Biking 4 Invisible Children

Took Over 2,000 Pics. CHECK THEM OUT!

2009-09-16T10:12:00.005-06:00

Greetings,

Thanks to Kristen for volunteering to be the professional photographer for this trip, she snapped over 2,000 photos during the 83 days on the road. They are all uploaded on Picasa, so just click the below link to be directed to them.
Feel free to make comments on any photo you like, find funny, or think is weird!

http://picasaweb.google.com/biking4invisiblechildren

Mark

Day 82 & 83: Ashland to Williamsburg to Yorktown = WE JUST BIKED ACROSS AMERICA!!!

2009-08-29T18:36:00.002-06:00

Day 82

We ate at Perkins for breakfast, gulped down two pots of coffee between Mike and I, applied sunscreen, and set out for the day. Today, the roads were not that secluded, rather busy, a lot of traffic, and loud. We had to ride single-file and it wasn't until about half-way into the day that we found the peace and quiet, country roads we all prefer so much more! It was a hot day and we stopped for a cold beverage at a gas station. Mike came to the table wearing a leather doo-rag and goggles and we couldn't help but crack up.

We made it to Cannon City about mid-day where we had planned to meet up with a few Kiwanis members from the Yorktown Chapter. Mike had been in contact with the group since the start of the trip and they wanted to ride with him for the last 40 miles or so. We met Bill, a former president of the group, Claire, and Jack. They were ready to go and Bill set the pace. I was having trouble keeping up with his 15 mph pace, so although he was 70, he could still definitely get those legs going! They took us on a very scenic tour on the route to Williamsburg, where we had planned on staying for the night. We rode on the Colonial Parkway which was built during the Depression to create more jobs...it's still the same road! It was a bit bumpy but very pretty! As all 8 of us rode into the city, I felt like a celebrity or something. Everyone was looking at us and pointing, we pulled up to the Hospitality House Hotel, which was absolutely beautiful! The Kiwanis graciously set Mike up with a suite in the nicest hotel I had possibly ever seen! They said we were welcome to stay with him as the suite was two rooms, equipped with a kitchen and large restroom! We were so excited! They told us to get cleaned up and meet them at the Green Room Cafe next door where we enjoyed a nice tasty brew and some juicy burgers that were half off!!

We enjoyed their company and to my surprise my great Uncle Stole, Aunt Jan, and second cousin Jeff took time out of their evening to meet me there as well! We visited and it was so neat to have a part of my family there, so far away from home!It had been a great day and we were so close to finishing, we all couldnt help having a lovely time!

Day 83

Today was it, the last day of biking across the country, day #83! We met Bill out front of the hotel at 9:00 sharp and there were some people there taking our pictures and interviewing Mike. We again felt like celebrities, an awesome way to finish our adventure! We had a total of 13 miles to ride and Bill led us through Colonial Williamsburg as well as on the Colonial Parkway once again right next to the York River where we could smell the salty goodness! It was a lovely morning and we made it to the statue mid morning! We took some photos, hip hip hoorayed, and quickly rode our bikes down the hill, so they could taste the Atlantic. We dipped our wheels in and then jumped in helmets and all to bask in our glory! It was a moment to remember thats for sure!

After, Bill and his wife made room for our bikes and gear in their cars and drove us to have lunch with the Kiwani's at their weekly meeting! We arrived at Joe & Mimma's Italian Restaurant where the entire backroom was reserved for the Kiwani Club. As we walked into the room, spandex and all, we were applauded for just biking across the country. As you could imagine we were all a bit suprised and did not expect such a nice welcome! The president introduced Mike and he stood up in front of the club explaining the inns and outs of the camp he was raising money for that was sponsored by the Kiwanis Club in Oregon. They then invited us up to talk about Invisible Children as well as Rob and Dan to talk about Cyclists Fighting Cancer. We realized that between the five of us we had raised close to $20,000, all for organizations dedicated to helping children. It was such an awesome way to finish the tour, I mean to be greeted by all these people who were so eager to find out how they could help and wanting to be there to congratulate us, complete strangers at that. As well as finishing as a group, we had become a family, and bringing it back to the reason that we all decided to do this in the first place; it truly couldn't have been a better ending to a trip of memories that will last a lifetime.

Mark and I have decided that we are each going to write a reflection entry. I'm not sure if anyone will read it because the trips over now, but I have learned alot this summer and have a few final thoughts that I would like to write down, to have to look at in the future. So you all have Kristen's words of wisdom to look forward to! ha Take care and thanks so much for all your support over the last few months, we truly would'nt have been able to do it without all of you! So thank you!!! We've done it!!!!

Day 81: Charlottesville to Ashland

2009-08-29T18:28:00.003-06:00

We hit up Starbucks at 6:30 am where we used our graduation giftcards for the first time! This was the first Starbucks we had run into on the road, besides Fort Collins! We rode past a tree full of butterflies so I was happy and just kept riding! On days like today when you prepare for a long day of riding, everything just kinda blends together, at least for me. I took a video of myself going downhill at one point saying yaa-hoo the entire time and well to be honest thats all I really remember! Except for the story Rob told me about spinning so hard in spin class that the bike started smoking, I almost fell off my bike!

We went to a chinese food restaurant where they served us each about three pounds of food and then we decided we would call around to find the cheapest hotel room in Ashland. Let me rephrase, I called around to find the cheapest hotel room in Ashland, you'll never believe it $43 for a two beds for the five of us. Even cheaper then camping in some instances!! We were all pretty stoked about that and enjoyed a nice sleep in a real bed except for Mike that is, he had to sleep on the ground poor guy!

Kristen

Day 80 Vesuvius to Charlottesville

2009-08-28T14:41:00.002-06:00

This is the day we have all been waiting for! We grabbed a good hearty breakfast at Gertie's Cafe and headed up the hill!! It was pretty darn steep and for about 4 miles we were climbing up and up and up. Seeing some fellow cyclists flying down what we were were slowly climbing, was a bit distracting. The ride was beautiful but tough. Each pedal was a conscious effort especially with only two rings on my bike.

We all made it within the hour and reached the Blue Ridge Parkway which was absolutely gorgeous, lush green foliage lined the parkway on either side of us with valleys and forests glowed in the distance as far as we could see. We stopped at a few overlooks and at one particular one, we met Leo who was having some major problems with his bike. He was headed West to Oregon and we gave him some advice, wished him the best of luck, and as we were leaving we saw a huge black snake slithering into the bush, I screamed! We stopped in Afton, Virginia, another place we had been reccommended to go and planned on having lunch there.

Thats when we met June, the Cookie Lady. She has resided in Afton for most of her life and has been catering to cyclists since the bicentennial in 76. She originally found many cyclists coming through her small town and offered water to them out of her hose. She then dedicated her side house, known as the bike house, to all passing through cyclists. It is a shrine to bicycles, cyclists, their stories, memorabilia and everything else you could possibly imagine about bikes. Over 14,000 cyclists have signed the guestbook, got their pictures taken, and have slept under the bike house roof. It is a truly amazing sight! We were all in shock and just kept wandering around the place, there were about four rooms and you couldn't even see the walls..they were covered in post cards, and newspaper clippings from the years past. We visited with her for a long time, listening to her telling us stories of all the cyclists from over the years. She offered us cookies of course and we ate a lot of them! We said our goodbyes and got our photos taken and headed on our way to Charlottesville.

We didn't exactly know where we were going to stay and somehow arrived at the conclusion of camping out at a church on their back lawn. We originally were thinking of staying at a fraternity house however, after inquiring with a few we weren't exactly 100% they wanted 5 bikers there, especially four men in spandex, i probably would have been fine on my own ha! So we went across the street to the church, everything always works out you know! We took hose showers and grabbed some dinner at a local restaurant in town. We slept under the stars and prepared for a 94 mile day!~

Kristen

Day 79 Troutville to Vesuvius

2009-08-27T13:32:00.002-06:00

We were suprised to find Carleen at 7am by the pavilion equipped with her camera in hand snapping photos of us like we were celebrities! We chatted with her for a bit and were on our way. We were riding down the highway and there went Carleen in her car! She stopped twice down the road to take more photos of us! A bit strange but we just kept riding! The boys went to Burger King for lunch and I just couldn't do it, so I ate a pb&j instead. We rode our bikes over a walking bridge which was a bit rickety but we survived!

We made it into Lexington by the afternoon and decided to take a long break there. We toured Washington and Lee University and walked around the old historic town. We ate some ice cream and enjoyed the beautiful sunny afternoon! We rode the last 20 miles or so with a light sprinkle of rain and pulled into Vesuvius behind Gerthie's Store. We ate some delicious peaches and took some hose showers, played some cards and drifted into dream land!

We had been hearing about the horrors of the climb right after Vesuvius for months now. We met numerous people who said they had feared for their lives on the descent down and were uncontrollaby hitting 45 mph while slamming on their breaks. The same mountain that we had to pedal up! We were told it was about a four mile climb and the steepest on the map. I was worried and definitely have dreamt about it! Another guy we talked to actually crashed on his way down, skidding his elbows pretty bad, so bad that Elbows became his nickname, and had to go to the hospital! Others told us that their rims were so hot they were smoking! Tomorrow we would find out for ourselves!!!

Kristen

Day 78 Radford to Troutville

2009-08-27T12:07:00.003-06:00

Today we have completed MAP 11 and we are now on our last map!!! We stopped after 13 miles and ate at the Country Kitchen Restaurant in Christiansburg. The boys practiced some aerodynamic bike moves and we found an apple tree and played a version of apple baseball with a bike pump. Oh the small things in life that you'll never forget!

Rob and I were riding along, side by side, in the back of the pack and talking about god knows what, and Rob screamed out in shock! He said, "You just ran over a lizard and his tail shot off!!" So of course, we made a u turn and took a video of the lizard, well two halves of it. The tail was blue neon and still squirming around. Apparently, a lizard can shoot his tail off as a defense mechanism to distract his predator, and in this case he shot his tail off but got run over twice, once by my front wheel and again by my back tire, poor thing.

We made it to the city park and set up camp under the pavillion. While the boys played a game of basketball and another game of horseshoes, I went across the street to the fire station and asked if I could shower and do some laundry! The guys were really nice and let us all shower there! We decided to BBQ and had a feast for dinner. They cooked me dinner! We had steak and brats and potato salad and coleslaw! We met a women named Carleen who loved all the boys and gave us a few laughs! I somehow lost my shoes, they must have fallen off my bungee, (the 3rd time this has happpened) and so Carleen gave me a pair of her Saucony tennis shoes! What a doll! They were a perfect fit and really comfortable! However, before then, when I walked over to the fire department I wore Marks shoes which were, well you could imagine, huge on me and I looked like a clown, pretty priceless as you could imagine. I definitely received a few funny looks!

Night Night Kristen

Day 77 Troutdale to Radford

2009-08-27T11:31:00.002-06:00

We ate breakfast at the same diner and Mike ordered the biggest bowl of grits they had to offer. He paid $8 for the bowl, we all had a pretty good laugh about that one!

We had a climb early in the morning and then it was pretty much all rolling hills on a downhill slope for the majority of the 77 mile ride. We were given a business card about a week or so previous to stay with the Lee Family in Radford and thats what we had planned to do. The boys made me call Dr. Lee and I am happy I did because he offered me the guest room with a queen size bed as well as a lovely view from the second floor and all the boys pitched their tents on the front lawn! Yay!!

We arrived at the Lee's and Sarah, Thad's wife offered us cold drinks and showed me to my room! I knew we would get along because she was a Volvo driver! We got cleaned up and did some laundry and after, Sarah offered us her car to drive to dinner! Mike played guitar for us and the boys went outside while I went upstairs to my comfortable bed! The Lee's were so generous and we all appreciated their hospitality!!

Night Kristen

Day 76 UMC to Troutdale

2009-08-27T10:47:00.002-06:00

As we woke up on the comfy church pews, we gathered our belongings and headed out for an early start. Now as there were five of us, we set off into the early morning and enjoyed the rolling hills through the countryside. I will always remember this ride because it was one of my favorites. If I could wake up every morning, drink a cup of java, and take a ride in that exact same place I would be in heaven! However, it didn't last too long before we had to start climbing, climbing and more climbing.

We reached the peak of the mountain and got ready for the biggest descent toward Hayters Gap, we had had in awhile. Usually I would be more than excited to fly like the wind down the hill, but with only one brake working I was a bit more hesitant. The boys let me go first, because they said that I would be going the fastest, ha. I think it was because they wanted to get a good look at me wiping out if that was the case! What sweet men!

We stopped at a diner for breakfast and after the food was brought out, we had to split up on two tables because the boys ordered sooooooo much food! After we all had food babys, we stopped in Damascus at the bike shop to remedy a few problems on our bikes. Mike had a shredded tire, myself, one brake, and Mark needed to get his tire trued. After about an hour or so, we were ready to head up the hill and begin a 13 mile climb, however it was POURING! We had a meeting and although probably not the smartest decision, we decidied to keep treking!

So up we went, laughing and sheilding our eyes from the painful rain drops. It was a beautiful ride and we made it! We got to the bike hostel which consisted of two rooms equipped with bunk beds, a nice little porch and a nice shower! We ate dinner and crashed!

Kristen

Day 75 Breaks to UMC of Rosedale

2009-08-26T08:43:00.003-06:00

I woke up in the morning, thanking God that I survived the night and wasnt supper for the raccoon, however my towel wasnt so lucky. Yup, thats correct, the fury little guy ate my towel.

It was a misty morning and we packed up our things and while dining at the same restaurant as the night before, we met a man who approached us and showed us some pictures from the previous year of his cross country ride. We also met a group of three couples who donated both to our cause as well as Rob and Dans ride for cancer. People are so generous, I tell ya!

Today's ride wasn't too long but we had a pretty long hike up one of the taller peaks. It was hot but we reapplied our 50 spf sunscreen!! I tried beating Mark up the mountain but was unsuccessful!

We asked a couple if they knew where a grocery store was and they said it was 5 miles down the road. We got a second opinion and are happy we did because we came to find out it was actually 12!! Thats a huge difference when you are on a bike! We decided to eat at the gas station and to my surprise, I had a really nice salad!

We made it to the United Methodist Church and found the sign that said Cyclist's Welcome! The door was open and we made ourselves at home! There was a kitchen for me to use and really comfortable pew cushions that were reccommended for us to sleep on. There was also a huge cabinet full of food for all the cyclists! We were ecstatic and used the hose out back to take showers. I even took some girl time (by myself) and napped on the swinging bench outside in the hot sun.

The boys tightened my back brake because the front one was out of order while I cooked dinner! I made a plethera of pasta, macaroni and cheese, and spaghetti and we had a feast. A guy pulled up to the church by the name of Michael Henry. He was pulling a bob trailer and was from Portland , Oregon, surprisingly headed East! That meant that he had been riding like a crazy man in order to catch up to us, at least 100 miles a day! He turned out being really cool and we all had some good laughs! From that moment on we were like a little family (I was like a mom with 4 boys) and we all decided to finish off the trip together and ride into Yorktown as a posse!

We crashed and set our alarms for 6 am! Yikes!

Kristen

Day 74 Hindman to Breaks

2009-08-26T08:20:00.003-06:00

Today we had planned a 65 mile ride, but somehow it turned into 80. Lets just say that if we had planned to ride 80 miles, it would have been fine, but to be on the bike for an additional hour....that can get annoying. Anyways, we finally left Kentucky and made it to our last state, Virginia!!!

In the morning we climbed Pippas Pass as well as 5 other peaks. I think we all agree that one of those peaks was the hardest pass on the ENTIRE map. Although it only lasted for about 2 miles, this was the steepest thing I have ever seen for the longest amount of time. Without stopping, because if I did I wouldn't have been able to get back on my bike, I met Mark and Dan at the top, who both looked like they had just taken showers. My face was about as red as a tomato, possibly even turning into a purple shade, (red onion status).

As we descended into Lookout Valley, I was in the back of the pack, seeing that I only had one working brake at the time, I was taking it as slow as I could. Thats when it happened, a huge black rot weiler put his turbo boost into gear and was inches away from taking a big juicy bite out of my calf. I quickly grabbed my spray bottle full of extreme hot sauce and shot that sucker in between the eyes. While still pedaling as fast as I could, I heard wimpering and right as I turned back to look, the dog was down, he took a faceplant in the grass and I was home free with a heart rate that was off the charts.

Looking back at this moment, I realize I could have seriously injured the dogs sight however, my life was endanger! I really do love dogs but not when they are about to eat me. I consider this act as taking the necessary means to keep my leg, thus it is justified.

So after that additional hour of riding, up and down hills, we found a campsite at Breaks National Park. It was so beautiful!!! We set up our tents and took showers. I took some of the boys clothes to the sinks and began hand washing them, they all called me Cinderella. Thats the thanks I get for washing their dirty clothes. Anyways, come to find out, on our way to the restaurant, they had a laundry room!!! Another hour of my day wasted. After dinner we rode back to our campsite, but this time in the pitch black darkness. It was about a mile ride and we couldnt see a darn thing. Rob was hit in the face with a bat!!!! That had me laughing for a long time!!!!!!!

We went to bed and in the middle of the night, I woke up to a breathing sound right next to my head. I turned my head around to find a raccoon practically in my tent. I was speechless. Literally, I couldn't speak and I really did try. I was terrified! I didnt move and finally fell back asleep.

I can't believe we are in our last state! WOOO-HOO!!!!

Kristen

Day 73

2009-08-25T17:00:00.002-06:00

Booneville to Hindman

Today is the second day in the Appalachians. There has been a lot of hype over the Aps, but I personally don't think they are too hard. I think the hardest mountain range we crossed was the Ozarks in Missouri! The Aps are similar to the Ozarks, but the only difference is the climbs are a bit longer, but not as steep!!

Our experience in Kentucky has been excellent. The people have been accommodating when we had questions on directions and gave us some good recommendations on restaurants to eat at. We rode about 35 miles with the heat index reaching around 90 degrees and our stomachs telling us we needed some serious calories ASAP! We were in luck and noticed a church was having carnival and had FOOD STANDS! We chowed down on some cheeseburger and listened to live Christian rock music.

