Post pizza party at Courtney's Place in Toronto, Kansas

Day 30, Blazing Hot Saddles

We write while being sweetly lulled to sleep by a guy who is jammin and twangin out some country music and some southern rock with an electric guitar and an amp at an adjoining campsite. It fits with the whole picture of Cross Timbers State Park here in Toronto, KS. Gimme two steps, gimme two steps good!

We muscled out 72 miles in some blazing heat, which according to locals is not at all hot for this time of year. Unfortunately the winds blew from the south today but we are hopeful they will change for tomorrow--we saw a flag blowing westward tonight!

Among today's events include an insect the size of a bird landing on Andy's back while riding. Stephanie heroically rode as fast as she could away from Andy in order to save herself. The insect cawed like a bird, I kid you not, brrrrkaw brrrrkaw. Guess they grow 'em big in Kansas. We had a lively game of categories (anybody who has spent extended time with Stephanie will have played this game). Category was 'Names of Songs' with the rule being you had to sing it loud. We had some good double-pointers with 'Witchy Woman' and 'Rockin Robin' along with Andy's imaginary 'Zulu Fight Song' (he couldn't think of a 'z') that went something like boom chucka chucka chucka boom chucka chucka chucka to the rhythm of his pedaling. Quite inventive.
We didn't know how far we'd get today, and when we got to this small town of Toronto, nothing was open and none of the soda machines even worked. We were starving and hot, and napped in the only shade for miles. Some of the townspeople took pity on us and told us that if we waited half an hour, we'd have some of the best pizza in Kansas and wouldn't you know, Courtney's Place opened and we have to say it was indeed amazing pizza and especially good malt shakes, served by Courtney herself. With our current serenade of 'Jeremiah was a Bullfrog' we are most definitely in Kansas, Toto!

Lake front property - Chateau Velo

Day 29, The states get fewer and farther between...

What a day-we blasted through 86 miles with little to no effort--tailwinds into Kansas, who knew??! We'd post the state line pic (this one's a good one, enhanced by the third person addition) but we'll have to keep you all in utter suspense until we find a computer to upload it.

We had the distinct feeling of going away from civilization today. The small towns we stopped in were quite pleasant, although the cockroach count has increased substantially in all of the supermarkets. We have found a wonderful haven tonight in the fellowship hall of Immanuel Lutheran Church. Pastor John and his wife Darla have been so welcoming and also forthcoming with garden vegetables! Their beagle Disco was quite a hit as well. It was a treat to cook in a real kitchen and the AC will certainly be appreciated tonight sleeping! The kindness of people continues to impress.

Cross your fingers for us for more tailwinds tomorrow (and the next day, and the next...) and Andy will continue to hope for a bigger trailer flag.

Day 28, Ozark, aux arcs!

Our stay at Pomme de Terre State Park (yes, why would anyone name a
state park after a french potato?) was very pleasant on our lakeside
property. I wouldn't say we had a great night's sleep though. It was
hot as anything last night, and our foray back into the world of
camping and away from the world of AC was tough. We even took a late
night dip in the lake to cool off and luckily the thunderstorms came
not far after to cool us off even more (after a mad scramble to secure
our belongings from the crazy wind). But neither heat nor
thunderstorms are conducive to sleeping, so we took a leisurely
morning to ease ourselves back onto the bike.

The riding today was quite pleasant if remote. We were definitely out
there on the country roads, and had some more good, steep hills. We've
left the hard part of the Ozarks by now though-Ozark is an
'Americanization' of the French 'aux arcs', interestingly. We again
increased our farming knowledge by learning about a new crop called
milo. If you ever see something that looks like stunted corn with a
large, fuzzy poofball on top, well, that's milo, a grain used to feed
barnyard animals that takes dry weather better than corn. Yes, we are
getting quite the farming education but have no immediate plans to
become farmgirls post-trip. Perhaps Kansas steer- raising will tempt
us more.

Our karma is up after today since we helped many turtles cross the
road. We did not want them to have the same fate as the armadillos. In
other animal news, we have caused many stampedes recently, whether of
the cow or horse variety. Hopefully one of these days a raging llama
or goat stampede will break out upon our passing.

The eminent and enigmatic Andy arrived today to join us biking for a
couple of days in Kansas. Anyone crazy enough to join us for the
headwinds is more than welcome!!

Day 27, Things we learned today

1. Armadillos live in Missouri. We know this because we are roadkill
naturalists, and have seen multiple specimens of flattened armadillos
in this fine state.

2. All flavors of Gatorade taste exactly the same. Except Strawberry,
which tastes like a medicinal Jolly Rancher, and thus is not something
you want to taste while riding a bicycle, or maybe ever.

3. Sitting for an extended period of time in an air conditioned
convenience store is not conducive to motivating to go outside and
bike when it is over 90 degrees outside. In fact, the effects of the
air conditioner are detrimental to any such exercising initiatives.

4. Popsicle stick jokes can be amusing when its too hot to care.
(Example: what animal doesn't like to do laundry? The leopard, because
it has so many spots.)

5. Beers taste really, really good while enjoyed IN a lake. Swimming
with one hand while trying to hold said beer is not recommended,
however.

Days 25 and 26, MO Wine-fueled century, and beer-fueled rest day

From the comfort of a real bed and fueled by Oreos, we finally have amassed enough energy from the rest day to post for the past two days.

