Some concluding thoughts

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6832 km 62 days 345 hours 110 km/day 19,8 km/h

2013-08-04_0648_internetSix thousand eight hundred thirty-two kilometers. Sounds impressive right? Don’t be misled, it’s just the accumulation of 62 days of cycling with 15 rest days in between. This was my eighth ‘long’ distance bicycle tour. And no matter where I go, I keep meeting this people who think that you’re some sort of adventurer with super natural powers. And I keep telling them that anyone who wants it is capable of doing this. It’s really not that hard if you never go in overdrive and always keep continuing at your own pace. And before you know it you’ll fall in love with it anyway, so that will help you getting through some inevitable difficult moments. This trip was in so many ways unique. It was by far my longest one untill now, it was my first bicycle trip out of Europe, the first time that I traveled on my own,… Lets just keep things simple and say 1378104_665542341547_1482390564_nthat it was an unforgettable journey. The United States were beautiful and this not only in terms of nature. To this point I am still surprised about the generosity of many people I met during those three months and I owe many thanks to a lot of persons. Thank You! One figure to illustrate this: out of the 87 days I stayed in the US, I only paid 36 times for overnight accommodations (and I never stealth camped). WarmShowers guests, city parks, churches, family of fellow cyclists, complete strangers that you meet on the road: they all welcomed me and other cyclists on our trip across the country.

During the first six weeks I was traveling at an ever faster pace as my shape got better and better. I guess I was slowly turning into an endorphin junkie when I met Sara, Pedro and Joe again in 20130825_112925Jeffrey City. 🙂 The next day I raced to Lander with Joe. It was a great experience and he nearly lured me into riding the rest of the Trans Am together. But I am so happy now that I chose to slow down a bit and travel the rest of my journey with a group of newly made friends. My first 35 days I was riding about 128km a day, the next 27 days I did 87km on average. How does that saying go again? “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” We had so much fun together and if my blog was the victim of that, so be it. Of course I was also just being lazy because Annie & Jeanné, Garry and Sara & Pedro did actually find the time to blog while we were traveling together. I would especially like to mention this last blog: Sara & Pedro are still riding stong! They are in Mexico now on their journey to Ushuaia, Patagonia. I am actually silently dreaming of a South-American trip myself. Emphasis on silently.

But first things first: back to he USA! A new journey, a new blog. This is where you can find my new photo journal:  Camera Wanderings on WordPress or on Facebook. Good bye, Hello.

Oregon & Seattle

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23/08 Oxbow. Arrival in Oregon at night in a car. Feels like cheating, but who cares?! Get over it!
24/08 Hazy sunny days.
25/08 Baker City. First goodbye to Jeanné & Kevin.
27/08 Sunset rides, the best time of the day.
28/08 Oregon roadscape.
29/08 Oregon landscape.
30/08 Ochoco Pass.
31/08 McKenzie Pass. The sea of lava on top of the last TransAm pass.
01/09 Sunrise at Scott Lake.
02/09 Eugene. Last stop before we hit the coast.
04/09 Florence. Cloudy sunset at the PACIFIC OCEAN!
04/09 COAST-TO-COAST!!
05/09 On the Pacific Coast Highway.
05/09 Wheel dip. What’s my next challenge??
06/09 Newport. Seaside lunch.
07/09 Lincoln City. Goodbye, Ocean.
08/09 Portland.
09/09 Portland. Cathedral Park with Johannes.
10/09 Portland. Typical dream-of-the-nineties-fountain.
11/09 Seattle. Bolt Bus drop off.
12/09 Seattle.
13/09 Seattle. Smile for the camera.
13/09 Seattle. Bye bye.
15/09 Frankfurt am Main. Back in Europe.

Idaho

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17/08 Pacific Time Zone!
18/08 Lunch on the Lochsa River.
19/08 Annie the lightweight cyclist.
20/08 Fire in the distance
20/08 White Bird Hill Summit. Search for Kevin on the photo.
20/08 Riggins. Camping next to the Salmon River with Ryan and Jason, biking the US for MS.
21/08 New Meadows. Camping in the garden, thank you Irene and Carl!
22/08 Short afternoon ride to Council
23/08 Hitchhiking because of problems with Annies freehub.

