Saturday, August 30, 2014
Preparations
I think I've got everything together. I'm determined to not use a backpack this time. I've got a multi-tool and a small, light air pump on top of my aforementioned spare tube. I'm bringing along a pillow and a sheet/blanket this time. The only things I haven't packed and/or made space for are my computer, my phone, their respective chargers, and my earphones. I think that's pretty darn good, considering I have everything I need should I be stranded on the road or my bike need adjustments. I'm feeling reasonably at ease. I'm sure that'll change once I'm on the road halfway from Winchester to Lexington, sweating up a storm and desperately wanting coffee or whatever. But right now, I'm feeling fine. If I need anything, I'll pick it up and make a mental note along the way. If I don't need anything I already have, I'll get rid of it and make a mental note along the way. I'm not worried, for once. So I feel reasonably at ease.
Wednesday, August 27, 2014
Momentary Backtracking
I'll be biking back home tomorrow morning, in order to sort some things out, clean windows for a bit of cash, and fine-tune my baggage setup (moving some weight to the front, ditching my backpack, that sort of thing). On Saturday I'll set off again, back to Lexington, where on Sunday I'll be doing some things around town. Either Sunday afternoon or Monday, I'll start my trip to Louisville, which I expect to last a couple/few days, and I'll be using Warm Showers for the first time to hopefully have some rest stops along the way. I choose to be optimistic about it. After that I'll likely be hovering around the Louisville area for a little while, since I have gigs on September 6th and 13th. After the 13th, all bets are off for a couple of weeks. Here's to adventure.
Tuesday, August 26, 2014
Bike Trip! Day 1.5-ish.
So, on the 24th, I started my bike trip. It's hard to believe that was just yesterday. (This bit was written on the 25th. Obviously.) Bunches of things happened. Many bunches.
On the aforementioned 24th, I started, somewhat foolishly, at nearly 7 PM. The route I was taking from Winchester to Lexington was supposed to take over two and a half hours, and, since I'm not quite fit for cycling yet, I had guessed it would take a good bit longer than that. Not that I was figuring on riding right through the night--no, I would set up camp somewhere for the night, despite the fact that a vast majority of Kentucky's land that I've ever seen seems to belong to someone else. Of course I would find seven square feet that would not be visible from the road, yet also not potentially get me in trouble with the law.
The weird thing is, I think I found that seven square feet. It was during sunset. I should have taken it. I didn't. Lesson learned: as soon as the sky stops being blue, start looking for a space to camp. At least in the more territorial areas of the US. It doesn't matter if it's 7:30. If you've found one chance, take it, lest you not find another one for the rest of the night.
Which is exactly what I didn't do. I passed the spot, and it got dark. I turned on my headlight and kept going. I stopped by Boonesboro State Park, and they said I had to pay $14 to camp there. As a personal thing, I'm keeping money of any sort to a minimum (that, and I just didn't think I could afford it), so I passed them by. I kept going (having unknowingly passed the turn that would have taken me to Lexington) and, now half an hour into full darkness and fairly lost, I basically went door-to-door asking if I could pitch a tent in their yard for the night. The first two said "no." The third, after hearing what I had experienced, said I could set up in their backyard for the night. That night was spent journaling and reading for a little while, then sleeping. It was one of those nights in which I didn't give a damn about the internet.
The next morning I left without a trace but the 7'x3' rectangular imprint on the grass, left by the tent. I got to what I thought would be back on track, but that track was actually taking me further away from my destination of the day. Since my phone was finally back in service, I made a call, got my bearings, turned around. And that is when disaster struck in the form of a flat tire.
While riding back to the turn I had missed earlier, I started feeling a slight beat with each rotation. That concerned me a bit, since I had no way to get to any bike shops in any of the three cities I was anywhere near. It was odd, though: I felt serene anyway. I'm so used to panicking when things of this sort happen--I definitely wasn't expecting calm. But hey--I'd just go to the next house and see if they could help me out.