Yesterday Molly and Stephanie rocked (even we ourselves recognize this) by bicycling 101 miles! The first 40 were on the Katy Trail again, which we learned was named for the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad, or MKT for short and shortened even further to KT. We took turns performing the rather unusual task of leading in order to combat spider webs that had sprung up overnight. Nothing can quite explain the feeling of a spider web completely covering your face, especially when you're not sure where the owner of the web actually IS. Right before Jefferson City, we walked our bikes over a highway bridge onto oncoming traffic (the only way to have a shoulder) and once we survived that, we entered into the Missouri that is completely baffled by the existence of bicycles. To be fair, in Jefferson City we did meet one of the men that helps run the Tour of Missouri (George Hincapie's foaming mouth and face are plastered on posters advertising the upcoming event) but most people are rather surprised to see cyclists. One woman even asked us why we weren't biking on the highway, because wouldn't that be less dangerous? Clearly she has never experienced the pure terror of being in the air rush of a semi barreling down mere feet from you at 70 mph.

Several rolling hills later, we arrived at the Lake of the Ozarks and a magical place appeared before our eyes--a relatively inexpensive hotel, with an indoor and outdoor pool, a hot tub, and the best part of all, a DENNYS. We impressively downed a serious quantity of breakfast food for dinner. There might have been on our table two large chocolate milks, six large pancakes, bacon, sausage, english muffins, biscuits, eggs overeasy, hash browns, and enough syrup and butter for it all to be doused in. 101 miles!!! Our tummies deserved it.

Today at any given point in the day, we were either sitting by the pool, or lying in bed watching TV. We did make one shopping excursion on our bikes in our street clothes (read: skirts). In a mere three minutes, we got four separate honks, one whistle, and one 'all right baby!' We evidently are popular here although perhaps will refrain from wearing the miniskirts on the bike again.

We've eliminated some more weight by cutting out the tags from our clothing. With rested legs and a whole 2 ounces less weight, we'll fly on the bikes tomorrow!

Blog cut short...only 13mi to Cali (MO)

Bike Manager extraordinaire!! Thanks Mom!!!

Day 24, Napa Valley, Sonoma, Oregon, Washington, the Finger Lakes, and...Missouri?

We started today off on Main Street in St. Charles, MO next to the largest statue of Lewis and Clark in existence. Unfortunately, Lewis (or was it Clark?) was not wearing his signature raccoon tail hat but instead they were joined by their faithful dog, a Great Pyrenees. This was a fitting starting point as we made our way down the Missouri River just like those two old explorers did back in the day. We traveled along the Katy Trail, a rails to trails path beautifully done and kept up. We whizzed along enjoying the much-changed scenery. Instead of dealing with honking cars, we were able to watch people exercising along the trail. Instead of never ending fields, we got to see some more never ending fields BUT also intermingled with river views, cliffs, cranes, jungle-like canopies (shade!!) and the occasional beaver or deer leisurely crossing our path. It was really a nice change of pace to hop along for 70 miles without any cars at all.

We were rewarded for our efforts by winery visits (yes, you read that right) with Priscilla in the town of Hermann. Missouri has wine, you ask? Missouri has pretty decent wine, even! All of the German immigrants to this area in the 1800s compared the fertile soil with that of the Rhine Valley and this region was a top-producing wine region. The region even helped out France in the 1870s by sending over thousands of strong, resistant vineroots when much of France's vines were destroyed by a phylloxera epidemic. We learned such other tidbits of useless information such as the state grape of MO is the Norton grape, which makes a very tasty red wine if we may say so ourselves.

Back to reality tomorrow as our faithful manager and sagwagon driver Priscilla/Mom leaves us-our trailers will be back on our bikes and memories of B&Bs and her smiles in our minds.

Day 23, Explorers in Raccoon Tail Hats

Quite an eventful day. We went 70 miles today, rode on historic Route 66, crossed the Mississippi River, entered Missouri, and rode on the Lewis and Clark Trail.


Route 66 on a Sunday morning was quite deserted but we could imagine how it would've been back in the day, with Cadillacs cruising down the highway topping out at 40 mph. We ourselves did not quite hit 40 mph but with a tailwind (!!) for extended periods of time, we were cruising along ourselves.


We crossed the river in Alton, IL and although we appear to be only 34.7698% done, it feels like we've truly made some good progress as the Mississippi marks the dividing line between the East and the West. Of course, the western portion of this grand country does happen to be a little bit bigger and longer than the eastern portion. We now have formidable states such as Kansas to tackle! More Kansas grumbling to come we are sure, but for now we are going to try and enjoy redneck Missouri as much as we can before the painful, neverending, neverchanging stretch of land known as Kansas.


We had much inspiration from the DC family for how to do these stateline letters, and it was a great idea but we didn't pull out the execution so well. Yes, it does look like Stephanie's pulling her pants down (LOOKS like) and the O is indeed much, much higher than the M. mO?


We finished off our eventful day with a brewhouse tour of our national beer, Budweiser (oops wait, are we all Belgians now?), which was a lot of fun. We saw the Clydesdale horses of course at the stables on the property, and learned that a full-grown Clydesdale stands over 6 feet tall, weighs 2000 lbs, can pull twice its own body weight, and drinks 30 gallons of water per day and eats 50 lbs of hay per day and as much as 10 lbs of grain. Is it odd that we sympathize with the Clydesdales with how much they have to eat in order to pull so much weight?

