Days 6,7,8 - Virginia wet green

This is a condensed version of the last 3 days of my adventure. I can sum it up in two words: rain and punctures.

Armed with maps printed by Luc, I left the Bijeau home on Monday and started heading south, leaving D.C. after crossing the Potomac river. The trail took me through Georgetown, a historical part of Washington where some of it's oldest buildings (~1780) are located, and continued all the way to Alexandria.

On it I met two more extraordinary people. First, a runner, Eric McGlinchie, professor of political science, world traveller, 100 mile runner and father of two! How the hell can one do all this stuff? I struggle with balancing a job and amateur-level triathlon, and kids are not even on the radar yet. I bike, he runs, and in the two miles we spend together I feel a bond already.

An hour later I stop to eat at George Washingtons house in Mt Vernon, which is now a museum and most importantly, has a food court. While I am eating at a table outside, a cyclist sees my bike and asks me if I can keep an eye on his while he gets inside to get food. I said "sure, then please come join me". I get to meet another John, a civil engineer from Seattle who builds light rail road, recently for the Microsoft campus. John was on a business trip to Washington and rented his road bike. We get to talk more and I find out that John was trekking Yugoslavia by bike in 1984, with armed soldiers coming out of the woods to check him out. I do the math, I was 1 year old! He is 55 now, but at 25 he did some crazy things.

The nice bike trail ends and so does the good weather. I soon find myself on a busy highway and rain starts. And except a few short breaks it does not stop until two days later.

I don't get to see much of the two historical towns Fredericksburg and Charlottesville that I pass trough on Tuesday and Wednesday, because of the rain.
Tuesday was especially bad. In the morning I find the rear tire deflated. I don't see an obvious cause and I change the tube.
I wander a bit through Fredericksburg spining in a circle for about an hour because of a road block. It has an old feeling to it but I don't get to appreciate it because I have other preoccupations, like changing the tube a second time because this one gets deflated too, breaking one of my two tire levers in the process. I check again really carefully the tire and the rim, nothing. With the road block, tube changes and the fact that the motel was a bit far out of my route, it's almost 2 PM when I leave Fredericksburg. It rains, stops, rains, stops, and then all over again. At some point I don't even notice anymore when rain starts or stops. I am generally wet, but the rain gear does a reasonable good job at keeping my trunk/core dry.

At 6 PM the navigation tells me I got 3 hrs till the cheapest motel in Charlottesville. I can't wait to get there, with all this traffic and rain.
But the day has one more in store for me. Another puncture, right when another bout of heavy rain starts and there's no shelter around except leafless trees. I can hear the air "hissing" out of the tire, and I summon all my memories of misery endured in the Carpathian Adventure racing series to help me fix it. I curse the damn broken tire lever too.
At 10PM I finally get to the motel, can't describe how good that felt.

Wednesday morning rains like hell again. I am not in a hurry to get wet again so I wait for it to slow down, around noon.
I am in Charlottesville and want to see something of it despite the weather. So I eat my late breakfast in a park inside the beautiful University of Virginia campus watching the students passing by.

The road continued to Waynesboro, after climbing a big hill in the Shenandoah state park. On top of the hill is the Skyline Drive, which is supposed to be a scenic route but by the time I get to it it is covered by fog.
Oh and I get another puncture, same rear tire, but at least the rain stopped.

In Waynesboro I find a bikeshop where I get one more tube. I hesitate to change the tire which I think still has life in it and I regret it deeply 2 miles down the road when a small piece of wire makes another hole in it. I get back to the shop, riding on the flat tire, could not care less if I shred the damn thing to pieces.
While a nice guy at the bike shop replaces my tire with one that reassuringly says "anti puncture system", I get to patch some of the 5 tubes used so far.
I am now paranoid about the tire and I check it every 10 minutes.

But there is joy after misery when I see a patch of clear sky at the horizon. Soon the sun is shining, and the traffic is almost gone too.
I now pedal into the sunset towards Lexington, my destination for the day.
The smell of flowers and grass after the rain almost makes me dizzy and reflecting on the succession of highs and lows in my trip gives me a phylosophical mood.
Now all I need is a beer to get deeper into it, which I get first thing after checking in at Motel 6 in Lexington.

