Winnemucca turned out to be a bit of a metropolis in this part of the of the world. Host of the Superior Livestock Auction, where farmers come from around Winnemucca to buy and sell their steer, cattle, bulls and cows. A lot of trucks and cowboys and a good occasion for the local hotels to increase hotel prices. We found a decent one which looked like it came from the same mold as most other motels in the States. Two floors and outside gangway a small reception and a very small pool always facing the most busy road.

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It is hot in Nevada right now and the wise men would get out of the motel early and ride some miles before noon till 4 pm where it gets really hot. But we had worked late Wednesday and we had found a bicycle shop which was supposed to open at 10 am. The owner had decided to go on a cruise in Alaska, so the store was closed and we considered our options, of which on was taking the train back and forth to Elko to buy some tubes and another was to order via Amazon for a hotel’s address. Eventueally we left Winnemucca after noon and had a dehydrating ride up to Battle Mountain. Battle Mountain is named after confration(s?) between settlers and native Americans of Shoshone and Paiute tribes who were here in the mid 19 th century whent the immigrants started to come to the area in larger numbers. Now the two most important things happening in the area are casinos and minining. The land is dry and there is no agriculture. It is remarkable to pass the many prisons. State prisons and federal prisons and county prisons. When you enter a prison area you are warned not to pick up hitchhikers. I tried to find some statistics for Nevada specifically but it was hard to find something which summarizes the different levels of jurisdiction. You get the impression that Nevada is a good desolate area to send a lot of federal criminals.

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With no options to buy anything for a bicycle in Battle Mountain we got up early and had a beautiful ride to Elko, where we found two bicycle stores and emptied their stock for anything that would fit our bicycles. We were at the hotel mid afternoon with just enough time to buy supplies for Friday’s ride and get a haircut. Troels looks good, your reporter on the other hand got his wish to have a real “Crewcut”. Machine all over and very few milimeters. I will enjoy the reduced weight and the fresh feeling around my upper head – photographs will come after a few days of growth. While Troels had his cut, I went to see a ranch shop. I bet that a local guy in his truck can buy 90% of his supplies in such a store. I spoke to Verna who was excited to show the saddle department, the fishing department, the clothing department and the rest of the shop. I also spoke with Lee, who had moved from the marine base in Fort Pemberton in California to work in Elko. He was managing the gun department. I tried to be curios and neutral about gun laws and did not get myself into trouble though mentioning that there are less liberal gun laws in other countries. I was taught that only the good people do not carry guns, so therefore Lee’s advice was that also the good guys should buy one of his guns, some of which by the untrained visitor were the size of bazookas. In Nevada you have to live in the State to buy a gun and the store is supposed to (and does) a background check on people who want to buy a gun.

Outside of Elko we met a trace of my favorite Donner party, mentioned in my Lake Tahoe Post. One of the reasons why the Donner party came so late to the Sierra Nevadas was that they met the guy who had “invented” the Hastings Cutoff. As an alternative to the California Trail (the more beaten track), Hastings had found a shorter route. It might have been shorter, but from the book, mentioned earlier, I remember some ridiculous scenes of dead ends and having to take the wagons apart and carrying them over difficult terrain.

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(It was attempt to draw a blue arrow on the right map)

Inside Elko we met our first other adventure cyclists. A group of five Irish lads had taken 50 days to come from Boston to Elko and they were headed for San Francisco. Very fun finally to speak to some freewheeling soulmates and hear about their experiences.

Reflections after the first week

We are now well under way and though we would have liked to do Winnemucca-Elko in one day we do not feel under pressure yet. We were calculating a day of rest per week but we agree that we do not need the rest and there is not yet that much to stop and see. We are more excited to see what lies behind the next curve of the road or behing the next summit. So from the body-bike-“can do” perspective we are confident. The wind direction has been mostly westerly which has supported our progress. The number of flat tires and the time it takes to get in and out of towns and especially cities has made it more difficult than expected. Troels has proven to be a great travel companion. Serious when we need that and full of fun when we need to cheer up. A lot of talks about life back home and a lot of stupid talk about the people we meet and the things we see. I am ready to take another week. Tomorrow we will see if we can make it up to a town called Jackpot – probably another casino town with some cheap hotels with a brown carpet in the lobby. Jackpot could then be our last stay in Nevada, so we can roll into Idaho.