That's when the disaster turned into an amazing experience. The house I stopped at was owned by a middle-aged couple who were sitting in their patio. When I waved at them, the man came out to ask if I needed help. After telling him, he rummaged around in his house for a pump, while his wife invited me in, gave me a can of Arizona green tea and a bowl of (really good) potato salad, and made intermittent conversation while smoking a cigarette. The man tried inflating the tire, realized that the tube had been punctured, and, upon learning that I had no spare (I'm seriously learning from experience here), tied my bike into the trunk of his car and drove it and me all the way into Lexington, to a bicycle shop that he had known for a while (for the record, it was "Pedal the Planet," on Richmond Road). There, I took my bike back into the service station, told them my problem. They said "no problem," and operated on it for a while. They said that, along with the rear tube, the front tire had lost a little tension, the brakes were on the loose side, and spokes were a bit off-center. When all was said and done, I paid $30 for practically a whole new bike and a spare tube, and I was suddenly already in Lexington. I rode around the city for a while, marveling at how smoothly the bike was running; it was nowhere near this good when I had first ridden it home a month ago!
Anyway, that was my first day or so of tour-cycling. I think I'll take it easy for the next couple of days, and set off again on maybe Thursday or Friday. I'll also be signing on to "Warm Showers" so that I might avoid the dire straits I was in a couple nights ago.
That's that, I guess. On to the next thing.
On the aforementioned 24th, I started, somewhat foolishly, at nearly 7 PM. The route I was taking from Winchester to Lexington was supposed to take over two and a half hours, and, since I'm not quite fit for cycling yet, I had guessed it would take a good bit longer than that. Not that I was figuring on riding right through the night--no, I would set up camp somewhere for the night, despite the fact that a vast majority of Kentucky's land that I've ever seen seems to belong to someone else. Of course I would find seven square feet that would not be visible from the road, yet also not potentially get me in trouble with the law.
The weird thing is, I think I found that seven square feet. It was during sunset. I should have taken it. I didn't. Lesson learned: as soon as the sky stops being blue, start looking for a space to camp. At least in the more territorial areas of the US. It doesn't matter if it's 7:30. If you've found one chance, take it, lest you not find another one for the rest of the night.
Which is exactly what I didn't do. I passed the spot, and it got dark. I turned on my headlight and kept going. I stopped by Boonesboro State Park, and they said I had to pay $14 to camp there. As a personal thing, I'm keeping money of any sort to a minimum (that, and I just didn't think I could afford it), so I passed them by. I kept going (having unknowingly passed the turn that would have taken me to Lexington) and, now half an hour into full darkness and fairly lost, I basically went door-to-door asking if I could pitch a tent in their yard for the night. The first two said "no." The third, after hearing what I had experienced, said I could set up in their backyard for the night. That night was spent journaling and reading for a little while, then sleeping. It was one of those nights in which I didn't give a damn about the internet.
The next morning I left without a trace but the 7'x3' rectangular imprint on the grass, left by the tent. I got to what I thought would be back on track, but that track was actually taking me further away from my destination of the day. Since my phone was finally back in service, I made a call, got my bearings, turned around. And that is when disaster struck in the form of a flat tire.
While riding back to the turn I had missed earlier, I started feeling a slight beat with each rotation. That concerned me a bit, since I had no way to get to any bike shops in any of the three cities I was anywhere near. It was odd, though: I felt serene anyway. I'm so used to panicking when things of this sort happen--I definitely wasn't expecting calm. But hey--I'd just go to the next house and see if they could help me out.