Day 5 - The American home

I leave camp very early, leaving no trace behind. Feeling lazy this morning, knowing that I am almost in Washington DC and will spend a full day here.

Rock Creek Trail is a narrow asphalt road that starts I somewhere north of the american capital, and if you follow it you get all the way to the National Mall. Basically it's a stretched out park across Washington, somehow an equivalent of Central Park I think.

I exit it at some point looking for a place to eat and I end up at a McDonalds. The clientele seems to be mostly mexican and chinese. I take my regular egg and bacon sandwhich and proceed calling home as I usually do during breakfast.

A guy with a notebook at a table in front of me hears me speak on the phone. "Is that russian?" And so I get to meet John Wharton, who spends his retirement years in Mexico with his mexican girlfriend working on expanding their little business with a campsite for tourists "such as myself", called "El Parque" :) It's located in a cute historical little town, San Miguel de Allende, a UNESCO world heritage site.
Funny coincidence is that John will come to Romania in a couple of weeks on a Danube cruise from Budapest to Giurgiu, then Bucharest.
So there is a lot to talk about and after an hour we somehow end up debating the ucrainian crisis.
John says I got to meet his friend Paul and we walk to his house nearby.

Paul is quite a character. Skinny, tall, blond hair, laid back and a very gentle guy who travelled all over the world on his bike in the nineties. He has a ton of stories from his treks in South-East Asia, China, South America and I browse two packs of amazing photographs while we sit around his kitchen table drinking tea. His fridge is also filled with memories from his trips, newspaper articles, and several photos of a cute asian girl with coins on her neck and keys as jewelry hanging on the side of her head. John jokes that she's his dream girl :)
Jerry, or "Chief" as Paul calls him, another bike world trekker drops by and I get to meet him too.
Paul invites me to use the shower (I don't think I stink, but the guy knows the first necessity of a cycle tourer after a night in the bushes), then we talk some more. Too bad we have to split up, me to see the city and them to do their bike ride, I feel good in their company.
At departure Paul offers me a scarf with the American flag. Whish I had something for him in return of his great gift, but with all this ultralight thing I did not think to bring any souvenirs from Romania.
So ends my first visit to an American home, Paul's batchelor crib impressed me with it's simplicity and warm atmosphere.

In a very good mood I continue pedalling the trail now full of active people that bike, run, play soccer (many mexicans live and work here), kids do acrobatic horse riding.

Pierre, my friend & fellow ixian who works at the North Carolina Ixia office, has surprised me the other days when he told me that his best friend Luc Bijeau can host me for a night in Washington.
So I am heading for his address where I am warmly welcomed by Amy and Ellie, Luc's wife and daughter. I leave my belongings safely in their beaitiful home and go bike through the city, targeting the National Mall and surrounding neighborhoods.

After a few hours of wandering, admiring and almost falling asleep on the grass in front of the Washington Monument (the giant obelisk) I use a different route to return at Luc's home. It takes me about 50 minutes to get back, Washington is quite big. In total today I count almost 80km, I did not expect to do that much in my rest day.

It's now almost 10PM, Luc and his son Charles are back home after attending a scrabble competition in Rhode Island. I imagine Luc is very tired after 9 hours of continuous driving, but he still takes the time to correct his son's homework for French, while Ellie is also doing hers. However tired we both are it's always a great idea to go for a beer and something to eat and we walk through the quiet neighborhood to the pub a few streets away.

Luc is also a software engineer so we talk the same language, I could not have found a better host :)
I find out that Luc and Amy are both marathoners, in fact that's how they met. I found the talk with Luc, as the one with the guys in the morning, to be very sincere and felt a connection that transcends our different origins.
Relaxed after the beers we head home, where I decide that tomorrow I will start lazy too and drop on the bed dead tired.