Fifth day and we have established a routine. It is difficult to get enough calories. You are hungry and satiated at the same time. I had been looking forward to be able to indulge in Cinnabons, Candy and poor food, so therefore frustrating that you cannot,

We take our Recovery Hydrolysate every evening and though it is difficult to a randomized blinded clinical study with crossover and bells and whistles, we can definitely spread the anecdotal evidence that Arla Foods Ingredients’ whey hydrolysates work. We feel OK, when we get up in the morning at least until this morning. Let us see tomorrow after a long leg.

Also the wounds from the first days of fumbling around on the bike are starting to heal. I managed to tilt twice on the bike due to not unclipping my left foot. They were solo accidents while taking breaks but when the bike tilts to the wrong side due to the bags’ weight I have to use my left knee to stop the fall. Looks stupid but luckily there have not been many people around when it has happened.

There is a fine feature (in theory) that the Garmin GPS can sense if there is an accident. At the time of setting up the device, I was probably asked to give Charlotte’s contact details. When something happens the Edge sends a message to Charlotte unless I abort the message by pushing a few buttons. I do not now why my wife should get a notification in the middle of the night if the bicycle falls over on a parking lot, while I am shopping for Gatorade or for that matter if I am run over by a Peterbilt truck, so I should turn off the feature.

Today we did not have any accidents – only four flat tires. Three by Troels, one by me, so we are now 5:2 on that statistic. We rode very carefully the last 40-50 miles because we had run out of functional tubes and the tube repair kit was emptied last night. We did 217 kilometers to Winnemucca – All roads lead to Winnemucca, especially Freeway 80, which bicycles were allowed to go on. Four or five kilometers before Winnemucca, the GPS instructed us to leave the freeway to go on a scenic drive by the Airport and a long state road leading into Winnemucca. Not what you are longing for after a hot day on the freeway.

We do not know a lot about this town except that it is the only Nevada town named after a Native American chief. Mucca is pronounced as “mocca” the coffee kind of mocca, if there should be other moccas.

Last night we had our dinner and a couple of beers (each) at the Stateline Brewery. Still in California but very close to the state border to Nevada. We were careful not to cross the border, because that was supposed to happen on the bicycles today.

You get to see a lot on a bike tour, and we talked about that San Francisco already seems far away. Some places you could wish to be able to explore a little more. Last Winter, I read a book about a number of settler families who left Independence in 1846 to seek good fortunes in California. They left Independence south west of Chicago late in order to cross the Sierra Nevada mountain range before winter and this combined with all sorts of obstacles and a very slow pace lead to the party being caught by snow and the survivors only survived by eating their travel companions. I had therefore hoped to see the Donner Monument north of Lake Tahoe, but we will save that for another trip. Also I think that many of the sites are so far distanced from the road, we would have travelled, so that you should probably come by car and bring some hiking shoes.

Instead we have met some Pony Express history along our way. The Pony Express was a mail system, where young riders rode their horses in a kind of relay system and could carry a letter (or more probably) from Missouri to Sacramento in 10 days, which should be about 180 miles a day. We are not going to beat that in reverse, so good that we have the internet. Some of the towns where the baton was passed on where Folsom, Placerville and Strawberry, where we have been through and today we added Carson City and Dayton.

The ride today

The morning started with another ascent up to Spooner Sumit but we were rewarded with a long downhill to Carson City. We had our third flat tire just outside Carson, but there after we enjoyed a south westerly wind meaning that it took us only app. 5 hours to get to Fallon, where we are staying tonight.

We continued to follow Route 50 which is also called the Loneliest Highway of (North) America . We concluded that to deserve this title it must be a lot more desolate to the east of Fallon. The lady in the reception said that after the highway got its nickname, a lot more people have come here, so that is a bit of catch for marketing department. She further informed us that Fallon is the site of Topgun – the naval air force training program. Apparently a Topgun II movie is in the making also with Tom Cruise in the leading role. He did not stay at the Fallon Best Western during filming.

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Tomorrow will be a big ride, if we make it. Our destination is Winnemucca and from now on and up to Yellowstone it will feel like jumping stepstones to cross a river. There are very few towns of a size to have a hotel and we will have to bring plenty of sugar and liquids.

