Friday morning. the race event is over.   The ride is 2600 miles from over.  After 7500+ miles, this did not seem like a long distance some how.  It is however when you have it in your head that, you just want to get HOME.   Ellen packed up the rental car to return to the airport.  I packed just enough to make it home.  Rain gear, a change of clothes,  and some tools.  The rest was put in boxes and shipped home.  This made Maybeline 40 lbs. lighter.

     We had such a good time this past week and the whole trip has been a great adventure for me personally, but now it was time to go back to the world.  Bittersweet really.   I miss everyone and New England, but if I could make a living being a nomad and riding around the country seeing different places and meeting different people every day………..I could do that.  Ellen and I headed East on Rte 80 to Salt Lake City, Ellen in her car, me on Maybeline.   It was hard to wave goodbye as Ellen took the exit to the airport.  I had to remind myself that I would see her in 5 days.  

Rocky Maybeline

     Alone again and on the road. (There’s a country song in there somewhere) 2480 miles to go.  Then it clicked, I remember how to do this and do it while you can!  East of Salt Lake City the road climbed out of the desert plains and over the Unita Mountains.  Then back into the plains again.  Flat and then rolling farmlands that got greener as I headed East.  I road Rte. 40 into northern Colorado and stopped in Steam Boat Springs for the night.  The next day I ate some “continental breakfast” in the motel lobby and was on the road early.  The weather channel said 47 degrees and a nice day on the way.  It sure did not feel like 47 degrees as I headed out.  The road leaving Steamboat springs seemed to climb immediately into the Rocky Mountains. 

     One more place to see on the way home……Rocky Mountain National Park and the Continental Divide.   We climbed over Rabbit Ear Pass at 10,426′.  The top of the mountain leveled off into a fantastic sweeping meadow for a few miles.  It was getting pretty chilly up here, I thought. Then I noticed that there was Ice on the small ponds in the meadow. “O.K. it’s not just me”.  On the Western side of the mountains I was in the shadows.  As I crested the mountain I drove into the rising sun and down from the pass.  The temperature rose.  Riding through places like this or anywhere for that matter, is so much better than traveling by car.  Granted it is not always comfortable and is not as safe, but you feel the temperature changes immediately.  The smells, the texture of the wind.   I think people who don’t ride will not realize that the feel of the wind changes with it’s temperature.  The air is a different weight and thickness.  There are also cold and warm spots like the water when you are swimming in a pond.  Drastic changes between one pocket of air and the next.  The smell of the pines in Rabbit Ear Pass was so intense it was almost too much.  It reminded me of my living room an hour after we stood up the new Christmas tree every year.  I think traveling in a car either blocks these things out or at least dumbs them down a bit. 

     I descended from the pass and into a valley before I headed North into Rocky Mountain National park.  I passed a lone Prairie dog on the shoulder of the road, standing up as they do.  I’d swear he just waved at me.  I must be getting punchy.  Suddenly,  I was starting to feel really sick.  My head was pounding and I was going to lose breakfast.  This went on for a couple of hours.  I kept going because the fresh air usually helps but not this time.  It really stinks riding when your sick.  You feel out of it and even dizzy at times.  This effects your perception, your reaction times and therefore your confidence.  After a couple hours, about the time I reached Rocky Mountain National Park, it seemed to pass.  I concluded that the “continental breakfast” must have been a little aged or contained something sub-continental.

Higher and Higher

   I felt better just in Time!  Rocky Mountain National Park was the only place along the trip that I would compare to Glacier National Park in Montana.  So incredibly beautiful. The mountain peaks, the green valleys and streams were just untouched by man.  Timeless.  The wildlife, and the views as you rolled in and out of the clouds along the Continental Divide are indescribable.  The pictures do not come close to the experience of being there.  The sound of the wind breaking the silence intermittently or light reflecting from the crystal clear waters in the streams tumbling down the mountain sides out of the snow packs that hang in the upper slopes.  The park services do an amazing job of keeping these places unspoiled by the cities that surround them.  This place has probably been the same for thousands of years and it really is a privilege to be able to witness it.  Another place that I wish the whole family was here to see.  These parks, Yosemite, Yellowstone, Glacier and the Rockies are really meant to be visited with time to spend and hiking gear to spend it with.  There is just so much more to see beyond the roads that cross them.  I crossed the Continental Divide at Trail Ridge at 12,186 feet above sea level,  just beyond Milner Pass.  It was all down hill from here, literally.  I descended the mountains and into the farmlands again.