Back on the road another 35 miles to the small town of Hindman. The 35 miles went by fast because our new English friends, especially the stand up comedian Rob kept us laughing with his Seinfeld commentary! As we arrived in the town we heard from other cyclists that there was Historical Society which allows cyclist to spend the night and warm showers. The only downfall for this lodging situation was we had to climb the steepest hill of this entire trip. No exaggerations the grade was 18%. Rob, Dan, and me tried climbing up with grade, but failed halfway up! I thought my chain was going to snap! As we arrived at the Historical Society we were greeted by a nice man with ice tea. The owner in the lodge was nice, but his price was a bit ridiculous. He wanted to charge 30 dollars a person...to expensive for our tight budget! Instead we parked our bikes next to a creek and decided this was the best place for camp. Kristen knew she wouldn't be having a shower, but she's getting better these days with not having a warm shower. She has become content with other means of showers such as gas station sinks, water hoses, ect.. Today she was in luck because the creek was 3 feet wide and 2 feet deep! The only negative about this creek was that it was heavily polluted with fertilizer runoff from agriculture. When we were showering one of the town's residents yelled at us "Tomorrow you are going to wake up with rashes all over your bodies from all that pollution!" We just laughed it off and continued bathing.

We went out for pizza and now going to sleep at 9pm cause I will be waking up at the crack of dawn!

Night Mark

2009-08-18T14:28:00.003-06:00

WE JUST BIKED ACROSS AMERICA!!

Sorry for the delayed updates on the blog. We have been riding 80-90 mile days and didn't have time to update the blog. It was great to finish with a group of people. We literally rode our bikes into the ATlantic with Dan Rob and Mike.

Kristen mom is flying across the country CA to VA (only takes a 5 hr flight instead of 11 weeks haha!) and meeting up with us to celebrate this great accomplishment!

We are going to drink some victory champagne right now. Check back in 2 days for complete update of our trip

Thanks for all your support!
Mark

DAY 69-72...almost caught up!

2009-08-11T11:30:00.002-06:00

Day 69 Rough River Dam to Convenient store off highway 84

Because we were in an "RV" site rather than a tent site, this old crazy lady charged us $20, $8 more dollars than we should have paid. Mark was angry and when he tried talking to her about it, she raised her voice and put her foot on the pedal of her golf cart and peeled out, leaving Mark with a strange look on his face. I, of course, was laughing hysterically! We enjoyed a lovely breakfast with our neighboring friends and headed on the road. The terrain was the opposite of flat and after two big riding days, we were pretty tired. We had a water fight and minutes later a huge storm erupted! We took some awesome pictures and made it to a bike hostel right off the side of the road!

We were instantly greeted by Lauren, who gave us freeze pops and welcomed us into the store. We visited with Arnold and Lucy, her mom and dad, and took nice warm showers and even learned how to snap green beans! Arnold took us to their garden where we picked potatoes and tomatoes, squash and cucumbers, which were washed up and cooked for dinner! We thoroughly enjoyed their company and had a wonderful dinner with them! Thanks again for your warm hospitality!

Day 70 Hostel to Bardstown

We woke up early and Lucy made us cheesy eggs! It was Lauren's first day of high school and we waved goodbye to her as the school bus pulled away from the house. It was a bit overcast and we decided to grab some caffeine at the gas station about 15 miles into the day. Mark couldn't resist a peanut butter and Oreo milkshake at 10 in the morning and I decided to try a five hour energy hour shot. After two episodes of Judge Judy and one Maury talk show, we finally decided to end our two hour break at the gas station!

We rode a mile off route to tour Abe Lincolns birthplace and saw the actual cabin where his family lived as well as the spring where they retrieved their water from! It was pretty cool but we had to get back on the road!

We were reading the newspaper in the town of ..... Where the headlining articles were about two men stealing generators and one about the mold forming on Lincoln's cabin. After lunch I decided that to change the routine up a bit, I was going to make Mark navigate to Bardstown, about 35 miles away! I was enjoying watching him look at the map and acting concerned about not missing a turn, it actually made me quite happy. I was kicking back enjoying the ride, not knowing where the heck I was going and it was lovely! We had a few steep up and downs for the last handful of miles and pulled into a campground at the edge of town, about 6:15. We met Dave, the camp host who gave us some info about restaurants and laundry and such. He even gave me a ride to the showers in his nice little golf cart! (which was not very far away at all but I still enjoyed it!)

We met east bounders, Dan and Rob, our two new English friends whom we've adopted to our cycling posse. Or shall I say, they have adopted us because they know what's going on and we are just basically following them! They are a bit older and wiser than us but we all get along quite well! After a shower and a bit of a chat with some other riders, we grabbed some food down the street and enjoyed listening to live karaoke! Mark chickened out although I know he wanted to sing Avril Lavine!

We decided to wake up early in the morning and try to ride with the other boys! A 5:30 alarm was set and a 92 mile ride to Berea was in store!

Day 71 Bardstown to Berea

Hearing the alarm go off at 6 am makes me sick to my stomach. We haven't woken up this early in about two weeks, but it feels good to start pedaling before the scorching sun comes out in midday. Rob and Dan wanted to stop for a quick breakfast and they came up with McDonald's. We didn't want to complain so we swallowed our pride and Kristen had fruit and yogurt(fruit was still frozen) and I had the Mcgriddle(around 800 calories).

We cranked out 45 miles in 3 hrs. I think all of us were happy to share our cycling stories with each other and it made the time drift by. All of us were feeling hungry, looking for lunch when Lees Buffet for 5 dollars a person caught our attention. We owned that buffet and definitely got our moneys worth for fried chicken! We taught our new friends, about Kristen and mines little saying which can be put in front of any saying or expression, for example; we are biking across America SO HARD! It's a little inside joke we wanted to share with everyone, sorry if you don't get it but it's become part of our cycling vocabulary.

The riding for the rest of the day was filled with rollers and some nice descents. The temperature was pretty hot outside, but our new friends and the scenery kept our minds off the heat. The last 10 miles we had a good pace line and pretended we were in the Tour de France.

We found a campsite for cheap and took our beloved and long anticipated showers and grabbed some dinner. Recap of dinner..all of us enjoyed Cracker Barrel but never got the milkshakes. Rob and I paid 2.60 for strawberry flavored milk!

Another early morning ahead of me.
Mark

Day 72 Berea to Booneville

Today in a nutshell:

1. My stereo gone, someone stole it....:( ipod gone too...of course it's the first day in the Appalachians.
2. Ate breakfast at Walmart and bought large sandwiches for $4.98 for lunch.
3. Shredded the first day of the Appalachians...so hard!
4. Ate our lunch in shady grass patch on the side of the road.
5. I almost ran a cat over, by accident! But it moved at the last second.
6. I sprayed some dogs with hot sauce that got in my way
7. We rode 57 miles
8. We found a guy named Joe with a crazy beard, no teeth, and a cat named sissy who is riding from Florida to California on a mountain bike, packed for the end of the world.
9. We drank real milkshakes.
10. Mark went running and had a few close calls with some dogs.
11. We had a debate over top ramen noodle soup.

DAY 68

2009-08-07T14:46:00.003-06:00

Day 68 Seebree to Falls of Rough

Today we rode 75 miles and for some reason I was feeling like a triathlete. I got an extra energy boost and was bolting up the hills. We stopped at a convenient store and were delightfully surprised to find homemade turkey sandwiches from a lady who had been making sandwiches for 31 years! The terrain got a bit hillier and the day and miles got a bit longer! I wasn't feeling like a triathlete for the last part of the day, thats for sure. We stopped in a small town and ate some grapes.

30 miles later we found a campground by the Rough River Dam and I took a shower immediately! All Mark could think about was food, so he went to restaurant while I passed out in the tent for a bit. When he returned, with a nice chicken salad for me, our neighbors at the campsite invited us over to hang out by the campfire. We met Denise, Danny and Maddy, who lived in northern Kentucky. They offered us s'mores as well as cold Pepsi's and we enjoyed their company very much! Maddy put on a show for us and danced to Hannah Montana, blonde wig, sequenced dress and all! As we were headed to our tent, they invited us for breakfast in the morning!

Kree

Day 67

2009-08-07T14:24:00.008-06:00

Day 67 eddyville to seebree

Today we geared up for a 90 mile ride! We knew we had a long day ahead of us! Chowed down on some good breakfast that would provide us with the needed energy. The whole day there were rolling hills. Kentucky is quite beautiful with the majority of the states lands used for agriculture purposes. We rode through fields of corn, soy beans, cucumber, and tobacco crops. We stopped for lunch to refuel and 2 hours later we stopped again foe me so I could eat another cheeseburger.

We had been on our bikes for about 7 hours and the sun was beginning to set with only 2O miles left until warm showers and a home cooked meal. A funny thing that happened to Kristen was that her head almost was taken off by a turkey vulture which literally came out of the bushes. I tell ya this girl always has really random animal encounter! My story wasn't so funny...I think the bad burger that I ate was tainted and had to GO number 2 REALLY bad!! Lucky to say that when I thought there wasn't any more strengh to hold it anymore I saw the wonderful church with Pastor Bob standing out front, greeting us with a warm smile.

The church was really nice and very accommodating. Bob let us have the whole basement of the church which has showers, tv, mattresses, and a mean ping pong table. Bob was kind enough to invite us to dinner that hid lovely wife Violet made. Bob and Violet have been letting cyclist stay and eat warm delicious dinners for years! Violet made an amazing dinner and we stuffed our faces until Kristen and I got food babies! Thanks again Bob and Violet for our hospitality and taking us in like your own. Your kind gestures will not be forgotten.

After dinner we exchanged stories with the West bounders and they gave Kristen a spray bottle filled with extra extra hot sauce the fend off the ferocious dogs in E Kentucky. Hope it works!

Well we stayed up late..it's about 2 am wayyy past our bedtime!
Night
Mark

Day 63-66

2009-08-07T14:19:00.002-06:00

Day 63 Pilot Knob to Ozora

We grabbed some breakfast at the Hitchin Post Restaurant, across the street from our pavillion/home for the previous night. To my surprise, there were two smashed beetles next to where my head was and Mark said he saw them headed straight for my hair in the dim light when he was going to sleep! He smashed them to pieces for me, oh how sweet! Maybe I should sleep with something over my head!!!!

We made it to Farmington after 17 miles and grabbed some caffeine, coffee and mountain dew usually do the trick! After talking with a local, we found out about the winerys close to Coffman another 25 miles away! We hopped on our vehicles and began thinking about a nice refreshing taste of wine! We met a very nice couple who bought us a glass of wine, they were celebrating their 26th year anniversary! Another couple gave us 20$ to support our cause! I tell ya, its teuly amazing how generous people are, even complete strangers!?! We rode another 20 miles, and met George W. Lawson, a westbound dude who carried an insane amount of water! He showed us a picture of him holding a roll of toilet paper and taking a dump by a no dumping sign! It was pretty classic, not gonna lie!

We rolled into Ozora, basically a truck stop/gas station four way corner and found our favorite place to eat lately. We ate Subway for dinner, once again!!!! After a lovely dinner we went across the street to the motel and asked the front desk if we could pitch our tent in the grass patch in front of the closed down bar and frog infested pool that was murky green! They said it was fine but if we got a bug bite that it wasnt their responbility, whatever that was suppossed to mean! We literally slept by a marsh, and had to be careful where we walked, it was like quick sand but muddy grass instead. Ha! I actually found it quite funny! We took sink showers at the gas station and I went to bed thinking I was going to get attacked by a large bug of some sort!

Day 64 Ozora to Carbondale

We woke up in marsh land, grabbed a few hearty snacks at the gas station and were on our way for a 75 mile day! We mastered bike dancing, could possibly be a new sport!

We entered Illinois, across the Mississippi River and into Chester: the home of popeye! We snapped some photos and grabbed some lunch at the grocery store, we sat inside on a bench and people watched for awhile until the rain began! We decided it was only a light sprinkle and kept riding, southern Illinois is beautiful! Rolling hills and green fields and lots of trees! The storm was chasing us all day but somehow we made it to Motel 6 just in time! I took a shower as fast as I could and Mark was glued to the television! We slept in a lovely, real bed and enjoyed the use of the air conditioning! We planned on meeting Irene, Marks mom the following day and taking a rest day, the first one since Fort Collins!!

Day 65 Rest day in Carbondale

The day consisted of going to the bike shop, WalMart, the laundry mat, and Applebees! It was a productive rest day and so nice to see a familiar face! Poor Irene was stuck in bumper to bumper traffic and after driving for eight hours she made it!

She went to all the trouble of bringing us both new clothes and plenty of food in an ice chest! We gave her all the stuff we didn't want and exchanged some of our old stuff with the new. We downsized a bit to lighten our load for the Appalachians! We enjoyed each others company and got a good rest in a bed for the second night in a row! Thanks again Irene! It was so great to see you and we will see you again very soon!!!

Day 66 Carbondale to Eddyville

We didnt wake up until 9:30, I blame it on the beds! After Irene's hotelmade breakfast which was delicious, we picked up our bikes, had a photo shoot and pedalled out of town! We said our goodbyes and planned to ride 60 miles to Eddyville.

It seemed that today, EVERYONE was mowing their lawns as we passed by their house, church, school, whatever! It was very strange! All day we encountered great roads! Not much traffic, not too steep, and beautiful country! We rolled into Eddyville about 6:30 and found Hayes Campground, about 1 mile off route. It was horse friendly you could say and our campsite was directly next to a horse stall! Our neighbors showed us their awesome RV equipped with horse and human quarters! We met Rebel, the black stallion, and when he went pee, it literally sounded like someone turned on a fire hose! We met another man from washington named James who we joked and chatted with for a bit. He gave us some money out of the blue and told us to have a safe trip.. No questions asked! At that moment, as we were siting on the picnic bench, boiling water for some mac and cheese, the storm approached and conquered! It poured cats and dogs and we ran under the office porch for shelter!

As we walked back to camp, there were rivers running down the sides of our tent and we were happy to find that somehow our tent was perfectly dry! We slept like rocks and were hoping to find the storm gone come morning time!

Kristen

Day 60

2009-08-01T10:22:00.001-06:00

Day 60 Hartville to Houston

We started our ride and decided we would take a short day because of the location of campsites in the next few days. Plus we are planning on meeting Marks mom, Irene, in Carbondale, Illinois which gives us plenty of time to get over the Ozarks and cross the Mississpi River! We stopped at a general store about 20 miles in, where we snacked a bit and Mark turned the hose on and started spraying it all over himself while dancing like a weirdo! We rode another 20 miles or so and hit up the Subway in Houston, suprise, suprise!

After an hour and a half of enjoying the air conditioning, and Mark napping we headed to the park to set up camp! We were able to take warm showers at the pool and played frisbee for two minutes, that's the longest you can play without sweating profusely!

We ate and went to bed, the essentials of life!
Kristen

Day 62

2009-08-01T08:54:00.005-06:00

Even though we went to sleep late, we got an early start to the morning. On the road before 9...we knew it was going to be a good day. The weather was overcast, so the scorching sun wasn't at our faces. Within the first 1 mile, we had a steep climb. Lets say our legs weren't warmed up and we began sweating profusely. The rest of day was filled with rollers and the sweat ran faster down our entire bodies.

We stopped for lunch in Ellington. We were starving because we didn't eat any breakfast. I ordered a ranch double cheeseburger..thinking it was a double cheeseburger with ranch as the dressing. When it came out it seriously was a pound of meat with a little bit of lettuce and NO RANCH. I'm proud to say I was able to eat the whole thing. It was difficult for Kristen to enjoy her meal due to my greasy burger right in front of her face.

We rode to a small town called Pilot Knob and got dinner at our favorite place SUBWAY. Seriously we have been eating at Subway for the past 7 days. It's just economical to eat there. After eating we went to the city park to setup home under a pavilion. The park was right next to a famous Civil War Fort called Kaskia. We went into the visitor center and the tour guide named Brick gave us a history lesson about how the Union soldiers upheld the Fort from being overtaken by the Confederates.

Kristen had the itch to do the laundry cause we were running out of clean clothes. We walked across the street from the City Park to a motel to see if we could use their laundry and possibly jump into the pool (What we consider a shower!). Brent the manager on duty was kind enough to let us do both!

I want to thank the loyal fans of our blog. We appreciate everyone's support! Keep on keepin on!

Mark

Day 61

2009-07-31T22:08:00.005-06:00

Today we woke up to "The most annoying sound I have ever heard," Kristen says about my cell phone alarm. We packed everything up before 9am and waited for the library to open, so we could catch up with emails and update the website. I personally spent the time emailing tourism outfitters in downtown Chicago where I could do my 2 month internship. I tell ya it's a bit scary that this trip is going to be ending in about three weeks and our simple lives of biking, eating, and sleeping will come to an abrupt end and we will have to start looking for jobs. However, Kristen and I both discussed our life after this trip and knew it was going to be different, but the exciting thing is that we will be going on a new adventure, with more new people to meet, and new experiences to share. We wouldn't trade this summer that was filled with heartwarming stories of acts of kindness that strangers have done throughout the states we passed, or the funny people we met along the way, or myself learning a thing or two about women. The most important thing we will take out of this summer is that we "just two ordinary college student" had the passion, motivation, and determination to pursue something that we truly cared about and wanted to make a difference in the world. We used a lot of the skills that college has taught us and incorporated that into a bike ride which will help children have the chance to receive an education.

After the library we went to our favorite one-stop shopping center.....Walmart. We bought some breakfast food and 1 pound of beef jerky! We really don't like shopping there, but its perfect for our budget that is slowly dwindling because all the food we consume in order to hit our 5,000-6,000 calorie daily intake. We love burning so many calories because seriously we can eat whatever is in front of us and still lose weight.