Today’s soundtrack got to be ZZ Top Legs. We speculate that it is not legal to use earphones on a motorcycle. Instead the Harley Davidsons turn their radios at maximum to the harassment of quiet non motorized bikers. Every second time it is a ZZ Top tune.

No experiments today – we just wanted to take the shortest road to South Lake Tahoe. We climbed to Echo Summit and cruised the other side of the Sierra Nevada mountain range into Lake Tahoe.

On several requests, we have produced a map showing our progress – not a full account of the roads travelled but an overview of progress and remaining distance.

Monday we are planning to cross our first state border and reach Fallon in Nevada.

As mentioned we went in a nice straight line from Folsom to Placerville. We thought our GPS had told us to cross Route 50, which is the shortest route to South Lake Tahoe, but at this point it is too much freeway to allow bicycles on it. It was our impression that we should stay close and then when 50 would let us in, we would take this road. After our pancakes, however, we were advised to take another route leading and suddenly we found ourselves far away from 50 at a at a small recreational area Sly Park at a lake called Jenkinson lake. We did not think that we had done enough for the day and we started to look for hotels, which could become Saturday’s goal. It was hard to find anything, so we were luckythat the Sierra Inn in Kyburz had a room. We booked a room and started riding on a beautiful road called “Mormon Emigrant Trail”. We thought that we had 1000 m as total ascent (I am not sure about the terminology here, but we will use “Total Ascent” as the number of vertical meters you have gone up on a day’s ride and “Climb” as the number of meters you have elevated yourself on a ride. If it goes up down and up on a ride, total ascent will be higher than the climb) but must have mistaken total ascent and climb. After only a few miles, Troels began to suffer from some serious muscle cramps and though he was brave it quickly became clear that he needed to rest, slow down and get more energy. After another while it became clear, that we were probably not going to make it to Kyburz before dusk, so what to do? Split up or just hope for some downhill stretches, where we could advance faster and at least get to our hotel not too late? We developed the cunning plan, that I should ride to the hotel and see what Troels had ahead of him and possibly get some rescue. I climbed to 2300 meters, but after 10 kilometers I should turn left on a Silver Fork Road which happened to be downhill down to Kyburz in 1250 meters. Good for Troels I thought, he would only have to endure the first 10 kilometers to Silver Fork Road, turn left and go mostly downhill. Bad for our itinerary, as the loss of more than 1000 meters of elevation hurt my heart, because we will just have to recover those meters tomorrow. The agreement was that I should call Troels, when I got to the hotel. I missed his call by a few minutes, while checking in and asking whether, I could borrow or rent a pick-up truck. When I tried to call back, there was no cell phone service and when Alfonso from the Sierra Inn offered to take me with him up Silver Fork Road to meet Troels, I just quickly accepted and went with Alfonso in his Toyota. No Troels even though we went all the way till where I had left him. Alfonso and I quickly agreed that he had been picked up and I felt sorry that I had taken more than an hour of his time and 75 kilometers in his truck.. Kyburz is just three four houses along Route 50, and Alfonso even took me to a gas station to buy a little liquid and some food. I did not get his last name, but for the rest of this story he is just Alfonso Goodheart, with the middle name “Patience”.

Troels was not at the Inn. He had called the hotel and told that he stood somewhere on route 88 with a lady, who had been so kind to stop. So Troels had missed the Silver Fork Road and gone much too far and was 45 miles from South Lake Tahoe just like I was in Kyburz, just down in the valley. We saw no other option than to bother Alfonso Patience Goodheart once again. It was clear from the first up and down that the headlights of his car was not ready to pass any test, and neither was Alfonso’s night vision, so I offered to borrow his truck, but he was not comfortable with a stranger just taking off in his only mode of transportation. Luckily we compromised and I could drive and he could be the passenger. After all I had transformed myself into a guy with good local knowledge of Silver Fork Road after once down on the bicycle and an up and down in the truck. We found Troels who had run out of water and food. He had managed to entertain Tania almost two hours after several hours just standing at the road side. We turned off the lights at 2 am after a day not according to plan. Troels was in good spirit despite the trouble and already able to declare this another thing to remember and laugh about – some day!

