(January 3rd)

Day 9 - Kountze to Shepherd TX

The Tourist Tribe

 

Amy & Matt from Leicester, UK. I met them riding East (as I was riding West) just outside of Rye, TX

 

 

I kicked off the day early (as has become my habit) with a dawn stop at Subway on my way out of town. I considered stopping at one of the local restaurants but, let's face it, who has ever known me to pass up breakfast at Subway?

 

It has been a gorgeous day for riding, and this morning was no exception: blue skies, mid-60s and almost no wind at all. Making good time my first stop was at the Honey Island General Store, where I spoke with the proprietor, Chuck Turner. He told me that he sees cyclists come by his store all year long, and from all over the world. He told me of one gentlemen who'd visited this past year who was riding a bamboo recumbent from the very southern tip of South America to Alaska (and, let me tell you, that was a humbling bit of knowledge!). He also proceeded to tell me that JUST YESTERDAY a couple from Vermont had stopped.

 

I missed fellow travelers?? And they were traveling the opposite way no less (and thus far more likely I'd run into them than if I was trying to catch up to them)! I was really disappointed because I'd been hoping that some other lunatics were out on the Southern Tier in the winter, I found some, but missed them! Ah well. Maybe next time!

 

Turns out "next time" was 10 miles down the road as, in the distance coming toward me I saw two bicycle tourists. Huzzah! Fellow travelers?

 

Ah...but immediately my "etiquette nerd-self" kicked in. What IS the proper etiquette for greeting fellow cyclists on a Texas backroad with trucks whizzing by between us a 70+ miles an hour? Would they wave? Should I stop? Of course we'd both want to stop and talk, right?? Or would it be a completely rookie move to stop and wave? Maybe I should keep things low-key like motorcyclists do with just the "two finger down low" wave.

 

Knowing there was no way I was going to play it cool, I simply began waving like a demented princess in a parade as I slowed to a stop. "Where are you from??" I asked as a massive logging truck passed between us and drowned out pretty much all of what I said.

 

"Britain" says the young man of the couple. "Where have you ridden from??" I yell as two pickup trucks careen between us at Daytona speeds.

 

"San Diego" he yells back...and, thank goodness...then had the presence of mind to ride over to my side of the road, followed shortly thereafter by his wife.

 

In the ensuing conversation with Matt and Amy Kingsford I learned that their experience as bike tourists mirrored mine remarkably closely:

• Averaging about 10 miles an hour - CHECK
• A mix of camping and hotels - CHECK
• Rest days somewhere between each 5-10 days - CHECK
• Going roughly 50-60 miles a day (or, in other words about 5 hours riding a day) - CHECK
• Completely throwing out their plan after about Day 2 of the journey - CHECK
• Got rides on rainy days twice - CHECK

They'd been on their journey for 8 weeks. I don't think all that was actually bike touring however, but rather some of it was their trip over from Britain (not totally sure on that). Leicester to be exact. They shipped their bikes over in boxes and he put them together in LA. Then, they got down to San Diego and started officially from there. I'll be reading THEIR blog over the next several days at: www.4legs3wheels.wordpress.com.

 

Amy told me that her absolute favorite place ahead of me was Silver City New Mexico and that while there is some serious climbing still to be done, the vistas are well worth the effort. She opined that they'd tried and failed to find anything to like about El Paso. I could only agree and add I've always felt it had achieved the dubious honor of being "The "Ugliest City in America."

After a bit more bike talk like "how many punctures have you had?" (Me = zero, Matt = 7 on the first day!) or "is that Rohloff hub?" etc., we parted with some pics of each other and the happy knowledge that there are more of us in our Bike Tourist tribe :)

 

P.S. I chose "Pizza at Della'" for dining this evening. While the "Texas Luau" pizza was delicious, the 3 mile round trip on the shoulder of US 59 was hair-raising. All the elements of cyclist's nightmare: darkness, major 4 lane highway, near-continuous stream of 18-wheelers, 75 mph speed limit. For those of you who may not have met me in person, I'm a large man...and still the backblast of the passing big rigs nearly blew me off the side of the road on one occasion. But, the good news is that my touring bike and its awesome "gravel tires" can make it across even grassy/muddy medians with ease!