Our epic voyage West to East USA. Several years before we rode this epic route, Stef watched a documentary of a TV presenter who rode and documented his Trans America trip.
This inspired Stef to put it on his bucket list.
Of course I couldn’t let him go alone so we planned to ride it in 2020.
Then came the COVID 19 Pandemic just as we were ready to start…. We postponed until 2022 and this is the blog I wrote, mainly for my father’s benefit as he is not on social media.
104.35km. 1,034m ascent. 4h49 ride time Following a not so great night’s sleep in the North Park at Marshfield due to the everlasting heat, we set off early to beat the heat agin. Wonderfully cool so early and a side to tail wind made today’s ride really enjoyable, even though it was up near 40C…
83.58km. 1,053m ascent. 4h21 ride time We gained a short term Co-lodger last night. Hans-Udo arrived shortly after midnight and left again at the break of dawn. He is racing the TransAmerica bike race He looked really worn out and almost asleep on his feet. Maybe it would have been a challenge I would take…
We have ridden 4,672km (69%). We have climbed 32,498m (58%). We have 2,371km and 26,405m of ascent left to do
113.86km. 753m ascent. 5h49 ride time Again out at dawn to beat the heat and the temperatures were lower than yesterday. 23C when we left but it was already 10h00 before it hit 30C 😀 And we left flat Kansas behind after about 12km to enter Missouri 🤩 Missouri is known for its short very…
Chanute to Pittsburg. 95.70km. 336m ascent. 4h19 ride time As the heatwave continues we are also continuing to start at dawn After a great evening and good rest at our Warmshowers host Rick Bushnell’s home with diner and breakfast included we were ready for another hot and humid day Flat again but with more trees…
Eureka to Chanute. 103.99km. 438m ascent. 5h08 ride time With all the heatwave warnings we have been getting with 40C+ temperatures we decided to try to ride only before midday. We were up at 04:45 to leave in the twilight. We didn’t want to ride the on the highway in the dark as it was…
El Dorado to Eureka. 58.30km. 257m ascent. 2h41 ride time. We had to make this one a short one to be sure to get a motel with AC and ensure a good night’s sleep after yesterday’s long, hot and windy ride. Eureka was the only real choice. Not as far as we would like to…
Hutchinson to El Dorado. 132.08 km. 624m ascent. 6h33 ride time Hard and hot. It was already over 30C at 08h00 and only got hotter…. The wind was supposed to abate around midday and also change direction, it didn’t. The temperature was supposed to go down to 24C by 17h00, it didn’t. Our problem was…
Lyons to Hutchinson 50kmh wind with gusts to 82kmh. And guess in which direction? Full on headwind for us Up at 05:30 to avoid the heat and breakfast across the road from our motel at Scrambled Sam’s at 06:00 Then full on headwind. We couldn’t even average 15km/h against the wind. We took 2km stints…
Ness City to Lyons. 152.68km. 971m ascent. 6h40 ride time We had hoped the SSW wind would help us today, especially as it was very strong. More than 46km/h with gusts up to 60km/h 💨💨 This wasn’t really the case, it just made progress difficult. At least we had the wind upstream of the trucks…