Day 4 - Scenic Maryland

This one is going to be more telegrapic because I have some catching up to do :)

Morning starts with small breakfast consisting of half giant sub from last night.
In yesterday's evening rain I noticed that my phone was not charging anymore from the USB plug attached to the dynamo hub on the front wheel. After cleaning the wires that go in the dynamo hub I see it is working so it appears it doesn't like to get wet. I quickly improvise something with a piece of plastic and some zip locks.

Entering Maryland a sign warns me that a scenic route follows. And it does not lie. Maryland has some beautiful state parks and my route passes right through them.
They are full of wildlife and I count the animals I've seen so far: two foxes, two rabbits, one badger (I think), a pheasant, storks, many deer, and an eagle with a reddish beak.

After a small lunch break when I get to write half of yesterday's blog post, I start seeing many road cyclists out to train and I chat with some of them.

It is sunny all day but still quite windy, forecast says 30kph with 40kph gusts. 4th day of wind in a row.

I am near Washington DC in the evening and I decide to find a place to camp. This time it's a forest next to an old tobacco plantation turned into park. I avoid camping in the park although it is deserted and very inviting, because a guy tells me the police peruse it sometimes.

Immediately after I set the tent, I invoke a short rain to test it and it seems to hold well :)
In the night I am woken up by deer that run away when I open the tent to check them out.
I fall asleep enthusiastic about spending the next day in Washington DC.

Day 3 - Monster river, monster hills

The sunny morning announces a great day but I see that a storm is scheduled for the evening. Passing through the fields in the cold air I see more Amish people, a man in a carriage and kids walking the side of the road. I ask their permission to photograph them because I don't want them to hate cyclists.
A puncture keeps me on the side of the road for 30 minutes most of which I use to pump the tire with my tiny pump.

After Lancaster I enter a short but steep portion of highway, with shoulders as wide as a driving lane in Romania. The  day brings longer hills than the previous one and I am glad I fixed the chain, otherwise I would walk the bicycle up. On the other side of a long hill I see what seems to be a lake, it's so big. But it is the river Susquehanna that has a dam nearby. After the bridge over the river into Wrightsville which goes along the remains of an old bridge, I stop to eat something in a greek pizzeria where the greek owners and personnel watch a greek TV channel.
Wrightsville looks really neat but I don't see it too much as the route exits town along the river.
A cyclist appears in front of me and we both fight a fierce wind. Me trying to catch him, he obviously trying to get some exercise or in a very big hurry :). He's Tom, Vietnam war veteran, strong cyclist in the seventies, really nice guy. His home town is a place called Telluride, that I will pass through in Colorado, and suggests I should visit it.

Soon I enter an isolated road (Claudia, my trusted navigator, informed me to eat before because I'm not going to find food for a while). Belly is full of greek spaghetty, I think I'm good.
Real climbing starts, hill tops are very long they feel like small plateaus with a few houses here and there. The wind is howling and I see clouds building up. Approaching storm makes me cut short a lovely conversation with my beautiful wife on Viber, in order to prepare rain gear. Minutes later it starts pouring. I covered the handlebar phone, and pedal thinking that this is not as bad as I thought. The air is so clean, and looks like I am out of the hills. The eye of the storm is behind me, and I seem to be getting away from it.

Soon I find a motel, and with the rain picking up I decide to call it a day. A good decision it seems as the rain became serious and continued through the night.

Day 2 - Serendipity and first Amish encounter

It was a cold night and I did not get a very good rest. Accuweather indicates 1 Celsius  at 6 AM as with freezing hands I pack my tent quickly and start pedalling to breakfast dressed up with almost all my clothes: rainpants, thermal shirt, fleece, rain jacket, gloves, headband, shoe covers (been sleeping with all these on too)

At a McDonalds I refresh myself, write a blog post for the day before and arranged my stuff packed in a hurry so I don't get spotted.

In Conshocken I take a bike path along the Shuylkill River, which stretches out of town ondulating with the hills. Grass is cut everywhere, it's neat, looks like a golf course.

