She was really mad with us this morning. In the early hours of the morning the predicted storm hit Eureka and the lightning flashes lit up the stained glass windows of the church like something from ‘The Omen’. Warm and dry on our sleep mats on the floor we thanked Joanie and the church that…
Riding days start early on the trail. Our alarms were set for 6am, by which time Jerry and Jonathan were already up, clipping their panniers onto their bikes and making coffee. First Baptist had been a great place to stay, but the TransAm never rests, so by 7am we were out of the door and…
By Terry “See that red bit? … that’s the worst of the weather and it’s heading straight at us.” said Jonathan, pointing at the radar weather image on his phone. Sure enough, half an hour, 3 bowls of wheat flakes, 2 blueberry muffins and lots of rubbish coffee later, the thunderstorm hit Pittsburg. So much…
“You’re getting slower, aren’t you”? Terry’s question was direct, but honest. After 19 days of continuous cycling without a break since Fort Chiswell in Virginia, fatigue was beginning to set in. I found myself looking more and more at my feet and less and less at the landscape. I’d noticed no change in Terry’s energy…
“That’s not tea”. “Yes it it” “Is it hot?” “No”. “Do you have milk?” “No, we don’t keep perishables”. “Then it’s not tea then is it?” We are standing in KFC looking at a fizzy pop machine and for the first time on this trip I’m really grumpy. I face-timed Ellie and Kate this morning…
Ok then I’d better ‘fess up. There are no aliens in this post. Unless you include the cockroach we found in our hotel room this evening. That was pretty alien, well less of the pretty actually. But anyway the headline was there to grab you into the great Ozarks vs the Appalachian debate and if…
“Make sure you watch out for Chiggers”. “Chiggers”? “Yep you can’t see them but if they get up your leg they’ll leave bites all over your groin, they’re nasty”. “So how would I get rid if them?” “You can’t. Well you could try taking a bath in bleach – that’s about the only thing that…
Could you live in rural America? It’s a question we’ve been asking ourselves on several occasions over the last few weeks. Remote, few facilities, little in the form of entertainment, it seems there are few positives to recommend it. But spend more time with the people who live in ‘Smallville’ and you begin to get…
Our earliest start yet – on the road just after 7am to try and beat the predicted heat later in the day. A quick 12 mile dash chasing Rudy and Heidi through the country lanes and then, suddenly, we’d arrived at the Ohio River and it was time to say “goodbye Kentucky – hello Illinois”!…
It’s Memorial Day in America, a public holiday, so the roads are quiet. The Stars and Stripes are everywhere as the country remembers its war dead. Sitting in a cafe in Sebree this morning over breakfast I was reading the Evansville Courier which had an article about a local lad killed in Vietnam in 1968…