Fun fact: we saw 4 of the enormous tanks where they ferment the beer (there are 3600 on site). One tank holds 200,000 six-packs of beer. If a person tried to drink all of that beer by drinking one beer per hour, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, it would take that one person 137 years to drink ONE whole tank of beer. We got started with two free beers courtesy of Anheuser-Busch.

We were relieved to hear that in the Budweiser storage facility in St. Louis, they keep about a half million cases of beer. If production were to stop, that amount of cases would keep the Midwest distributors going for a whole eighteen hours before it would run out. Turns out our own beer consumption is not so far off the mark!

Day 22, Will Illinois ever end?

Southern Illinois continues. It continues to be quite devoid of activity, and certainly culture as well, unless you consider an enormous building-sized mural of a biker babe (as in, motorcycle babe, NOT like these two biker babes) on a Harley holding a beer in hand with an American flag waving behind. That is the closest thing that we have seen to "art". We imagine that the reference to consumption of alcohol while operating a motor vehicle is clearly artistic liberty at hand.

We had 55 miles of spinning it out while Molly's mom Priscilla took our stuff in the car. Little to no headwinds, uneventful biking, by now you all are well aware of the sights we see on a daily basis, which include (surprise surprise), corn and, you guessed it, soybean. Our post-ride stop at "The Ice Cream Man" in Litchfield, IL was highly appreciated by both, although we refrained from attempting the "Headache." The Headache consists of 12 scoops of ice cream, various candy toppings, whipped cream and cherries, all of which must be consumed by one person in under a half an hour unless you want to pay the $22 for the concoction. If you succeed in under a half hour, it's on the house. One brave soul this year actually managed to scarf it all down in a mere 15 minutes (a record), which is proudly noted on the wall.

Hot tubs and freshly repainted toenails later, we were ready to try the Ariston Cafe here in Litchfield, considered the first restaurant on the old Route 66. This lovely piece of Americana was quaint and everything it promised to be, although its houseflies apparently have a penchant for alcoholic drinks. It's not every day that Molly (or anyone, really) utters the phrase, "So as I was saying before the fly drowned in my wine..."

Another state completed tomorrow! We move onto Missouri tomorrow and will cross the mighty Mississippi River near St. Louis, a la Lewis and Clark, but with better-looking legs!

May just be our best stateline pic yet...we've had some practice now!

Day 21, Drowning by 18 Wheelers

We have both started out days a little more dignified than today in our lives. While breaking down camp, a thunderstorm hit and we had no shelter from the rain. After Molly determined that underneath the picnic table was a) uncomfortable and b) not big enough for two, we huddled miserably under our tarp while sitting on top of (and not under) the picnic table.

The rain let up. For a whole 2 miles on the bike. And then it began raining again. And it continued. A lot. The spray from semi trucks doesn't necessarily get you any drier, either.We were headed to Arcola to visit the medical clinic as Molly had woken up the day before with what looked like boxer ear. Stephanie swears that unlike how it may seem, she did not punch Molly in her sleep. Dr. Doug (Molly's husband) said we needed to get antibiotics for it hence our stop at the clinic. We walked in looking like drowned rats and you think that would've gotten us some sympathy so they would see her right away, but no. We risked further injury via pneumonia as we shivered, wet and cold, waiting for two hours in the waiting room with their AC naturally on full blast. Drugs in hand as we left,luckily the sun chose to shine and warm us up (maybe the beer and hamburgers for lunch helped too).

We rode through a full-on Amish settlement today. The houses wereeasily identifiable, either by the different sizing of their windows,a telltale buggy parked outside, or laundry flapping and drying ontheclotheslines. We think it is pretty remarkable that a culture like theirs has thrived in the face of (or perhaps because of?)overwhelming American materialism. We learned that the Amish adoptsome modern technology when it is for the good of their community, but that they do not value individual ownership, so a single tractormightbe used by many. Community vales certainly were evident as werode byan entire group of men working to reroof one barn.

We got further along west today than we thought thanks to the early arrival of Molly's mom! We are excited to have her with us to support us and sag us for the next couple of days. Having her around will certainly add excitement to our lives, as today we found ourselves enthralled by a field of zucchini and squash. Hey, it wasn't corn or soybeans!

Day 21, Drowning by 18 Wheelers

We have both started out days a little more dignified than today in
our lives. While breaking down camp, a thunderstorm hit and we had no
shelter from the rain. After Molly determined that underneath the
picnic table was a) uncomfortable and b) not big enough for two, we
huddled miserably under our tarp while sitting on top of (and not
under) the picnic table. The rain let up. For a whole 2 miles on the
bike. And then it began raining again. And it continued. A lot. The
spray from semi trucks doesn't necessarily get you any drier, either.

We were headed to Arcola to visit the medical clinic as Molly had
woken up the day before with what looked like boxer ear. Stephanie
swears that unlike how it may seem, she did not punch Molly in her
sleep. Dr. Doug (Molly's husband) said we needed to get antibiotics
for it hence our stop at the clinic. We walked in looking like drowned
rats and you think that would've gotten us some sympathy so they would
see her right away, but no. We risked further injury via pneumonia as
we shivered, wet and cold, waiting for two hours in the waiting room
with their AC naturally on full blast. Drugs in hand as we left,
luckily the sun chose to shine and warm us up (maybe the beer and
hamburgers for lunch helped too).

