I woke up early and spent some time catching up on work thanks to the internet. showered, put on the same dirty clothes and headed out to work my way toward Columbus. Some directions from a man walking a dog and then some up hill driving, then down a bit, then more uphill. repeat for 6 hours. i forgot to stretch the night before and felt a tug in my leg by my knee, then pain. repeat for hours. i trudged on fairly slow all day trying to get 70 miles down to make my second day easier. I make it about 60, gave up when i came upon a golden bike path lined in campgrounds. Started listening to ‘Vegetarianism and the Occult’ hoping for something humorous about sacrificing cucumbers to strange dieties…..no such luck. to sum it up ‘put good things in your body, you will be good’ old wisdom, and it saves hours from your life by not listening to the book. I dragged myself up to the campsite determined to make a fire to cook dinner. boiled some zuchinni with dehydrated banannas(thanks to Katie Spotz) with some oatmeal(thanks to the continental breakfast). an ok meal for a long day.
Posts Tagged ‘Bike’
Loudonville, OH
Thursday, July 9th, 2009Akron, OH - 42 miles
Thursday, July 9th, 2009Ah, the supposed easy day. my parents came down the night before and put me up in a hotel, a great continental breakfast later they dropped me back off at the venue and i started down hoping to pick up the Ohio Canal bike trail and take it down all the way to akron. it was to fulfill my canal destiny. I had amended to my hotel printed directions but after some second guessing and too many hills south of parma i decided to ask someone where to go. In trimmed Bill(he was trimming his hedges), after some conversation he decided it was easier to just show me the canal path and drove down on his bike with me. This is not the canal I had expected, it was like the old Erie Canal, thin and shallow, partially overgrown, but with flatter paths and smooth roads i sailed on. I met some nice people who purchased me a popsicle, those real fruit kind. wonderful things. all was good until i noticed I was running late. I started to high tail it, but got a bit lost, found a map, found a hill, strained my legs 411-ed(verbing that one) the venue info and finally showed up 20 min late to no one at the bar except the bartended and a 30-something punk named Zack. We all talked a bit, the bartender pushed the show back til 6, waiting for people to show up. Zack left for a bit and upon return promised me 8 people all waiting to listen to me play at the house and tried to get me to leave. Being only 40 minutes in to a 2 hour set I was confused, it was a paying gig, Zack ambiguously ‘asked’ the bartender if I could leave(only by actually asking him ‘we’re cool right?’) tricky devil this one was. I talked to the bartender, and Zack was discouraged that I had to play more, I was not. More people started trickling in toward the end of the set and they were really enjoying it. Zack grew impatient, I got done 2 hours later, started packing up, thanked and apologized to the bartender from trying to leave earlier. he was understanding.
It was a short walk down to the house I was staying at. Zack told me about hopping trains and being the oldest punk around, how the others had sold out and how being a 30 yr old punk helped him get ‘the 19 yr old pussy.’ I started wondering as we walked deeper into the ghetto, he told me about the 12 yr olds trying to prove themselves the people that don’t like him and his dog. he loves his dog. we arrived at a house, where a family and some of their friends were out on the lawn, everyone was out on the lawn, eating, drinking, laughing, just a big old block party. I was introduced to Chris and his girlfriend and the house I was staying it, it was ok, in the process of being rebuilt. kind of dirty, but not bad. it was good times and drinking until they started the fireworks, 4′x4′ flats of fireworks, better than the city’s. Long night, good people.
Lakewood, OH - 50 Miles
Tuesday, July 7th, 2009A long night of sleep and another late start, breakfast with Alex’s family, who somehow, somewhy are not italian, but sure act like it. I head off again at 10:30 only to be stopped 6 miles in by a girl in a van yelling out her window ‘Are you biking across the country? ” i said no, only to Chicago. She offered me food(why i turned it down i have no clue), but we did meet at a starbucks(we didn’t purchase anything) and talked. Her name was Katie Spotz and as she told me she is going to be the youngest person to row across the atlantic ocean. hopes of kindred spirits and visions of myself in 5 years commenced. she has had her hand at other feats. running across the mojave desert, swimming the entire allegheny river and everyone’s favorite, biking across the country. I headed back out by 1 pm and started for the other side of cleveland. City driving, better than suburban driving, but it has its own perks. went through some strange parts of town, and had ‘you best get your ass out of this neighborhood’ i tried to yell back, ‘i’m trying’ 30 miles more of construction and city driving i arrived in downtown cleveland, took some pictures of the lake, pissed off a few buses and headed to lakewood. the venue was great, the library with its strict internet policy was not, the band that was good but brought no people, not so good. Losing my iPod and having to drive back to the venue at 1 am only to find it in my yellow bag. also bad. overall. good day, bad show.
Mentor, OH - 75 miles
Sunday, July 5th, 2009It was a rainy morning, late start again. Jon drove me back to the coffee shop, where we waited out the rain before starting up. Everything was fine until I noticed 8 miles later I had forgotten my helmet at the coffee shop. It set me back some, but eventually Laurie, the owner of the coffee shop drove it out to me. PA-5 (the road) is great for bikers, nice little set aside section, its flatter, some rolling hills, beautiful wilderness. The last thing I expected to see was four men wearing camouflage with signs and flags followed slowly by a van. Turns out they are 2/3 of the way through a ‘walk for peace’ to bring attention to whats going on in Burma. We talked a bit and then headed our separate ways. Lunch in a cemetery followed(they have great free water), then 2 hours of rainy riding. It cleared up later as I started hitting cities again. I took a back way, wandered into Painesville and headed up to Mentor to stay with a friend. Alex is his name and my friend Joel Murray’s college roommate is our connection.We went out drinking for a it and then I slept like a champ.
Erie, PA - 60 miles
Sunday, July 5th, 2009After a bit of a late start, and then having to pick up the artwork for my new cd at the printers, then having to do an interview on the side of the road I finally really got into biking 2 hours later than I wanted. Hills slowed the journey a bit, but I kept going. Encountered some wonderful wildlife, a fox, some deer. if i wasn’t pedaling, I could sneak right up on them 10, 15 feet away before they would notice. Stopped at Vinnie’s pizza place west of findlay lake and was greeted by the two Asian girls working at the counter, a strange sight to me as I was expecting a farm boy or someone named ‘Vinnie’. It flattened out a bit from there and I made my way into Erie thanks to a bike trail. Today’s lesson was that google maps is a bit off on the distance, and that there is a lot of roadkill. Played at Presque Isle Coffeehouse, and hung out with Jon, Megan, Kara, Kayla and a few others bar hopping around, even ran into my old friend Katie.