And Higher still

     Over the next few days I crossed Nebraska, Missouri, Central Illinois, Indiana,  and Ohio. As I drove east the landscape grew greener and the elevations got lower. As I did previously, I stayed on the 2 lane routes that crossed through the farm lands.  Thousands of miles of wheat fields giving way to corn fields.  All of these places were very similar, If you took a picture in northern Nebraska and another in Missouri, It was basically the same scene.  Beautiful but monotonous after a while.  If that makes any sense.  That is a compliment actually, our farmland in the central United States is just thousands of miles of segmented, maintained and manicured beautiful green.

   I had gotten so used to cruising through these isolated parts of the country at 85- 90 m.ph. that it was a habit to go that fast for hours on end.   As I approached the East Coast this would finally bite me.  In Indiana I came to a route that was a huge 4 lane highway but with crossing roads every few miles and traffic lights.  Due to the intersections, the speed limit was 60.  A state trooper was coming the other way when he picked me up at about 80.  I had seen him first and was slowing down. (not “first” enough though) He cut across the grass median and got right on my tail, lights and all.  “O.K.” I thought, my own fault and it was bound to happen”.  The officer explained that it was Labor day, the patrols were doubled and the speed limits were strictly enforced on this type of road, with the intersections and all.  He wrote me a ticket for 70 in a 60 and I was back on my way.

Back into the valleys

    A couple hours later it happened again! Lights, Trooper,…..Damn! I was on the same type of road with the intersections, and the reduced, strictly enforced speed limit. (I don’t learn so good)  The trooper looked at my plate and said “you’re a long way from home, What are you doing?” I explained the Ride and the Marsh family foundation and handed him a business card for the foundation that Ellen had made up.  He said “O.K. This will only take a minute.”  He called in my plate for priors or warrants.  I stood on this concrete bridge looking off at the scenery, thanking my lucky stars that I was now in Ohio and that he would not get the “we just got that guy 2 hours ago!” answer from dispatch.  He came back with a written warning and an explanation that this road has crosses at every intersection and is known in Ohio as “the Highway of Death”. “Gotcha” and “Thank you Sir.” and I was back on my way. 

    The ”lead wrist” routine is now officially coming to an end.  I am back East.  Do not get me wrong, I am not a proponent of speeding.  I only do it when there is no traffic or side streets to contend with, and I have a clear view of the road and its surroundings for a long way ahead.  In The farmlands this is the case and it is relatively safe to make some time.  It also becomes habit forming and feels like I could jump off and run next to Maybeline when I slow to 55 m.p.h.  Time to carefully get out of Ohio and cross into Pennsylvania.  The rest of the ride was basically uneventful other than 400 miles of rain the next day but you don’t want to hear about that.  I stopped in Central Pennsylvania for one more night.   440 miles to go.  The next morning was cool and foggy but it burned off and warmed up quickly.  I took the back roads through northern Pennsylvania as I did out West but the further East I got, translated into the more towns and traffic lights I had to contend with.  I was averaging 30 m.p.h. so I was forced back onto Rte. 80 and then picked up Rte. 90 near Albany NY. I hopped off at Troy N.Y. to get on Rte. 2 across Western Massachusetts.  

    I wanted to come back through the Berkshires the way I left 31 days ago. I gassed up in North Adams for the last time at the same station that I had gassed up in for the first time. It was a little strange coming back as I got close to home.  Nothing seemed any different. The leaves were starting to turn but that’s about it.  People going about the same business that they were a month ago.  I got home and it was anti-climactic.  Sean my youngest was home and came running out.  My daughters were at college and Ellen was at a soccer game with Ian.  Every body busy doing what they do.  We had a great reunion that night when every one was home but my actual arrival drove home the fact that we are all busy in the worlds that we have created for ourselves.  I just had the opportunity to step out of it for a while.

Solitude in the corn fields

On that note I will ask you to read on one more time so I can try to explain what I really found on this trip.