We rode through a full-on Amish settlement today. The houses were
easily identifiable, either by the different sizing of their windows,a
telltale buggy parked outside, or laundry flapping and drying on
theclotheslines. We think it is pretty remarkable that a culture like
theirs has thrived in the face of (or perhaps because of?)
overwhelming American materialism. We learned that the Amish adopt
some modern technology when it is for the good of their community, but
that they do not value individual ownership, so a single tractor
mightbe used by many. Community vales certainly were evident as we
rode byan entire group of men working to reroof one barn.

We got further along west today than we thought thanks to the
earlyarrival of Molly's mom! We are excited to have her with us for
the next couple of days while she sags us and supports us. Having her
around will definitely add some excitement to our lives, as today we
found ourselves entranced by a field of zucchini and squash. Hey, it
wasn't corn or soybeans!

Day 21, Drowning by 18-wheelers

We have both started out days a little more dignified than today in
our lives. While breaking down camp, a thunderstorm hit and we had no
shelter from the rain. After Molly determined that underneath the
picnic table was a) uncomfortable and b) not big enough for two, we
huddled miserably under our tarp while sitting on top of (and not
under) the picnic table.

The rain let up. For a whole 2 miles on the bike. And then it began
raining again. And it continued. A lot. The spray from semi trucks
doesn't necessarily get you any drier, either. We were headed to
Arcola to visit the medical clinic as Molly had woken up the day
before with what looked like boxer ear. Stephanie swears that unlike
how it may seem, she did not punch Molly in her sleep. Dr. Doug
(Molly's husband) said we needed to get antibiotics for it hence our
stop at the clinic. We walked in looking like drowned rats and you
think that would've gotten us some sympathy so they would see her
right away, but no. We risked further injury via pneumonia as we
shivered, wet and cold, waiting for two hours in the waiting room with
their AC naturally on full blast. Drugs in hand as we left, luckily
the sun chose to shine and warm us up (maybe the beer and hamburgers
for lunch helped too).

We rode through a full-on Amish settlement today. The houses were
easily identifiable, either by the different sizing of their windows,
a telltale buggy parked outside, or laundry flapping and drying on the
clotheslines. We think it is pretty remarkable that a culture like
theirs has thrived in the face of (or perhaps because of?)
overwhelming American materialism. We learned that the Amish adopt
some modern technology when it is for the good of their community, but
that they do not value individual ownership, so a single tractor might
be used by many. Community vales certainly were evident as we rode by
an entire group of men working to reroof one barn.

We got further along west today than we thought thanks to the early
arrival of Molly's mom! We are excited to have her with us for the
next couple of days while she sags us and supports us. Having her
around will definitely add some excitement to our lives, as today we
found ourselves entranced by a field of zucchini and squash. Hey, it
wasn't corn or soybeans!

Day 20, Kamikaze Coons!

Last night's brush with wildlife added excitement (perhaps more than
we'd have liked) to our otherwise predictable corn and soybean-filled
existences. We discovered shortly after retiring to our tent that the
very tree we had chosen to camp underneath was home to not one but an
entire family of raccoons. These large rats with opposable thumbs
chattered all night long (raccoon talk is severely unsettling when it
sounds like rabid hisses), kicked over all our kitchenware on the
picnic table, and were completely unfazed by our attempts to scare
them away whether at 10 pm or 5 am. But wildlife encounters are indeed
a part of camping and raccoons are a far cry from charging bears or
stampedes of cattle at night, both of which Molly has experienced
before in the great outdoors and we would like not to be repeated on
our own trip.

On the road, at a bleary-eyed 7:30 am, we rather unbelievingly passed
by a horse and buggy on the road with a smiling, cheerful bonneted
woman. Welcome to Amish country! They don't zip along too fast in
those contraptions as we went whizzing by the buggies. Outside the
grocery store this morning, while parked near but not too near the
'horse and buggy parking ONLY' sign, we met the one man in existence
who has been all over the world and has found nowhere as charming as
Rockville, Indiana. Go figure. Our experience at the grocery store was
a little disconcerting to us both, after which we realized that we had
actually been enthralled by a 'real' sized store that had a ladies
room NOT located in the stockroom and had not one but TWO stalls. Oh,
the thrills of life.

We crossed into Illinois today, which proclaims itself as the Land of
Lincoln. Faithful readers may remember that Indiana is Lincoln's
childhood home; clearly a mini-brawl between the states is afoot.
Central Illinois has not thus far produced any scintillating events,
but when it most surely will, never fear that our exploits will be
recounted with gusto.

Day 19, Fish Tailing in the Dirt and Gravel of Indiana

When someone says 'the middle of nowhere', where exactly are they
referring to? They might well be talking about Marshall, Indiana. We
heave-hoed our way over gravel roads and passed by junkyards (oh no,
wait, that was just the lawn of Mr. and Mrs. Redneck) to get to our
current location. And to think that this morning we left civilization
(and Starbucks) to come...here. We had a beautiful tailwind for
exactly 3.2 miles, as naturally the only day of our trip that we
headed mostly south, the tailwinds happened to be in our primary
direction of west. Sadly there is nothing else interesting to report
from the middle of nowhere and we fear that tomorrow might be exactly
the same. Apologies to our readers for the ennui of Indiana. Perhaps
eastern Illinois tomorrow will end up proving more scintillating.

Look Mom more corn!!

Day 18, O'Dark Thirty

In the military, that means really stupidly early, which is when we
were up this morning. We drank our tea and coffee in the dark, and
were out of camp at sunrise. The mist and colors from the sun made the
normally tiring cornfields peaceful and compelling. Which quickly
changed with the full light of day, but for the first 30 miles we
hardly noticed as time flew by while chatting about religion and
politics (you think I jest?) The corn lined the roads so high it was
like riding in a garden hedge maze with only the occasional car to
break up the view.

