South Dakota suffered through and chalked up in the DONE column, KNK reversed course, and rather than heading east to New Jersey, set their GPS and compass southwesterly. Destination: Crested Butte, Colorado, by way of Cheyenne, Wyoming. That was where we last left KNK.
Having determined that we still had six and a half hours of driving time to reach Crested Butte from Cheyenne, we did not pause to do anything fun in Cheyenne. Goodbye, Old Paint…
It was Friday., or maybe Thursday. There were people on the road with us. Lots of them. And there was traffic, three full lanes of it.
Kip was driving, and we planned assiduously to get gas and change drivers before reaching the mountain pass, but suddenly, the pass was there, and so were we, and he drove us up to 8,200 feet. But he did fine. The meds were working. Still, the next pass was mine, and we traded places and topped off the tank. Then we did the real pass, the highest, at 12,000 plus feet. At the bottom was a large lake, formed by the damming of the Taylor River. There were numerous cyclists heading up to the pass, fully loaded. Kudos to them!
We made it to Crested Butte and were greeted with hugs and kisses by Laura and Joe.
The next few days were filled with walks and hikes and bike rides and trips to the Farmer’s Market and dinners out and quiet dinners at home and long conversations under the aspens. I was able fit in a 25 mile ride toward Gunnison, but the high point was definitely my first attempt at technical mountain biking.
Laura and I did one of the green trails down Mount Crested Butte. Ok, it was a green trail, but I was plenty scared. I tried to stand the entire way as Laura had instructed me to do, but it was utterly exhausting. So, I sat my butt down on the very low seat and negotiated the banked turns and avoided the huge rocks. I didn’t walk, and I didn’t fall, so I would call that a success. The bar is as low as the seat, apparently.
Though I had counted Colorado among my states years before on a solo snowshoe outing, I added a bit more challenge that Saturday, or Sunday, or Whatever day… who knows. Anyone who has ever set out in a car to explore over a long period will understand.
On our final night, Sunday, I didn’t sleep well, and had trouble finding the door in the middle of the night in the absolute pitch dark of the Rocky Mountains. I emerged in my stupor to find that Laura n Joe had run out of Taster’s Choice, but luckily, I had my travel stash. We trundled out the door fairly early to head for Nebraska, where I had no idea what amazing feat I would accomplish. I hoped it would find me.
Monday: Another three-mountain pass day saw me at the wheel to start. It was 50 degrees when we left the Butte and 95 degrees in Denver as we went through. Hard to wrap one’s head around that. Later, Kip did 2.5 hours, and we crossed the plains of Colorado to arrive at the plains of Nebraska. At one point, we saw a cop standing in the middle of route 80 watching a young Black man change a tire, making sure he didn’t get clipped by the onrushing traffic. This is the sort of interaction with police that we all wish for, but don’t all experience.
We found ourselves back in interstate country for the first time in a while. The plains extended around us, but we had the sense in both Colorado and Nebraska that there were people nearby. They didn’t feel as empty as the plains of North Dakota and Montana.
Consulting the map upon arrival at our chosen overnight stop, Oglalla, Nebraska, I confirmed we were near the southeastern end of the Sand Hills, of Sand Hill Crane fame and name. Once we had checked into the Americinn (which has become a favorite motel chain, and surely is pronounced American, not Ameri sin), I went to check out Route 30, the Lincoln Highway, for a possible bike ride.
I found a two-lane road, broad shouldered as a Nebraska farm girl, lined with historical markers and tall yellow flowers on scraggly stalks, not quite black-eyed Susans. Having spent much time over the past seven years seeking out and exploring our nation’s historic roadways, such as the American Road in Ohio and Route 66 in Oklahoma, and, recently, the Oregon Trail ruts in Wyoming, I knew Route 30 was for me.
But…
It had a rumble strip and a 65 mph speed limit. The Nebraska contact for info on the Lincoln Highway emailed me to say that they do not encourage cycling on the Lincoln Highway, since it has a rumble strip, and a 65 mph speed limit…
I was determined to try.
August 31, 2021:Cycling 26.4 miles
On a Tuesday, I woke early to tackle thirty miles of Route 30, the Old Lincoln Highway, the first road across the U.S. This path, or trace, was used before its official founding by the Pony Express, The Oregon Trail, the Mormon Trail, and the transcontinental railroad. Vestiges of its past remain.
Freight trains run regularly along its length and keep cyclists company. It parallels Route 80, and yes, it does boast a 65 mph speed limit, which might have intimidated me, but since there were no cars, the speed limit didn’t matter. The road is aptly named First Street for a goodly portion of its length. It was truly the first street!
Native Americans tried several times to hold their ground in this vicinity but were lied to and pushed around and pushed back and corralled onto reservations. We all know the story, but it bears repeating. Always.
The weather was coastal, foggy and cool, with a strong wind out of the east, occasioned by the tailings of Hurricane Ida. I got off to a good start on First Street, rolling along just outside of the rumble strip, cooled by the fog, enjoying the experience of tracing history backwards.
By the time Kip caught up with me sometime after the twenty-mile point at Paxton, we agreed on Sutherland as an end point, at mile 32. A little while later, I saw a sign that said Route 30 rather than the usual Alternate Route 80 East signs. I slowed to think about taking a photo but decided against it.