That's when the disaster turned into an amazing experience. The house I stopped at was owned by a middle-aged couple who were sitting in their patio. When I waved at them, the man came out to ask if I needed help. After telling him, he rummaged around in his house for a pump, while his wife invited me in, gave me a can of Arizona green tea and a bowl of (really good) potato salad, and made intermittent conversation while smoking a cigarette. The man tried inflating the tire, realized that the tube had been punctured, and, upon learning that I had no spare (I'm seriously learning from experience here), tied my bike into the trunk of his car and drove it and me all the way into Lexington, to a bicycle shop that he had known for a while (for the record, it was "Pedal the Planet," on Richmond Road). There, I took my bike back into the service station, told them my problem. They said "no problem," and operated on it for a while. They said that, along with the rear tube, the front tire had lost a little tension, the brakes were on the loose side, and spokes were a bit off-center. When all was said and done, I paid $30 for practically a whole new bike and a spare tube, and I was suddenly already in Lexington. I rode around the city for a while, marveling at how smoothly the bike was running; it was nowhere near this good when I had first ridden it home a month ago!
Anyway, that was my first day or so of tour-cycling. I think I'll take it easy for the next couple of days, and set off again on maybe Thursday or Friday. I'll also be signing on to "Warm Showers" so that I might avoid the dire straits I was in a couple nights ago.
That's that, I guess. On to the next thing.
Friday, August 22, 2014
Obligatory Introductory Post - Getting Stuff Together
Hey, my name's Geoff, and I'm just starting to ride a bicycle. I'd learned to ride in my mid-teens, but never bothered to keep it up afterward. Now, though, since I'm 22, don't have a driver's license, feel the tug of wanderlust and the need for mobility, the bike I have (a cheap $130 thing from Walmart) is an utter godsend.
So, a bit about me: I've been playing viola for eleven years, and during that time I've been through quite a few youth orchestras, all-state orchestras, chamber music groups and summer programs, solo recitals and competitions, and other things of that ilk all over the place. Then I went to college, got severely depressed, got a kidneystone, got in debt, and after two years, having had enough of all that, unceremoniously dropped out without much of a backup plan (read: no backup plan). Since then I've continued to play a bit of chamber music, worked some freelance gigs, and done some stand-up comedy. And now, two years after dropping out, I still have nothing to fall back on. I haven't had a steady job, either. I live in a small town in Kentucky. Small towns in Kentucky are not renowned for their job opportunities.
So now I've decided to take up cycling and see where it takes me. I intend to do some tour cycling as soon as I get some free time, ideally going as far across the country as I can get, even more ideally making my way over to Europe somehow, because Europe is by all (most) accounts amazing.
What I'm planning right now is to do a couple of musicky gigs, today and tomorrow, go back home on Sunday, get things together, and go on a small trip on Monday. Maybe it won't be that small, maybe it'll be smaller--I'll play it by ear. I just definitely want to camp out on Monday night.
Anyway, Hurrah for long-winded introductory posts! Let's see if I can actually keep updating this blog on a semi-regular basis.
So, a bit about me: I've been playing viola for eleven years, and during that time I've been through quite a few youth orchestras, all-state orchestras, chamber music groups and summer programs, solo recitals and competitions, and other things of that ilk all over the place. Then I went to college, got severely depressed, got a kidneystone, got in debt, and after two years, having had enough of all that, unceremoniously dropped out without much of a backup plan (read: no backup plan). Since then I've continued to play a bit of chamber music, worked some freelance gigs, and done some stand-up comedy. And now, two years after dropping out, I still have nothing to fall back on. I haven't had a steady job, either. I live in a small town in Kentucky. Small towns in Kentucky are not renowned for their job opportunities.
So now I've decided to take up cycling and see where it takes me. I intend to do some tour cycling as soon as I get some free time, ideally going as far across the country as I can get, even more ideally making my way over to Europe somehow, because Europe is by all (most) accounts amazing.
What I'm planning right now is to do a couple of musicky gigs, today and tomorrow, go back home on Sunday, get things together, and go on a small trip on Monday. Maybe it won't be that small, maybe it'll be smaller--I'll play it by ear. I just definitely want to camp out on Monday night.
Anyway, Hurrah for long-winded introductory posts! Let's see if I can actually keep updating this blog on a semi-regular basis.
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