On the next 25 miles, we escaped multiple near deaths by semis, those
atrocious beings that are a cyclist's nightmare, especially when they
pass so close you actually feel your bones shaking. I suppose on the
bright side, we had a tailwind at that point, which got us off of the
shoulderless road sooner.

We were done EARLY and are in the cute college town of West Lafayette,
IN, home of Purdue University. We got to feel like real people for an
afternoon, by doing normal things like walking to an ice cream shop
and perusing a bookstore. This was a nice change from walking to, say,
the water spigot at the campground or perusing, say, your handlebar
bag to see if there's any more trail mix.

Day 17, Ski Season!

Today started great, middled monotonously, and ended far better than
we could have expected. Had breakfast (buffet! Means ALL YOU CAN EAT
so the holiday inn lost money on us today) with Stephanie's aunt and
uncle who then kindly took our stuff via car to our destination this
evening-woohoo to less weight! A big thank you to them and then we saw
them on the road a bit later to brighten our day.

The middle of our day went something like this: Corn, corn. Soybean,
corn, headwind. Headwind sneeze sneeze (Stephanie is allergic to
indiana apparently) corn corn soybean. Headwind, headwind, corn.
Headwind.

The lack of services forced us to go foraging for food in the
soybeans, although actually it was just wading through poison ivy and
soybeans on foot in order to get to a grocery mart that would have
been much, much easier to bike to, but where's the adventure in that?

In camp 80 miles and many headwinds later, our new friend Bart took us
waterskiing with another guy Thomas on the huge Mississinewa Reservoir
at sunset. Beers and skis! Its like winter but without the snow!

Day 16, In Defiance of Headwinds

As the left sides of our bodies get tanner and tanner (ok, or sun poisoning) as a result of going from east to west constantly, we understand more and more why people use zinc though it makes you look pasty white and odd.

Today from a biking standpoint consisted of very little interesting news as we only passed through one real town, called Defiance. Also, we experienced insane headwinds and we crossed the 1000 mile threshold (only 3000 to go!) and are thus one-quarter of the way done. We also crossed into Indiana today and therefore have one-third of our state count done.

Indiana may be the crossroads of America but they don't have signage proclaiming any sort of grand entrance into their state, and thus we rode on a four-lane highway to get to this sign in order to commemorate our entrance into Lincoln's boyhood home state.

Post-bike, we are so lucky to have had Stephanie's Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Jim drive down from Michigan to greet us in Monroeville, IN (try to find THAT on a map) and were so sweet to put us up for the night in a hotel and take us out to dinner! We went to Mad Anthony's Brewhouse in Fort Wayne--Mad Anthony is the nickname of Anthony Wayne, a general with a 'fiery personality' in the American Revolution, and whom Fort Wayne is named after. He also happens to have some pretty fine brews named in his honor, which we were grateful to taste after a long day of dry mouth from the headwinds.

Tomorrow we are trailer-free as Auntie M and Uncle Jimmy will be taking our stuff to our next destination for us! This is the ultimate way to make the endless cornfields and blowing winds bearable and we are blessed to have so many friends and family support us on our journey.

Here's to hoping tomorrow brings less decomposing animals on the side of the road than usual.

Day 15, WhooEeee Dog, It's Fair Day!

Today was full of pleasant surprises from beginning to end. While
breaking down camp this morning, the Boy Scouts next to us (bless
them) offered to share their breakfast of pancakes, sausage patties
and bacon with us! We gladly took firsts, and seconds, but didn't dare
take thirds as much as would have liked to for fear of overstaying our
welcome (and because one kid started giving us strange but impressed
looks with how much we were eating).

On our route, we wondered what kind of crops we'd been staring at for
10 miles straight, and had the good fortune of asking a woman named
Gloria who ended up telling us the surprisingly interesting process of
growing soybeans. Gloria helped to expand our limited farming
vocabulary to include tillable acreage and harvesting combines, which
incidently with a price tag of $200K each makes farming subsidies a
lot more understandable.

We bet that you readers have been asking yourselves for quite some
time, 'now where was our fine 19th president of the United States,
Rutherford B. Hayes, born?' Wonder no more. 'Rudy', as we'll call him,
was born in Fremont, Ohio, which we had the good fortune to pass
through today. Judging by the size of his estate, like many US
presidents, Rudy was not strapped for cash.

We passed through Pemberville that though only boasts a population of
1,365 puts on a pretty amazing little fair. While slurping on
strawberry lemonade slushies, we looked at some Margaritaville-themed
flower arrangements, played Skee-Ball, and saw the country's
preeminent (there can't be many) youth fiddle bands. We missed the
parade by a hair, but saw the baton-twirling aftermath along with Miss
Oak County Apple Festival 2007.

We got into camp rather late due to the fiasco of buying our third
stove of the trip. While I have been sworn to secrecy to not divulge
the location of our camping spot this evening for fear of others
making a run on the camp, we were given a free cabin by the ranger in
another stroke of good luck today which meant no setting up our tent
and that we have real beds for this evening! The 'ohio state parks jr
officer' plastic badge we both received is pretty cool too and we wear
it with pride.

Top Thrill Dragster, $25M manmade fear

Day 14, Three, Two, One, Go...