We got back on the road and into the Ozarks again. This day is when we really entered the Ozark Mountains. I thought all the hills we were climbing for the past two days were the Ozarks...was I in for a treat! The scenery reminded Kristen and I of Costa Rica. The Ozarks are really lush and green, with trees closely spaced in high canopies. It was absolutely stunning. I felt like I was riding through the Amazon Rain forest. We must admit, we had no idea the Ozark Mountains (I wouldn't necessarily consider them mountain just CONSTANT STEEP HILLS) existed. The 60 or so miles we rode were hard. It was probably the steepest grades we faced in this whole trip. The good part about these hills was the downhill we got up to 45 mph and the climbs only lasted about 1/2 mile.

We stayed at a campground in the town of Emienence. It was nice because there was a river were we could wash up our sweaty bodies. That evening we met fellow campers Bre and Rob and they invited us for a few drinks. We enjoyed spending the night sharing stories about our trip and learning about their lives. Thanks for cooking up the late-night brats. Time flew up and it was almost 1am. We were just about to part to our tent when Bruce the maintenance guy at the campground came by with a guitar and starting playing the Eagles. Great way to finish up the night!

Night
Mark

Day 57-59

2009-07-27T09:07:00.002-06:00

Day 57 Walnut to Golden City

We set out to find the infamous Cooky's Cafe, located in Golden City that we had heard so much about! I think everyone we ran into headed West mentioned this restaurant and the delish homemade pies! We said our goodbyes to Bernie and rode 22 miles to Girard where we enjoyed a nice Subway sandwich in the air conditioning! We ran into three westbounders who warned us of the dogs in Kentucky once again and the pie we have been eagerly awaiting!

We stopped at the bike store and Mark bought a new helmet, it's white and shiny! We crossed into the border of Missouri, which for now doesn't look too much different than Kansas. We caught a tailwind when our route was headed straight East which was the first day we had experienced that kind of riding in a very long time! I think Kansas didn't like us too much and was trying to get us out of there!

I stopped to tinkle because it's hard to hold it when you are on a bike! I was crouched down in a ditch by the side of the road and as I went to hike up my spandex, something wasn't right! Not exactly sure how it happened but my shorts were filled with tiny little fuzzy like thorns, along with my gloves, socks, shirt and HAIR! Mark found it funny while it took me a while to get them all out!

We had to take a detour which added 8 miles onto the ride because of road construction and finally reached Cooky's Cafe right before closing time! Yummy food and superb pie! Mark had strawberry rhubarb and a piece of blackberry pie while I tried chocolate banana! All the pies are made daily and they gave us a whole apple pie for free that they were planning on tossing!

We took showers at the city park where we slept under a pavillion but got attacked by Mosquitos in the middle of the night! I woke up and found Mark in the tent, so I happily crawled inside for shelter from the little critters!

Day 58 Golden City to Fair Grove

Today we experienced our first taste of the Ozark Mountains! Small climbs yet steep grades, up and down, up and down, and up and down! When you get to the top of one you can see about another six in the distance! It's almost like a self-propelled roller coaster ride!

We grabbed some lunch at Willy B's diner and enjoyed the AC! It was a scorcher outside and the humidity was in full effect! We got back on the road and rode the roller coaster again for the last half of the day! Mark began to get angry at the hills and I could hear him yelling from afar!

We planned to stop in Fair Grove where we pitched our tent under a pavillon built by the historical society, with bathrooms and hot showers! Yay! We went to a cute cafe called the Oddfellows and it had some similar features to my future cafe (mine and Lisas 8-10 year plan)!

It was bedtime finally!

Day 59 Fair Grove to Hartville

Today I spent the majority of the day thinking about why people do the things they do. I believe that sometimes people in general, get in such a routine that often times it's easy to loose sight of the reasons they do the things they do. When you find a reason to perform a certain task, it makes it a bit easier to complete it. It's easy to get wrapped up in our own lives, having selfish thoughts, and focusing on simply what affects only ourselves. Instead, it's important to realize the big picture, the forces behind the actions we take, and the reason we wake up every morning and live our lives.

The reason we are riding across America on two wheels is to give children a classroom of their own and learn, laugh, and live through their childhood. Yes, we all have hardships and issues, and sometimes it feels like the hardest thing we've ever experienced but when you grasp the big picture, sometimes our problems are just small ones that can be fixed easily. I think everyone is guilty of having these thoughts and it's very easy to get sidetracked now and again. Reminding yourself of why you do the things you do, makes the world of difference!

While we were at Bernie's house, I read a quote in his bathroom which I'm sure you are all familiar with, "Life is 10% what happens to you, and 90% how you react to it." I love that saying because its so true! So everyone should remember that today and try not to stress out when something happens, take it like a grain of salt and get through it!

Sidenote: One other thing that Bernie said, "Two things happen to you when you get old; 1. You become forgetful 2. I forgot..." I got such a kick out of that!

A thunder storm woke us up mid morning, but we were safe and sound under the pavillion. It lasted til about 10, so we just kept going back to sleep....so nice!
After the storm passed, we were talking to the lady who owned the cafe, and her house was struck by lightning!

We began riding in the cool air, although it was definitely still humid. We loaded up on snacks at Wal-Mart, the biggest store we have seen in a while and ate some cereal for an afternoon snack. We rode through an Amish community, where we saw warning signs for a horse and buggy and dodged all the dead armadillos on the road..so sad. Up and down, up and down, up and down. This is the longest rollercoaster I have ever been on!

We rode about 43 miles to Hartville, a tiny town, with a four way stop, a Subway, of course and a laundry mat! We saw some people on horses headed to the corner store and knew we were in a small town. It had been two days now that I hadn't done laundry so I grabbed our dirty clothes and headed there. Once I got there, I put the clothes in the washer and realized there was not a laundry detergent or coin machine. I walked to the store and when I got back to the laundry mat, the door was locked with my clothes inside. I started cracking up and waved down the sherriff. He told me where the owner lived and I knocked on his door but got no answer. It wasn't even 8 o'clock yet, the time they said they closed, small towns do what they want I guess! I was there promptly at 8:30 in the morning, after a yummy breakfast and then we headed out to the next destination!

Day 54-56

2009-07-27T09:00:00.002-06:00

Day 54 Hutchinson to Newton

The morning started off early.... I can't put WE in the sentence because it was Kristen who was the one who woke up. She had a fun filled morning! Went to the laundry mat to wash our clothes (I thank god everyday that I selected a women to come with me because I always have clean clothes! To be honest if I was doing this trip with another guy I would never have any clean clothes!) and went to the store to get food for breakfast all before 8am. I woke up seriously a few minutes before she came back to the church and pretended to do something so I didn't feel completely worthless. My contribution to the morning was making scrambled eggs. I admit and Kristen agrees they were some good eggs. We finished packing up all our stuff and got out on the road around 10:30. We were happy with this start time and the only other thing we had to do was get Kristen a new tire for her back wheel cause the tread was worn off and kept on getting a flat on a daily basis. I went to the bike shop while Kree veered off to the library to update the blog/website. Next thing I knew it was 12:30 and I was still doing more repairs on her bike so it could make the 1400 mile trip to the Atlantic.

We were on the road at about 1...finally. Just as we were about to leave town and merge on the state highway we heard a gentlemen yell out of his pickup "I'm the guy on the website with Big Bikes". I was like this guy is a nut and kept on riding. Two minutes later he was back. This guy pulled up next to us and said we must check out his house/workshop cause makes retrofitted big bikes. I looked at Kristen and said "have a late start already, what is 20 more minutes matter. We pedaled up to his house. When I attempted to dismount from my bike the trailer hit Kristen's pannier and I couldnt unclip my left foot...next thing I knew I was heading towards the grass(thankful it was grass and not pavement). Les Bernard was the man behind Big Bikes. Some of his bike designs were far out there, but as he let Kristen and I ride some of his crazy bike designs, we really enjoyed the ride!

So after chatting with Les for about a hour we hit the road at 2:30. We rode for about 3 hours and covered 35 miles until we hit town of Newton.. The time was approaching 6 and the next town with services and camping was 30 more miles. We wouldn't make it before dark so we called it a night in Newton. We found a $8 Chinese buffet and ate until we almost threw up! We setup camp at the nice city park and slept under a pavillion. (In the middle of the night a storm came with strong winds mixed with rain and got is and the sleeping bags all wet...)

Day 55 Newton to Eureka

We woke up to Marks annoying alarm that I despise! My alarm plays a nice little tune that makes you wake up in a good mood and doesn't scare ya half to death! His is just loud and goes eh, eh, eh, eh!!!! After living through the storm, we decided to grab some breakfast at The Breadbasket, to our surprise, it was another buffet! I need to get out of this town before I gain ten pounds! We talked with two men by the names of Paul and Byron who were interested in where we were headed! They were nice fellas and we asked them about Menninites, a popular religious sect in Kansas. They were both Mennintes themselves, and gave us some history! They were travel agents in the past and have done a lot of missionary work in Uganda! They grabbed one of our brochures, and as we headed to the register to pay for our meal, the cashier told us it had already been taken care of! People are just so nice in Kansas!

Sidenote: as we sat down to eat I placed a napkin by Marks plate, with the intention that if he saw it, there would be a slight chance he would use it. Oh he used it alright, to soak up the cottage cheese juice left on his plate, and then poured ketchup on it for his potatoes. I can't take him anywhere!

We hit the road and had about a 75 mile day ahead of us. It was a bit chilly in the morning time and as we pedalled quickly, the cold air was swiftly hitting our bodies. The terrain was getting better, a bit hilly and more trees! It definitely made the time pass more quickly! We rode 34 miles to the next town and stopped at a gas station. We sat on one of those swinging benches, I love those things! We rode all day, it definitely got way hotter and when we had about 18 miles left, guess who got her 8th flat tire, I did! We patched up a tube on the side of the road and fixed it all up, leaving the scene with greasy hands and chainmarks everywhere, I tell ya, I don't know how I get so filthy everyday!

We made it to Eureka and headed towards the city park to find the pool was closed! Since there was no barbed wire, we hopped the fence and went for a quick dip, we had to cool off! Mark set up the tent while I was trying to open a bottle of wine. Problem was is that we didn't have a wine opener. I sat there, with my knife trying to shove the cork inside the bottle. Then I tried chopping up the cork in order to get rid of the top half. After about 30 mins of entertaining myself, I decided to ask the people who lived across the street. This cute old man answered the door and was a bit hard of hearing, actually he could hardly hear! So I started playing charades, and he took me around to his work bench and pulled out his drill! He drilled a screw in the cork and then pulled it out with a pair of pliers! It was so cool!

We grabbed some food and of course milkshakes for dessert! Off to bed for a 92 mile ride tommorrow!
Kristen

Day 56 Eureka to Walnut

This morning we didn't wake up to any alarm, except for the scorching sunlight roasting our faces! I started organizing our things like usual and realized our cookie bag along with the rest of our food was scattered around the park! An animal perhaps a racoon or coyote had rummaged through our food and something else for that matter! Marks helmet was mysteriously missing! I know it was under the picnic bench the night before and it was nowhere to be found! The tale of the missing helmet remains a mystery! I was hoping the animal would have taken mine, after the cat incident and all, now I have no excuse to get a new helmet!

We grabbed some breakfast at the Copper Kettle Restaurant and began chatting with Becky and Peter, from Ontario on a motorcycle tour! They were so nice and took a picture of us! Becky was a schoolteacher and said she wanted to tell her class what we were doing to inspire them to do whatever they wanted to in life! We definitely felt cool when they passed by us on the highway a few miles down the road and took an action photo of us!

We made our way through a few small towns, loaded up on some granola bars and finally ended up at the Subway in Chanute! The air conditioning felt amazing! We met Chris and Kyle, oddly enough, Chris was the brother of Jeff, a guy we shared a cabin with in Rawlins, Wyoming! Such a small world! We chatted for a bit and decided to head out and use up the last of the sunlight!

We rode about 25 more miles to Walnut, Kansas, just before the sun was about to set! As we entered town a huge dog chased after me and my heart was pumping! I have only heard horror stories about the dogs in Kentucky and am a bit nervous! As we looked around for the city park, we saw a man by the name of Bernie Smith, on his front porch. As he pointed us in the direction of park, he mentioned we were welcome to stay at his house and take showers and do laundry! You can't imagine how happy I was! He made us feel right at home and was so nice to invite us into his home! I tell ya, the people in Kansas have the biggest hearts!

We talked about Tornadoes and learned about the different calls that hens, wild turkeys, and owls make and the history of hunting! Bernie was a great guy and the world would be a better place if it was full of people like him!

Day 50-53

2009-07-20T11:13:00.002-06:00

Day 50 Tribune to Scott City

We were sad to leave the Robertsons! We felt like we were a part of their family. It wasn't our final goodbye just yet. About 20 miles into our ride, we met up with Karly and Shannon at the pharmacy they work at. It was hard leaving our new friends, but staying in touch will be easy with the power of Facebook.

Back on the road again! We had about another 50 miles to the town of Dighton where we planned on calling it a night. The expected happened and we got our favorite part of Kansas....headwinds. We rode about 5 miles in these strong winds until we saw a rest area and decided to stop for lunch in hopes the wind would stop howling after we finished up lunch. An hour goes by and we finished lunch, but the damn wind just got stronger! We figured the best solution was to take a nap. We passed out for about 3 hours haha! Good news was that the wind died down a bit when we woke up...

With it being dusk now, we knew we had no shot of making it to Dighton before it got dark, so we decided to ride to Scott City which was 20 miles away. It was a lonesome ride with the winds at our faces the whole time. Having headwinds the whole time in Kansas, we have become experts with just dealing with the wind and not have it ruin the day. We made it to Scott City right before dark. With me being so hungry I convinced Kristen to grab Mexican food before we setup our home in the park. The food was great and we topped off the night with Dairy Queen millshakes... mmmmmmm my favorite!

Night Mark

Day 51 Scott City to Dighton

The winds today were ridiculous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Get sideways! We were, I was miserable. We rode 25 miles to Dighton and were planning on taking a rest for a bit and then heading back into the winds. That all changed when we met Vicki Hubin. She was so energetic and outgoing and invited us to stay with her and go to the town fair that was going on that evening. When Mark heard there was a hot dog eating contest and live country music/dance, we couldn't resist! We have been looking for an eating contest the entire trip and Mark was confident he could win!

We relaxed at the house and met Vicki's family Joe, Kelsey, Joleen, and Kyle. They were all so nice! We watched some TV and took showers to get ready for the big event! It started storming and we were so happy we were not on our bikes! The storm passed and we watched the parade, it was almost like Halloween except we didnt have to move, everyone in the parade just threw us candy! We raced to the fair for the hot dog eating contest and guess who won!!?? Thats right, the out-of-towner from Chicago! He ate 9-10 hot dogs, I was suppossed to be the counter, but got sidetracked, in 12 minutes! One other guy ate 9 but he puked, eeewww! The world champion hot dog eater ate 67 in 12 minutes! That is gross! We learned how to dance the two step and fit right in! We had so much fun and experienced something so new! It reminded us of what you see in the movies, small town country fair!

We had a great time and want to thank the Hubin's for taking us in! We again felt like family and it was sad to part ways. Although we only rode 25 miles today, we still had a once in a lifetime experience, which is what this trip is all about! Mark was even invited back next year to be the reigning champ of the hot dog eating contest!

Kristen

Day 52 Dighton to Larned
Today we rode 98 miles! After leaving the fair a champion, Mark and I got a great nights rest on a very comfortable couch! We woke up to breakfast being made for us by Kyle, a lovely chef, and on our way out the door were given candy, chips, and Gatorade to keep us going! We said our goodbyes to the Hubins and headed east!

We rode 32 miles and reached Ness City where we grabbed some lunch and sat under a nice shady tree to take a rest. The ride has been, let's see how should I say this, plain? The great plains are very plain! You can always tell when you are coming into a town because there looks like there is a wall of trees ahead. When the tree wall looks close, it's really about ten miles away, there's just nothing else standing in between!

We rode another 33 miles in a crosswind, the wind was present the entire day just not as strong as the previous days. So as the light wind was our inspiration, we kept pedalling! I got a flat but we changed it quickly, I'm getting better at it! We made it to Rush Center and the only thing opened in town was the pub and grill, let me rephrase, the ONLY thing in town! We began chatting with Steve and Doug, two motorcycle dudes we had seen twice out on the highway, whom we had given the secret "biker" wave to. They bought us a nice cold beverage which refreshed our parched thirsts! They were very inquisitive about our trip, and we had a few laughs with them as well!

About 6:30 we headed out for our last 33 miles to Larned! And for once in my life we had a tailwind!!! Granted we had changed direction and were headed south for the first 19 miles and it felt like we were on motor bikes! That all changed when we started heading East again and that tailwind was now our crosswind! We reached the lovely city park at about 9, just in time to see a beautiful sunset! The city pool was open for a private party so we snuck in to take showers! We met Ben from England who was westbound! We chatted for a bit and decided it was best to sleep in our sleeping bags under the pavilion and not bother with the tent.

Mark was getting cranky because he was so hungry so we rode into town and the only thing open was Sonic, probably never going to willingly eat there again! Blah! I think I dozed off before my head even hit the pillow!

Day 53 Larned to Hutchinson

We woke up early and hit up the grocery store to grab some food. We got on the road and planned to ride about 78 miles to Hutchinson, a city of over 40,000 people! The biggest one we've seen in awhile! We encountered some winds, although light, they were still annoying! We stopped about halfway into the ride and ate some lunch under a tree. There was nothing for 60 miles, only wet marsh land and a lot of road kill!

We made it to Nickleson to grab a cold drink and Mark fell asleep on the table while I was talking to a farmer! The heat was very noticeable as we pedalled the last 9 miles into Hutchinson. We rode past an exotic animal farm where we saw a real live ostrich and zebra for the first time ever! We made it into the city and headed to the swimming pool to cool off, just in time for it to be closed....so sad. We were riding back to Main St. when we saw a water fountain, play thing for kids...you know it shoots out of weird looking contraptions and all the kids run around and squeal. Perfect for a shower! We put on our bathing suits and shampooed our hair, while we got interesting looks from onlookers! We didnt care, it was so refreshing!

