt. Hope. It felt like a slow morning, mainly due to the downpore of rain. However, once in Mt. Hope, the pace picked up- Amish people everywhere, but also just regular people, too. A horse auction was happening so the town was bustling. A tip we received from Valentine's wife, Sara: We went to the Mt. Hope furniture store and got FREE strawberry pie with whipped cream AND ice cream! Amazing. Oh AND coffee! We planned to get to Wooster and take a rest day, so with some serious motivation we got back on the bikes and kept going instead of sticking around for more pie.
Maya and I did enjoy more icecream outside of Wooster. Great pit stop when the sun finally came out. Met some other cyclists involved with GOBA: Great Ohio Bike Adventure.

Wooster was wonderful. The Library is new and modern and beautiful. We also happened to arrive on the day of Javapalooza. Local Independent bands were playing later in the evening which was the perfect excuse to sit around, drink beer, and people watch. We did finally get around to dancing.














Saturday, June 14, 2008

Fear









Maya is scared of two things:

1) Dogs.
2) Tornadoes.

Hmm. Sounds like which movie?

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Bike Heaven

So there's this road, in case you didn't know, that runs from New York City all the way to Seattle, Washington. There are no hills, it's shade covered, but sunny everyday, and there are no cars on it, ever! If only it were true. There is a road like this, but it only runs from Washington, D.C. to Pittsburgh. We got on it between Rockwood, PA and West Newton and it was the most amazing bike trail in the world (granted, I'll keep looking for a better one, just to make sure).




We camped along the way near Connelsville, at this funny trailor park along the Youghiogheny ( pronounced yah-kuh-GAIN-ee - ha, the english language).
- This is sunrise the next morning =)





Our second day on the path, Lara got another flat that we fixed in the morning and then it became flat AGAIN on the road!! There was a hole in the tire itself, so putting new tubes in was a waste and we resorted to emergency measures and made a boot out of hay type grass to protect the rim. I called it Franken-wheel. And Lara rode on it the 10 miles to the next bike shop in West Newton. Props =)




This is going to be a bit out of order, because before we got to bike heaven we were also in Orrtanna at an Elephant museum!! and in Ohiopyle (ohio-pyle) visiting the falls and at Falling Water, the Frank Lloyd Wright house, and camping in some generous persons lovely backyard outside of Somerset and fixing bikes and the stove, and playing with thousands of kittens, marveling at a mole! and drinking a celebratory beer for our 500 mile marker!! and, and, and - a picture is worth a thousand words...


Kitten and Mole














Dinner
Laundry









Old Bridge over our bathing creek










Misty morning and a big hill defeated












E'd Elephant Museum!!













Falls at Ohiopyle and Falling Water









And today, right now, we are here, in Washington,PA doing a little down time =) feels sooo good.










Much love to you all,
Maya
and Lara, of course


P.S. Happy Birthday Natalie!