And thus we were off on the highest and fastest inverted
rollercoaster, the Wicked Twister at Cedar Point amusement park. And
that was after we had done a couple of other terrifying and highly
entertaining ones (see photo to follow, which includes 120 mph up and
down 90 degree angles). We also partook in the water park, most
notably at the swim-up bar with margaritas and long island iced teas.
A highly entertaining way to spend our rest day, especially when the
people-watching in lines was so amusing (think: swim trunks that say
'I wish I were an oscar mayer weiner' on the rear).

Day 13, Race to the Rollercoasters

This morning, Molly's comment that summed it all up: 'blue skies to
the left, blue skies to the right, and we're riding in the rain
corridor in the middle.' We rode through quite a mixture of the
US-from the comfort and idyllic setting of Chagrin Falls to the
endless suburban sprawl to the diverse and struggling neighborhoods of
southern Cleveland and back to the beautiful houses on Lake Erie, we
had it all today.

Fun facts of the day: did you know that if you took all of the water
in the Great Lakes
You could cover the 48 contiguous United States under 9.5 feet of
water? Or that the surface area of the Great Lakes is roughly the same
size as the entire United Kingdom or the states of CT, NY, MA, VT, RI,
and NH combined?

We stocked up on beer tonight to fete our day off tomorrow and also on
cookies to complement the beer. We flew on the bikes this afternoon
and whether the motivation was towards rollercoasters or beer we'll
never know but vive our rest day!

--
Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com

Day 12, Beware too much sugar

We write from the comfort of a REAL home (not, of course, that I would insinuate that a mat in a tent on the side of a highway in a trailer park is not considered a real home like we experienced last night) but this real home happens to be Molly's neighbor Kate's parents' home (got that?) in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. The town is lovely with its waterfalls in the center of town, and lest I forget the beer here happens to be very good as well (and the chicken and shrimp and hamburgers and fries and salad at Rick's Cafe also).

A little update from yesterday, lo and behold our TWO state crossings yesterday, PA and OH. Our letter-making skills are out-of-control good as you can witness from the artistry below:

Here you need to use your imagination a little to find the letters O and H.


We had 80 miles to do today and it seemed long, especially considering that in the end, eating the entire tub of cake frosting with pretzels is actually a bad idea for your stomach, who knew? We should stick to things that we know will be good for us, such as: Snickers ice cream bars, SnakPak puddings, fig Newtons, Kudos bars (the peanut butter kind), apples with either peanut butter or Nutella, bananas, oranges, orange juice, iced tea, Doritos, Pringles, Ruffles, ice cream, chocolate chip cookies, peanut M&Ms, trail mix. This is but a mere sampling of what we have consumed--we continue to impress even ourselves with how much we eat.

We like the Midwest--people are nice and more importantly, the land is FLAT. We ride back to Lake Erie tomorrow to Sandusky, OH, and will be partaking in many, many rollercoasters on our day off the following day at Cedar Point Amusement Park. Here's to a better day tomorrow as we ride 86 miles frosting-free!

Salade n Sun on the beach on Lake Eerie

Day 11, The Generosity of Others

-hot water heated up in a golf course club microwave for my tea
-free cookies from a six year old
-yard sale man turned bicycle repair man on the sidewalk
-directions from passersby when you look a little lost
-encouragement from golfers in the middle of their game
-golf cart rides from fellow campers when the campsite is far and the
load of firewood is heavy

Day 10, Motel Luxe

92 miles today to Lake Erie! We are both excited to have made it this
far, and are ready to change states especially if it means changing
weather. For the fourth day in a row we packed up a wet tent (which I
will have you know makes it much heavier to lug!) and this morning we
left camp in the pouring rain smelling of mildew after attempting
(unsuccessfully) to dry our bike clothes in our sleeping bags while we
slept. To cheer our mood whilst being drenched, we warmed up on the
state forest's exercise parcours, with balance beam exercises and toe
touches. We aren't sure how such a fun exercise activity has fallen in
popularity since its heyday in the 70s. Back on the bikes, Stephanie
slalomed slugs on the road, which is better than the prior morning
where she had to flick ten slugs off of her flip flops before wearing.

The first 30 miles kicked both of our butts with hills, with a
particularly memorable moment occuring on a long, steep hill next to
fully whirring wind turbines. We stopped and ate half of a grocery
store full of food after the first 30 miles--we're pretty close to
rivaling Michael Phelps with his daily intake of 10,000 calories.
Rain, some flats, obviously more hills, and then the descent to the
lake!

We made a very strategic move in splurging on a motel this evening, as
warnings of t-storms with 60 mph winds and 5 inch diameter hail are in
full effect on lake erie this evening. Pizza delivered to our door and
dry clothes tomorrow morning both seem luxurious. Onward and westward
through PA and to Ohio tomorrow.

Day 9, will our stuff ever be dry?

We are wet. All of our clothes are also wet. The tent is wet, and we
just ate cold hot dogs for dinner. Letchworth state park, the
professed 'grand canyon of the east' is not so grand. But new york
seems to have flattened out a bit, so we have that going for us...onto
lake erie tomorrow in search of better weather.

Arcadian Vineyards, Seneca Lake

Day 8, Vineyard Haven

Today was completely necessary in that we did it up molly and steph
style from sunup to sundown. Good wine, good food, good scenery, good
people. We completely shifted gears (so to speak) from nascar-heaven
to a more, shall we say, refined lifestyle. Seneca Lake turned out to
be unexpectedly beautiful in a relaxed and pastoral way. No more were
we surrounded by fried dough vendors peddling to racing fans, but
turned to farmlands and rolling fields of grape vines. We did three
vineyard stops, and our two favorites were Villa Bellangelo and Shaw
Vineyards, both on Seneca Lake.

