25miles less but I needed to go to a supermarket and to chat to the
ACA people about the route. So my first stop was the local Walmart,
where I stocked up on snacks, shampoo and conditioner (so important,
and yes, so vain! but without conditioner I keep tearing half my hair
out) and chatted to the pharmacist about safe dosages of ibuprofen.
Turns out you can take huge amounts of the stuff for long periods,
somewhat surprising to me- at least that'll keep the knees and other
assorted ailments under control. Also, upon recommendation by the
English girls, I will now attempt to soothe the saddle sores with
nappy rash cream, after Vaseline proved useless and cortisone too
aggressive. Sorry for the slight overshare there, but it's the painful
reality of touring!
Next stop was the Adventure Cycling Association headquarters. I
chatted to two guys, one of whom has done the Transam and said he
always managed to deal with the dogs, and never used his dog spray.
The other guy showed me a good set of state maps that I could use to
make up my own route. But these are bulky, expensive and have no local
information like bike shops and motels. So, I have decided to stick it
out, and face those pesky dogs. Urgh.
In the afternoon, I rode the remainder of the way to Darby. There's
lots of roadwork on highway 93, which didn't make for comfortable
riding, and it'll continue like this for a few more miles out of
Darby. Also coming up tomorrow is another climb of about 3200ft. I
hope that if I start early, I'll make it up by lunch time.
A little aside on how I keep myself entertained, seeing as I really
can't listen to my iPod. These last few days, the Transam sections
have coincided with sections of the Lewis and Clarke trail. These two
guys led the first expedition from the settlements in the east all the
way to the Pacific coast. (or that's how far my history knowledge
goes) Anyways, I made up a 6 degrees (approximately) of separation
thing, Radio 1 style, between the two: Lewis and Clarke sounds like
Lois and Clark, the main characters in Superman. In the 90s Superman
TV show, Teri Hatcher played Lois. She now plays Susan Mayer on
Desperate Housewives. Her co-star Felicity Huffman, who plays Lynette
Scavo, was the main character in a recent movie called Transamerica.
Aha! Well I was chuffed I thought that up anyways... Ok I might be
going slightly crazy out here in the wild wild west!
PS I passed the 1,000mile mark today, very encouraging!
Sent from my iPhone
No comments:
Post a Comment