After feeling fresh, we made it to Zion Lutheran Church, noted in our maps as a bikers hostel! They had two beds, a kitchen, shower, and tv for us to use. We also found a guestbook and a bulletin board for people to leave advice and places for us bikers to stay along the way! We grabbed some pizza in town and enjoyed a nice comfortable sleep! It was all free and it is so awesome how people are so trusting and generous! I love the people in Kansas!

Off to Cassoday! Write soon!
Kristen

Day 48 & 49

2009-07-20T11:07:00.002-06:00

Day 48 Olney Springs to Eads

After leaving Betty and Jerrys house we got on the road at 7:30 am! We rode 11 miles to Ordway and grabbed some last minute snacks, the heat was sweltering to say the least! The winds started up again, stupid wind, aaaahhhh! Mark ended up getting a flat tire on the trailer and as he was behind me, he was apparently screaming my name, I couldn't exactly hear him because of the head winds. I finally realized that the hoarse screaming wasn't a part of the Bob Marley song I was listening to but in fact Mark needing an innertube and the pump! We fixed the tire and headed East to the next town! We stopped in Arlington, a town with one house and a picnic bench with an outhouse, aka a wooden seat over a hole! There was a guestbook, mostly with all cyclists in it, that I definitely signed! We then made a stop in Haswell, a town with a few more houses and a gas station. We caught a glimpse of the Tour de France and met two kids Blake and his sister who showed us some pop wheelie tricks on their huffy bikes! We met a guy named Scott who let us use his hose to cool off before the last stretch of our ride!

We rolled into Eads, Colorado and found the city pool! Mark was amped to do a front flip off the diving board, after he was reminiscing about his good old lifeguarding days. He approached the board, ran to the edge, bent his knees, and collapsed! He helplessly dog paddled into the air until he hit the water, in front of all the cute girl lifeguards! As you could imagine, I loved every second of it and was in hysterics!

We went to the restaurant in town, actually the only one, and had some tasty treats! We met up with Phil randomly, a guy we had previously ridden with, after we both took some time off! It was nice to see a familiar face and we camped out at the city park, which had amazingly fluffy soft green grass! Another guy named Craig, was headed west and was chatting with us. I was looking for an outlet and he mentioned the post office always had outlets! So I walked to the post office so I could charge my iPod and cell phone and was a happy camper, literally! Off to bed!
Kristen

Day 49 Eads to Tribune

We packed up and grabbed some breakfast at the gas station and started riding! We made it to Sheridan Lake which was barely a lake at all and took an hour break there, eating trail mix and sipping on some mountain dew, recently Marks favorite! We got back on the road about noon and headed towards Kansas!

Now here is a good story for you all, I would have to classify it as the best yet!

We were about a mile west of a town called Towner, when I looked to the left side of the highway to find a blur of a car and an animal rolling beside it! I dropped my bike and ran across the two lanes in a hurry, while Mark, I'm sure was rolling his eyes and wondering what I was getting myself into. It was a kitten! A cute, harmless, scared kitty cat who seemed to be okay but was bleeding a bit from his mouth and had an infected eye of sorts. I carried the cat with me into Towner and knocked on about five peoples doors to find out where the cat belonged. Nobody seemed to know or were that interested really at all. I couldn't leave the poor thing on the side of the road as he would probably get eaten or run over within the hour so I decided I would take him with me to Tribune, Kansas! I conviently named the kitty "on the border" since he was so close to the state border as well as close to dying! I bungeed my helmet to the front of my handlebars and set "on the border" in my helmet so I could pet him and make sure he was okay! We took pictures with him when we crossed into Kansas and had about 15 miles to go! 5 miles down the road "on the border" was trying to get out of his bike seat. I clipped the chin strap around his body like a seatbelt so he wouldn't escape! He kept meowing and after a wind gust blew a not so appealing smell my way, I realized he had shit in my helmet!!! I swear, I don't know if I will ever be able to wear that thing again! At this point, Mark is seriously questioning what I am doing with the kitten, he asked me where and who I was planning on giving "on the border" to. I knew he was a bit frustrated and probably wishing he was with another guy, who probably would have left the poor thing to fend for himself, but I just had to make sure he would be okay! All I said was it would all work out, as most things usually do. I cleaned off "on the border" with the rest of the water and put a plastic bag down in the helmet.

We were about six miles away from Tribune when Mark slammed on his breaks and started to make a u-turn. I asked him what he was doing and he said he saw a cell phone on the shoulder between the road and the grass. He looked at the missed calls to find the two most recent calls from Dad. He called "Dad" back to find he was only a mile or so away from our location and would come and pick it up! That's when we met Mark Robertson. We returned his son, Clay's, cell phone and happened to ask Mark if he knew of an animal shelter or a veterinarian in town to take "on the border". His response, " well guys, you're in luck, I'm a retired vetrinarian of 20 years!" He gently took the kitten out of the car seat/helmet, mentioned that his late cat of 19 1/2 years had just passed, which was when he decided to retire, and said he would take care of the cat for us! You all can imagine our shocking responses, I got chills and was speechless while Mark yelled, "oh my god!" So is that crazy or what!? We talked about it nonstop for the last twenty minutes of our ride and decided to grab some groceries before heading to the city pool for a shower.

We were looking for travel size body wash when we saw Mark and Judy Robertson again! They invited us over to their house for dinner and to stay the night if we wanted to! Mark said it was just too crazy of a story to end just yet. We were again shocked but of course accepted! We jumped in the pool and Mark redeemed himself and did a gainer off the diving board, in front of some other cute girl lifeguards, I was hoping he would mess up again just for a good laugh! He drank a 2 liter bottle of mountain dew, minus a few sips but still! We took showers and headed to the Robertsons house!

We rode down their long driveway and found Mark mowing the lawn, we stepped into their beautiful home that was air conditioned! We spoke with Judy for a minute and she offered to do our laundry! While drinking some iced tea we got to know their kids, the twins Carly and Clay, 17 yr olds, Shannon, 20 yr old, and later we met Cole, who is 23! They are the perfect family and were so welcoming, we felt right at home and like we had known them for a long time! We had lasagna for dinner which was delicious and I even got the recipe! The meal was complete with garlic bread, salad, strawberries, and wine! Yummy! For us, HEAVEN!

After dinner we played a friendly game of knockout on their basketball court, and I was definitely knocked out both times in about 1 second flat! It's all good though because Shannon was repping for the girls team and she was kicking tushy! Judy and Mark took us for a spin in their awesome yellow jeep, or what Mark liked to call their mid life crisis, on a gorgeous summer night! They gave us the grand tour of Tribune, where they had both grown up and were high school sweethearts! It didn't take all but 10 minutes because the town has only about 800 people! We even got a quick lesson on wheat harvesting and the secrets and hardwork put into farming!

We got back to the house and watched a pretty odd movie called Knowing with Nicholas Cage, we all decided it was bizarre! It was really nice spending time with a family! For both Mark and myself, we both miss our families and life on the road can get tough sometimes! It was so neat to see everyone getting along so nicely and what family is really all about! I forgot to mention the homemade cherry pie a la mode! Sidenote, Mark just found out what a la mode meant, ha! So delicious!!! Judy told us she had a cherry tree in the yard and had made the pie earlier that day! Such a treat! The kids seeemed to like the special treatment and told us it's not everyday they get fresh cherry pie for dessert! They asked their dad what cyclists he would be inviting over the following day! We got some shut eye thanks to Clay for giving up his room for us and laid down our heads on real pillows! We could have slept for days but not after smelling breakfast upstairs! We were definitely spoiled with biscuits and gravy and bacon! And of course, the coffee! So after all of this, you can imagine how we felt, reenergized and not too sure if we wanted to leave just yet! It's truly amazing how things work out sometimes! Whether it was a coincidence or rather part of the big plan of life, it was so strange! Mark had even mentioned to me, after he found the phone, that he was hoping the guy would be a vet so we didn't have to take care of the kitten!

So, the moral of the story; no need to stress because everything always works itself out, even a helmet with cat poop in it! Or, whenever you are saving a kitten, hope that around the corner you will find a cell phone! Thanks again to the Robertson family for taking us in, you guys are awesome!

Technical Difficulties

2009-07-20T10:26:00.002-06:00

We have updated our blog for the last week, however cannot email them at the moment from our itouch...so sorry! We are okay and still pedalling! Headed to Corraday, Kansas today and will post the blogs asap! Sorry for the delay! Hope you are all a-okay!!!
Kristen

Day 47

2009-07-16T07:58:00.001-06:00

Since the reservoir was a few miles out of town, we navigated our way through Lake Pueblo State Park and made it into the big city of Pueblo! We found a cute ma & pa restaurant called the Pantry and loaded up on coffee and eggs. We decided it was necessary to find a bike shop to grab some innertubes since we didn't have any that fit my bike! Mark ran to Wells Fargo while I made the trip uphill towards Bobs Bicycles! Twenty streets later, no joke, I made it to the shop to find that it is closed on Mondays! Ugh! I ran to kmart, another 4 blocks to find that they didn't have the right size innertubes! I bought some cute shoes for $6 since another one of my sandals apparently went flying off my bike two days before! After an hour of running around I found Mark in the parking lot of Wells Fargo asleep! We decided to forget the innertube because I was fed up, just in time to ride past a big biking shop right on our route!

We made our way to Highway 96, the one we plan on being on for the majority of our time through Kansas, and rode once again with the wind in our faces! We stopped at a convenience store and met some people headed west, a father and his 14 yr old son! I accidently told the kid he was a badass in front of his dad! It seriously was the only word that came to mind! We kept pushing along and reached Olney Springs after a huge wind gust that was definitely going to be hanging around! We decided it would be a good place to camp out for the night! I saw a sign for a United Methodist Church and walked in on vacation bible school! We were surrounded by five women whom I asked if we could pitch our tent next to the church. One lady spoke up and mentioned she was the mayor of the 350 person town! She said we were welcome to stay at her house and take showers! We went over to her house and met her husband Jerry, took showers, relaxed on the couch, and used their instant hot water for top ramen, it only took thirty seconds! We each got our own bedroom, mine with teddy bears and a red silk bed spread and Marks with John Elway memrobilia and a Broncos theme! We woke up early and Betty gave us milk for our cereal and made us coffee! We were out the door by 7:30 am and were headed for Eads, Colorado! Such nice folks!!

Day 46

2009-07-16T07:52:00.002-06:00

Last night it was supposed to be an early night cause we had a big day that entailed rafting and riding...pretty stressful huh?haha! Well Kree passed out pretty early, but I couldn't fall asleep because a big storm lightening storm was approaching our campsite! Not exaggerating..there was lighting bolts every 10 seconds. My early bed time was 1230

We woke up this morning at 7...we were impressed because for the past week morning time was around 10. Since I have a triathlon at the end of August, i figured today would be a great day to go for a swim. I'm not really worried about the biking portion or the running, but swimming is where I have a great potential to drown! I went to swim laps for about 30 minutes in Yogi Bear kids pool. For a good visual the pool was big enough for me to do about 3 strokes. After hitting the pool we packed up our things and hit the rafting outfitter.
I was excited to witness Kristen go down class 4-5 rapids for her first time ever going rafting. We met our guide named Allen and our 4 paddling friends from Denver. Allen gave us a safety briefing..Kristen got scared after Allen said that 4 people already died this summer on the river. We hit the first rapid and Kristen was nervous, however, after going down a few more with everyone paddling in sequence we were trucking down the beautiful Gorge canyon with 1000 ft granite cliff walls on both sides of us.

The trip was good fun and back on the bikes 60 miles to Pueblo. On the ride we experienced almost every weather condition. At first of was hot and sunny. Next it started raining. The raindrops were huge and it felt like we were getting stung by hundreds of bees. After storm passed we had more sun. Then making a slight turn we got cross wind that was around 40 mph. It was so strong it blew us off the road a few times. Literally when I was riding behind Kristen, her bike was tilted sideways to fight the strong wind.

We finally finished battling the wind and arrived at our campsite, which was Pueblo reservoir. They had showers but it cost 50 cents for 3 minutes....we didn't have any change so decided to shower for free in the reservoir water. The water wasn't to cold..don't worry we used biodegradable shampoo.

We ate hot dogs, strawberries, soup, chips and salsa for dinner and called it a night. Tomorrow will be another day where we have no worries other than the essentials in life....food, water, and shelter. Tough livin

Night Mark

Day 43, 44, 45

2009-07-16T07:49:00.001-06:00

Day 43, 44, & 45
So as I said before, it was really difficult to leave the condo! I spoke with a friend of mine, Ryan Bowlby, with whom I used to live with. He currently lives in Alma, Colorado which is 7 miles from where we were planning to stay and he graciously invited us to stay with him and his roommates! Now that we had a place to stay and it was seven miles closer, we procrastinated even more! We didn't leave the condo until around 4:30 and headed to the bike shop in Frisco where I got new grip tape and new padded cute pink gloves! Three fingers on my left hand have now been numb for a good three weeks so hopefully these purchases will be the perfect remedy! Mark bought new tires and by the time he switched the old ones out for the new ones it was 6:30! Ha... We were in Breckenridge at 7:00 and had 17 miles to go over Hoosier Pass! It was a really nice time of day to be riding but the sun was setting quickly so we had to hurry! The first six miles up the pass was very gradual and we had set a good pace, however when the sign in front of us said, 4 miles to the summit, I knew we were in for a treat! After the sign, the crazy steep switchbacks began and didn't cease until the tippity top of the pass, where we caught the last glimpse of the valley below in daylight! The temperature dropped and we had a straight shot downhill into Alma, however it was getting darker and darker! We put on our safety flashers and bolted to the lights below us in the distance. We were able to run into the grocery store seconds before they closed to grab some pasta! Alma is such a quaint little hippie town of about 200 people and very dog friendly too! I will have to go back someday! Ryan picked us up and loaded all of our stuff into his Yukon and took us back to his sweet house equipped with three balconies, plenty of bedrooms and chill roommates, Dan and Steve-o! We made some dinner, took showers and watched Ironman, a surprisingly good flick starring Robert Downy Jr.! I slept on a very comfy pullout bed and didn't wake up till around 10! I made coffee in a real coffee maker for the second day in a row and Dan made us delicious breakfast sandwiches which I ate basking in the sun on the balcony! Oh the life! We used the internet for a hot minute and we were on our way once again!

We caught an awesome tailwind for about a half hour and practically flew to Fairplay! We grabbed some snacks, Mark ate pudding, sour gummy o's, chocolate milk, pringles, and chocolate doughnuts... Sounds healthy huh? We reached Hartsel after I got a flat tire! Mark was riding in front of me and I knew even if I screamed on the top of my lungs he wouldn't have heard me! I couldn't switch my flat because he had all the innertubes so I just waited until he realized I wasn't behind him! He finally came back for me about 15 minutes later and fixed the tire to find out that the tube wasn't patched correctly... Ah! We patched up another tube and well after about a forty five minute detour on the side of the road, we headed towards Hartsel! We ran into two guys from Indiana who were westbound, we exchanged some stories and they told us they had a funny evening in the small town of Guffey, and recommended staying there. We headed over Current Creek Pass and waved goodbye to the Rocky Mountains! As it was getting to be evening, the air was getting colder and some storm clouds had formed above. We decided we would stay in the town of Guffey! We veered off our route a mile uphill to discover a happening little town! There was live rock music by two guys in a band by the name of Up To No Good, at the Freshwater Saloon where we enjoyed a ten dollar steak dinner and a cold brew! Dancing in my spandex with the locals was a sight to see as my dads favorite song was played, I couldn't help but sing! One lady asked me how I knew all the words, she said I was too young to know them!! I asked an old guy named Jim to dance and he said no, if he dances, he falls in love! Thought that was pretty funny! We also met Bill who owned some cabins and bunkhouses along with what seemed all the other buildings in town! He offered us a place to stay, gave Mark a ride in his old buggy, and gave me a sweatshirt from his garage with a bunch of holes in it from welding! We became quickly acquainted with the small town gossip and pretty much everyone who lived there! We slept in one of the bunkhouses and didn't wake up until 10! I swear, we just keep waking up later and later and need to get out of the habit! I guess it is our last summer! We grabbed some food at Ritas Cafe and Deli, where we saw Bill and Ed and Don who we had met the previous night! When we were riding out of town, Jim was in his pickup and gave us a friendly hello! Only one night and we felt like family!

It was in the low 90's and we had plans of riding 80 miles to Pueblo! We made it about 22 miles and Mark yelled back to me asking if I wanted to go rafting after seeing a sign! I have lived in Colorado now for four years and have never been rafting! The tours had already left for the day and I left it up to Mark to decide what our next plan of action was. We could of either kept riding to Pueblo or have stayed the night at Junction 50 and take the morning rafting trip! At this rate we will never get to Virginia but then again, who knows when I will ever go rafting! Mark told me we were going rafting and that was the end of the story! We are now staying at Yogi Bears Jellystone Campground with all the little kids you could possibly imagine! We debated going on the hay ride with Yogi and friends, for about 1 second! We grabbed a tent site and the rain began to fall. We decided to wait it out so our tent wouldn't get soaked! The rain stopped and we decided to go for it! Even better, we thought we would time ourselves, however everything was going wrong! We couldn't stake the tent down because the ground was so hard, the wind picked up, and guess what else... The rain! Our tent was soaked, the rain fly was on backwards and the vents were opened as well! So much for that record, 8 minutes to be exact, pathetic! We found shelter under the neighbors canopy while they were away and that's when it began to hail! The weather finally calmed down and we were able to dry our tent out! We were about to make some dinner when the rain started up again so we just decided to go to sleep, at 7:30! We woke up 2 hours later and made some food and now I am going back to bed! Our rafting trip begins at 9 am tomorrow down class 4&5 rapids, whatever that means! I pretty much signed my life away so hopefully I will survive! Night night!!