We indulged mostly in dry to semi dry white wines while being regaled
with interesting stories by local winemakers. We stopped for a brief
visit in Penn Yan, NY, home of the world record holding buckwheat
pancake. And we made the most delicious dinner in our suburbia-like
campground (think wide open lawns and ambient music) while enjoying a
local gewurst that we picked up during our (many) tastings today.
Ahhh. Rested legs, happy tastebuds. We are ready for whatever New York
state has in store for us, which we're hoping is all downhill to Lake
Erie.

Day 7, Nascar 101

America continues to thrill by its multi-faceted population. This
weekend here at Watkins Glen, NY happens to be the big Nascar weekend
at the racetrack. The troops are motivated-flags hung around
campsites, war whoops and car horns right until the 'quiet hour' of 10
pm, jesus music or country music blaring, decked out buses supporting
#88 dale jr (uhh we had to google that, didn't know his number off the
top of our heads...), and in general a mass of people that can really
only be described as nascar fans. A cultural experience for us both.

We also had a nice walk around the gorge, ithaca is indeed gorges like
the bumper sticker. We napped in the tent as dreams of tanning by the
pool were shattered by the fickle weather, and scored a ride up the
big hill after laundry and groceries by a nice park ranger who may or
may not have stopped because Stephanie was biking in a bikini top.

Our legs feel well rested and our stomachs well tuned for winery
explorations tomorrow (the tummies having been primed by an a propos
bottle of Red Bicyclette merlot this evening)!

Watkins Glen, 19 waterfall gorge

Day 6, Podunk Road

It took us over two hours to get out of camp this morning. We were
tripping over ourselves, forgetting everything, and in general we were
sloooooow. And getting back on the bike...painful. At a certain point,
your butt just says no to being on the saddle. You kind of have to
trick yourself into going again, like saying 'its only a short day, it
will be over soon, and tomorrow we have a rest day!' But our trek from
Chenango Valley State Park to outside
of Ithaca was anything but short--a long day of almost 70 miles with
many hills between point A and point B. We stopped in Ithaca and had a
nice two hours of walking (our butts thanked us for giving them a
break!) and window shopped to our hearts content. We learned on the
way out of town that Ithaca is in a large valley whcih of course meant
a big climb.

We passed Podunk Rd today, which explains a lot about where we were. A
sweet couple from MA stopped near us on the top of one of the many
hills, said they had seen us miles ago and wanted to know if they
could help in any way-even offered a bottle of wine! We thought the
extra weight wouldve killed us, but in retrospect maybe a little wine
in the water bottles would have been just the kick we needed!

We have a lovely rest day planned with hopes of sunning ourselves in
order to get rid of the gorgeous bike tan afoot. Laundry falls a
distant but important second on the to-do list. Lots of love from the
Finger Lakes!

Day 5, Jeepers, 92 miles!!

Today was quite long. Understatement, understatement, understatement.
We started out in the misty fog overlooking a reservoir that is a
major water supply for NYC, so for the first 30 miles it was pretty
flat and cool. Our whole Catskill Park experience was thus not as
mountainous as feared. However, as soon as we exited the Catskills, we
apparently ran into the Catskills' evil stepsister hills to the west
that we slogged through for much of the day. Our thighs are currently
screaming in pain as a result. We did have about a 10 mile respite
(which is what going next to a river, a railroad AND a highway will
give you) but the hills reared their ugly head at the end of the day
so we cranked our ipod music (linkin park for molly, reo speedwagon
for stephanie) even louder and slogged up them again. A very nice man
mowing his lawn gave us some water and our encounter with him has made
us decide that the exclamation 'jeepers!' is highly underused these
days and merits a full-fledged comeback.

Neither of us can currently walk in a straight line after a day like
today, wonder what tomorrow we will look like on a bike!

Day 4, Girlz in the Catskillz

77.9 miles, Kinderhook, NY to Margaretville, NY! Molly and I are very happy to say that we went THROUGH the Catskill Mountains today, instead of OVER them. Lenny told us that we had chosen wisely to go through the southern route instead of the northern route over, as the northern route would have involved switchback climbing. Instead, we found that the southern Catskill valleys made for very pleasant (and relatively flat) riding. We started off with Lenny as our tour guide all the way to the charming town of Hudson, where the main street offered a cool coffee break at the French-style Nolita Cafe while we waited for the bike store to open. One trued wheel later, we were off across the Hudson River on the Rip Van Winkle Bridge (the man storied to have slept 100 years...hence our photo):

We were on some very smooth and un-trafficky county roads this morning and were treated to some odd sights such as giant white-marble head sculptures in random fields. We would like to extend a very warm shout-out to Mary and Ray from Mezzaluna Cafe on Route 212 towards Woodstock, who offered a very colorful welcome in their modern and inviting cafe. We suggest that you all read local Ray Steiner's book "The Mountain", as we are two very proud new "nieces" of Ray's. Apparently he has many "nieces". We then passed through Woodstock (and neglected to treat ourselves to tie-dye t-shirts proclaiming "Jerry is Alive" although we did partake in some local ice cream) and continued our jaunt through the Catskills. The day seemed easy, as Molly's parents had taken our trailers, although we were confronted with a giant hill at the end of the day up towards the Country Club/Mountain Resort where we are staying this evening. Our valiant efforts up the hill were rewarded with free beers by the golfers here who could not believe that our legs carried us up that enormous hill without the help of a golf cart. You skiers out there will appreciate our efforts to recreate the movie "Aspen Extreme" powder 8 competition UP a hill on bikes. A hot tub (and more beers courtesy of Molly's dad!) has helped rejuvenate our spirits and we are very thankful that Molly's parents, Priscilla and Norman, have come for a bit to support us on our journey. We are both lucky to have such wonderful families!

