Reflections on Cross Country 2024

I wrote a brief summary of my Cross Country 2024 trip in Reflections at the end of 2024. In this post I reflect on that trip more extensively. I don't discuss my gear in this post, but see Review of my gear for Cross Country 2024.

This post has many links of the form "M/D", where M is a number from 7 to 10 indicating the month, and D is a number from 1 to 31 indicating the day of the month. In each case the link is to the blog post for the Dth day of the Mth month.

More challenging than expected

Cross Country 2024 was planned to be a trip of about 4,500 miles. I would fly from my home in New York City to Portland, Oregon, from where I would ride to Astoria, Oregon, and follow the Trans Am bike route to southern Illinois, at which point I would ride to the the south end of the Blue Ridge Parkway and then ride the full length of both the Blue Ridge Parkway and Skyline Drive, continuing on to Washington, D.C., from where I would either take a train to New York or ride a few more days to return home.

I flew from New York to Portland 6/30, my bike flying as regular luggage for just $35. After reassembling my bike and visiting friends and family, I left Portland on 7/6, ready for adventure.

Plan for Cross Country 2024

This trip turned out to be much more challenging that I had expected it to be, for the following reasons:

• Extreme heat
• Elevation
• Smoke from wildfires
• Failure of my rack
• Cold nights
• Hurricane Helene

The extreme heat started after I left the cool Oregon coast and turned inland. When I arrived at my destination on 7/16 the temperature was 90F at noon. The extreme heat meant that even with starting to ride at about sunrise, there would be only six hours before I wanted to be finished riding. This continued for two and one half weeks through 8/2.

My first encounter with elevation was on 7/17 when I climbed from 1200 feet to 5300 feet over McKenzie Pass in five hours. At my send-off party in New York I told my guests that I thought elevation would not present a challenge because I expected the increase in elevation to be gradual. But increasing my elevation 4100 feet in five hours is not gradual! Elevation would continue to present a challenge all the way to Hoosier Pass in Colorado at 11,500 feet.

I first experienced smoke from wildfires on 7/20. As a result of the smoke I spent two extra rests days in Mitchell, Oregon, and on 7/22 I took a bus from Mitchell to Prairie City. The smoke was still bad on 7/23 so I hitched a ride in a car to Baker City. The smoke was again bad on 7/24 which I took as a rest day. 7/25 started with the air clear enough to ride, but for the last 13 miles there was again plenty of smoke. The next morning I bought an N95 mask which I needed during my ride that day.

The failure of my rack occurred on 7/26, eleven miles from my destination, the Woodhead Park Campground. I had five rest days waiting for a replacement rack which did not arrive until 8/1. During those days the air was full of smoke. On 7/27 I made a plan to rent a car in order to drive out of the smoke, but I eventually abandoned that plan. When I left Woodhead Park Campground on 8/1 I thought that I was done dealing with smoke from wildfires, but the evening of 8/21 I discovered that my routes for the next few days would again put me in the smoke. The next morning I created routes for five days that would allow me to avoid the smoke.

I spent three cold nights slightly below 40F that were unacceptably cold: 8/17, at 5900 feet; 8/21, at 7800 feet; and 8/22, at 6800 feet. I had previously camped with my sleeping bag, air mattress, and tent when the temperature dropped a little below 40F. Those nights, with the elevation no more than 1000 feet above sea level, were cold but acceptable. So 40F feels much colder at high elevation than near sea level. Those three nights at high elevation were unacceptably cold because I hardly slept. The next day I wasn't ready to ride until the sun came out and raised the temperature of the air and warmed me. As a result I would start my ride late without being rested. I don't know what temperature would have felt ok with my sleeping bag and tent at those elevations, but I suspect it would be at least 50F.

During the first four weeks of this trip, because of the extreme heat and elevation, I fell behind schedule because I was often not able to ride as many miles in a day as I had planned, and there were additional delays due to the smoke from wildfires and the failure of my rack. Because of all the delays, on 8/4 I started to investigate the possibility of taking a train from Denver to Chicago and then to Carbondale, Illinois, thereby skipping eastern Colorado, all of Kansas and Missouri, and western Illinois. By 8/19 I knew I would follow that plan. On 9/7 I climbed to Hoosier Pass at 11,500 feet, and on 9/8 I caught a bus from Frisco to Denver and then a train to Chicago on 9/9. On 9/11 I caught a train to Carbondale, Illinois, where I resumed riding.

