I thought I should follow the TransAmerica updates by answering some questions I have been asked about the ride. First of all, Steve and I bought maps from Adventure Cycling which were extremely helpful.
Along the route we experienced many incidents, which I was unable to fit into the updates to my church. These are some of them:
DRIVERS
MOST COURTEOUS
The vast majority of drivers passing us or, in some cases, waiting to pass us were patient and courteous, but the most courteous and patient were those of Virginia. The route took us on many narrow, winding roads which made it difficult for motor vehicles to pass us. At times there were three or four cars behind us who had to wait for a chance to pass us as there was no place for us to pull off the road. The drivers did not blow their horns, race up close behind us, or yell expletives at us as they passed. We rode from the north to the south of Virginia (the long way) thus spending many days in the state and were always treated courteously by drivers.
NASTIEST
As we rode through Kentucky we were, several times, subjected to what the local cyclists call “The Black Out.” This consists of a driver of a large diesel pick-up truck slowing down right alongside a cyclist, then gunning his engine so that it spews black diesel exhaust onto the cyclist. Once, Steve was ahead of me by about a half-block when a pick-up driver did this to him and he actually disappeared from my view for a short time in the black cloud. We were told these people “…just don’t like cyclists” and just enjoy treating them badly.
LEAST COURTEOUS AND MOST DANGEROUS
As we rode through southern Colorado we were on narrow, high-speed roadways with little or no shoulder. The area through which we were riding was flat and wide open, the roads were straight, and a person could see for a mile or more ahead. Yet every driver that went past us, every driver, refused to slow down (usually going approximately 80 m.p.h.) and refused to move over even an inch, coming perilously close to us. And this even though it could easily be seen that there was no oncoming traffic. For several days we felt as though we were constantly at risk while riding. Once we turned north into the rest of Colorado the drivers became much more courteous and we enjoyed the rest of our time in the state.
DIVINE INTERVENTION
While on the TransAmerica Bike Ride Steve and I were riding through a plains area of Missouri, in “the middle of nowhere,” without a structure in sight. We were about midway through our daily ride. We stopped for a drink of water and to just talk for a minute. I noticed black clouds ahead of us in our route and saw lightning in the clouds. It was obvious a storm was moving in our direction at a pretty good clip. I pointed the clouds out to Steve, who had been looking the other way, and told him we had better find shelter of some kind soon.
We started peddling toward the storm, which of course increased the speed with which it would get to us, and were getting a bit desperate as we now could see large streaks of lightning in the clouds as they approached, and we still could not see anything we could use for shelter.
We passed a small hill on our right, then came to a right curve in the road. As we rode around the curve we saw, to our relief, a small church which had been hidden from our view by the hill. And, even better, there was a small covered picnic pavilion next to the church. We rode up the slight approach to the pavilion and, as we entered the shelter, the rain reached us and it started raining hard, and we even got slightly wet as we reached the pavilion.
As we sat in the shelter the storm raged around us, thundering loudly, lightning, and raining very hard for about a half-hour. We stayed safe and dry inside the shelter and even enjoyed watching the storm rage. As the storm abated we could see blue sky approaching, and shortly after that we were back on the road with hardly a sign that a storm had passed, except for the wet road.
We continued for a long ways before seeing another building and I have always thought of this episode as divine intervention. The church and pavilion had appeared at just the right time to get us out of an otherwise dangerous situation.
REUNION
When Steve and I were about midway through Missouri my girlfriend, Lee, and Steve’s wife, Pam, drove down to join us for a weekend. It was great to see them again as it had, by then, been a month or more since we had left. They had both supported our three-month long trip and we greatly appreciated their support. We had a very nice weekend and Monday morning Lee and Pam left for the long drive home and Steve and I biked off to continue our trek.
A SMALL WORLD
At about the halfway mark in the TransAmerica ride Steve and I stopped in a small Kansas town for an overnight. That evening we walked into a small restaurant/bar for supper. It was one of those places where everyone stops talking when a new person walks in. We entered and, sure enough, all 12-14 people in the place stopped talking and looked us over (I swear the juke box stopped playing for 10 seconds or so). We ordered our food at the counter, picked it up, and found a table close to the door. The people in the place had started talking again but were still stealing glances at us.
We had just started eating when a woman walked in the door and, once again, everyone in the place stopped talking. She got her food and turned, looking for a table, and Steve said, You might as well sit with us, we’re new here, too.”
She sat down with us and we had a nice conversation with her. She told us she was from Texas and was only there for the night. As the conversation ensued Steve mentioned that I had been a St. Paul police officer and she replied her brother was a Washington County Sheriff. As Washington County is close to St. Paul and I had worked with them numerous times, I asked her his name. She replied, “Mike ________.” I told her I had worked with Mike on numerous cases and knew him well! What a coincidence. She proceeded to call Mike on his cell phone and when he answered she talked to him for a moment, then said she had someone who wanted to talk to him and handed me the phone. I said, “Hey Mike, it’s Bruce Wynkoop.” He told me he was in Northern Minnesota fishing and we talked for a short while. At the end of the conversation he hesitated and then asked, “What are you doing with my sister?” I answered, “Never mind.” and handed the phone back to his sister. We all laughed and she had to explain to him how we had come to be in the same spot.
We had a very pleasant time with her over dinner and a couple of drinks, then went our separate ways. Just one more example of what a small world it is.