Speaking of families, we are sending lots of love and thoughts to Stephanie's brother Scott as he is out in California competing in the U-23 Nationals in road cycling. GO Scotto and GO Team Metlife! Love you kiddo!

Day 3, One State Down, 11 to Go!

58.5 miles, Plainfield, MA to Kinderhook, NY!  This morning we experienced our first knuckle-gripping downhill dirt road better suited for mountain bikes which was a good wake-up at mile 3, and then had more hills going over the Berkshires.  We realized that though these mountains may be old and not as high as newer mountains, that doesn't mean they aren't a bear to get over.  Molly's young nephew Jeffrey had misheard the description of how we were carrying our stuff, and instead of in "pouches" he heard "couches" so he was expecting us to be carrying couches behind the bike.  I swear, sometimes today on those hills it certainly felt like we were pulling couches behind us...

We crossed our very first state line, which caused much excitement.  The photo took a couple tries to get right (think us creating the letters YN instead of NY) but here it is in its final glory:

Today we write from great comfort in Kinderhook, NY (better than last night, where Molly was standing on the picnic table at our campground attempting to get reception for just 20 seconds to send our blog post...).  We are staying at the lovely home of the parents of a college friend of Stephanie's, Jamie.  Lenny and Warren have been wonderful, and Lenny came out to ride with us for the last 10 miles.  We rode with him through the scenic roads of Columbia County, New York, which have gorgeous old farmhouses on wooded lands.  

 

Molly's parents are coming to join us for dinner, which should be quite a feast as Jamie's parents have an amazing kitchen garden with all kinds of vegetables.  We feel like we've earned our dinner, and what a dinner it will be!   We also got to see the new chicken coop at Jamie's parents' house, and we are honored to know that two of the 26 chickens will be named after us!

We did much better on the beer front today than yesterday (there were not so many services in Plainfield, MA, and certainly none of the package store variety...) and sampled some Adirondack-made Saranac beer in Lenny and Warren's garden while throwing sticks for their two labs, Sophie and Cutter, to fetch.  Life is REALLY good, especially since Molly's parents are sagging us tomorrow and graciously picking up all of our luggage in their car while we bike through the Catskill Mountains!  Two mountain ranges in two days.  Our legs are going to be huge.

The real beginning (50 lbs heavier...each!)

Day 2, trailers and all...

We were excited to be off with our full gear...handlebar bags and
trailers...but just a mile down the road steph heard something
rubbing. After a lot of discussion, we finally came to the root of
the problem... Stephanie's front wheel and computer were installed
backwards.

Once the issue solved, the hills of western mass awaited...is it
really possible to do over 4000 feet of elevation in one day on the
east coast? Apparently so...

Special note: the orange creamsicle ultragen recovery drink tastes
even more like a creamsicle when mixed with orange fanta soda pop.
Try it sometime...it's awesome!

Now it's off to NY tomorrow where more hills await.

Day 1, Spinning it Out

Crane Beach in Ipswich, MA to Princeton, MA -- 73 miles! The send-off this morning was perfect.

Walking up the steps along the boardwalk before seeing the ocean was indescribable--complete butterflies in the stomach--what are we doing??

The back wheels go in the Atlantic Ocean, and the front wheels will go in the Pacific Ocean...it seems a long way away.

We are westward bound! With no words of wisdom to share with each other, both of us are at a loss for words but not a loss for smiles.

Our energetic and faithful send-off crew: Frank, Judy, Carrie and Scott.

Further down the road, in Concord:

In downtown Concord, we met up with Chris, Lauren, Katie, Timmy and Jeffrey. Chris rode with us for awhile and regaled us with close bike encounters with flying deer. All I can say is that I hope we don't encounter four-legged wildlife careening through the air towards our heads!

We were treated to a guitar concert at a cafe for lunch, and the artist Stuart Ferguson sang us a "biking across the country song". In the words of Janis who can say it much better than I, "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose..."

Cheers to freedom on the open road.

The Night Before...

So as the moment draws closer and closer, we would like to thank all of the people who have helped us prepare for our trip and for all of the well wishes we have gotten...which have ranged from "you're doing WHAT??!!" to "May all of your hills be down" (we wish...). Other notable comments include:

--in reference to the name of our blog: "I will be keeping my eyes on the twobabesonbikes website as its a welcome change from the normal websites that i visit with two babes in them!"

--from a French friend: "bon voyage et on pensera fort a tes mollets" which means "bon voyage and we'll think a lot about your calf muscles..."

--"I'm glad you're a blogger and not a booger."

A wonderful, wonderful meal tonight prepared by the DC family will certainly help us along the road the next couple of days (and help us remember that real food exists out there as we eat camp food every night....gosh I think i might dream of that blueberry-peach cobbler with homemade peach ice cream for a LONG time) and we thank you and love you for our send-off meal!