On 9/25 I left Cherokee, North Carolina, and began to ride the Blue Ridge Parkway. Just 15 miles into my ride I discovered that the rest of the Parkway was closed due to the approach of Hurricane Helene. Because of Helene I spent eight nights in a hotel in Waynesville, North Carolina, until I was able to rent a car on 10/3 and drive to the home of friends in Blacksburg, Virginia. On 10/4 I drove to the home of a friend in Alexandria, Virginia, and after two rest days I left Alexandria, rode for six days, and arrived home on 10/12.

The map below, showing the 3,100 miles I rode, contains three gaps: 1) in Oregon from Mitchell to Baker City, 2) from Frisco, Colorado, to Carbondale, Illinois, and 3) from Waynesville, North Carolina, to Alexandria, Virginia.

Cross Country 2024

The trip last summer was more difficult than expected and also more difficult than the 90-day trip I took in 2019. On that earlier trip I often finished a riding day feeling strong. Near the end of that trip there was a week during which I rode about 90 miles every day but never felt wiped out at the end of the day. On the trip last year I often felt wiped out at the end of the day. In addition to the reasons I cited above for the recent trip to have been more challenging than expected, there are also the facts that I was five years older than when I took the trip in 2019, I experienced eight months of stiffness in 2022 due to inflammation, and I had COVID two or three times, all of which might have made some contribution to the difficulty.

Dangerous roads

There were a few days for which the route I had planned was dangerous. In some cases I re-routed on the fly, but there were other days I did not do that.

On 7/8, in Oregon from Astoria to Manzanita, I was terrorized by heavy traffic including logging trucks on 101. The map below shows both the route I took (along the coast) and the route I wish I had taken. The former was 45.7 miles and the latter 56.2 miles. Riding the additional 10.5 miles would have put me on beautiful roads with low traffic. You can find both routes here.

Sections of my routes on 9/22 and 9/24, from Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Cherokee, North Carolina, had traffic that made riding extremely dangerous. On 9/24, from Murphy to Cherokee, the road was so dangerous that I stopped to get a ride from a driver, the first time I've ever done that. The map below shows the southern routes I took and the northern routes I wish I had taken. The northern routes would have would have taken four days instead of three because of where lodging is available, a small price to pay to avoid all the danger. When creating the southern routes I was concerned about some sections but did not sufficiently investigate how I might avoid the trouble. You can find both the southern and northern routes here.

One thing that puzzles me is why on 9/24 I didn't turn off Route 74 onto Cold Springs Road at mile 44, which would have allowed me to avoid a section of 74 with an almost unusable shoulder. Maybe it was because the shoulder was ok at mile 74 and I decided to continue on the more direct route. Or perhaps I missed the cue to turn off 74. I can see on the record of my ride that I stopped for a few minutes at the exit to Cold Springs Road. Maybe I was on the phone with Bob making a plan to meet him and Anita on the road so they could give me a ride to the hotel in order to be on time for our dinner reservation.

Several times when climbing on a road with substantial traffic but no shoulder I found it safer to ride against traffic rather than with traffic. That way I could easily see the oncoming vehicles, and would get off the road if the traffic was not moving over. On previous trips I've used that strategy when the sun was ahead of me and low, and therefore making it hard for drivers approaching from behind to see me.

I’ve made a new entry in Aphorisms and Exhortations:

It's safest to ride in the direction of traffic except when it's not.

Water

In 2022 I experienced eight months of stiffness due to inflammation which I believe was caused by dehydration. Since then I have drunk much more water, especially on bike trips, and I've been adding homemade electrolyte to my water. For each day of this trip I would study my route and discover where I could obtain water. Where the need for water was great and the opportunities to get water were far apart, before departing I would fill my 2-liter water bladder in addition to my two water bottles, each of which held three quarters of a liter. From Oregon to Colorado I would sometimes drink as much as six liters of water during a day's ride.

Help from random strangers

There were many times I received help from random strangers. I already thanked all of them and others in Gratitude: Cross Country 2024, but want to mention them again to highlight the fact that I received so much help from random strangers.

