I had a wonderful time in Charlotte NC staying with Tom's family. I know I have already written about my stay there, but I can only reiterate what a fantastic time I had and how welcome I was made to feel by all the family. In my last week there I got to go back to the mountains, which was amazing, they are certainly one of my favourite highlights from this trip, but you know me I love hills. I got to go panning for gold, but didn't make my fortune! Tim also gave me a shooting lesson, which was fun, although I don't think I would ever have the patience to become any good at it. All the family helped so much with getting me back on the road again and doing some of the boring bits and pieces that needed doing. All I can say again, is how nice people have been to me on this trip and how hospitable, and a huge THANK YOU!
Monday, 31 October 2011
Friday, 21 October 2011
Moving on
I have spent the last few days planning the next part of my trip. I intend to cycle north up the East Coast, and have got some adventure cycling association maps, however getting phone numbers for campsites, checking that they are open, trying to find the best way of getting to the coast has taken a lot of time. What makes it harder is not knowing how far I will be travelling each day - the maps have no elevation profile as it is all flat! I am very excited about doing some long days, but also anxious that I may not be able to, either because of the weather, or my own ineptitude! I also want to deviate from the route suggested in the maps and see more of the Maryland coast, but I am not sure how realistic this will be. I have bought a pair of shoes with cleats and changed my pedals, what a difference! It is like learning to cycle all over again and my legs ache, I didn't realise that they would use different muscles! I think, once I have got used to them they will be better as they seem so much safer than the toe clips I have been using. Any way I will be leaving the home comforts behind once again on either Sunday or Monday and will be travelling again without much access to the computer so will try to update you all when I get the chance.
Sunday, 16 October 2011
North Carolina
I have been staying the last week with Tom's family, (for those of you that don't know, my father grew up with Tom,) when we got our Christmas letter from Tom last year I rather cheekily invited myself to stay with them. I have been welcomed with open arms and made to feel so at home, which has been really nice after being on the road for so long. We have also been doing some sight seeing and last week I got to go to the Great Smokey Mountains to see the fall colours. I really enjoyed being in the hills, so I am lucky enough to be going back with Tim later today for a few days and hope to do some hiking.
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| Near Ashville elevation approx 1800 m / 6000ft |
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| Linville Falls |
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| Linville Falls |
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| Blue Ridge Parkway |
We also went to visit the Biltmore House, which I found fascinating. It was comparable to a National Trust property in many ways, and reminded me of Waddeston. However it was so American!!! In places it was a very odd mix of European styles of architecture, the dining hall was a cross between a church and a medieval hall, and the house was filled with European artifacts and treasures. It was built at the end of the 1800's, and is a lot homier than many mansions in Britain, it is Americas largest house and has 250 rooms. The best part however was the gym and swimming pool in the basement! The servants' quarters' were rather nice and filled with the latest mod cons, and the servants had a lot of time off compared to their British counterparts; I think that working as a domestic in America would have been better than working in England. Visitors are referred to as guests on all signage, which I rather liked. Normal visitors got to see a lot of the house, and lots of different rooms, about 44 of them. They also ran some rather good looking tours. I have attached some more pictures for you all. What was really clever, was that they had a minibus collect you from the car park and drive you to the house, the driver meanwhile orientating you, most of this was stuff about the car park and tickets, but also told us where the toilets were, could have been used to tell more of the history, and could have been used to sell the annual passes, on the way back the driver again answered history questions. This system meant that people got a good welcome, and the car parks are all out of sight from the house.
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| Lissa and Me |
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| For all of you still working..... |
I have also spent some time looking around Charlotte, which has some beautiful old houses, and a very modern downtown. I have also had my bicycle fitted with a lower gear to help with the hills in New Zealand! Today I have had a lazy day and enjoyed a swim in the outdoor pool, so I am feeling very spoilt.