In the heat of the hectic afternoon and evening we did not take a lot of (any) photographs. But as prophesized yesterday, we would meet the American River again. I have a strange preference for rivers versus rocks and trees. Probably my religion is 5-10% animism. When I see a creek or a river, I always start to speculate and investigate where it comes from and where it is going. It is going somewhere. A large part of Silver Fork road followed the river and this morning I went out to cool my feet and enjoy the atmosphere outside Sierra Inn.

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The statistics

We rode 131 km today with 2842 m total ascent. If we had managed to stay closer to Route 50 we could have advanced the same distance with 91 km, so 40 km on top to get in shape. Swell.

The first Saturday of our tour could have a lot of headlines. “Miles travelled is not the same as miles closer to New York”, “American River read yesterday’s post” and “Altitude an asset you can quickly lose” just to mention a few. Everything went OK until noon after which things got a little out of hand. It is late here in Kyburz and I need to collect a few facts to make the full afternoon account, so Day 2 will be broken into a short morning presented here and a long afternoon evening presented Sunday.

It’s hot and music on the road

We got out of Folsom half past eight after a breakfast outside Walmart. Bike paths took us out of Folsom and then it started to go up, up and up towards South Lake Tahoe. Second round of breakfast was consumed at Mel’s Diner in Placerville, two high stacks of pancakes with plenty of syrup. We needed to cool down after a hot morning. It is officially a heatwave. Neither of us have listened to music or podcasts yet. Too much is happening, traffic is dense, so we will save that for later. A soundtrack for day 2, however, could be Tom Petty’s Into the Great Wide Open, which we then listened to on the rock-ola jukebox which was at every table:

Apparently Mel’s Diner is iconic in this part of the country since it was the location for a tv-series and used as location in several movies.

Stay tuned, tomorrow will be a little more interesting and explain why we suddenly ended up in Kyburz.

A strange thing when something long anticipated suddenly becomes reality. Of course we have always known that the start would not be a starting line sunshine, thousands of cheering spectators and a gunshot to mark the beginning of our journey but we had expected a more clear line between “now we have not started yet” and “now we have started”.

Yesterday we took our two bike travel cases to Transgroup Worldwide Logistics. They will send them to New York. Afterwards we unloaded our bicycles in San Francisco Airport’s rental car return and rode the 20 kms back to our hotel. I had my first puncture after about 5 kms and halfway into San Francisco Troels hit a hole in the road. I had not bothered ro bring a spare tube nor a pump, so Troels earned his new name as “El Mecanico”, because he had. We were lucky that we had San Francisco’s primary Trek dealership just around rhe corner from our hotel, so we could buy a new tyre and replish our stock of spare tubes and even out the disc on one of the bikes which had been bent in transport.

Back in our hotel room we started to plan our Friday departure with a fresh weather forecast and our different maps. The Golden Gate Bridge would propably be covered in morning fog. In addition hereto we came in doubt whether we were allowed to cross the Petaluma River on route 37 or if we had to go all the way up to Petaluma to cross. Instead we consulted Google, bilemap.net and our Garmins and concluded that we should roll down to the Ferry Terminal and take the boat to Vallejo.

Wheel dip in the Pacific

We were then suddenly in a rush to go and make the ceremonial wheel dip in the Pacific Ocean which by our definintion encompassed the outer parts of the San Francisco Bay.

Wearing our two different company jerseys

If you sense a bit of disappointment it is right but at the SF Ferry Terminal I was reminded (No. 6 reason to go on a bicke trip. No. 1-5 will follow in a later post) exactly why we are doing this. A guy sitting on a bench started to talk to talk to me. I suspected that he was one of the many homeless you see in San Francisco. He asked a lot about the bikes, where we were headed and so on. He quickly calculated that New York in around 30 days would mean 100 miles a day. Then he got up and pulled up his phone to show me his steel horse. Which was a little more sturdy bike type with a small trailer for his loudspeaker. It turned out that Reginal, as he introduced himself, lived in SF, but toured on a large part of his life with his trumpet. After several tours up and down the west coast, he was now planning to cross the country to New York, though his buddy on the bench made a facial impression indicating that New Yorkers are very nose in the sky people. Finally Reginald turned on his loudspeaker and dug up his trumpet and blew us a farewell and good luck serenade. This was a reminder to me, what this tour is about. Maybe it is not the grand vistas but the small perks like these that will be remembered. When you squeeze all the must see sites and instagramable places into a short vacation. I will now remember Reginald forever and I was even rewarded for my positive attitude by getting my Golden Gate moment in the afternoon.