• Stanley and Teresa, for giving me a ride in Oregon from Prairie City to Baker City in order to avoid smoke from wildfires 7/23
• Linda Meadows, host at Woodhead Park Campground, for the many ways she went out of her way to help me. 7/26, 7/27, 7/29, 7/30, 8/1
• Kevin Deshon and Sonya Jennings, who brought me food when I was at Woodhead Park Campground waiting for a replacement rear rack to arrive 7/27, 7/28
• Julia and Ron Thompson, who brought me food when I was at Woodhead Park Campground waiting for a replacement rear rack to arrive 7/30
• Joe and Val McCown, who invited me into their home during a downpour and then drove me to my next destination 8/13
• Gene Miller, for getting his friend Bill to give me a ride in order to avoid a dangerous road 9/24
• Bill, friend of Gene Miller, for giving me a ride 9/24
• Craig Suggs, for giving me a ride from the Blue Ridge Parkway to the Best Western Hotel in Waynesville, North Carolina, when I discovered the Parkway was closed due to Hurricane Helene 9/24
• Frank and Gerri Perry, for inviting me to a dinner that included four generations of their family 9/30
• Joe Blackmon, for offering to let me stay in his home when I didn't know when I would be able to rent a car to leave Waynesville, North Carolina 10/2

Linda Meadows, the host at Woodhead Park Campground, was technically not a random stranger because rather than being someone I happened to meet along the way with whom I had no business or prior personal relationship, she was employed by a campground where I stayed. I'm including her in the list above because what she did for me went way beyond anything expected of her as the campground host.

I’ve made a new entry in Aphorisms and Exhortations:

I would never plan on help from random strangers, but I can always count on it.

Success of my GoFundMe campaign

When I started my GoFundMe campaign I had no idea whether it would raise any money at all. I am grateful to the fifty people who contributed a total of $3,588. I had originally estimated that my expenses would be about $10,000 but they were actually about $15,000, so my patrons made up a large portion of the overage. (In case you're interested in contributing to the campaign, click the link above.)

Transition to being home

I was away from home on this trip for a little more than three months. It took about the same amount of time after I completed the trip before I felt I had fully adjusted to being home. The contrast between being on the road and being home is enormous. On the road every challenge must be dealt with immediately, whether it is a flat, smoke from wildfires, a broken rack, or road closures due to a hurricane. After being home for about two weeks I realized that while there were many things I needed to do, most of them could have been put off for a month. Also, on the road there is the single purpose of getting to the next destination safely, while at home there are all sorts of purposes.

Another entry for Aphorisms and Exhortations

During this trip I thought of the aphorism below but only now added it to Aphorisms and Exhortations:

It's not possible to see the top of a climb from the beginning of the climb because the climb blocks the view of the top.

Plan for a possible trip

Despite being proud of meeting all the challenges on this trip, when I saw the map showing the small gap in Oregon (from Mitchell to Baker City) and the two large gaps (from Frisco, Colorado, to Carbondale, Illinois; and from Waynesville, North Carolina, to Alexandria, Virginia) I felt some disappointment that I was not able to do all the riding I had planned. I've devised a plan for a trip on which I would ride the two large gaps:

• Fly from New York to Denver
• Spend a few days in Denver to acclimate to its elevation of 5,000 feet
• Take a bus from Denver to Frisco
• Spend a few days in Frisco to acclimate to its elevation of 9,000 feet
• Ride from Frisco to Washington, D.C., using the routes I created for Cross Country 2024
• Take a train from Washington, D.C., to New York

I would take this trip only when the Blue Ridge Parkway and Skyline Drive are both open (see BRP and SD for info about closures). Between Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Cherokee, North Carolina, I would avoid the dangerous routes I took last summer and instead follow routes 55-1, 56-1, and 56-2 which you can find here, along with all the other routes for this trip. I estimate this trip of about 2500 miles would take at least 50 days, not counting the days in Denver and Frisco acclimating to the elevation.

Frisco, Colorado, to Washington, D.C.

Final thoughts

Near the top of every page of my blog is this rhetorical question:

How much of an adventure can it be if everything goes according to plan?

Cross Country 2024 was a huge adventure with many things that did not go according to plan.

* * *

See Cross Country 2024 to find links to my daily blog posts as well as blog posts about the planning of the trip.

See Gratitude Cross Country 2024 in which I thank the many people who supported me on this trip.

See also Review of my gear for Cross Country 2024.

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