Yesterday I had such a funny day, I went with Jenny (Tom's daughter) to the Renaissance Fair. Even better, we went in her convertible, which I am rather envious of. It was hilarious. On arrival I approached a lady in costume, who turned out to be the Queen, and asked her very politely which year it was. However the poor lady who started answering in a rather good fake British accent with the appropriate olde worlde words got rather flustered as she realised I was from England, and that she couldn't answer my question - the fair seemed to be roughly England between about 1400 and 1700, with a bit of America and the modern age thrown in! It was a very entertaining mix. We watched jousting (with unrealistically lightweight lances, swords, and even a flaming whip - like Indiana Jones) and the Merry Washer Women singing, and some singing comedy nuns, and jugglers, and they even had camel rides. Some of the fake English accents were hilarious, and I was very disappointed that there weren't any cross dressers (which would have been appropriate as women weren't allowed on stage in those days.)
Tuesday, 11 October 2011
To you
I hope you are all enjoying reading this, but if you want more or less of something do let me know, and I will try to oblige.
I have had the odd email from people saying that they can't post messages, I have tried to set all the settings to allow messages but I am technologically not the best, so if any one has any ideas please let me know how I could change this!
I have also had a few people saying that they are struggling to send me emails, and I also realise I haven't received any from some friends for a while - this may just be because you have better things to do than email me, but if you have emailed and think I ought to have replied but haven't please try to let me know - it may be that I haven't got the email!
I also have some friends who I would like to email but haven't got their email addresses, so if you are reading this perhaps you could contact me? (Helen C primarily! but also Nicky P, it would be nice to hear from you and I only have your NT address.)
Also, I love getting news from home so feel free to get in touch!
I would also like to thank you all for reading this, as it is so nice for me to try to share with you what is happening in my life and you all I think know how I feel about Facebook, so thank you for bothering to read the waffle I write here, it's much appreciated!
I have had the odd email from people saying that they can't post messages, I have tried to set all the settings to allow messages but I am technologically not the best, so if any one has any ideas please let me know how I could change this!
I have also had a few people saying that they are struggling to send me emails, and I also realise I haven't received any from some friends for a while - this may just be because you have better things to do than email me, but if you have emailed and think I ought to have replied but haven't please try to let me know - it may be that I haven't got the email!
I also have some friends who I would like to email but haven't got their email addresses, so if you are reading this perhaps you could contact me? (Helen C primarily! but also Nicky P, it would be nice to hear from you and I only have your NT address.)
Also, I love getting news from home so feel free to get in touch!
I would also like to thank you all for reading this, as it is so nice for me to try to share with you what is happening in my life and you all I think know how I feel about Facebook, so thank you for bothering to read the waffle I write here, it's much appreciated!
Kings Canyon and Sequoia
This really was an adventure, and I am so grateful to all of the people we met who helped us out along the way; we were very lucky to have met you all.
We left Fresno intending to get to a campsite for night, and this plan went badly wrong when we realised we had been cycling in the wrong direction for about an hour - I know, how stupid can you get?! We found ourselves on a newly built road with invisible debris on the hard shoulder, no street lights, in the dark, and still many miles from the intended campsite, so decided to try to wild camp for the night. This plan went badly wrong when we met an irate farmer with a pack of ravenous dogs, a large flash light and a gun. We ended up in a motel for the night. Our second day of trying to get to Sequoia started off well with fresh fruit from a stand for breakfast and cycling past miles and miles of orchards which are planted so accurately that the straight lines remind me of maths problems. However the day soon began to heat up, and quite soon the terrain looked like this:
Then our first incline began and I started to wonder where the line between being too hot, and being dangerously at risk of heat stroke started. There was no shade in sight, it was only going to get hotter, and there was no where to stop. Ooops. I stopped to catch my breath and felt faintly sick - this was not a good sign. Perhaps I had bitten off more than I could chew....
Then we were rescued, and I have never been more in need of rescuing. Bob, a fellow cyclist, but luckily this time in a truck, picked us up. He drove us to his very very beautiful farm, gave us drinks, invited us to stay the night, and for a delicious home made dinner, home made baked breakfast (thank you, Ginger,) hot showers, and then gave us a ride all the way up to the top of the mountain and to the entrance of the National Park.
We stayed in a campsite in Grant Grove and cycled to see the world's third largest tree, which was incredible. These sequoia trees are different from the ones on the coast, they are a bit fatter and a bit shorter, although what seemed to me to be more noticeable was that these trees had sturdy, gnarled branches at the top reminiscent of an oak tree. Individually they were so impressive, on the whole I enjoyed the trees on the coast more as there were simply so many of them, and walking through forests of them was almost otherworldly.
