The road that never ends

Holly Goquickly had her rubbers majorly worked over Saturday.

Big Ring and I hit the American roads once again, this time entering from a different border crossing, with the same goal of reaching the base of Mt. Baker, but with mapped out alternate routes if need be.

130714usa1It may look all peaceful and serene, but looks can be deceiving!

I don’t know what it is about these American towns, but somehow, they’re like the ON button for the radio in my head. And on Saturday, I was singing Lambchops 😀

This is the hill that never ends.
Yes, it goes on and on my friend.
Some people started cycling it not knowing what it was,
And they’ll continue cycling it forever just because…

130714usa2
Reece Hill Road: “Eff me! Will you never end???”

A somewhat stressful journey on a road that motorists seemed to think was a high-speed highway had us altering our route and heading towards Silver Lake instead of Mt. Baker. While the new route cut down on mileage, it didn’t cut down on ease.

The road was bumpy as hell with heavy pavement. My butt was growing ever sorer. I was beginning to wonder if I had saddle sores developing – it was that bad!!! My pace was abysmally slow on a road that didn’t appear to be going up. (Although later I learned we were on an incline for quite some time.) And it seemed every time I’d catch up to Big Ring, I’d lose him again in a heartbeat; he’d become but a dot in my peripheral vision, and oftentimes I couldn’t see him at all.

I started to think worst case scenarios. What if one of these vehicles hit me? What if Big Ring got hit? What if his body was lying on the side of the road, and I zoomed by so fast I didn’t see him? (Hey! My Garmin said I maxed out at 100.5 km/h, so really, anything’s possible ;)) What if we were lost? What if we had to knock on someone’s door for directions? What if that someone was Annie Wilkes???

When I finally caught up with Big Ring, my frustration and fears boiled over. I snapped, and then before he could respond, I proceeded to speed off on my bike. And, oh man, my legs were giving her. I was powering up the hills, zooming down them, and pushing hard through the straight stretches too. And when I heard Big Ring easing off on his pedals in my slipstream, that pissed me off even more, and I pushed even harder.

130714usa5
Angry pedaling = super fast cycling chick!

Unfortunately, however, I was only able to be a speed demon for about 10 minutes, after which, one of my earlier fears had me slowing pace.
Me: Do you know where we are?
Big Ring: Welllll, I thought I did, but now, I’m not so sure.
Oh frick! We were 100 per cent lost. In the middle of small-town nowhere. The plot of Misery flashed before my eyes.

130714usa7
Figure 8? Or bow tie?

We flagged down a motorist, who thankfully didn’t murder us, and got proper directions that put us back on quiet country roads towards home.

SATURDAY’S RIDE:

  • 9:30 a.m. BG before: 6.3
  • Temp. basal: none
  • Carbs: granola bar (14g) with partial bolus
  • Distance: 80.08 km
  • Average speed: 20.0 km/h
  • Time: 3:59:17
  • Fuel: @11 a.m. BG: 3.2 (1/2 PB and honey sandwich and raisins) @12 p.m. BG: 3.9 (1/2 PB and honey sandwich) @12:30 BG: 8.4 (Turkey sandwich and quinoa salad with bolus) @2 p.m. BG: 6.0 (1/2 Pocketfuel) @3 p.m. BG: 5.9 (1/2 Pocketfuel) 
  • 4:15 p.m. BG after: 4.8

I later learned that Big Ring has lived his life wanting to get lost on the saddle of his bike. Me, I like my detailed routes thank you very much 😀

14 thoughts on “The road that never ends”

  1. I love the pictures and the story and the cute little map! we are so much alike it’s unreal. I guess that’s the shitty part about riding in the states. Can’t just pull out the iphone and look at the gps without it costing a zillion dollars. Cuz that’s how I fix getting lost in Canada (it happens with every ride).

    1. I know right! What’s the point of having a GPS on your phone if you can’t use it without wifi??? Ridiculous! And then the so-called GPS on my watch was crud too… it would tell me when I needed to turn to go back the route I came, but ONLY as I was approaching the turn. Ugh.

  2. Glad to know that someone else gets angry pedaling too! I almost made someone puke once 🙂
    P.S. I am taking some credit in the link that Tony posted because I showed it to him…..

  3. Something about this seems so cool that you can ride your bike right into another country. (I’ve walked through a heavily-trafficked crossing into Mexico before, but the one time I crossed into Canada, by car was pretty nondescript and uneventful). Cool song, too — now it will be stuck in my head for the rest of the day. (It never ends…)

    1. I’d love to say the song came to me as a mom, but no, for more than 15 years it has randomly filled my head for hours on end every now and again. It has that power 🙂

  4. Pingback: To fluff or not… |

Leave a Reply