Kree

Day 42

2009-07-09T13:17:00.003-06:00

I think I have officially mastered "hawking a lugee"! Hanging out with all boys I guess pays off for something! However, my two friends maria and bri, have always been pretty good at that! We left Elkcreek Campground, just 15 miles outside of Granby, late morning and began the battle with the wind! However, Clear blue skies and the beautiful Grand Lake to our left were keeping our spirits up! We reached Hot Sulphur Springs about 25 miles into the day to grab some lunch at a hamburger and shake stand! We applied some more sunscreen, met a deep sea fisherman, and said goodbye to our friend John! I called Cynthia Reed, an angel, who is the daughter of some family friends from my church in California! She has a friend, kristen, who offered to let us stay in her condo in Silverthorne for the night! That meant another 65 miles of riding in the wind, but the washing machine, the hot tub, the bed, and the coffee maker were all calling my name! We got back on the road and pedalled into the wind, crosswinds, headwinds, every kind except a tail wind for the next forty miles! I ate some sour patch kids for a quick sugar boost which gave me acid reflex, won't ever do that again! I met some girls In the gas station who were headed west and riding with a big group supporting MS, we exchanged stories and advice and went on our way! It is really neat to meet other people in the world who have shared the same experiencies and are supporting such great causes! We definitely understand how much work goes into planning and making things happen! My friend Fozzie told me that dreams are free, which is true and it takes character, determination, and a lot of passion to make it happen! It simply comes down to how bad you want it, a person's life is only controlled by themselves and anything is truly possible! The wind finally died down with about 25 miles to go, the scenery was delightful but we were exhausted, Mark was seeing spots and asked me for a clif bar, which is extremely odd because he hates power bars! We made it to the grocery store, which is located on top of a hill. We bought $40 worth of groceries, an Italian feast, breakfast, lunch, and snacks! We then found out that the condos were located up another hill....I carried a gallon of milk, a liter of mountain dew, cookies, along with numerous other things up what seemed like a mountain! But it was ALL worth it! So thank you Cynthia and Kristen! We watched a movie, made chocalate chip cookies, slept like champions, and I even gave myself a facial! It is now 2 o'clock and we are moving as slow as molasses because we don't want to leave! We are planning on riding 25 miles today over Hoosier Pass and staying with a friend in Alma tonight! It pays to know nice people! Thanks again everyone for all your love and support!!!!

day 41

2009-07-09T11:59:00.005-06:00

Today was the big day...trail ridge road!!! Feeling fresh after a $ 4.50 all you can eat pancake breakfast at the campground, we headed out seeking the highest paved road in the US! Because the trailer was better balanced Mark offered to take one of my panyurs which was so nice, my bike felt a million times lighter! We made our way through town, where of course there was a parade going on, which, oddly enough last time I was in Estes Park there was a parade as well, a bit ironic. We entered Rocky Mountain National Park around 11 am and began our adventure into the clouds! We climbed, climbed, and climbed some more. Along the way we met John from Wisconsin who was very friendly and was heading our way! We talked with him and decided we would split a campground later that evening! As we headed up the last five miles or so, the weather changed rapidly, storm clouds rolled in, the crosswinds began and with no guardrails and very thin shoulders, we were both a bit sketched out but kept pedalling! (mom, I can tell you this now because I survived!) we took about a mile hike, can you believe it, I went for a hike?! The path took us up to an elevation of 12,300 and had a circular gold plate on top of the highest rock that told you the mileage of every national park and in what direction they were in! Pretty sweet! We hopped back on our bikes and headed up the last two miles to the visitors center where we scarfed down some lunch as we looked out into the beautiful mountains! We met a guy named Alan who said he rode our same route fifteen years before and was on business trip in Denver...he told us to enjoy it while we still can! He is from Virginia so we may be calling him in a few weeks! We put on some warm clothes, because when your up that high, it's pretty dang chilly! We checked our breaks and began the descent, so fun!!! Hard, sharp u-turns, in the midst of the rocky mountains, with lush forest and wildlife at every corner! The hard work earlier that day definitely was all worth it in the end! The road thenturned into straight up dirt/gravel, and I was over it pretty quickly...needed an extra sports bra or something! We got to the campground just before dark and met Joe, who had just finished sixth in the continental divide mountain bike race from Canada to Mexico, 2750 miles, 21 days, an average of 125 miles a day, 17 hours a day....insane!!! So far only 13 have finished and there was a 60% dropout rate!!! I hurriedly took a shower so I could get rid of my dust unibrow! Mark didn't even shower until after he ate and he looked like a chimney sweeper! We talked with John for awhile and then slept like logs!

Back on the road again...

2009-07-09T11:06:00.003-06:00

We apologize it's been awhile since we've wrote on the blog, but we had some necessary recovery time in Fort Collins for the past 4 days! It was nice to see all our friends back in the place we called home for 4 years. I rode my bike through campus and not going to lie I was pretty sad. It's just hard to believe that I wasn't returning at the end of August. However, I realized in this trip that you can't live your life in the past. You can reminisce about the good memories you had with all the lifelong friends and all the things they taught you about yourself and how to live life to your fullest potential. You must take all things you learned and pave your present and future path that leads you to happiness.
I want to thank our friend Adam for throwing an amazing 4th party. He roasted a 60 pound pig for about 20 of our closest friends...delicious!

Well we headed back on the road at about noon...hard for us to leave! I was excited about Kristens repacking job on the trailer. It's official! We aren't ghetto anymore! She threw away our enormous clear bag where we threw all our clothes, food, and other junk we carry and upgraded it with a waterproof bag. It's great cause the trailer is a lot more stable! We could of made life a lot easier for ourselves if we went south on the frontage roads, but we wanted another challenge so we went the opposite way from Virgina and headed back into the Rockies to reconnect with our Aeventure Cycling map. We rode about 45 miles up a gradual hill into Estes Park. Kristen wasn't really feeling it mentally the whole day, I think she was still in shock of leaving all her friends and Fort Collins. Her spirits changed when we found a campsite outside of town and took a shower! We met the owner named Jim and he was helpful with orienting us with the towns restaurants...we went with Mexican and stuffed ourselves until we couldn't breath! We also asked him what was the best route through Rocky Mountain National Park and that's when he told us there was only 1 road through the park. The road is Trail Ridge Road, highest paved road in US 12300 ft. This meant tomorrow we had to climb 5000 ft in 30 miles....agh!

Well I'm going to test up for the big day tomorrow! Night

DAYS 34-39

2009-07-03T12:41:00.003-06:00

Hey ya'll~
We made it!! So far the journey has been amazing! Here is a recap of our last week in Wyoming! We are now in Colorado and resting our tushy's for a few days! Hope you are doing well and Happy Fourth!

Day 34 Dubois to Lander: Met up with some other cyclists! Heather, Jackson, Fozzy,(from New Zealand), Phil, David, and Dylan! Heather and I made each other sane again and talked about laundry and showering alot! Raining all day long, rocked out to Michael Jackson in honor of his life, rode with David who gave us the bright idea of putting plastic bags over our shoes and helmets as inexpensive rain gear,we were styling!, ate at Pizza Hut with our biking possy, and slept in the extra bed in the cabin with the Kiwis while Mark had the tent to himself.

Day 35 Lander to Lamont: Rode 91 miles, got 80 mosquito bites in Jeffery City, Kristen had three flat tires!, camped behind Grandma's Cafe for free, met Jean who shared his birthday cake with us, used Heathers pocket shower, such an amazing invention!

Day 36 Lamont to Rawlins: Rode only 30 miles, met Jeff and Jake who we shared a cabin with, a real bed!, I made five boys see The Proposal at the local movie theatre..chick flick!, played cards with Fozzy, and slept so well! A nice relaxing day! I even painted my toe nails!

Day 37 Rawlins to Riverside: I bought eggs and Jake made us egg sandwiches for breakfast with his trusty frying pan, ran into our Kiwi friends for lunch, the boys jumped in the river after going for a run...weirdos, bought sweet foam visors for $.60, did laundry and set up camp in a beautiful little campsite with green trees and the river, ate at Bear Trap restaurant and had Jambalaya Pasta, played pool and met some cool people our age who worked at a ranch down the road!

Day 38 Riverside to Walden: woke up to the sound of cows moooing like crazy!, packed up and entered COLORADO!! woo hoo!, rode in a pace line for most of the day trying to keep up with the world class athletes from New Zealand, ate dinner at the River Rock Cafe, and slept in the city park for free. Used the local pool and showers to get clean while Mark trained for his triathalon! Lets just say it was a good wake-up call!

Day 39 Walden to FORT COLLINS!!!!: Said bye to our lovely new friends...hopefully we will meet up with them at some point again, rode 110 miles, a new record!, climbed Cameron Pass, enjoyed the lovely ride through the Poudre Canyon, suprised my roommate Kari at her place of work, met with Katie, Patrick, Bre, Tim, Scooter, Maria, so happy to see familiar faces! Slept in a bed with the toilet right next store...ah the luxuries! Brew tours and fourth of July BBQ so excited!!

Sidenote: The bugs were annoying me while I was climbing Cameron Pass so I started shooing them away with my arm. I look up to see Mark cruising back down the hill that he just climbed up. I asked him what he was doing and he asked me the same thing. Apparently, a lady driving by stopped him to tell him I was waving at him and needed his attention when in reality, I was just trying to get the bugs out of my face...ha.

Invisible Children Lobby Days June 22nd-23rd

2009-07-02T15:56:00.002-06:00

***Just arrived in Fort Collins yesterday afternoon, a place we called home for the past 4 years. We will spend the next 4 days relaxing and just catching up with our friends before we part and seek new adventures in life. We apologize that the blog hasn't been updated, but the places we were riding through in Wyoming didn't have Wifi connections. In the next few days with a lot of time off we will update the blog for the past 7 days.......so stayed tuned!***

This entry is kind of a reflection of the past month or so on the road....

I wanted to thank everyone for their support, prayers, and words of inspiration. We have been on the road for over a month and had nothing but positive interactions with people in the small towns we pass through. A lot of people are curious for the reasons we decided to bike across America and we tell them the story about Invisible Children and the Child Soldiers. I've noticed that it isn't necessarily imporantant how many things or money a person possesses or how little a someone has in their name. It doesn't matter which of the 50 different states we live in, which each state or region of the country could bring different cultural barries, different perspectives on economic or politicial issues, different means on to resolve health crisis, and different views on ways the US should handle international matters. What unifies us as a country is that we all have a good heart and want to help each other out in many ways we possibly can.

On June 22nd-23rd Invisible Children had a Lobby Days in Washington DC to lobby senators and congress man for the The LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act 2009, or Senate Bill 1067 that was presented to the House by Senator Russell Feingold and partner Sam Brownback. Thousands of young Americans had over 300 meetings with policy makers into sponsoring this bill so the president could approve and pass the bill. The bill says the Obama Administration should come up with a regional strategy within 6 months to guide U.S. support—which includes political economic, intelligence and military support—for a multilateral effort to protect civilians and permanently end the threat posed by the LRA. Futhermore, Ugandan government address the conditions of how the LRA became so powerful, that why its imporatant to also rebuild northern Uganda’s institutions and addressing political and economic grievances. This will help to insure the surest safeguard against future violence and instability.

During the Lobby Days, 91 senators heard the bill. 8 senators have already committed into sponosoring it and 12 members of Congress. The momentum is still strong and hope to see more senators sponsoring the bill.

Day 31- Grant Village to Jenny Lake

2009-06-25T16:49:00.004-06:00

So because it takes Mark forever to write one blog, here I go again...

We left Grant Village and were on our way to Jenny lake, about a 65 mile ride. This required us to veer off of our path and venture out onto the Teton Spur, towards Jackson, Wyoming and through Jackson Hole. We normally probably wouldn't have decided to add an extra 34 miles onto the trip but we heard it was beautiful from a handful of other cyclists whom we had met previously. We decided to go for it since from experience, the best places to go are from hearing about them from other people. We stopped in Colter Bay for lunch which looked like a bustling little place to spend a vacation! The service was great and we then we rode another twenty miles to Jenny Lake. The whole ride was breathtaking, probably the prettiest ride we have taken so far, well I guess its hard to judge. We stumbled into camp at about 7:34 and saw a sign that the ranger talk had begun four mintues before. We listened in on the ranger talking about climbing, the Collin Exem school, and the history of the Grand Tetons. The lake was nestled in right next to the mountains and as the sun went down, the mosquitos came out. We set up our tent as quickly as possible~!

We met a couple, Steve and Lynn who had biked across the U.S., twice, on a tandem bike pulling their 18 month yr. old baby in a trailer. They gave us some answers to some questions we had and basically told us Missouri was the worst state. I pulled out the map in disbelief to find what looks like a heart monitor of some sort or a lie detector test...I don't even know. It's basically allllllll hills, up and down, up and down, barely 200 ft climbs, but a million of them! I guess we don't have to worry about that yet. They gave us a donation and told us to be safe and look forward to the cookie lady in Virginia!

Another cyclist pulled into camp, Kyle, who had decided to take about a week bike trip before he began working at the Knolls course. He was a great guy, with alot of insightful ideas and we had fun talking with him! He knew how to play the harmonica, which Mark and I have both been practicing but really have not picked up. Every fellow biker so far on this trip has been such a delight and just really laid back. It seems like a good way to enjoy life and everyone keeps telling us how lucky we are to be doing this at our age. We do realize that if it weren't for you, friends, family, and strangers even, we wouldn't be doing this so thank you to all who have supported us! We fell asleep to the beautiful stars above and Mark claims to have heard coyotes or wolves in the middle of the night. I can sleep through anything!

Love to all!

Day 33- Lava Camp to Dubois

2009-06-25T16:38:00.003-06:00

We decided to ride only 20 miles today because the next nearest campsite is in Lander, Wyoming, about 93 miles away from where we stayed last night. I didn't feel like riding that far so we decided we would take a relaxed day. We are planning to be in Fort Collins by the fourth of July and from my predictions, we are ahead of schedule.

We set up our tent, did some laundry, and went for a swim. When I went to dump out our clothes of our ghetto clear bag, which I forgot to mention had been picked apart by some birds to get to our packets of oatmeal at Old Faithful, a few of the clothes were stuck to the bottom of the bag. I reached down, past the duct tape to find the grape jelly had spilled all over. I really don't know if this bag is going to last...we are trying to make it last to Fort Collins at least...not sure if its going to happen. We went to this deli called Paya, grabbed some sandwiches and hit up the library, where we are now. We have goals of playing in a ping pong tournament this evening in the KOA gameroom. Basically, nothing annoys me more than Mark beating me at ping pong so be thinking of me and hopefully the ping pong gods will be on my side. Hopefully you all are having a great summer so far! Can't wait to see my Fort Collins people!

Day 32- Jenny Lake to Lava Mountain Camp

2009-06-25T16:19:00.003-06:00

Today we climbed Togwotee Pass, the second highest pass on the transamerica trail. We left Jenny lake at about 10am after having a nice relaxing morning looking at the beautiful Grand Teton Mountain Range! We grabbed some food in Moose, Wyoming at a cute outdoor cafe that had an incredible view of the mountains. We began talking with three guys from Maryland who were on an, BOYS ONLY OUTDOOR VACATION, suprise suprise...more boys woo hoo, if only you could hear my excitement. I asked them how many times they had brushed their teeth in the last week and they said once...eeeeeeewwwwww. I have decided ALL boys are gross.

Anyways, we pedaled quickly to Moran Junction and saw a buffalo crossing the road on our way! We grabbed some more water at a convenient store before heading up the nearly 20 mile climb of about 2600 ft. Like usual,(except I did beat him up White Bird), Mark was in front of me and I was listening to my pump up tunes and chewing endless pieces of gum, my new habit. The road was about a 6% grade, and did flaten out every now and then which was a nice break. As I approached the last five mile marker, a line of cars were stopped at the beginning of a road work/construction site. The man holding the stop sign waved me forward to tell me that I would have to get a ride in the pilot car almost to the top of the pass. What a bummer! It was so unfortunate I couldn't ride that last five miles of uphill in the blazing heat...as you could imagine. Actually, I was psyched! ha We rode the last mile or so to the top of the pass and then decided to stay at a campground called the Lava Mountain Campground about ten miles away. The restaurant was complete with lava lamps and lava cake, pretty cool I must say. I got to shower and so I was happy!

Day 30

2009-06-25T15:55:00.003-06:00

It's Kree-dizzle....

So I think Mark is writing about Chuck and Kevin, the Montana mountain men...they gave me a riddle and I want all of you to do it too. Follow the steps and don't skip ahead or you probably won't get it....

BEARS
ABOUT
TALK
TO
ASSHOLE
THIS
GOT
I
LONG
HOW
SEE

Step 1. From top to bottom say, BEARS, before every word....bears bears, bears about, and so forth

Step 2. From top to bottom say, BEARS, after every word....bears bears, about bears, and so forth

Step 3. From top to bottom say, BEARS, before AND after every word...bears bears bears, bears about bears, and so forth

Step 4. From bottom to top, read only the words....

Now how do you feel???

Ha I thought that was hysterical. Anyways, today we rode from West Yellowstone to Grant Village. It was about a 50 mile ride, which left us plenty of time to sightsee! We stopped at the Upper Geyser Basin and saw some geysers and hot pools. We also saw these formations called paint pots which looked like bubbling muddy planets of some sort! We saw some wildlife and snapped some photos and then made our way to Old Faithful! The geyser erupts about every 90 minutes and being the most popular sight to see in Yellowstone, I felt like I was at SeaWorld. Everyone was awaiting the eruption, counting down to the minute, all with their cameras in hand. The enormous geyser went soaring high about 30 feet in the air and it was definitely a sight to see~!

