Here's a little diddy

So we are voting on grant applications in the next couple days. I have been impressed by the riders interest in the each of the organizations that applied and I'm excited to begin discussing the merits of each applicant, but I also realize that through this process we are doing more for the affordable housing cause than the direct effect of the money we raise.
A lot of food and supplies were donated from churches across the country in order to help make this trip possible. At each town we rely on strangers to lend a hand; maybe feed us a small meal and provide us with a hot shower. In economic terms, that's probably a lot of money that was donated in the form of hot water for showers, casseroles, and air conditioning. At times I worry that the food, water, and hospitality are not going to our cause. We're using them for our own benefit and therefore reducing the money that could flow directly to affordable housing groups.
But I think that misses the point of the trip completely. As the website says "Bike & Build fosters leadership and lifelong philanthropic service in our participants" and I think that's true. The participants could be riders or community members, but in all cases the trip is inspirational and hopefully inspires a longer lasting donation to the cause.
I love the comment that I've heard more than once on this trip - "Don't listen to what they're saying about young kids today! You guys are really doing something great and that gives me hope for the future." I'm not sure who is talking about young kids and I don't know what has been said, but I'm glad we gave some hope. I know the trip is going to in some form re-orient my career path toward service and I hope it may have similar effects on the riders and the people we meet along the way.

Wyoming has Mountains!

There is snow on the Mountains only 50 miles to my West. We caught our first glimpse riding into Shishoni on a 100 mile day. The landscape has started to become more 'featured' ever since we hit Nebraska and Wyoming, but there has been little in the way of actual mountains. It was nice to crest a hill and see the real thing with snow on top. It was also pretty nice to know that I climbed those mountains on NOLS only two years ago.We are heading over the Continental Divide tomorrow, into Jackson the next day, and over the Rockies the day after. I am obviously very excited.

Visiting Lander today was also a little surreal. The last time I was here, I was preparing for my NOLS course in the Wind River Mountains, and it was kind of cool to come back for another adventure. I visited the Gulch and the hostel and bought some of the bulk food. One of the riders even found my picture posted on the Honor Wall, which was pretty cool.

If you're interested in the day-to-day definitely check out the route tracker on the Bike & Build website where at least two of the riders update our progress daily. I also just uploaded about 130 pictures or so from between Ohio to Iowa/South Dakota today so check it out.

PICTURES!

My first camera lasted all of two days of the trip and somewhere in Connecticut it started to fall a part. First the lens didn't close, which wasn't too bad, and by day three I had pieces all over the place. I sent it home to get fixed and sometime in Ohio I was able to get my hands on another picture taking device. There are some gaps in the pictures but here is a general overview.


Dayton in the morning

Re-route on the 120 mile day

Indiana!

Carrol Iowa


A video!

Its been a while

So I kind of thought that the beginning of the trip would be the busiest and eventually I would fall into the routine and find all the time in the world for blogging, uploading pictures, and writing post cards. Of course that is never the case and each day continues to bring new challenges and adventures. Here are some thoughts about the states from the first half of the trip:

Pennsylvania is beautiful with actual rolling hills and gorgeous farmland that continues right into eastern Ohio.
Ohio is not flat. This is a lie and I had one of my worst days trying to climb the hills on an 80-mile ride through Amish country in eastern Ohio.
The roads and the drivers are better in western Ohio than eastern Ohio. We had some rough days in Youngston but I definitely began to love the state by the time we hit Dayton.
Illinois and Indiana are indeed flat. It is also hard to imagine what the states would look like with natural vegetation. There is so much corn and soy that it almost seems like its supposed to look like that. Illinois and Indiana are also a lot thinner than I expected. We blew by the states in no time.
Iowa is generally awesome and biker friendly. They have a yearly bike ride that spans the state called the Rag Ride and everyone in Iowa loves to talk to you about it. The advantage is that Iowa is used to bikers in large quantities and so drivers and people are not too annoyed to be held up for a few minutes on the main roads by bikers.There are also hills in Iowa, but not nearly to the extent that Iowans think there are. The hills are perfectly graded and help to brake up the monotony of corn and soy. I have some amazing pictures of Iowa that I will try to get posted.
South Dakota started flat with lots of corn but that is giving way to rolling hills of pastures and a few trees.

We Are so Important!

During our build day in Youngstown, we had two camera crews and a newspaper crew show up. Here's the first link to the newspaper, I don't know if I can find the other ones on the interweb but we'll see. Newspaper Article

Shawn, Tino, Peter, and I were stopped at a Wallgreens today and somebody came up to us "Are you the same guys in the paper?" He was holding a copy of the city paper in his hand with a big picture of Tino and I on the front of the section. He asked us to sign the paper and we chatted a little. I felt slightly important for a few minutes, which was cool.

Last night we also got to see ourselves on TV. We took a trip down the street to have a drink and eat some wings and our Habitat Host mentioned that the 11 o'clock news was doing a piece on us. We convinced the bar owner to change the channel, although due to some law we weren't allowed to have sound, but we made up for it by yelling loudly at the screen and cheering during the interview with Chong and Maggie. Here is the link to the TV story.

A second TV crew showed up after we were finished. They got awesome shots of us doing NO work and dancing . . . we did put on a roof, installed a door, and landscaped the outside of the house I promise!
Us slacking!

Done with Cue Sheets!

So I was responsible for getting the riders from Providence to Wellsboro with cue sheets every day. The process was slow and was definitely my biggest stress for the first part of the trip. I enjoyed the challenge of routing 32 riders each day and I enjoyed the patience of the riders who didn't skip a beat when I told them the day's ride was 100 miles, when everyone was expecting 80.

I also learned that roads and road signs in New England are meaningless. Routes! Everything is routes and routes do not follow paths. Routes follow random roads that are not associated with road signs. Cue sheets could have 70 lines of right on such and such street for 200 ft, continue on the next street while kind of staying right for another 300 ft, and follow this road with three road names for the next 40 miles where it will change names approximately 14 times. The other option is to say stay on Rte-44/US-55/CR-17/Old-17 as it winds through all the towns between Poughkeepsie and Roscoe over 70 miles and hope that no one misses a sign and that the mileage comes close to correct (which it rarely did).

I am glad to pass the torch to Natalie this week and pick it up in the West where the routes consist of only one road between towns.

Affordable Housing for Penguins

Today we had an interesting day visiting the Binghamton Zoo, shoveling penguin poop, and working in the name of Habitat for Humanity. Sometimes even the best laid plans . . .

Originally we were to build a community garden for an affordable housing community in Binghamton but severe weather predictions canceled the project. Amy (our Habitat liaison) called in a favor at the zoo and we were set loose. The zoo was a fun although a strange project that wasn't quite in line with out trip's focus. I was especially glad that my Aunt Maggie came to visit! She took pictures of us working in the penguin pen, playing with the penguins, riding the carousel, and getting wet working outside. She also stopped afterward to sit and have lunch. I really enjoyed sharing the day with her, even though a bit strange.