Today is Wednesday, July 13. We leave on Saturday for Indy and fly out to Vancouver, B.C. on Sunday, then board the cruise ship for beautiful Alaska for two weeks. We will try and keep you informed and show you pictures as we have opportunity, somewhat along the same lines as my coast to coast blog. We'd love to have you join us vicariously so stay tuned. I think you will enjoy following our adventures.

Lion's Club Pride Ride

Today was a beautiful day to be on a bicycle so Nan and I went to Lakeville and rode in the Lion's Pride Ride put on by the Lakeville Lion's Club, complete with a pancake breakfast. We took the tandem and rode the 25 mile route. It passed the home I was raised in and the town I went to school in and where many of my relatives used to live. We got back to the start, put the tandem in the van and I got my other bike out and finished up with an almost 80 mile ride up and around New Carlisle and back for a total of 106 miles (the 25 miler was a little longer). It was a nice ride. That put me over 4000 miles for the year. I'm hoping to get a least 5000 in. That would double my usual annual mileage. We shall see.

Pumpkin Vine Ride

I have a wonderful organized ride to recommend for those of you who are bicyclers and live in this area. It's the Pumpkin Vine Ride, which is held every year at this time. We did it Saturday, 6/18. It's a very well organized ride that begins either in Shipshewana or Goshen and you have your choice of riding distances between 20 and 100 miles. It was well marked, the SAG stops were well supplied and the roads were quite good. My wife and I rode our tandem on the 30 mile ride through very scenic and predominately Amish countryside. We then returned to our starting spot in Shipshewana where I put the tandem away and jumped on my regular bike and added 60 more miles traveling through both Goshen and Middlebury.

In God's good mercy I continue to be free from any symptoms that put me in the hospital in Georgia on the last day of the coast to coast trip. I also met up with Bob from Goshen at the Pumpkinvine ride. He was a fellow rider on the coast to coast trip. Since returning from Georgia I've logged over 550 miles. Ironically, I have had more flat tires in the last week than I had throughout  the entire coast to coast trip. Go figure!

Next Saturday there is a ride in nearby Lakeville that is only a few years old. If I can manage my schedule, I plan to ride and see what it's like. It's called the Lion's Pride Ride and you can ride 10, 25,62 or 100 mile distances. Simply Google Lion's Pride Ride, Lakeville, IN and you can get registration information. Hope to see some of you there.

Creative Cycling

I've been thinking about updating my bike's security and finding utilitarian uses for it other than recreational riding. I found the internet to be immensely helpful in my research.

How about this for an innovative lock?

Do I have to join the force for this lock?

I could have used this for those fast down hills

Why didn't I think of this?

Is this the new biathlon bike?

The Lion's Club

Today I had a chance to tell of my Coast to Coast adventure to the Lion's Club in Elkhart over lunch. My friend Jack, the same one who drove me to Indy to the airport, arranged for the engagement since he is a member. I had about 25 minutes to share and showed the obligatory slides. My story was well received and it was fun reliving the recent memories. Jack said I may be getting a call from the Optimist's Club in town to speak to them as well. I will also be sharing my story this Sunday morning at church during our Adult Bible Fellowship hour.

I continue to add miles on a daily basis on my bike. Since returning home and taking a week off from riding I have ridden over 420 miles for a total of almost 3900 miles for the year. At this pace my informal goal is to get to 6000 miles by year end. That will almost double my best total for one year and put me well over 30,000 miles ridden since 2000.

Bicyclist repeats coast-to-coast trip 37 years later

Bicyclist repeats coast-to-coast trip 37 years later

This is the article that the South Bend Tribune did on my coast to coast trip. Thank you for doing a nice job!

2011 Coast to Coast Map

Click on the word map to see the map of our 2011 Coast to Coast ride. I hope to do some more fine tuning as time allows and want to also add the route that I took in 1974 along the north route. Stay tuned.