We climbed two short passes each reaching the top of the Continental Divide and our downhill ride consisted of a view of Yellowstone Lake, the largest highest lake in the U.S., I believe. The Grand Teton National Park was sparkling in the distance with white snowy peaks and it was truly amazing! We headed into Grant Village and I told Mark to get us some food before the store closed, did I mention we woke up at 10am and didn't get to Grant Village until 8pm! We didn't set our alarm and like normal had a slow start. I set up the tent like a mad woman so I could shower as quickly as possible. After I realized the shower cost $2, Mark was nowhere to be found. I tried to follow him to one of the restaurants but it was getting dusky and there was a huge buck in the middle of the road. I made a quick u-turn without thinking twice and decided to wait for him at the showers. 10 min. went by, another 10 min. went by, and another. I was starting to wonder if he had been eaten by a grizzly bear. This very nice family had seen me sitting on the bench for awhile and gave me two dollars! I thanked God and took a warm, toasty shower as fast as I could. We met another cyclist at our campsite who was from Canada and on a two week bike trip heading toward Missoula. I chatted with her while Mark attempted to build a fire...didn't work out so well, I think the wood was wet or something. Off to bed!

Day 29 -Enjoying Day off in Yellowstone Park

2009-06-25T15:52:00.008-06:00

Today we woke up in bright spirits because it was our day off and that meant no pedaling of any sort taking place for 24 hours!! It's a necessary break because we've been riding for 10 consecutive days straight and our bodies needed a rest.

My definition of a rest day entails exploring the beautiful landscape by hiking in Yellowstone National Park (1st National Park baby!) and seeing hundreds of hot pools, geysers, and abundance of wildlife. However, Kristen had a totally different definition of a rest day! First of all I found out she really doesn't like to hike...her theory "What's the point of hiking when I could either ride my bike or run to the destination 10x faster!" I knew it was going to be difficult to convince her to come, so I didn't argue with her and we parted ways. I think the few hours a part from each other was necessary because we are constantly with each other 24 hours.

Kristen went into town to explore and find a store that offers massages or pedicures...the girly things! I'm finding out that spending so much time with the opposite sex that MEN and WOMEN are TOTALLY DIFFERENT! We have different views on hygiene, foods, ect...I just learned to accept these and not fight it.

Me on the other hand being an Natural Resources major and reading tons of books about our National Park Services, I wanted to find out first hand why Yellowstone is so majestic and worth the extraordinary effort in preserving. What better way to seek adventure then by hiking around. Since it was a rest day I didn't want to ride my bike 25 miles to a trail head that a ranger recommended to me, so I decided to hitchhike. After sticking my thumb out for over 30 minutes, I thought I wasn't going to have any luck in getting pick up, then I see a car pull off to the side of the road and it was a nice elderly couple. Coincidentally, we were both going to hike the same route! We struck up the conversation of our little biking adventure and how Kristen and I were raising money for Invisible Children. They told me they were so happy to see my generation being interested and involved with helping others so far way. This comment made me reflect on "Invisible Children's The Rescue" event which we attended in April in Denver. We were so astonished to see kids ages 18 and younger attend in masses and speak up by writing to their politicians and demanding for action in dealing with the crisis in Uganda. They told me about the years they spent in Africa doing missionary work for churches. After about a 30 minute conversation we approached the trail head and went our separate ways.

I planned on hiking Fair Tale route which is a 10 mile loop that takes you by geysers, 130 ft waterfall, and grazing meadows for buffalo and elk. Also, I was cautioned to watch out for bears...they highly encouraged me to purchase bear spray for protection, but who has $50 to spend on spray???? After hiking about 7 miles, I saw the gorgeous waterfall, walked next to Imperial Geyser (not too pleasant of a smell because the wind was blowing all the sulfur into my face), and understood why this land was so magical and necessary to preserve for our generation and future generations. It's difficult to comprehend the millions of years of history in making and shaping this vast landscape. With about 3 miles to walk to the end of the trail, I encountered a little problem. The trail went through a meadow where about 200-300 buffalo were grazing. I seriously didn't think buffalo were that dangerous because I categorized them into the Cow Family...slow and lazy. As I meandered through the buffalo (closest I came was about 6 ft from one), tried not to make any eye contact, I was almost at the end of their grazing meadow until I heard a loud snort come from the grandaddy buffalo!! I thought this isn't good, so my walking pace turned into a speed walk. I'm lucky it didn't charge at me because my assumption that these are slow animals was totally INCORRECT! They could get up to 30 mph in 10 yards!! So moral of this story is turn the other way when you see buffalo!!

That evening I met up with Kristen. She was a little worried that I might of gotten attacked by bears and she wouldn't of had a biking partner anymore haha! She had a laid back day catching up with friends, and meeting locals. She met locals named Chuck and Kevin, who were generous enough to buy us a good dinner! Thanks for the company and the meal!! Great Guys!

That is it for now

Take care,
Mark

Day 28- West Yellowstone

2009-06-21T11:14:00.002-06:00

Hey everyone, its Kristen! The morning began at about 5 am, to the sound of the worlds most annoying alarm, which went off every ten minutes for the next hour! We managed to finally sit up, while still in our sleeping bags, and reach outside the tent to grab our breakfast supplies, to make delicious pb&j's! Half asleep we ate our breakfast and somehow, beat our getting ready record by a whole half an hour! We were in awe of ourselves and realized it was probably the cold morning air that hurried us along. We were off early in hopes of beating the wind, which if you don't know by now, I despise, and that is just what we did! We pedaled about ten miles to find a moving mass of what looked like animals in the distance! Sure enough we stumbled upon about 100 cows being herded along the highway to their summer pasture! It was a riot, the cows were scared of us, but way bigger then us too! I was nervous I might get attacked since they surrounded us on all sides! It was like trying to make our way through a cow maze! The cars were having a difficult time maneuvering through the crowd but we were much more agile and bolted through the pack! Not only did we have to dodge the cows but the cow pies they left on the road too. Mark was behind me and apparently my back tire spit up cow poop all over him! I was in hysterics but it seriously was so sick!

We enjoyed a beautiful ride by Quake Lake and as we peered to the left, out onto the pure glass lake water, I got my water skiing itch! We made it into West Yellowstone after about four hours and 46 miles. We grabbed some burgers at a local restaurant and then decided to find a place to stay for the night! We asked around to find all of our choices, and found there were three RV parks. It had been two days without a shower for me and well that's two days too many after a day of riding! Boys are not the same, Mark said he would not shower as much if it weren't for me, I expect a thank you someday! We rode to the other side of town to find one RV park that had just watered their lawn and sent us down three blocks to another one just in time for a terential down pour! I ran inside to pay for the site and the guy told me only cash was accepted and the site was $35 !!! Considering Mark was already setting up the tent and it was raining I asked if I could write a check, he basically said he didn't think my money was good there and that us "tenters" would track mud into the bathroom! How rude right?I told him that I wouldn't even want to give him my money and told Mark to take the tent down because we were leaving! Being in the hospitality industry and all, I was in shock that someone could run their business this way! Mark got mad too and yelled at him in front of other customers! The first mean person we have encountered. So we rode back to the other side of town and met some wonderfully fabulous people at the Grizzly RV park! They offered us a cyclist rate, warm clean showers (the most important thing), and they even had a conference room with a TV! We decided to grab some pizza and while waiting for a table at Pete's Pizza, we met a lovely couple, Neil and Maureen who live in Chester, England! A table popped up with four seats and I asked if they wanted to sit down with us. They accepted and we had a great conversation over some delicious pizza! They have travelled all over the world and are so enthusiastic about exploring places they have never been! We shared our passion for travelling and I hope I can live my life like theirs one day! They graciously paid for the check which was very much appreciated so thank you guys so much!!!! They invited us to England, so that's always an option! Ha! Mark wanted a shake like always and the girls at the ice cream store said they could make him a suprise! Of course he agreed and was delightfully surprised with a huckleberry carrot cake ice cream mixture! Huckleberrys are so good, almost like blueberries but better, I guess you can only get them in Montana?

We are planning on doing a hike tommorrow to see some geysers, hopefully it won't rain on us!

Day 27

2009-06-20T21:59:00.001-06:00

Today in a nutshell...
It took us 3 hrs from the time we opened our eyes until we left our campsite....we are getting slower and slower packig everything up as the trip continues haha! We had a breakfast bagel and hit the road to West Yellostone at about noon. Ben warned us about the headwinds in Montans flatlands. Kristen said a prayer to the wind gods for a smooth, calm day of riding and we hit the road. Within the first pedal stroke the wind gods were against us! We had a combination of
_headwinds and crosswinds of about 30-40 mph! I knew Kristen was misersble because she hates wind! I told her to suck it up and push through it. Ten minutes later i was felt the same level of frustration! We were pedaling as hard as we could and only going 5 mph, at the rate we were going to make it to Yellowstone at midnight!

After riding for almost 4 hrs we rode a total of only 26 miles and stopped at a campsite right off the side of the road. Right now it 9pm and the wind is still
raging at 30 mph! The tent sometimes caves inwards cause the wind is so
strong. Hopefully we don't fly away with the tent when we are sleeping tonight and the wind lets up tomorrow morning.
We will be praying to the wind gods tonight for a better day tomorow
Goodnight

Day 26 Twin Bridges to Ennis

2009-06-20T21:58:00.000-06:00

Our friend, and driver of our one day support car, Ben, agreed to take Marks trailer along with one of my saddle bags and meet us in Ennis to camp with us for the second night. Mark was like a little boy in a candy store, he felt free and rode like the wind! As for me, my bike weighs about 30 lbs and well with only one saddle bag I was just lopsided. However, we really appreciated good ol Benny Boy to schlep our ghetto clear oversized clothing bag, complete with duct tape, as well as our camping gear, food, and all the other crap we have.! We rode only 42 miles total for the day and climbed over a short but steep pass just after we stopped in Virginia City for a taste of a brew at the oldest microbrewery, established in 1863, in the US!
We talked about how the way people are raised, truly shapes who they are and how they react to situations in life. We also have realized a lot about the opposite sex and how men and women are SO different. We have also discussed the things that bother us about each other, which we decided was best to talk about. Mark always says, "whhhaaattt", when he is in disbelief which is annoying, and he said I make this slurping noise about 20 times a day, which now I have totally caught myself doing which is probably pretty annoying and weird too. Anyways, spending all hours of the day with one person is definitely a learning experience, I can't imagine getting married.... Ha!
We ascended the climb with high spirits, my first positive attitude towards a climb in a few days now, maybe the beer helped! Mark bolted up the hill at about the speed of lightning while I was enjoying Red Hot Chili Peppers - " get to the top"! Our support driver had gotten off work and spotted us on the climb and waited for us at the apex, offering us granola bars and water, not really although that would have been nice!
Then it began, the most EPIC, gnar, shreddable, sick, outrageous, radical, far out downhill ever! With the mountains complete with snowy peaks in the distance, the warm sun on our faces, and the wind at our backs ( where it belongs) we raged down the long switchbacks in harmony! We kept a solid pace and for the last 3 miles of flat road we were kicking it into gear at 28 mph! We were feeling good and arrived at our campsite very quickly!

We set up our tents and like normal I was on the mission of taking a shower, the ice cold river was my only option. While the boys went fishing, and did their manly things, I mustered up the confidence to slowly waddle into the river and feel my body go numb. Using doctor brahminns 18 in 1 organic soap, I began washing my hair, to my surprise a boat was coming in for a landing and well I felt pretty awkward! I got out of the river with soap everywhere while they loaded their boat in the trailer and they apologized for interupting my bath, ya it was weird! We decided to head back into town to grab some food and my chain had two figure eights in it. We fixed it and Ben hopped on my bike and with greasy hands I jumped in Marks trailer, a sight to see, I was laughing the entire time. We ate some Mexican food, had a dance party, and eventually got back to our site to find a sqwaking bird of some sort and a sky full of stars! One of the most beautiful night skies I have ever seen! We saw some shooting stars and then decided to get some shut eye! Yellowstone, here we come!

Day 25

2009-06-18T11:43:00.004-06:00

We had a slow start this morning because we stayed out pretty late last night. Our new friend Mayo took us out last night and showed us all around town--we received local status treatment which was nice! Today was suppose to be a laid back day because we were only riding 28 miles to the town of Twin Lakes. We thought wrong!! We were thinking the 28 miles was going to be a breeze because the highway we were taking is relatively flat. The first 15 miles were fine and pedaling at a good pace, then the cross/headwinds starting attacking us. Let me tell you Kristen despises winds the most out of any other thing Mother Nature tries to throw at us! However, Kristen being the tough person she kept cranking and I just sat back in her draft the whole time(I'm always in her draft because I'm pulling the trailer and she can't get behind it...it makes my life a lot easier SO Thank You Kree!!) We arrived in Twin Lakes an hour later and saw Ben waiting for us at the Bike Park (This is a small recreation area devoted to cyclists with a shelter and bathrooms all for FREE!) The shelter was great because it began raining right when we arrived and we were able to stay dry!

After the weather cleared we went into town to purchase a daily fishing license because I wanted to try out fly fishing and Ben being the angler enthusiast had an extra rod for me. We didn't have to go too far to to find a river because there was one running right through the Bike Park. After Ben gave me a brief run down on casting and all the little things involved with fly fishing, I was ready to seek out the murky river and catch myself a rainbow trout. It took me about 10 minutes to learn how to cast correctly. After about 45 minutes with not a single bite, I went over to Ben and asked if anything is biting? He said "this river is flowing too fast and waters to muddy for the fish to see anything". That was a relief to hear because I thought a was just a bad fisherman. Tomorrow we are meeting up with Ben in the town of Ennis to do some more fishing, hopefully I have some luck and catch a trout!

It was too wet to setup our tents, so we decided to sleep inside the shelter on the cement floor. The only improvement I would recommend about the shelter is they install a light switch, so you're able to turn off the lights at night! We had to sleep with the lights shining in our eyes the whole night...can't complain too much cause it was free!

Goodbye for now!

Day 24

2009-06-17T10:08:00.005-06:00

After waking up in a hotel room with four boys...no comment, Mark ran to the grocery store and made us all eggs and toast, complete with some orange juice, all for the great price of $11 dollars. The kitchenette in the room was quite nice and we all enjoyed our last meal together. We packed up our bags and headed outside to get our bikes geared up for the ride that day and stumbled into swarms of mosquitoes. We ran back into the hotel, grabbed our trusty bug spray Deet, and then all smelled like gasoline. The mosquitoes were upset that they could not have a thanksgiving feast, suckers. Seriously, there were hundreds. We took some photos with the Tres Muscateros, said our goodbyes, participated in a group hug and then the water works began, at least for me, the only girl. It's crazy how after just knowing someone for a week, let alone not speaking the same language, you are able to become like family. It was like a family, all five of us, biking together, eating together, sweating together, laughing together. I almost felt like I have known them forever and it was truly a incredible week, definitely not an easy one though. Rodrigo checked our bikes for the last time and they rode off into the distance. We grabbed some H2O at the store and to Mark's surprise, his water bottle was moldy, isn't that crazy how if you leave gatorade in your water bottle it could grow mold? duh. I begged him to buy a new water bottle however he persisted to spray windex in the bottle, inserted a paper towel into the cup and used a pencil to direct the paper towel in a circular motion. It didn't work and I put it in my bag and hope to throw it out when he's not looking. Anyways, we finally got on the road and biked 62 miles to Dillon, Montana.

We climbed two passes that day, Big Hole and Badger Pass. Mark was flying, I have to admit my mind was not in the right state, and well when that happens, 5 hours of biking feels like a lifetime. I was pretty miserable. It's such a mind game, its so easy to complain and have negative thoughts while anticipating a climb that really wasn't too bad, however looked like Everest to me. In retrospect, I am lucky to have the ability to bike up a hill and so many people would die to have the opportunity to do something like this. Honestly, you have to focus on positive thoughts and its easier said then done. The kids in Uganda would probably love to ride a bike, and it's them who matter at the end of the day. So, I'm going to try really hard not to complain from now on, but girl problems and wind are exceptions. After we reached the top of the last pass, we enjoyed the downhill ride and made it into Dillon. We saw a teepee from the corner of our eyes and with the dark rain clouds moving in, we knew it would be home.

John, the owner of the RV park, gave us a deal on the teepee and because we were about 4 miles away from town, offered to call his friend, Mayo who could drive us into town. It wasn't too hard to resist and they even had free chocolate in the office. We took showers and waited for Mayo. He had lived in town for 3 years, originally from California, his sister oddly enough works in Thousand Oaks, and he knows everyone! We went to a few local hang outs, grubbed on some food, and got the tour of the town. It was a fun night and we definitely stayed out way past our normal 9 pm bedtime. It was nice to interact with people, in a "big" town, all of 4,000 people. In Dillon, dogs go everywhere with their owners, grocery stores, bars, shops, you name it- there are dogs everywhere!

When I am biking, I have plenty, probably too much time to think and you wouldn't believe what goes on in my head. Yesterday I caught myself listening to U2's hit, "Still haven't found what I am looking for" and counting all the possibilities of what they are looking for. I once, named all the people I could, as fast as I could, to pass the time. I think about my future a lot too, I am thinking about being a cycling teacher for a part time job, I even have songs picked out and pretend that I am in class..."C'mon ladies, you can do it! You go girls!"...ya It's really refreshing to let your mind wander wherever it wants to go, and not have to worry about a million things, except for when I will be able to eat another cheeseburger. I have the biggest appetite, its insane...after dinner I am ready for another meal. So, since I am trying to loose weight, I have to be a bit careful about the second meal choices...ha. Mark is the complete opposite, eating everything in sight. Irene, he misses your cooking and is looking forward to coming home and getting fed!

