We're Off... Again!

To Shutesbury, Massachusetts -- 73.5 miles, 10.1 mph, 5700 ft

We're at it again. Eleven months after heading out on bikes from Barcelona, we're back in the saddle on, if not a bigger adventure, at least a more demanding one. To get back to California in three months along a northern route -- conveniently going through Wisconsin -- we will need to cover about 4300 miles, more than twice the distance we ended up riding in Europe. We'll have an extra month, but even then we need to bump up our daily mileage. I'm just going to keep telling myself this is a good idea....

The day definitely turned out to be more than we bargained for. On the bright side, we did manage a record setting start time, leaving Glenn and Terry’s house in Sudbury at 7:30. The morning was grey and misty, around 50F and pretty much stayed that way the entire day.

We had an early coffee/muffin stop in Clinton and also an hour break in Barre at Becki's Bistro. Becki herself was there and told us of the bike adventures she had taken with her three boys when they were young (back before the days of cell phones). We stopped a few other times on the side of the road but otherwise tried to keep moving. It started to look bad when less than halfway into the 70 miles, my legs started to cramp and my butt was already so sore I could hardly sit. Fortunately, some Advil, water, and lowering the seat by a few millimeters seemed to improve the situation, and we were soon on our way again.

Snack break

Later in the day, we took a short detour suggested by Glenn to the "Rocking Stone." How these two stones got piled on top of each and balanced on a rocky ledge, I’ll never know.

Unfortunately, we did have a few mapping problems today adding to the overall distance, which in turn highlighted our lack of training. (We haven't been on the bikes since the end of July.) Not only that, we were amazed to see that the route to Shutesbury included more climbing than even our hardest days in the Alps -- close to 5700ft.)

In any event, three different times Ms. Cranky directed us to non-existent (or at least no longer existing), roads. Around 6:30, my chain jammed between two chain rings on a hill.  We were within about 8 miles of our Warm Showers host in Shutesbury, but unfortunately, the worst climb of the day would be the last couple miles up to their place. In any event, once we were riding again, we met our third non existent road. In an attempt to get back on track, we chose another road which quickly turned to dirt and ran smack dab into a locked gate. We finally called our hosts to let them know we wouldn't be there before 7:00. I was beat and Meg was close to tears. (Meg's Note: and by close, he means, I was in tears)

Road block

Still smiling!

Given the late hour, we settled on backtracking to the main road and meeting Sara along the way. Since there was no way to get the tandems into her Subaru Forester, we knocked on the door of the nearest house and asked to leave our bikes there for the night. Jeff and Lynn were delightful and happy to help. We parked the bikes in their garage and they left the side door unlocked so we could retrieve them in the morning. Awesome. Problem solved; we were soon on our way.

Safely stashed away

Sara and John have a beautiful home in the woods outside of Shutesbury. They are, in fact, planning their own cross-country ride with friends this summer starting in Washington state in the middle of July. We had a wonderful meal and even played a short game of Apples to Apples before calling it a night. We have another Warm Showers host lined up in Williamstown tomorrow night. We'll need to head back to our bikes and finish the ride to Shutesbury before continuing on, just to add to the challenge.