Since Day 41

Well, I'm back after a self-imposed absence of more than two weeks. Here are some of the highlights since my last post:

• After leaving the hospital in Georgia on Friday, May 6th, we drove up to Charleston and spent the next day visiting the site of Ft. Sumter, where the first shots of the Civil War were fired. We also visited a southern plantation in town that was pretty interesting. See pictures below.
• From Charleston, we made our way to Andersonville, about 130 miles southeast of Atlanta. Of the many Civil War P.O.W. camps this was the worst because of its overcrowding, cruelty, total lack of food, lodging and deplorable health conditions. It was a camp designed to hold 10,000 prisoners but at its peak held 33,000. Almost 13,000 prisoners lost their lives at Andersonville and there are 18,000 grave-sites on the grounds. It was a very sobering visit.
• From Andersonville we went to Atlanta and visited Atlanta's History Center and Stone Mountain. Stone Mountain is a gigantic bald granite mountain rising 800-1000 feet above the surrounding ground level. I was pleased that I was able to make the mile long climb to the top without any difficulty, especially after the lighthouse problems at St. Simons. There is a huge carving in the mountain 90' high and 190' long about 300' above ground level of the Confederacy's three heroes, Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. See the pictures below.
• From Atlanta we moved on to Chattanooga and visited Lookout Mountain and Chickamauga, both Civil War battleground sites. The battle of Chickamauga was the second costliest battle in terms of human life in the entire Civil War. Over 28,000 soldiers were either killed, wounded or missing. That's about half the total American troops that were lost in Viet Nam in just one battle!
• After Chickamauga we arrived back home in South Bend on Wednesday May 11th where my next task was to prepare for a 5k run to help raise money for clean water in third world countries on May 22nd.. I AM NOT A RUNNER and it showed. I ended up inadvertently taking a wrong turn during the run and ended up "running" about 1.75 miles instead of the 3.1 scheduled. God is good! I am still sore from trying to do the run. No more running!
• I continue riding and on May 21st rode a metric century (63 miles) at the Tour de Max in Culver, IN. I definitely benefited from the conditioning I received from the coast to coast trip since it was a strong ride.
• I sat down for an interview with the local newspaper (South Bend Tribune) for an article that is supposed to show up in the community section of the Sunday paper this Sunday, sharing about my coast to coast experience. If I can, I will share the link with you since it probably will also show up on their online version as well.
• I am still in the process of trying to get my blog in book form, since I'm more confident in a hard copy version for posterity's sake than an online archive. There are a number of blog-to-print programs online but I have not run into one that I really like yet. If any of you have experience in this area I would appreciate your advice on what worked best for you.

Below are some pictures of our travels if you're interested.

Ferrying out to Ft. Sumpter

Inside the Fort

Inside the Fort

Andersonville National POW Museum

The grounds where the actual stockade was located

This cemetery in Andersonville reminds me of Arlington National 

Cemetery

The granite surface of the Stone Mountain climb

Sitting on top of Stone Mountain after the mile long climb

The carving closer up

A little further back

Looking down on Chattanooga from Lookout Mountain

We saw cannons everywhere we went

The Chickamauga Battlefield Visitor Center

This monument at Chickamauga was as tall as the lighthouse, so I climbed it

Stone reminders of the story of the battle of Chickamauga 

Update!

My apologies about not updating the events from last Friday. At my last post the test results had not been reviewed and I was chomping at the bit to get out of the hospital. I am very happy to report that all tests came back negative so I have a clean bill of health! I have had no more symptoms since the initial event and the doctor thinks it was probably a random TIA (similar to a mini stroke). Since late Friday, Nan and I spent a day in Charleston and Andersonville and will be spending the day in Atlanta today. I will have more elaborate details later on. Thank you for your prayers and thoughts, not only along the bike trip but in these last few days as well. God is good!