So my friends, until next time, may you all enjoy each day and take time to think about whatever you want to! Love to all! I miss everyone!!!!!!!
Kristen

Wisdom, Montana

2009-06-16T09:13:00.002-06:00

We have reached Wisdom, Montana, population 100. No cell phone service but they have wireless Internet! It was raining yesterday and I convinced the lady who owned the hotel, who only had one room available, to let all five of us sleep in one room! Ninety bucks for the whole room! We had to climb Chief Joseph Pass, the highest elevation yet! Basically I was not having that much fun but we did it! You know you are high up when you are eyelevel with the top of a chairlift on a ski resort! We descended but it was so cold!!!! We then rode another 30 miles into the town of Wisdom! We met up with David for dinner again, a really cute restaurant and we were the only ones there! I ate banana cream pie for dessert! Earlier in the morning, we were invited to stop by Kurts house to see the day old lambs! They were so adorable! Gracie, his granddaughter was so excited to show us around their property, it was so beautiful! They invited us in their house which was built by Kurt, who is in the log home business, it was incredible! We drank coffee and chatted and the tres muscateros were in awe of Julie, who sheared the sheep and spun their wool into yarn with an antique wheel thing! It was so cool, they offered us cake and rhubarb pie which was so yummy! Wish we could have stayed longer but Chief Joseph was calling our name! Today we have two smaller passes to get over and then we plan on staying in Dillon tonight! We have to say bye to our friends because they are headed back to Missoula today....so sad! They said I could come live with them in spain, so maybe that will be my next adventure, just kidding dad! This time I will discuss my plans with you before you read about it in a newspaper! Also, everyone has permission to make fun of Mark for thinking that Houston was in the playoffs, I'm sorry Uncle Mike! Thanks to everyone who has given us so much support, Kari has given us updates and is checking our PO box for us so thank you all so much! Thenext town has 3,000 people so Internet and possibly cell phone service! Love you All!! Peace kristen

Day 14 - 22...oops

2009-06-15T10:22:00.002-06:00

Kristen here! So we have been slacking hard core with the "daily blogs" but we haven't been in civilization for awhile! Here is a quick update of all the places we have been as well as the things that have happened...

Note: The Tres Muscateros, as I like to call them, or rather Rodrigo, Aldolfo, and Isidro, have been our travelling companions for about a week now, with my spanish skills and Rodrigo's English skills we are somehow able to communicate..we have had so much fun with them!

Day 14: Baker City to Oxbow, reached Idaho finally! Enjoyed a nice downhill most of the morning and then climbed a hill near Richland which was pretty tough! We enjoyed a nice downhill after that except it started hailing! We got to the campground and realized the only restaurant was two miles away the way we had already come...hitched a ride in a pickup truck which was delightful!

Day 15: Oxbow to Cambridge, biked 25 miles in the wrong direction, the road straight up ended...hitched a ride to starting point once again and climbed a grueling, hot 4,131 ft. pass, made it to campsite, only 10 dollars a night with hot tub, laundry, hot showers, it was perfecto!

Day 16: Rest day in Cambridge, went fishing with Larry, Bill, and Jim whom we met at the local pub the night before! Had a ball, they caught about 20 fish and saw two blacks bears, deer, snakes, and a lot of bugs yuck! All restaurants were closed by seven so we ate a pizza that a woman at the gas station heated up for us!

Day 17:Cambridge to Riggins, rode 80 miles ~Kristen's record mileage! Got a flat tire where we met up with John, a guy from Denver and the Tres Muscateros! Rodrigo owns a bike shop and fixed my tire within seconds! We rode in a paceline for the first time and went between 16.5-22 mph the entire way, yikes! Ate dinner with everyone at River Rock cafe...met Lane, Dwyane, and Jim at RV park who donated 20$ to our cause, paid for our campsite, and kept our beer in their ice chest!

Day 18: Riggins to Harpster, WHITE BIRD HILL!!!!!! The hardest thing I have EVER done in my life! However, I somehow beat Mark up the hill...about 13 miles of about a 7% grade, completed with switchbacks and a hot afternoon...I felt so accomplished when we made it to the top! Ate subway for lunch, a whole footlong! I was so hungry! Stayed in RV park next to river and slept for thirteen hours!!!!

Day 19:: Harpster to State Campground, bathed in the River, ate ravioli, a grouse did this weird flapping thing with his wings and it was really loud, about 10 ft. from tent...saw this huge cicada looking bug in the morning and flicked it away from my bag, went to Post Office fifteen miles away and the bug flew off my helmet and the post lady screamed..it was so huge ...eewwww!

Day 20: State Campground to Mile Marker 148; met up with the Tres Muscateros on the side of the road!! yay! convinced them to go to natural hot springs with us...hiked in a mile, naked man named Chuck took a picture of us, we were all giggling! We then camped by the river after we made a fire, which is illegal in Spain so the Tres Muscateros were very happy!

Day 21: Mile Marker 148 to Missoula, Montana; climbed Lolo Pass with the Tres Muscateros, stayed in Super 8 Motel...felt like a million bucks! Went to dinner at the Ironhorse Pub, laughed with the Spanish men...pathetically took a cab downtown, only four miles away, couldn't get on my bike again ha! Ate some milkshakes and felt like throwing up...

Day 22: Missoula to Darby, ~65 miles, headwinds for awhile, argh! Rodrigo and I broke away from the group and as I used all the energy I had to keep up with his 21 mph pace, I think I almost had a heart attack. He is 48 and an animal! Slept in the laundry room of an RV park but got to take warm showers! Met a guy named David who is raising money for the National Arthritis Foundation..he is riding from Seattle to New Jersey and is 59! He bought our dinner last night too! What a guy! Then Kurt, the guy we met back in Pacific City Oregon met us for dinner as well and we are planning to stop at his place to see baby lambs that were born yesterday! We have a 23 mile pass today that ascends over 3,000 feet...when are these hills going to end!? Please pray for me!

So my friends, here we go into the wilderness again! Hopefully we will be able to find some internet access somewhere soon! Hope everyone is doing well!!!!

Ciao and Adios!
Kristen

Day 12 and 13

2009-06-14T10:32:00.001-06:00

Today we left Austion Juction heading towards Baker City. We started the morning off right with a hearty breakfast that the owner of the restaurant Christie made for us which was delicious! Thanks again Christie for opening up your store for us yesterday, so we could buy some food and letting us camp in your backyard.

Before we started our difficult climbs over Tipton and Sumpter pass we decided to stop at a small bar and grab a beer...good carb loading baby! Tipton pass wasn't too difficult but Sumpter was more of challenge. I was waiting at the summit when I saw Kristen with a agonizing look on her face. Once she reached the top she jumped off her bike and yelled "my back is killing me!" She tried laying down to see if that would help with the pain, but must of laid on a mosquito families home because within seconds she was getting attacked by dozens of them. After she escaped the mosquitoes, I rubbed down her back with Icy Hot to see if that would relieve the pain. Lets just say Kristen felt the Hot for a few minutes! We wanted to make the 6 mile descend a bit more interesting and we thought it would be a good idea to see who's the fastest person down. Even with all the weight I was carrying in the trailer I still managed to win, but only by a few feet..hey a wins a win Kristen!

We managed to out pedal the storm clouds that were following us the last 20 miles before Baker City. We spotted a RV park and setup our tent before the large storm storm rolled in. All seriousness it looked like a F5 tornado was about to touchdown any second. The RV park had hot tube that we fully utilized to loosen up our aching muscles. After that we went into town and watched game 1 of the Lakers/Houston series. The Lakers dominated the whole game....how I wish the Nuggets were still in the series!
Later that evening when we were in tje tent ready for bed, it started to down pour! It felt nice to say that the tent we are sleeping in isn't just a tent, but our home for the next 3 months. This tiny home is going to provide us with the rest we need to re energize our bodies for the next day o pedaling. Don't worry we stayed dry with Kristens great purchase of a tent from REI!

The following day was a rest day because Idaho was going to kill us with all the climbing. I always thought Idaho was flat, but after examining the maps that Adventure Cycling donated to us, it looks like the central and northwestern parts are pretty mountainous with a lot of steep passes to climb!

We ran some errands throughout the day and in the evening we went to see the Pixon film UP. Kristen had a hard time convincing me to see it because I thought it was a kids movie, but like usual she convinced me to watch it. To e honest I liked the movie. I'm not going to ruin it for the people who still haven't seen it, but it's a story about an old man whose wife passes away and decides he wants to visit a place him and his wife always wanted to see and never got a chance. So the old man takes a bunch of balloons and ties them to his house and floats to S America. The plot kind of relates to us bike across America. We are both new to touring and as the days go on we are beginning to have our bodies more use to pedaling for 5-6 hrs a day. Most importantly this adventure is going to widen our horizons about the different kinds of people and lifestyles Americans have. Their stories and opinions on politics, environment, religion, ect which is the foundation that makes our culture so unique and interesting to learn about.

Sorry we are behind on the blogs will post more later

Take care

Idaho here we come!

2009-06-05T16:41:00.003-06:00

Day 10 & 11
Hello again, Kristen here. So before we left Mitchell, I went outside to grab our clean cycling clothes off the clothing line to find them soaking wet because it rained all night! The innkeeper offerred to dry them for me in her dryer, I was very happy that I didn't have to put on wet shorts. We grabbed some snacks at the grocery store, across from the cage where the towns black bear lived...weird right, I just can't get over that. We left in high spirits waiting to tackle Keyes Creek Pass, and we shredded that 6% grade, elev. gain of about 1300 feet, in about 9 miles! We were definitely rewarded when we raced down the backside and descended 1500 feet! It was so sweet! It lasted for 20 miles!!!! If only all the miles were that easy!! Then we decided to stay in Mount Vernon after shivering from the afternoon rainstorms! We ran into what looked like the towns only open restaurant. We ordered some Mexican food and Mark claimed to have been craving a milkshake for two days so he ordered a raspberry shake, he drank the whole thing and almost threw up! Ha! We then ran out into the elements again put on our rain jackets and rode to the campsite a mile down the road! We saw two sweet teepees and opened the door to find shelter! We were stoked that we had a home for the night with electricity! We set up our stuff and we were listening to some tunes and we heard a knock on the teepee door, it was Earl Nelson, the park host. He was awfully nice and informed us that the teepee we were in was reserved and the family had arrived! They turned out to be really nice and said they would take the other teepee and it was no big deal! After Earl took me for a spin on the golf cart, the family in the other teepee invited us over for tofu soup and s'mores! Sidenote, does anyone know if the term golf came about from the old Scottish game that was for Gentlemen Only...Ladies Forbidden? I read that somewhere. Anyways, I met a woman named Gloria who was a bird watcher and who had recently travelled to Uganda. We spoke briefly about the Invisible Children and about a first grade kid who had a penpal in Uganda. After writing back and forth, the kid started fundraising in order to put wells into villages in Uganda! His penpal was apparently captured by the LRA and became a child soldier, he somehow escaped and his American penpals family adopted him and they became brothers! Such a cool story, it's really neat that at such a young age kids are able to make such a difference!
We decided to hit the hay at about 9:30, gosh I can only remember those good ol' college days when bedtime was in the morning time...tear. Ha! We woke up this morning and bolted to John Day, Oregon where we ran into the grocery store and grabbed some coffee and bagels. We then made it to Prarie City where we called Christy, the store owner in Austin Junction, where we were going to stay for the night. She was originally closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but was planning on meeting us at the store to open it just for us! Before we got there we still had 16 more miles to ride. We climbed for 10 miles up about 2200ft. and were again rewarded with a 6 mile downhill, Mark asked if I wanted my rainjacket and I said no, let's just say I was an icecube! We arrived at the country store, literally the ONLY thing in the town, there isn't even a population size on the map! Christy met us at the store where we grabbed some food and she showed us where we could put our tent in the back lot. Its crazy how the landscape changes, earlier today we were in the high dessert and now we are in dense forest! Its so cool to witness the change actually being outdoors! We ate some ravioli and took cold showers using the hose, next thing we knew, we were ducking for cover in the tent to escape the attack of the killer vampire Mosquitos, they were everywhere! We heard some wolves howling, real comforting when you're camping in the woods! Tomorrow we have two short steep passes to ascend and we plan on staying in Baker City tommorow night! Almost through Oregon! Yeah baby!! This possibly is the hardest thing I have done in my life up to this point but equally the coolest! Hope everyone is having a lovely day!!

2009-06-03T14:23:00.002-06:00

Day 8 & 9
Hello everyone! Kristen here, after an interesting evening with Tiki we woke up late at 9 and didn't end up leaving until bout 10:30, usually it takes us an hour and a half to get going! We rode about 50 miles to Prineville where it started raining and this nice guy John let us hang in his convenience store to stay dry! We headed to the RV park in the pouring rain and set up camp under a pavillion to stay out of the rain! I let Mark make dinner for the first time, big mistake! Instead of eating top ramen and mac and cheese, we had cold chewy noodles and cheese soup! Not sure if he did it on purpose so he won't have to make dinner ever again, to be honest I don't even want him to! I was dying of laughter because we both wanted to shower at the same time however we only have one towel and one set of shampoo and conditioner. There were two showers in the ladies restroom and he ran in the bathroom and hid in the shower stall and decided he was too nervous to stay in there because he thought someone would walk in! He finally left and waited to take a shower until I was done! We woke up at 5:30am to the sound of he sprinklers hitting our tent and went back to sleep for an hour after moving the tent a few feet to the left. We got ready and around 8 set off for Mitchell over Ochoco Pass. The climb wasn't too bad, pretty gradual all the way up! After the rain began again we decide to stay in a hostel in the small town of about 170! We ate at the Sidewalk cafe, where we met the mayor Nd visited the towns black bear named henry who lives in a cage across the street from our hostel!

2009-06-01T23:30:00.003-06:00

Day 7
We just finished climbing Santiam Pass, which is 4800 ft. We both agree it was one of the hardest things that we have done in our lives!
However, we did it and the Rockies are just hills to us now haha! It was really hot outside with the temperature around 95. When we got up to the summit and we were both dead. I'm so proud of Kristen for pulling through like a champion. This girl just got her bike 3 months ago and is riding like she has been doing it for years! Keep in mind, she doesn't have gears that go very low and is carrying about 20 pounds in her saddlepacks. Whatever goes up must come down..decend we did! We had a 6 mile downhill and reached speeds up to 40 miles. I had a little speed wobble, but managed to regain control of my bike

We stopped in a resort community called Shuttle Lake for lunch to replenish our bodies cause we were starving! The lake was beautiful with a great view of Mt Washington in the backdrop. When relaxing on the beach, we met a guy named Bill. We struck up a conversation on all the biking touring he has done throughout the state.

We rode another 15 miles to our final destination for the day. The town we stopped at was called Sisters. While I was waiting for Kristen in front of the grocery store for her to ask directions to the campsite, I started talking to a lady whose name was Tiki. She said we were crazy for wanting to bike across the country! We told her that we were planning on sleeping at the nearby campsite, but she offered her backyard for us to crash for the night. Without hesitation we took her up on her offer! We spent the night chatting about our journey this summer and learned about her life story. Tiki was a very outspoken women who loves the outdoors, hiking, and meeting new people. Thanks again for the warm shower and your hospitality!
Now off to do our bedtime stretches
Goodnight!

Day 6

2009-05-31T14:56:00.003-06:00

Last night was pretty interesting...Kristen was already passed out and I was enjoying the view of the beautiful stars until clouds came rolling through and all of a sudden I saw lighting. I was a bit freaked out because our tent was surrounded by 100 ft tall Douglas fur trees, right next to water, and our metal bikes were right next to us. So, I decided it was best to move our home to a safer spot. Good news is we woke up in the morning without being struck.Of course it was another beautiful morning with the sun shining brightly. We ate some breakfast and packed our things up slowly..really slowly because we didn't want to leave this majestic place we called home for a night. We said goodbye to Ellie and thanked her again for her hospitality!We were off on the road again.

Today, we planned to ride only 20 miles to our next campsite, which was in McKenzie Bridge because we wanted to be fresh for the big 5800 ft climb over the Cascades tomorrow! We arrived at our new home for the night in about 2 hours. The highway were on had a big shoulder,flat, and freshly paved. We found a great campsite that was right along the McKenzie river again. Setting up the tent now only took minutes because we've become experts. It was nice to know we had the entire afternoon to relax and take the surrounding scenery in. Kristen and I started talking about how lucky we are to have the abundance of recreational opportunities available in our country. We have to thank all the federal agencies for helping to preserve these precious lands that make our country so unique and diverse.

Furthermore, I want to thank my sister Beata who is helping upload our blog with pictures during the times we don't have internet access.

Some updates with Invisible Children..on May 21 a bill was introduced to the House which targets Obama and his administration within 6 months to come up with a strategy to addess LRA violence and assist the communities that have been affected by the army by funding the country with 10 million in emergency humanitarian assistance. Most importantly US must come up with a policy to permanently stop Joesph Kony from terrorizing innocent people. For more information visit www.resolveuganda.org/node/853.

Well got to get some rest for the big day ahead of us tomorrow

Day 5

2009-05-29T22:35:00.006-06:00

Last night we laid low at our campsite and chilled at the rec room which had a TV so we were able to watch the Cavs game. A bit disappointed with the result of the game. However, we met a very nice man whose name was Dolewain. He is a professional photographer who lives in CA, but drove to Oregon to snap some photos of windsurfers, nature, and a NCAA track meet. Dolewain promised us that he wanted to snap a few pictures in our gear and spandex the next morning.Before we left the campsite for our 50 mile ride to a small town called Blue River we met up with Dolewain to do a little photo shoot. Thanks again for taking the photos, we love them! After parting with our new friend, he gave us a good piece of advise in life.."If you want to do something that you love for a career, get good at it and then everything else will fall into place." That's so refreshing to hear cause Kristen and I both agree with that statement because both of us want to find jobs we love and enjoy going to everyday. I really want to pursue a career in the hospitality industry because I love interacting with all different types of people and servicing their needs so they have a good trip or vacation.

The 50 miles we rode wasn't hard. It was flat the whole way and we had a pretty big shoulder so cars and semis weren't coming to close to us. The weather was sunny and HOT. It hot up to 95! We are getting some good farmer tans. I want to thank my Mom for buying us the neon jersey! They are very nice because air easily circulates throughout the jersey, so we don't sweat as much. Thanks again! After riding for about 4 hrs we were beat and thought it was time to call it quits. We planned on staying at a campground in Blue River, but we stumbled upon a bed and breakfast a couple miles before the town that also allows tents. Right when we pulled into the place, we automatically knew we were going to stay because the property was along the McKenzie river. We were greeted by Ellie, the owner. She was so welcoming and we felt right at home. She showed us to our campsite which literally was 4 ft from the river. Nothing like falling asleep to the sound of rushing water! Ellis felt like our mom, she offered us some tuna sandwiches and soup. Delicious! We ate our food outside and watched the beautiful sunset fall over the tall trees.

