Day 3, or... Day 1 of the Kansas bazaar

Where were we? Oh right, we're still in the car...

You'll notice that becoming a dominant theme of this trip, if you haven't already.

We spent last night in the city of the silver arch. But we were back on the road first thing in the morning because all either of us could both talk about was how much we both wanted to make it out west. Which makes it all the more strange... and later on ironic... that we spent a entire week... 7 full days... in Kansas.

By the end of it I think Kansas herself was tired of us. But I'm getting ahead of myself. There are tales to tell between now and our exodus from.. errr.. umm.. I mean our exit from the state.

Duncan, how are you enjoying the drive boy? That much huh...














Wanna go for a ride?














He he.. just kidding we have another 100 miles to go. Go back to sleep.

We stopped in Kansas City which is really in Missouri but we figured it counted anyway. After grabbing some food out of the cooler and taking the dog for a walk we found the River Market Cyclery.














Very cool shop. They let me "borrow" their internet for a while so I could find us a place to camp for the night.

I might have explained my trip planning philosophy already but it's worth repeating. It goes like this. Over planning is like a signal that jams your "adventure radar". If you've already decided on everything you want to do your not really open to the possibility of possibilities. You know what I mean?

With a couple of key exceptions, planning for this trip basically consisted of writing down the name, phone # and address of a bike shop or two in each city I thought we might visit. In my experience you can get pretty much everything you need at bike shops... directions to the best trails, where to camp, great places to eat and drink.

Hell, half the time you can even work your way into a one or two night stay riding someones couch in return for buying them a case of Pabst after the ride. I once stayed in a strangers house in Asheville, NC for a whole week and all it cost me was an opened bottle of rum I was going to throw away.

So, as far as I'm concerned, all you really need to know is approximately where you want to ride and the names and phone #'s of some good local shops and odds are you're going to have a kick ass trip.

Some might call that reckless for a trip of this length and duration, but I like to think of it as just more adventurous. My experience (without exception) is that over planning can kill any any trip. No matter how potentially amazing the idea is, too much planning can turn it into a boring, homogeneous and safe affair. Nothing ventured, nothing gained ...

Like a trip to the supermarket, you know exactly where you're going, you know what you're going there for, and you're 99% sure they're going to have it. And if they don't have it someone will probably apologize to you and give you a coupon for the next time you come back.

That's not life, that's preservation... like in formaldehyde.

Nope, not what I'm looking for on a road trip. Especially not this one. I wanted the sort of real experiences that you can't plan. I wanted to interact with life on a primal level. I wanted to achieve travel greatness.

That said, not having plans has its draw backs...

For instance, rolling into Kansas City at 4pm and not knowing where you're going to sleep after having spent between 24-26 hours in the car in the last two days... and it's 95 degrees, sucks.

So I was very happy when one of the shop guys asked what I was "searching the net for". Turns out him and his friends were headed out to Clinton Lake State Park outside Lawrence, KS in just about an hour.

Great trails, even better camping, less than an hour away. Ahhh... bike shop to the rescue again.

Tomorrow we ride...

Day 2 - Lots of Driving

We left Carter's Lake in the morning because a) Georgia is fun but it's no Pacific Northwest, and that's where I want to be. And b) because the sound those enormous Cicada's made at night could be measured in decibels... lots of decibels.

It was almost impossible to sleep. And I'm pretty sure there was a cougar stalking our campsite. We didn't want to spend another night and find out. Instead we decided to see lots of country today.

First... Nashville, TN is a shithole... I'm just sayin'.

I'm pretty sure they still have segregated restrooms there. Also, black people and white people did not appear too happy to see each other in "their" respective parts of town.

We definitely got off at the wrong exit here. We aborted our attempted lunch stop and didn't wait around to take any pictures.

Blech... that's one city I can cross off my list of places to visit. But the rest of the drive was inspiring. America's Heartland is very pretty.

We stopped in Paducah, KS for a late lunch a few hours later.














Nice little town that looks a little like it never left the 1950's. God knows what you would do there on the weekends though.

Although, parts of it seemed to be undergoing some sort of a gentrified artistic revival. This particular abode was on sale for the low low price of $690,000... I have no idea whether or not that included the Giraffe.



















Apparently Paducah has a problem with flooding during the rainy season too. This wall, plus the height of the embankment it sits on top of, towers close to 60ft over the rivers edge and the town STILL gets flooded every couple of years.














Why not just move to a place that just didn't have massive floods. While you were at it you could make it a place that also had things to do.



















Anyway, lunch was good and our walk around Paducah was educational and much needed.

OK, moving right along then. Oooh look, a pretty arch...














We camped out in St. Louis for the night and got an early start the next morning. Oh, and by camped out I mean we pulled into the first hotel we laid eyes on. Neither of us wanted to put our tents up in the dark after 12 hours in the car.

Stay tuned for more action packed days in the car. I promise we do actually get on our bikes at some point.

Day 1 - Georgia

We decided not to stop anywhere in Florida because, basically, I couldn't wait to get the hell out of Florida. So the cross country express drove a straight 10 hour shot to Carter's Lake the first day.

Carter's lake has good camping, a great trail and an even better shuttle-able downhill trail.

So, now that we're a solid 550 miles from home back in Florida let's take a quick inventory to make sure we've got everything we need for a successful camping trip:

Dog and dog's backpack, so he can carry his own food and water... Check















Tents... Check















Gigantic horror movie sized Cicada's being eaten alive by equally large and frightening bee's... Check

OK then, as long as we have everything. Let's ride...



















Kristi has an eye for the wildlife shots. She can spot little critters from a mile away. Hello Mr. Lizard. Are we disturbing you? He was guarding the entrance to the trail.















After we sucked our way through a lap on the cross country trail we headed over to the downhill trail. Yes, we're both very out of shape and quite pitiful. We're both hoping to fix that on this trip.

Props to the builders. They did a great job on this trail. It's short but there is so much packed into every turn. There's a jump, drop, rock garden, S-turn, or just generally different feature every couple of feet. Fast and fun all around, there isn't much wasted space in this trail. We didn't stop for too many pics. Just these two...

... the drop that starts things off.















... and the jump that wraps it up. Yes, I'm all Stiffie McGriffie with a complete lack of style. I just drove for 10 hours. Cut me some slack. It gets better later on.



















Ahhh good ride. And there's just enough daylight left to take in some scenery and eat some cold bean burritos for dinner.