Bike Trip #6-Weirdness!

Some would say wanting to bicycle across the continent is plenty weird enough but pedalling 70 miles a day in the sun can do even weirder things to your mind. For example, what do you do for fun and to unwind after a long day bicycling? You can't carry a TV. iPods were not around. We were on a tight budget. Heeeeeyyyy....Ya know...When I pull my pants up high then suck my belly in they fall down really low. Oh yeah well, look how far I can puff my belly out? Heck anyone can do that, let me show you how far in I can suck my belly. Anyone have a tape measure? Let's see who can make the biggest/skinniest bellies and who can get the greatest variations in measurements. Yes, you too can hours of endless fun with just a tape measure and your own belly!!! Trish worked as our official measurer since she was a nurse and all. As you see our fattest belly puffer was Mike. Our skinniest belly sucker was Pete. How could their mothers be anything but proud?

Here we have one of Del's ingenuities. Many of the cyclists liked to take a dip whenever they found a water hole they could dunk into. There was a problem of wet clothes though. Sometimes the sweat alone soaked shirts and wadding up wet cloths to stuff into a pannier bag was kind of yucko. Del rigged up his own personal mini wash line on the back of his bike and had no compunction about hanging his undies on it as he pedalled along. In spite of that he was sort of shy in some ways. My sense of humor required female representation on his wash line so one day when he had gone into a store I grabbed one of my bras and quietly pinned it to his wash line. He turned about as red as that background when he discovered it later. Oh, and this pile of crap is all the junk 11 people needed for a bike trip across the USA. THAT is what I shoved into that little car every day, and unloaded every night. May I also point out that I was such an efficient stuff packer that I could still use the rear view mirror.

By now we had crossed Wisconsin and were well into Minnesota. Greg and Mr. Lime took a brief detour from the rest of the group in Minnesota to go way into the north and visit some dear family friends of Mr. Lime while the rest of us took a more southerly route through the state. They camped in odd places along the way and did not always find bathroom facilities where they could wash up. When they got to Lake Superior Greg remembered reading or hearing that in a pinch sand would work well as soap. The two guys...er...'lathered up'...and tried to rinse off but were shocked to find that vigorous rubbing of sand onto one's body really only results in removing several of the top layers of epidermis.



What other adventures will these weird people have as they cruise along the country? Tune in next week...