Before heading to sleep I was able to pick up a wifi signal to check our email. We got an email from Phil who heard about our journey to raise money for Invisible Children. Interestingly enough he was doing a similar thing, but he was unicycling across Canada for Invisible Children!! I couldn't imagine riding 3000 miles on one wheel... Major Props! He is planning on finishing I'm June so check out his website http://www.unicyclunfacrosscanada.ca/ Keep up the good work!It's really great to find out about others who are committed in helping rescue the child soldiers and restore peace in Uganda. Shot out to everyone who is apart of Invisible Children and all the things we all have accomplished! Keep up the good work! The more voices being heard the more the elected officials must come up with solutions to end this war.

Goodnight for now

Video Leaving Astoria Oregon

2009-05-29T17:31:00.002-06:00

START LINE

2009-05-29T13:55:00.003-06:00

--------START LINE-------
ASTORIA, OREGON
Saturday May 23, 2009
@ Approximately 9:36 AM

Day 3 & 4

2009-05-27T11:10:00.002-06:00

So after riding for two days we decided that it would be a good idea to take a break as well as miss the memorial day traffic! We woke up to black bunny rabbits nibbling on our tent and decided to hit the beach. We hung out by this log to cover us from the wind and entertainment came our way all day long! We learned how to fly a kite called the slingshot, found out how Velcro was made, played some new tunes on the harmonica, met a surfer dude who had some words of wisdom, and Mark fell in love with this girl with black hair riding a black horse by the shoreline! We then ate some more pizza, so good and watched the Nuggets kick tushy! It's amazing how hectic our lives can get and we lose track of the present and constantly worry about the past or the future. It's neat how sitting on a log the whole day we learned so much about the locals attitudes, surrounding environment, and the proiorities in our own life.

We met an awesome guy named Kurt who had a very calming way about him, he bought our beers, thanks again! We met him at his work site today, right off the highway and we were able to see the project they were working on. They are building a ceremonial plank house on the Chinook Indian reservation by Fort Yamhill. The building is huge and all made from cedar, actual trunks of trees as well as planks that cover the sides and roof! It was absolutely beautiful! We were able to chat with Bobby a Native American whos ancestors were the first inhabitants of the land. Bobby educated us about his people and the hardships they have perservered through as well as all of their accomplishments in the last 25 years! It is so neat to learn first hand from people who had such difficult lives, but had the courage to continue fighting and never giving up about the things they are passionate; their culture and history. He was also interested in our story and the reasons why we are biking for Invisible Children. There are so many bad things going on in the world today and it is up to us, people, to do something about it! "Be the change you want to see in the world" is such a true statement! It is so easy for us to get caught up in our own lives but you wonder what the child soldiers are doing right now, being forced to fight against their will, a child should have the right to be a child, play games, sing songs, and go to school. It truly breaks my heart to know how corrupt our world is in every direction you look. We hope to give the children a little something to improve their resources to get an education and stop this war.

We continued riding, and I almost got attacked by a dog as well as almost ran over a bird! Key word, almost. We rode a total of about 60 miles and stopped in Monmouth, Oregon where they have never heard of campsites. We ate some Mexican food to get our energy levels up and called around to see if there was any place to stay, I gave in to getting a hotel room for the night so I could shower and sleep in a nice comfy bed! Mark and I decided that we would call a campsite in advance from now on because we can't afford hotels.

Day 2

2009-05-26T19:32:00.000-06:00

We started riding at about 8:30 and took a nice scenic but windy route close to the coast. We had stuffed the potato salad in marks shoe and he hit some uneven road and the potato salad went flying! We ascended our first climb and were sweating pretty good. My new expensive glasses were fogging up. I was pissed! We then enjoyed a nice downhill ride and as I hit a lip in the road I think I got some air and could only hope that mark wasn't going to eject over his handlebars along with the trailer! Luckily I only heard a aaaaaahhhhh after Mark got aspeed wobble but he regained control.We ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in Netarts Bay where we got to talking to two women. Mark didn't say much as he was mesmerized by Skylers hot bod! He did manage to pipe in when they asked when our deadline for the trip was and he said, "well I have to be back for my triatholon on august 30th" smooth mark real smooth.

After lunch we had about another 30 miles to go and we had yet another hill climb, this one a bit taller and a bit longer. We did it though and felt good when we did! We contemplated taking a 2.5 mile hike to the lighthouse and really quickly thought against it. We starting flying down the mountain and hit Sandlake, which literally looks like a lake of sand among beautiful green forest! Breathtaking to say the least. A bunch of people were ATVing and it looked like so much fun!We decided after looking at our map, that I initially thought was wet from water but realized it was my sweat ( because I keep it under my shirt), that a good place to stay would be Pacific City, or PC as the locals like to call it.

This place is legit, brew pub and all beautiful beach and great pizza! Last night mark decided to leave the water bottle cap unscrewed and it leaked all over MY sleeping bag! Our neighbors at the campsite were nice enough to let us use their fire to dry it out! Roger and Louise filled us in about the details of the logging industry and we talked restaurants as well! We decided to stay here today and take a rest as well as let all the memorial day traffic pass through! So you could probably find mark surfing the gnar waves today and as for me, I'll be rooting the Nuggets on at Pelicans Pub! Go Birdman!!!

Day 1

2009-05-26T19:31:00.000-06:00

So today was our first big day! We really weren't too nervous about the long road ahead of us because we have each other to push and motivate during the difficult climbs through the cascades and Rockies!

After pedaling 67 miles for about 9 hours our legs had enough and figured it was a good time to stop and setup camp. We found a campsite in Gilradia Oregon, after about three other attempts and a hysterical fall from Kristen because she couldn't unclip her shoes from the bike pedals...The thing thats so funny about this trip is that its our first attempt with carrying all our gear! Our buddy Jeremy who we met when we were on csu plaza was generous enough to lend us his bob trailer for the summer. Mark is carrying the bob trailer which weighs around 50 pounds. As for me I purchased panniers 12 hours before take off. They weigh about 20 pounds ah! So far so good. The roads we are riding are nice and scenic. Thanks again Adventure Cycling for hooking us up with maps!

We had a relatively steep hill climb on the 101 with a 800 ft elevation gain. Good training for the rocky mountains! Ah!We stopped for lunch in Cannon Beach where we met up with our support crew Beata and Bruce. It was nice to see them one last time! Thanks again for everything guys! Also, we met a nice family from east coast. They were familiar with Invisible Children and have a friend who's apart of a similar non profit that helps out the children of Uganda. It is unbelieveable how many people are willing to help those in need in countries that are so far away. As we continue to encounter people along the road we hope that our ambition and passion for Invisible Children will carry over for others to take action towards things they are passionate about.

Traveling the last leg of our trip we stumbled upon a sign and got free wine tastings a mile off the trail. We put our heads together, thought for two seconds and headed east for a quick taste! Everyone was really nice! Before we got to the campsite where we are now, this little punk kid kicked us out of an RV park- that little piece of crap! But we were able to meet some nice people who let us use their fire and eat their s'mores!

I'm tired now bye bye.

GO TIME BABY

2009-05-23T09:13:00.002-06:00

Hey Hey (as Mark would say)

So today is the day! I am waiting on Mark to put his things together and then we are off! I can't believe we are starting our summer journey today. We stayed in Astoria, Oregon last night with Beata, Mark's sister and her boyfriend Bruce who have fed us, housed us, given us rides, and without their assistances, we have no idea how we would be here now.

We are both really excited and anxious to begin. We have looked at our map and decided that tonight we will either camp at Cannon Beach or Rockaway Beach which is about 55-65 miles away from Astoria.

We ate a delicious italian feast last night in order to get our adequate carbs and drank a lot of water! The weather outside of the Lamplighter Hotel, which by the way has three beds in one room, is..well....overcast and cold! So hopefully it will burn off in a bit! After three days of packing and spending big money on our last minute supplies we are finally ready to get on the road!

We didn't realize that it is Memorial Day weekend and we are heading down the 101 Highway so we decided to wear our highlighter yellow vests and attach an orange flag to our trailer! I picked out Mark's outfit and we are matching! ha

So thanks to everyone who has donated to our cause whether it be monetary or simply just the love and support we have received from so many! We need it all! We are both looking forward to the laughs and random people we meet, as I have already poked Mark in the eye with the flag and met a wonderful hotelier by the name of Laura who offered us cookies that smelled like smoke as we checked in.

So here we go! We plan to be updating our blogs as much as possible, we are having some techinical difficulities with the itouch but we will have a lot of time to figure it out! Also, we decided that when we can we will be separately blogging so that should be funny!

We would also like to recognize Liz Duckworth who recently passed, a lovable gal with an awesome smile and a wonderful, outgoing personality who was loved by so many. We love you girl and will be thinking of you all along the way!

Peace and Love baby! America here we come!!!

Kristen and Mark

Word Is Spreading....

2009-05-12T18:45:00.003-06:00

Hey Hey,

Our biking journey to raise money to restore damaged schools and raise attention about the Child Soldiers in Uganda and boarding countries is gaining momentum! The more publicity we can attract the more people will learn about the atrocities that are happening in central and eastern Africa. Specifically help rescue the Child Soldiers of Uganda, so they can return to their homes and families. As more people learn about the calamities in these countries, they can go to their elected officials and demand them to create policy measures or pass legislation which will help end the wars occurring in central and eastern Africa and restore peace.

We made the front page on May 11 in the Rocky Mountain Collegian which caters to residents in Northern Colorado http://www.collegian.com We are very excited because CSU students and Fort Collins residents can learn about our biking journey to raise money for damaged schools in N. Uganda.

Also, the owner Darren of Bicycle Touring Pro website wrote a little blurb about our biking journey http://bicycletouringpro.com/lifestyle/2009/05/biking-for-invisible-children/

Our friend Elena is helping us make a media kit, so we can send out our biking trip and our cause to anyone who would be willing to publish it. Thanks Elena for all the time and effort you put into creating the media kit!

10 days until we leave!!

All the best,

Mark and Kristen

Last Weeks Fundraising Event

2009-05-12T13:52:00.015-06:00

Hey everyone!

Mark and I are enjoying some sunshine on this lovely Tuesday afternoon while we discuss the rest of the equipment we need for the trip. Not too many things because Mark is going to have to drag it ALL in the trailer! We cannot believe we are graduating this weekend and we leave Oregon next Friday! We are both excited and anxious to begin our journey!

Last week was a hectic week planning for our big fundraising event on Thursday evening at C.B. & Potts, a local brewery/restaurant in town. 10% of the restaurant's proceeds were donated to our bike trip. On Thursday morning, we were on CSU Plaza promoting for our event. We were equipped with spandex and two stationary bikes, showcasing our fabulous biking skills to get people to attend our fundraising event that evening.

Thanks to Jeremy Wilstein (official spokesman for our campaign) in attracting a lot of attention. He capitalized on the students who had mesmerized faces after witnessing Mark in spandex and convinced them to come to C.B. & Potts that evening. Jeremy, being the personable person had no problem convincing almost everyone he talked to!!

We can't forget to make a shout out to our friend DJ D Quay! He kept us motivated on our stationary bikes with up beat dance music. At one point the music was so loud that the Student Center building manager had to come out and tell him to turn it down! Way to keep bumpin the beats DJ Quay!

The C.B. Potts fundraiser that evening was a great turnout. It was great to see all of our friends, teachers, and community members enjoying great food and drinks. We had a raffle with a lot of food certificates that local Fort Collins restaurants donated. Our friend Bre helped us out by spending hours going from restaurant to business asking for any type of item or certificate that could be donated! Thankkkkss!

As the night wore on, more and more people started to come. Here are some photos of our friends enjoying themselves while a portion of their tab was donated to us so we could achieve our goal of raising $10,000 for schools in N. Uganda.

Thank you everyone who came out and supported us!

We are so close to graduation that we can smell our diploma! Then we are off on a bike ride across the U.S in hopes of informing the people we meet along the way about the war in Uganda. How it must come to an end in order to rescue the 3,000 child soldier still fighting for the militia LRA.

Summer is here so enjoy it!!

Kristen and Mark

Invisible Children "The Rescue" April 25

2009-04-26T20:45:00.010-06:00

Last night was a huge success! Close to 2500 participants took part in "The Rescue" of Joseph Kony's child soldiers. The event began at Cheeseman Park in Denver around 3pm when people started walking from the "abduction site" to the "LRA camp". This simulation represented the child soldiers being abducted from their homes and villages and brought to the Lord's Resistance Army camp where we waited for hours in order to be rescued. Being rescued meant that we needed media attention as well as a mogul who promised to do something about the situation currently happening in Northern Uganda.

Mark and I were both pleasantly surprised about the turn out of so many young people who are the faces of our future and care so deeply about the well being of their fellow teenagers. At around nine thirty we were rescued!!! Channel 9 news came to document the event and both a representative from Senator Udall's office as well as a member from the Flobots came to rescue us! Along with many others around the world we hope that something will be done to bring the child soldiers home and let them know peace.

Everyone came running to the stage after Denver found out that we had been rescued!

Mark and I in our volunteer shirts!

Everyone prepared to camp out until we got rescued.

Here are a few pictures from the event to give you a better idea of how it went!

On another note, Mark and I went on a 3 hour ride today and experienced some forces of nature including wind, wind chill, and also some tail winds and as for me, some forces of gravity. I took a pretty good fall while trying to catch Mark's draft which ended up in a crash, with a few good scrapes. After Mark asked if I was okay and the reply was a few grunts and an okay, we began laughing and continued riding. We had a good ride and are starting to get all of our equipment together!

As graduation creeps closer and closer we are cramming in everything we can from school to friends to training and gearing up for the summertime!

Hope everyone's week is going well and thanks for your support!~

Peace and Love,

Kristen and Mark

Things Are Coming Together

2009-04-16T16:25:00.015-06:00

Hey Everyone!

We can't believe we have only a month until we leave for our long adventure across America. We definitely are feeling senioritis kicking in, but trying to finish up the semester in good standings!

We sent out over a hundred donation letters to our family and friends. Thank you for all the people who have already donated! This trip wouldn't be possible without your help!! We currently have raised $1,200 dollars! Not too bad for only fundraising for two weeks. We hope for the donations to continue coming in!!

In regards to getting sponsors its been a slow and steady process. We emailed dozens of corporations related to outdoors and biking, but haven't heard back from them yet... We've talked to the small businesses and restaurants in Fort Collins, CO and we should hear back from within a week to see if they would be willing to sponsor us. We are hoping the bike and mountain shops will come through because we are in desperate need for biking and camping equipment. If you know of any company that could potentially sponsor us please let us know!

Training: We are both really busy with all the end of semester projects and work, however, we managed to get a few rides in a week. The weather in Fort Collins fluctuates all the time. One week its 40 degrees and then its 65-70. Yesterday, the weather was perfect and we went on a mellow 50 mile ride! Our butts were a little sore, but we have a month left to break in the saddle!

We just signed up for a twitter account. This is a great way for us to do daily status updates when we are on the road. Good way in keeping everyone informed about the weather, location, how we are feeling....so come track us!

Lastly, Invisible Children is putting on a international event called "The Rescue". This event is taking place April 25th in 100 major cities throughout the world. Click on the picture below to see if it's taking place in your city. The main purpose of this event is to raise awareness about the 23 year old war in Uganda. Most importantly, help rescue the 3,000 child soldiers that are still being held by the Lords Resistance Army against their will. So come SIGN UP for this event and let all your friends and family to join you on April 25th. Write to your local newspapers or politicians. Email Brad Pitt, Britney Spears and tell them to attend the event. The more media attention the better!!

That's it for now. We will keep you more updated about donations, sponsorship status, and training!

Have a great weekend,

Kristen and Mark

Website is up and running!

2009-03-25T22:26:00.000-06:00

Hey all!

Kristen and I are both very excited our website is up and running!! It has been a long and tedious process that wouldn't of been possible if it wasn't for our friends Mike and Emily! Mike is the one responsible for combining all of the text, pictures, thoughts, and ideas and creating a great looking website!! Emily helped us with visual appeal, writing mechanics, and made sure that our fundraising campaigns message was clear and consistent. Thanks again for all your hard work!

Kristen is VERY HAPPY because she just got herself a brand new cross-country bike! She can start training on the road with me and dump the boring stationary bike she's been training on for several months!

Having the website up is a significant milestone for our Buy a Mile Teach a Child fundraising campaign, which we will be biking across the U.S this summer from West to East in order to raise $10,000 for Invisible Children's Schools For Schools program. The program is aimed at improving 10 secondary schools in Northern Uganda. We can't wait to graduate in less then two months, so we can hit the road!

Our next step with the Buy a Mile Teach a Child campaign is receiving company sponsorships to help achieve our campaign goal. We will be going to all the restaurants, businesses, and bike shops throughout Fort Collins Colorado to see if anyone could help support our cause. If you know of any companies that could sponosor our campaign please leave the company's name and contact info on this blog or shoot us an email to: biking4invisiblechildren@gmail.com. You can also individually sponsor us just click on the "Donate Now" link below and download the "Sponsorship Form".

If you're around Fort Collins Colorado this weekend and you want to see something neat, I would recommend checking out “Trafficked” on March 27 (6-9pm) & March 28 (1-4 & 6-9pm) at the Lighthouse (709 Wagner Drive). This is a simulation event that helps educate people about human trafficking: sex slavery, forced labor and child soldiers.

Support Mark and Kristen’s Buy a Mile Teach a Child Campaign

"You Can Make A Difference!"

Have a wonderful week....weekend is almost here!!
Mark