Day 41 - A DAY TO REMEMBER!! Waycross to St. Simon's Island

THE LAST DAY OF THE RIDE! DONE! 65 miles to Brunswick and then on to St. Simon's Island on the actual Atlantic coastline. I am writing this on Friday since Thursday became busier than I anticipated. The  ride to St. Simon's started out chilly with a fairly stiff headwind; not the way I looked forward to finishing the trip. I was so sore and stiff from a couple days of hard riding that it took almost 20 miles for my body to even feel like riding. Thanks to Janech, Coach's wife, she pulled 7 of us about 20 miles in a pace line. That made the mileage much more manageable. Also the anticipation of meeting Nancy in Brunswick made the miles melt away little easier. We had one last big climb for the trip, which happened to be the largest of three causeway bridges in the last 7 miles of the trip. For the entire coast to coast trip I logged 2570 miles!

Once in Brunswick, we organized at the local McDonalds where the city police ushered us across the two remaining causeway bridges three abreast and ten deep onto St. Simon's Island and the coast. We took some group pictures and individual pictures before getting showered and cleaned up for the big final celebration banquet late in the afternoon, which would be the last thing we would do before ultimately going our own separate ways.

And then...

After getting cleaned up and collecting my bike and gear for the trip home Nan and I decided to do a little sightseeing. On the Island was a very tall, stately lighthouse from which we thought we could get a wonderful view of the ocean and shoreline. So the first thing we chose to do was climb to the top of the five flight, 129 step lighthouse. With a little leg muscle burn and soreness we made it to the top and it did prove to be very scenic. It also proved to be a bit scary.

At the top I began to feel my body start to go numb beginning with my left shoulder, where the numbness continued to move down my left arm and hand, my chest and left leg. At that point I was not feeling real stable and told Nan I wanted to come down from the lighthouse. With God's favor and Nan's help, I managed to make it down where we found a bench to site and wait to see if the numbness would go away. Well, it improved a bit but then started making its way to my face. When the numbness started affecting my speech is when we decided to call 911. Shortly after the call the symptoms subsided and mercifully have not come back since. With the EMT's counsel and Marilyn's help (she is a Wheels alumna who lives in Brunswick) she helped us get to the hospital. Fast forward from yesterday - I have had an EKG, CT of my head, MRI of my brain. a carotid ultrasound, plenty of blood collections and not more than two consecutive hours of sleep since Thursday night. Currently we are awaiting test results before we can confidently leave the hospital (assuming the results are all negative). The biggest disappointment of all was not being able to attend the closing celebration banquet to say good-bye to all my new friends. Oh well, my Father knows best! I am hoping that we will have the results before the end of today (Friday) and be on our way to our next destination - Charleston, SC. We will keep you updated through this blog. As I alluded to earlier, I will keep this blog active indefinitely. Below are some pictures of the last day.

Wildflowers along the road

The largest of three causeway bridges, around 186 feet high

The beginning of the big bridge

From a cyclist's perspective

Rodgers, Robyn (back to us) and Betsy in the Atlantic

Rodgers emulating a Wheels tradition

Congratulations Derrel and wife Beth

Congratulations, Rosie and Richard!

Congratulations Janet, Terry and Myron!

Way to go, Bob!

Here we all are. Mission accomplished!

Andy, my room mate. We did it.

Robyn can take a great American memory back to New Zealand!

Congratulations to Canadian Betsy for her 2nd or 3rd successful crossing

Rodgers crosses one more time.

Congratulations to first timer Jim from Tennessee

After 6 false starts, Dan gets it all this time!

Crossing number 21 for Dick. Amazing!

Karl and I at the end with the infamous lighthouse in the background.

Apologies to Lou, Edith, Bonnie, Al, Dean, Gary, Gil, Coach and Janech, for not getting a picture of you at the grand finish. If you are interested, I am coordinating with others on the trip to collect more pictures from other riders. So, if you would like to see more pics, please stay tuned. They may be available via this blog site or through Snapfish.