From Grant Grove we cycled to Lodgepole, which has to be one of the best rides I have ever done. The road mostly follows a ridgeway although there is still over a 300 metres (1000 feet) of ascent involved. The views are just amazing. I did find it very hard going though as the altitude is so high, we were at about 1800 metres (6000 feet), and I was in my lowest gear almost the whole way, during one ascent my feet went numb, and the tips of my fingers lost feeling as well. I realised at this point that I might not have managed the ascent all the way up on my bike, due to the lack of oxygen as well as the heat, and was doubly grateful to Bob for the ride.
We left Fresno intending to get to a campsite for night, and this plan went badly wrong when we realised we had been cycling in the wrong direction for about an hour - I know, how stupid can you get?! We found ourselves on a newly built road with invisible debris on the hard shoulder, no street lights, in the dark, and still many miles from the intended campsite, so decided to try to wild camp for the night. This plan went badly wrong when we met an irate farmer with a pack of ravenous dogs, a large flash light and a gun. We ended up in a motel for the night. Our second day of trying to get to Sequoia started off well with fresh fruit from a stand for breakfast and cycling past miles and miles of orchards which are planted so accurately that the straight lines remind me of maths problems. However the day soon began to heat up, and quite soon the terrain looked like this:
Then we were rescued, and I have never been more in need of rescuing. Bob, a fellow cyclist, but luckily this time in a truck, picked us up. He drove us to his very very beautiful farm, gave us drinks, invited us to stay the night, and for a delicious home made dinner, home made baked breakfast (thank you, Ginger,) hot showers, and then gave us a ride all the way up to the top of the mountain and to the entrance of the National Park.
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| Our rescuers Bob and Ginger |
We stayed in a campsite in Grant Grove and cycled to see the world's third largest tree, which was incredible. These sequoia trees are different from the ones on the coast, they are a bit fatter and a bit shorter, although what seemed to me to be more noticeable was that these trees had sturdy, gnarled branches at the top reminiscent of an oak tree. Individually they were so impressive, on the whole I enjoyed the trees on the coast more as there were simply so many of them, and walking through forests of them was almost otherworldly.
From Grant Grove we cycled to Lodgepole, which has to be one of the best rides I have ever done. The road mostly follows a ridgeway although there is still over a 300 metres (1000 feet) of ascent involved. The views are just amazing. I did find it very hard going though as the altitude is so high, we were at about 1800 metres (6000 feet), and I was in my lowest gear almost the whole way, during one ascent my feet went numb, and the tips of my fingers lost feeling as well. I realised at this point that I might not have managed the ascent all the way up on my bike, due to the lack of oxygen as well as the heat, and was doubly grateful to Bob for the ride.
From Lodgepole we intended to spend a day hiking and seeing the world's biggest tree; this was not to be however as the weather forecast got worse and worse. When we got up the next morning we were in the middle of a cloud, and the visitors' centre' was predicting a 100% chance of snow for the following day and temperatures of -8'C for the night. We left and started heading for the largest tree and realised that it was totally mad so turned around and cycled through thick freezing cold cloud all the way back to Grant Grove. At Grant Grove temperatures were predicted to be slightly warmer, thank goodness and we enjoyed a meal in the disappointingly under-heated restaurant before bed. It rained all night, and I mean rained! In the morning my tent had leaked and had water all across the floor, I looked outside to see that where we had been camped on a dry level campsite the night before was suddenly the convergence of two fast flowing and full streams. I thought it was time to cycle out as quickly as possible and get to the valley below. Christof felt that cycling in the rain was mad and so we moved my tent to a small dryish patch under a tree and dried it out as well as possible. Two hours later the rain had not eased for a second, when suddenly a new noise was heard - snow!
This time we packed up as fast as we could and fled the campsite, the mountain, and it seemed the weather, - we had a glorious hour and a half of clear weather which saw us zooming down 1500 metres (5000 feet) to the bottom of the mountain. What an amazing descent, and when we got lower the views were super, the plain which Fresno is built on has to be the biggest flattest piece of land I have ever seen, and I don't just mean flat, it is ironed, it is paper flat, and stretches much further than the eye can see.
