Between August 13th and October 24th 2009 I cycled coast2coast in the USA.
Here’s the trailer…
For the full story see www.shanecycles.com/coast2coast/
This film gives an idea of my journey through Oregon. My idea of Oregon was mountains and forests, I had no idea it has so much desert.
This led to some serious water issues which kept my trip interesting with afternoon temperatures of 35-40 degrees in the shade (not there’s much shade in the high desert). Ooh and for the record water filters don’t work in the desert, that sand just won’t go through there.
This film gives an idea of my adventure in Idaho, to sum it up….HOT…
Day 17 – A day I’d been looking forward to for weeks, Teton Pass. Finally pine trees and rivers again after weeks of desert and of course my favourite, a nasty pass.
With the Pine creek road pass (600m climbing) as a morning warm up it was time to get down to the real work. From Victor its a 21km climb of 900m up to 2500m(8400ft). It starts nice and easy but the last couple of hours is at 10% gradient, which means a nice slow steady climb.
The plus side is……coming down the other side into Wilson with a bike that weighs 45kg with a fat guy riding it means alot of momentum. This was one of the most fun(and fastest) descents I’ve ever done, with an average speed of 60km/h and a max of 80km/h, naughty me:)
Day 30 – Trail Ridge Road, highway 34 which is the highest continuous highway in the USA. As an added bonus it goes through the Rockie Mountains National park.
This was probably the most beautiful days cycling I’ve ever done. Whether that is down to the scenery or an oxygen shortage after climbing from 8000ft to 12,200ft(3700m) (40km in 5 hours) who know but at the time I was very impressed (and quite emotional). I was of course very lucky that the weather was nice, it really would of been a downer to cycle 5 hours only to see mist at 12000ft.
Trail ridge road though tough because of the altitude is a nice climb because the road is generally on 6% gradient. Just beware of those damn RV drives who leave their steps out or doors open, the road is very narrow, I almost got wiped out by a swing door on an RV.
This video gives an idea of my adventures in Wyoming and a little of Colorado. Wyoming is interesting, between Teton pass and Togwotee pass its all mountains and pine forests, but once you get over Togwotee its all desert again until Colorado and beyond.
Though some parts of the road (especially Lander to Rawlings) where pretty boring, this was probably my favourite state of the trip.
Forget all the clichés about Wyoming, cowboys and the wild west, its all truth.
This video give an idea of my adventures through the Midwest. As you can see from the video not alot happend.
Cycling for 2000km through cornfields and (very)small town America really wasn’t anything special. When you’ve seen one crappy Midwest town you’ve seen them all.
The is the final chapter, a combination of “a day in the life” the last days of the journey and a reflection on the trip.