ROAD KILL
Just after entering Illinois we came upon a scene which, for a retired police officer, was truly tragic: Strewn alongside the road were half a dozen or so donuts. Even more tragic was the fact they were the really good kind—Krispy Kreme!
Not to worry—except for just a tinge of pesticide, they tasted fine and saved me from having to buy lunch that day.
WHERE THE DEER AND THE ANTELOPE PLAY
On our ride through Wyoming we frequently saw antelope running the prairie next to us. They, of course, are fast and agile and on more than one occasion we saw them easily leap the fences along the roadway. We thought they enjoyed racing, and easily outpaced us, as we rode. Showoffs!
When camped in the picnic shelters in the middle of nowhere (see Update # 7) we saw a large number of them running around in the hill next to the rest stop. They looked as if they were playing “tag” with each other and reminded us of the verse in the song, “where the deer and the antelope play.” It was a beautiful sight. As for the next verse to the song, “…where never is heard a discouraging word…,” believe me, while riding into a 12-mile-an-hour headwind for a couple of hours I was uttering plenty of discouraging words! Which brings to mind the age-old question—if a bicyclist swears in the prairie and there is no one around to hear him, is it still swearing?
Then, when nightfall came the stars emerged and we have never seen them so clear and bright; you could almost read a book by the starlight (that might be a bit of an exaggeration but you get the idea). It was another beautiful sight and between the two made for one of our favorite nights of the ride
When we got about halfway through Colorado we stopped at Colorado Springs to see Connie, who we had met on CANDISC several years earlier, and her husband. We had a very nice dinner at their house and had a nice time.
After the next day’s ride my daughter, Ginnie, her husband, and my two grandsons, who live in Loveland, drove down to meet us. We had a great time sight-seeing around the area for a day. It was great to see them and we had a great day together.
After the next day’s ride my son, Ben, and his wife, who also live in Loveland, drove down and met me at a restaurant to have dinner. After dinner Ben and I noticed there was a baseball game on the TV over the bar. As luck would have it, The Colorado Rockies were playing my team, the Minnesota Twins. I hadn’t seen a ballgame, much less a Twins game, for sometime so Ben and I had a great evening talking over important subjects like sacrifice bunts, headfirst slides, good plays, “tall cans of corn”, loud outs, and other things of national import. I apologized to Ben’s wife, after we awoke her (she had nodded off some time after Ben and I had tried to explain the infield fly rule to her) for leaving her out of the conversation but told her it was really good to talk baseball again with someone so knowledgeable about it. Being the sweet lady she is she forgave me and said it was nice to grab a nap anyway.
I’m not going to call this one Divine Intervention, but it was close; I’ll just go with coincidence and good luck.
ONE LANE BRIDGE
Somewhere in Missouri we came across two signs as we crossed a one-lane bridge (see photo). There was an identical sign on the other side of the bridge.
As this was Missouri I could envision a car on each side of the bridge with the driver of each waving the other to go and being too stubborn to give in and cross first.
RIDING THROUGH A BUFFALO HERD
Remember the old song “You can’t roller skate through a buffalo herd” by Roger Miller? Well, Steve and I found out that you CAN ride a bicycle through one. How? Carefully!!
While riding through Yellowstone National Park we came upon a long line of backed up traffic caused by a large herd of buffalo crossing the road. The vehicles were creeping along slowly through the herd. We had been told how to handle this by cyclists who were riding east along the trail and who had experienced it. We each picked out a large RV, rode alongside it, caught the driver’s attention in the rearview mirror, and pointed to a support pole on the side of the RV. When the driver nodded assent, we grabbed the support and held on to it as we traveled through the herd. That way the buffalo thought we were a part of the large vehicle and would not attack.
We definitely would NOT have tried to ride through the herd without the traffic. It was fun to be in the midst of this herd of huge animals, but a bit scary, too.
ONE MORE STORY
Somewhere in Oregon or Montana—we were toward the end of our daily ride during which we had made several long climbs—we started a nice looking descent through a beautiful mountain area and I noticed a road sign that said, “WINDING ROAD NEXT 99 MILES.” By the time I had seen the sign, and it registered in my mind that I should get a photo, I had gotten a block down the road and just didn’t want to stop, make a u-turn, ride back to the sign, make another u-turn, and take the photo. I have always regretted not going back to get that photo.
And I have often wondered—if the highway department had rounded it off to an even 100 miles, would anyone have noticed? At any rate, you have to commend them for their accuracy and attention to detail.
EAST TO WEST VS. WEST TO EAST
Many people have asked why we went from east to west, instead of going west to east in order to ride with the prevailing west winds behind us.
The “prevailing west winds” thought is a common misconception; the prevailing west winds happen far up in the atmosphere whereas the ground winds can come from any direction. So the wind direction had nothing to do with our decision to ride east to west.
Steve had the idea to ride the direction we did. As we wanted to leave earlier in the year, April 30th, he said the west end and the mountains would still be cold and the weather would be bad. So we started in the east. As we started to meet people about the midway point who had started in the west we found Steve had been right. The riders told us the first several weeks of the ride had been very unpleasant—cold, bad-weather, snow. Our first several weeks of the ride had been very pleasant. Good thinking, Steve! Actually, we were lucky; the weather throughout the ride, with the exception of a couple of tough days, was pretty darn good.