Montana

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08/08 Entering Montana: already state number eight?!
08/08 Montana appears to be another beautiful state.
09/08 Still cycling together: group picture on top of a climb.
10/08 I saw many of these across America.
10/08 Al die willen te Amerika fietsen moeten mannen met baarden zijn.
11/08 Burned down forest on the Gibbons Pass alternative. Rough terrain but another highlight of my journey.
13/08 Road trip to the Glacier National Park in the truck of Eric’s dad who travveled with us from Yellowstone to Missoula. Thank you for everything Todd!!
14/08 Going-to-the-Sun Road in the amazing Glacier National Park (two dead camera batteries, aaaargh)
15/08 Bicycle path to Missoula.
15/08 Annie back on her bike after six days rest. On the downhill to Virginia City after that group pic she fell in the gravel behind me while we were riding 85 km/h. One of the most scary moments of my life, but she miraculously survived with only scratches and bumps. So my TransAm speed reccord has a bitter taste to it.
16/08 Officialy registrated at the ACA headquarters in Missoula as TransAm cyclists.

Wyoming

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30/07 Windy Wyoming. Forever West.
30/07 Massive thunderstorm hanging over Rawlins. But I have to get there: someone told me that Sara & Pedro are there! Walden to Rawlins: 184 km, but it was worth it…
31/07 Sara & Pedro! Last time I saw them was in Berea Kentucky 28 days ago! But someone else is about to turn up as well…
01/08 Joe! I met him for the first time just oustside of Roanoke in Virginia on 26/06. And here we are in the middle of Wyoming, more than a month and thousands of kilometers later!
01/08 Jeffrey City: Pedro & Sara from Portugal, Garry from Ireland, Joe from Maryland, Evan from Georgia and Nick from Australia.
03/08 Five cyclists from Virginia join us in the city park on the evening of our first rest day in Lander. The beginning of some glorious times.
04/08 All together on our way to Dudois.
05/08 Eat Coast pirates in the Grand Teton National Park
06/08 In Yellowstone, another landmark on the TransAm.
07/08 Ten cyclists, one bear box.
07/08 Old Faithful Geyser. Not everyone is interested.
07/08 Bicycle tourists at Old Faithful: Jeanné, Kevin, Annie, Eric, Liz & Evan.
07/08 Roaming around Yellowstone with Garry.
07/08 Go get yourself a book in the library for nice photos of Yellowstone.

Colorado

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26/07 Finally! MOUNTAINS!
27/07 Finally? Rain!?
27/07 At the peak of my TransAm shape: 142km from Royal Gorge to Breckenridge chased by a thunderstorm.
28/07 Bah! Cold cold rain!
29/07 Ute Pass. Alternative road tip by my WS host in Silverthorne. Thank you Aubrey!
29/07 Ute Pass dirt road downhill. Even with he rain one of my favorite days. This road is part of the Great Divide Trail, maybe, one day…
29/07 Too cold and wet to camp on the Willow Creek Pass. So I ended up riding 170km form Silverthorne to Walden = Exhausted
30/07 The sun is back, getting closer to Wyoming.

“I think he got stuck there!”

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First of all: sorry to anyone that was following my blog. I have been back in Belgium for more than three months now. My last blog entry is for the 26th of August,2013-08-24_1034_internet Eads CO to Pueblo CO. What happened?? I’ll do my best to keep it short. I was falling behind on my blog more and more and then I met the Portuguese couple that I had already met in Kentucky again in Wyoming. Sara & Pedro were riding with Garry, an Irish photographer, and Evan, a bicycle mechanic from Georgia. And so we formed a group of five for three days. While having a rest day in Lander Wyoming we met another group of five cyclists from Virginia: Annie, Liz, Jeanné, Kevin and Eric. From that moment on, August 4th, we rode as a group of ten for the rest of the TransAm! We had so much fun every single day that there was basically no time anymore for me to update my blog like it was intended to be on a daily basis. I felt bad about it but at the same time I didn’t want to miss out on having fun with the group. So all I did for the rest of my trip was post some photos on Facebook. I liked blogging but any future bicycle touring blog will probably be on a weekly basis or maybe more photo-orientated. I planned on finishing my blog in the first weeks after my trip but I am The Procrastinator himself so it didn’t happen. So why did I change my mind now? In a few days I am flying to Denver Colorado to visit Annie in Estes Park and go on a road trip with her later on in February. And I would like to keep some sort of a photo journal blog of this new trip to America. But it just didn’t feel right to start a new blog without finishing this one. So here it is: a state by state one-photo-a-day overview of the rest of my trip. Rather than presenting a collection of my best landscape pictures I tried to pick one representative photo for each day. I know at least a few people who will enjoy this, even at this point.