From Vallejo we criss crossed our way up to Folsom along Interstate but never on the highway. Lunch in Davis – wonderful small University town and much of the trip on excellent bike paths – where one place north of Sacramento we found our Petite Golden Gate along the American River Bike Trail. We might see more of American River since it runs its source is Mountain Meadow lake towards Lake Tahoe, where we are headed tomorrow.

I will probably burden you with more statistics the coming days. Today just the remark that Garmin’s GPC is magnificent. Though Troels’ sometimes recommended another route than mine it always found back on track and recommended some very traffic poor trails and roads. We did around 100 miles or 160 k today.

By the way Troels is active on Instagram with bikingusa2019 and I am to be found at andersstj now and then.

When you decide to go on a tour like this there is a little preparation to be done. In a series of pre-departure posts, I will share some thoughts on

1. Training – this post
2. Equipment
3. Leaving the workplace
4. Reading
5. Planning

Preparation – Training

It is evident that you have to spend some time on the bike in preparation and I have really tried to do that. “Tried” because realized monthly distances have always been shorter than planned distances. It is time consuming to get in good bike form and when time has been limited it has always been more tempting to take a run or a swim. Not speaking of the weather which is not designed for road biking in Denmark from October to March. One could have considered the mountain bike but I’d rather sit in our basement and pedal on the home trainer. Then I could train and read at the same time. So I must be the exception from the rule that men cannot multi-task. At least I could duo-task when one of the tasks was just to move the legs in a circular motion.

One of the courses on the Tacx was a ride from San Simeon north on the Pacific Coast Highway. It became one of my favorites because it was approximate two hours and then I smelled a little of the yellow striped US roads. When I had dropped off Charlotte, Patricia and Filippa at the airport in Los Angeles on Saturday, I simply had to go to San Simeon. The Foothill Cyclery in San Luis Obispo was the only store in the region which was open on a Sunday.

The real experience with broader vision and a fresh breeze from the Ocean easily beat the Tacx movie (see picture in the lower right hand corner). So to conclude – training has been serious but at some time your inner dialogue is about a hope of getting into form as we ride and an expectation that if de not exhaust ourselves by regarding each day as a race, everything will work out fine.

With 10 days to go, it is time for the first real post. We have been ready for a while and one week before I pick up Troels in San Francisco Airport on the 24th is about spending some good time with my family while staying in reasonable shape. Here it is an advantage that the shape was not that magnificent before leaving Denmark, so less to maintain.

From Venice I had a great 100k ride back and forth to Palos Verdes on a single speed California beach bicycle. It stood at the house, which we rented. I do not recall that there was a brand on it, it was just one of those bikes that you will find in a garage as part of the interior:

Beating the worst heat In Palm Desert I had to get up early and ride up into the mountains before the temperature hit 114 Fahrenheit (45 Celsius). The state route 74 took me up from sea level to over 5000 feet to the Santa Rosa Mountain. The bike was a rental from Tri-A-Bike – not just another bike – at Tri-a-Bike the bicycles had names. I had the honour of renting Frederick:

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On the way up I was hit by a white Toyota Landcruiser. Its side mirror stroke my elbow – it was quite undramatic – the mirror folded backwards and I was not put out of course, but it made me conclude that US drivers are not used to bicycles on their roads. While many will probably brake to find the right time to pass there will also be some drivers who instinctively will try to maintain speed and maneuver through if faced with a bike on the right hand and opposite traffic in the opposite lane.

Two lessons on the heat:

1. When the air temperature is above body temperature riding down hill does not cool you off. It is more like riding inside a hair dryer.
2. Black shoes can get so hot that they burn your feet – let us hope that our more northerly route does not present such high temperatures.

Today we are in San Diego and the fitness room in the basement is where I will pedal the coming days. This morning I, virtually, biked Gorges du Verdon, where I know that my good neighbor, Michael, is riding his bike this summer. I did not see him though.

Soon it will be Wednesday next week and though it always feels a little sad that a good family vacation is running out of days it is exciting to look forward to the start of an adventure. Thank you to those who have signed up to follow the blog. I am looking forward to writing a few more posts on our preparations and later a travel diary.