Only two small problems bother me on this sunny day (actually three if I count the headwind) as I enter Amish country.
First, the chain which jumps from one sprocket to another or even falls of on several occasions. I check it but cannot figure out what's wrong. Only a few gears work fine and I decide to stick with these until I find a bike shop.
Second, my solar charger falls off my handlebars on a bumpy descent. I gather its pieces and manage to put it back. Still charges the phone but some leds are broken.

I enter soon a very hilly forest area. There are still houses but more isolated. These finally look like homes where people live in, with stuff in their yards, all kind of contraptions, signs, bells, flags, rocking chair on the porch, small flower gardens, as opposed to the New Jersey where most of the houses seemed to be for vacation, fancy but empty.

All people I make contact with at grocery store, pharmacy, gas station, are curious where I come from and look amazed, then worried ("but where are you going to sleep?") and encourage me once I tell them.

I climb hills using one of my middle rear cogs, otherwise chain falls off. So I have to get up the saddle all the time and push hard on the pedals.
I guess this is why at some point on such a hill my chain breaks. It takes a while to remove the broken link and then to put the pin back on because I accidentally take it out completely and you're not supposed to do that. Somehow I manage to put it back on in like 20 tries, really testing my patience.
Happy I managed to fix it I see a lady moving around a nearby house and ask her if I could wash my hands all black with chain oil. She kindly takes me into her house where we have a conversation while I use a degreaser to wash my hands. As I leave, Rachel writes me a note with a number to call her and her husband Ed if I get into trouble finding a place to sleep.
So a broken chain actually turned out to be a good occasion to meet a nice person. Thanks Rachel!

The day gets even better when I notice that after I removed the broken link the chain issues are completely gone, I can use all gears fine now. So either the defective link caused it or the fact it was too long.

I just feel like I got a new set of legs and could keep going into the night if I have to. It's a beautiful evening as I exit the forest hills and enter a more agricultural setting.

In next town Bowmansville the Italian owner of a pizza shop wants to know what drives "us people" to do this. He's seen many cyclists on this route, some even two months ago when I guess it was still winter. John is chatty and informs me that there is a bunch of motels a few more km on my route.

Pedalling throuh fields and farms I see a man climbed up a plough pulled by horses. My first Amish encounter. I was afraid I leave Amish country without seeing the people that make it famous.

Around sundown I reach the motel and so a very beautiful day ends with a hot bath and saddle soreness preventive measures :)

First day on the road

I'm writing these notes while sipping coffee after a McDonalds breakfast in small town of Ambler, Pennsylvania.
Here's in short how the first day went.

A 7 minute ferry ride took me on the other side of the Hudson. Entering Newark was harder than anticipated. A neverending train of high speed trucks passes me by and the road shoulders are almost nonexistent.

Newark was not the nicest experience. Bad roads, bad neighborhoods, dubious people. As i was innocently photographing a school with cool graffiti, a black lady passes me by and gives me an incredulous look: "Did you ride your bike all the way up here? You got a death wish or something?"
I realize I have to get out but where is the right direction out? Two black mean looking tatooed police officers in a parked car confirm my suspicion that being here "is not the greatest idea" and point me the shortest way out. "And somebody just got killed for one of those" says one of them pointing at the smartphone on the handlebars. I hide it and pedal quickly out of there
Suddenly the landscape changes completely: nice houses, blossomed trees, road is good again. Phew!

Rest of the day takes me through the New Jersey and then Pennsylvania countryside on one of the most beautiful roads I ever rode. Rolling hills, no fences, mowned lawns (most likely the entire state is mowned), pretty houses with their PO boxes (even empty fields and pastures got one) and not a person in sight.

The wind blew furiously all day but it was mostly sunny.

In Lambertville I start looking for accomodation. Being a fancy resort all BBs are ridiculosly expensive. The only campground near town looks abandoned.
What discourages me from camping in the forest areas between houses are the omnipresent No Tresspassing signs. You cannot get a meter out of the road without tresspasing.

Right before dark I spot a good place next to the road behind some bushes so I cannot be seen. I pitch tent quickly, soon the noise of the cars turns down and I can get some well deserved rest.