Day #70

It is with a combination of great joy and overwhelming sadness for me to say this: I am in Berkeley, CA. Yesterday I finished riding ~4,000 miles from Savannah, GA to Berkeley, CA (through 13 states) on a bicycle over the course of 70 days. I’m finished.

Me just arriving in the San Francisco Bay after 70 days of riding from Savannah, GA

The Western Express ends somewhere in the San Francisco Bay with a 50 minute ferry ride to downtown San Fran. I rode with the BikeTheUSforMS crew, so when I got off the ferry, there was thunderous applause from all their friends & family followed by an excellent banquet with speakers–one of which was an ex-world-class-cyclist who was diagnosed with MS in her prime.

I’d like to extend a thank you to _everyone_ who I met on this adventure. From GA to CA, I biked through 13 states, and I met so many fantastic people who helped me out, gave me advise/encouragement/cash, put me up for the night, told me where I was and where to go, etc. There’s way too many States and names to mention, so I’m not even going to bother trying to fill this post with the names & places. You know who you are. If you’re visiting this site and I met you along the way: Thank You. From the bottom of my heart: Thank you so much!

I made it all the way without breaking a single spoke. I wish I could say I made it the whole way without a flat, but ~8 miles from the ferry I ran over some glass. As I was inspecting my tires for damage, I saw a massive thorn embedded in my front tire. As soon as I pulled it out, the gas poured out. If I had just left that thorn in, I would have made it ~4,500 without a flat. Instead, I had to change a tube for the first time and sprint up San Fran-ish hills so I could make it to the ferry by 14:00–which was supposedly the last ferry of the day. Man, this trip has been a challenge all the way through the last day!

Having to say goodbye to all the BikeTheUSforMS guys was difficult. There were 25 riders. I’ve been with these guys since Kansas. Every day I saw them, rode with them, sweat with them, and took many-a safety breaks with them. I had 30 seconds to say goodbye to each of them; it just wasn’t sufficient. I feel so close to so many of them, but I’ll probably never see most of them again.

I’m under a lot of shock right now. I’m sitting in my cousin’s kitchen in air conditioning typing on a laptop. I woke up at 7:30 AM (which is “sleeping in” for me at this point). I don’t really know what to do all day without biking at least 40 miles. Just trying to imagine a normal day in my ordinary life seems so absurd and boring.

Our last night in the woods was shared by peacocks and roosters. Little did I know how annoying peacocks are at night. It was way worse than the ducks that quacked all night in Larned, KS. Once 6am hit, the roosters joined in on the madness. Needless to say, I was up and ready to go with the early crew without an issue waking up.

Our first day in California was wretched. As we crossed the border, the terrain was indistinguishable from the desert of Nevada. The welcoming sign was nearly the most unimpressive out of all 13 states–other than the Virginia sign (which didn’t exist) and the Tennessee sign (which was knocked over like it had been hit by a car). Worst of all: we had to climb Carson Pass–which had nasty steep uphills tied with the since-forgotten humidity. I ran out of gas several times going up the pass. It got so dark that I ended up not making it to the MS campground before I called it quits; the next morning I discovered I stopped just 1/2 a mile short.

Here’s the photos I took of California: