Date: 2007-06-12
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Miles today: 0.0

Summary of the Trans Am Bicycle Trail;We rode from April 1st to June 7th...68 days with 4 zero days.4085.89 miles total68 days = 60.08 average miles per day. (Includes the 4 days we didn't ride)If we took the zero days out like Mrs Gorp likes to do, we averaged63.84 miles per day in 64 days. Ha!! :-))154,099 feet of climbing up hills, so I guess we went downhill that far too because we started at sea level and ended at sea level. I guess you could say it was a flat ride because when we were all done, we were at the same elevation as when we started. ;-))We crossed the Great Divide 9 times and the highest peak was over 11,500 feet high.The state with the worst drivers was Colorado. That surprised me because they seem to be mostly outdoor type people, but they definitely didn't care about driving within a couple feet of us at 80mph with oncoming traffic. I really don't think they know how to slow a car down.The best drivers were in Oregon....thanks!!!Two animals I got to see that I had never seen before were the grizzly in Wyoming and the badger in Oregon. We saw a stuffed badger in a display when we toured Mount St Helens and that confirmed that it really was a badger we saw.We did get to see a lot of mule deer and elk...way more than I expected. I got to see more beautiful eastern bluebirds in Missouri than I've ever seen before. It's rare for me to see a bald eagle along the AT, but I saw quite a few out west and even got fairly close to some. I saw another golden eagle on Mount St Helens, but I've only seen a few of those buggers on this trip. I got some nice...and close-up pictures of mountain sheep.The redwing blackbird was the one bugger we saw almost all the way across the USA.We were chased by dogs mainly in Kentucky and Missouri. The Jack Russels were the dogs that chased us the most. The pit bulls were the dogs I worried about the most. I ended up spraying three dogs and one Mrs Gorp with pepper spray. I used Fox Pepper Spray, the brand name, not really for a fox, and that stuff stopped them cold....and made Mrs Gorp spew and spit for miles. :-))We weren't chased by dogs in any other states that I remember.The most roadside litter was eastern Kentucky and that was mainly for one day's ride in one poor area.The litter I saw more than expected was cooler lids. I guess they just blow off when not secured.I got 3 flats, but only one of those were from a punture. The other 2 were friction flats from a faulty tire.For some reason, I seem to wear out rear tires every 2000 miles or so. Mrs Gorp was using Shwalbe Marathon Tires and they hardly show any wear...and she never got a flat.We rode through too many mornings with temps in the 20's and 20 to 40mph headwinds in the beginning along with some snow too.It seemed to me that we rode about 90% of the time into the wind. I would not ride west again...well, I would, but it will be a while. :-))We had to spend a little time in a storm shelter in Kansas because of tornadoes.We got into cold, snowy weather in western Wyoming for about 5 days.The coldest day for us wasn't actually the coldest weather we rode through. It was just 2 days before we finished. We left Sisters, Or and started getting rained on while climbing up to McKenzie Pass. It started out about 40 degrees and the rain soaked us, then it turned to snow at about 4000 foot elevation and stayed snow the rest of the way up and part of the way down. It turned back to a soaking rain in the low 30's for the rest of the day.We took 4 days off from riding, 3 of those were because of weather.There is Trail Magic along the bike trail too. We witnessed this from Goosebump The Snow Princess, Rainbow Slick, Underpants, Poppie, Fannypack, Hokey Pokey, Lois and Earl, Grassy Ridge, Lee and Rachel Perry, Joe Wieler, Liz and Tom, and George and Vonda. It seems like there was one other person I am forgetting....hummm, ummmm, oh yeah, Chief.The two best bike shops were Carbondale Bicycle Shop in Illinois and Danville Bicycle Shop in Kentucky. The one guy that helped me out the most with my bicycle was Dwan at Co-Motion Bikes, the company that built my bike.It seemed easier to me than hiking the AT, but there were also days when I was just plain beat.We never slept on the ground once. We stayed mostly in motels and ate at restaurants along the way.The motels weren't too expensive because we split the cost. It could be done cheaper, but I looked forward to a shower after riding all day. I could have ate my own cooking, but that certainly wouldn't have been fun. :-))I went from wearing an XL pair of biking shorts in the beginning, to wearing a L pair of biking shorts near the end and I can now see my....feet again. ;-))I really liked the "Take A Look" mirror that I had attached to my helmet. Mrs Gorp brought a Garmin Quest 2 GPS and that was a useless, expensive toy for the most part. My Pearl Izumi bike short liners were junk. They were completely worn out in just 68 days...and that was onkly using one pair at a time. The Brooks Saddle was worth every penny. I took a Suunto Compass and attached to my console and that worked great for telling me which way was west. :-)) I sent home my front panniers early on and only used a truck bag, rear panniers and a handlebar bag. They were Ortlieb's and they never leaked.The Topeak Road Morph tire pump worked great. The Slime tubes were overkill. I loved my altimeter which was on one computer and I used another bike computer for mileage.It turned out to be an even greater adventure than I had orginally thought. :-))