I stood on the pedals to get my momentum back, and the rear tire slipped out from under me. I thought, “oh, was that gravel, or maybe I should shift my weight back, or… maybe I have a flat…” Sure nuff. I found a tiny, and by tiny, I mean TINY, thorn in my tire. Miniscule, yet mighty. I had read of the legendary thorns of Nebraska in some biking blogs: I had hoped to avoid making their acquaintance.
For many miles, I had been keeping my rhythm singing, “Gonna take my horse to the old town road, gonna ride til I can’t no more.” I thought that would be when I tired, not when my horse quit on me.
Later, curled up with my map and my thoughts, I realized that the flat occurred in the exact location where the time zone changed from Mountain to Central. I was on the oldest of old town roads, traveling forwards at the speed of time, losing an hour, and Bam! my ride was over. It felt otherworldly, like an episode of The Twilight Zone. Don’t say it: I know I am dating myself, here.
We loaded up the bike, Nebraska challenge in the bag. Then, we drove on and on, stopping in Omaha to walk the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge, locally known as Bob. Having gained the other side, we were in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
The wide Missouri rolled by. And we rolled on, all the way to Stuart, somewhere west of Des Moines. We settled into an Americinn which had the exact same floorplan as the one we had stayed in in North Dakota. This time, we had the room that GNB had had before, occasioning weird feelings of deja vu and disconnect.
So that was Nebraska. We came, we found a special stretch of road, and I rode it, with pleasure, into the wind. But I couldn’t escape the sense that easterly was an evil omen, and strange forces were afoot (obviously!). We began to feel the magnetic pull of home.
Morning dawned. It was another day. It may have been Wednesday. We planned to drive the remaining width of Iowa and stop in Davenport and ride the bikes along the other big river, the Mississippi, for a spell. We were 1,123 miles from home, over 17 hours driving time. Three driving days, I reckoned, since I was a’ reckoning.
I had been in Iowa back in 2020 for the Democratic Caucus, and snow had covered much of the terrain. Now that I wasn’t doing all the driving, I was free to notice that it was way hillier than the other states of the Great Plains, and far more treed. It was the first place I saw more than a smattering of windmills. They were everywhere in western Iowa, and they looked like dancers or gymnasts in the golden hour, pirouetting above the corn.
We drifted into Davenport midday. This is where I had met Transportation Secretary Pete Buttegieg and saw the first of many bald eagles on that trip. We took a break from driving, unloaded the bikes, and pedaled the short distance to Credit Island, mid Mississippi, which was featured in a War of 1812 battle and was a place for trading with Native Americans, hence the name. The park was a bit downtrodden and there was some flooding, but the birds loved it, and we had a pleasant break from our long haul. After, we drove on into Illinois. Traffic was bad outside Chicago. No surprise there. Then came Indiana, which featured lots of trees right up against the highway. We made it past Gary and stopped someplace, checking into a Wyndham Group hotel.
Kip didn’t want dinner, so I bought a Pepsi out of the vending machine and mixed it with Jameson’s for dinner. This seemed an opportune time for some high jinks, so Kip created this stunning photo montage. We thought we were hilarious.
We were punchy, but the world’s problems and issues hadn’t been on vacation. Flags were flying at half-staff; the war in Afghanistan was over. The fires in California were forcing evacuation of South Lake Tahoe. Texas had vigilantes who will be paid $10,000 to hunt down any doctors who perform abortions past six weeks of gestation. And the remnants of Hurricane Ida, which had turned the winds around back in Nebraska, were bringing massive flooding to New York and New Jersey. A quick check online revealed that a friend from Somerville had lost his home when the house next door flooded, then blew up. Tragic, sobering, and super motivating- we needed to get home.
So we did. Three days’ drive, I had reckoned, condensed into two. We listened to Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska in Indiana, or maybe Ohio. We listened to Janis Joplin and Rod Stewart in Pennsylvania, and Born in the USA on repeat. It still resonates 37 years later.
We rolled in the drive just past dark on some day of the week on September 2 to find the house stuffy and the fridge making an ungodly racket. But the basement was not too wet. We were, we ARE lucky, in oh so many ways.
7,159 miles. Five states captured for 50 in the Fifties. Two remain.
Six national parks. 27 days. 14 states. One Subaru. When I got it to the car wash the next day, I told the owner that she had driven cross country. He said, “Looks like she drove cross country three times.”
Must have been the grasshoppers in the grille.
So that was Summer 2021. We made it. I owe thanks to Kip, Graham, Betsy, Laura, Joe, and the Subaru. What an epic ride!
Come January, I put in a call to Dr. Fauci. He said that since I lost ten months of 2020 and seven months of 2021 to covid 19, then the Delta variant, I am allowed to take a mulligan into 2022. He agreed with me that to push it now, with the Omicron variant surging, I would be doing the nation a disservice. I also want to make sure these last two states are special. I don’t want 50 in the Fifties to end with a whimper, my tail between my legs. I want to take the time to learn about Wisconsin and Idaho, to learn about myself, and to savor the sense of accomplishment I will doubtless feel upon completion.
As of this writing, January 2022, I’m starting to make my plans.