The next few days were a bit of a problem, there is no camping to be had anywhere near Fresno it appears, and although we had a warm shower host lined up to take us in the Saturday night we had two nights with no where to stay. Jeff stepped in, and very kindly after meeting us outside a Little Caesars (I know, I am sorry, I was STARVING, and it smelt foody) he offered us a place to stay for two nights, and, when we arrived it was luxury, rather than tents in the garden we had rooms, beds, a kitchen to cook in, and good company too. I am so lucky to have met so many so nice people, and Jeff and Myra were some of the very best, they looked after us and welcomed us with open arms.
Finally our last two hosts, Sid and Martha, whom we approached via Warm Showers, (a website for touring cyclists in case you are wondering) were also totally super and made life much easier, especially with boxing my bike and assisting with transport to Fresno airport for my flight to Charlotte, North Carolina. Thank you both so much, and I hope you get some travelling soon!
Yosemite
Once we arrived in San Francisco the group of cyclists I had been travelling with went our separate ways. Christof and I travelled to Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon. First we got a ferry from San Francisco to Oakland, then a train from Oakland to Merced, then a bus to Yosemite from Merced, then the bus back, the train from Merced to Fresno, and then we started pedalling to Sequoia and our adventures began.
Yosemite was amazing, the valley was stunning, and so much fun to cycle through, the road leads through the most heavenly scented forest, beside a river and meanders through a steep sided valley, at the top of which are the most enormous cliffs I think I have ever seen, and in all directions too. We were lucky enough to get a wilderness permit and so we could leave the crowds behind and escape to a hillside where we camped under the stars. It was incredible. We hiked the next day, although unfortunately not far as we were ill equipped; the one problem with cycling is I haven't figured out how to do a smooth transition to hiking, half of our bags were left at the visitors centre, our smellies in a locker in a car park several miles away in a metal bear proof box, our bikes under a tree half way up a trail, and our walking stuff poorly packed as I didn't have the right bags; and it was hot, with no water filter, and we were in bear country!
The views from the hills were so super, and then we returned to the valley to find people with binoculars watching climbers so small and high that they were impossible to see with the naked eye. When we left the park the sun was setting and the cliffs glowed pink and orange with the evening light, it was one of those so happy and lucky to be here moments (I seem to be having so many of those on this trip).
Yosemite was amazing, the valley was stunning, and so much fun to cycle through, the road leads through the most heavenly scented forest, beside a river and meanders through a steep sided valley, at the top of which are the most enormous cliffs I think I have ever seen, and in all directions too. We were lucky enough to get a wilderness permit and so we could leave the crowds behind and escape to a hillside where we camped under the stars. It was incredible. We hiked the next day, although unfortunately not far as we were ill equipped; the one problem with cycling is I haven't figured out how to do a smooth transition to hiking, half of our bags were left at the visitors centre, our smellies in a locker in a car park several miles away in a metal bear proof box, our bikes under a tree half way up a trail, and our walking stuff poorly packed as I didn't have the right bags; and it was hot, with no water filter, and we were in bear country!
The views from the hills were so super, and then we returned to the valley to find people with binoculars watching climbers so small and high that they were impossible to see with the naked eye. When we left the park the sun was setting and the cliffs glowed pink and orange with the evening light, it was one of those so happy and lucky to be here moments (I seem to be having so many of those on this trip).
San Francisco 2
When we arrived there was a bicycle festival going on with some of the weirdest bikes you have ever seen (sorry the pictures don't do it justice, check out: http://www.sfbike.org/?fat)
In San Francisco the thing I liked the most was the cable car museum. The thought that one central hub co-ordinates and powers cable lines at about 9 miles an hour that cover most of the city - many miles, and on this a network of cable cars run, is amazing! San Francisco had lots of very very steep hills, lots of very long straight roads, and was a fun place to be. Some photos for your delight:
In San Francisco the thing I liked the most was the cable car museum. The thought that one central hub co-ordinates and powers cable lines at about 9 miles an hour that cover most of the city - many miles, and on this a network of cable cars run, is amazing! San Francisco had lots of very very steep hills, lots of very long straight roads, and was a fun place to be. Some photos for your delight:
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| The Golden Gate Bridge |
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| Golden Gate Bridge |
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