"The secret thing about getting ahead is getting started!" -says Mark Twain, in whose country we are now. And so true it is for us, as our motivation is really hitting a low point halfway through the midwest. The air is getting hotter and moister, and angry afternoon thunderstorms perform their drama above our heads daily. "Is this ever going to stop?" we ask ourselves, wondering if we ever get to see blue sky or if camping can ever be enjoyable again.
The fact that the landscape is all but thrilling, I try to react to by reading on my Kindle-ereader exciting novels about adventures of Indians and Westmen....It works! Agnes is getting really bored, though, so she likes to think and talk about fun stuff to come, in order to keep us motivated...."Hey, let´s talk about the cool stuff we´re gonna do once we´re in New York!" -"I can´t, my book is very exciting now, maybe later??" The good thing about this maybe, there are only few pictures being taken, in contrast to the West. Which means, less work. One exciting event is on the way, though: our second wedding anniversary, where we want to treat ourselves a little bit, at least with staying in a fairly nice Motel, some good food.....We reach the little and charming town Hannibal, on the banks of the Mississippi River, where Mark Twain lived in childhood and youth. This is a perfect little place to be for our anniversary. Well, at least we think so. Only minutes after we checked into our nice Motelroom, the blue sky suddenly turns black, and a violent strong storm blows streams of water coming from above almost sideways! Oh, are we happy to not be outside! The downside of this is, though, almost every shop and restaurant closes so we don´t get to eat out for our little celebration. We deal with it our way, setting up a neat little picknick dinner with some wine in our room... An exception in the boring landscape is the halfminute, when we cross the majestic and legendary Mississippi River, shortly meeting with this giant, on his trip running 3800km all the way from Minnesota down to New Orleans, Louisiana...Old-fashioned Steamboat-style Mississippi Boats run trips along the River down south, but we head on eastwards, hoping to someday escape the weather escapades. We are now in Illinois. Would we have noticed, if there hadn´t been the sign? Yes, because the license plates changed as well: Illinois, Land of Lincoln. (He was actually born in Kentucky, but spent an important episode of his life here). As the sky turns from grey to black once again, we try to reach the next roof, preferably a gas station. A highway patrol car stops in front of us, the officer warning us of upcoming severe thunderstorm. YESS, thanks, but we need a roof to hide! We find a barn where we wait under the roof for the worst to pass. Just a normal day in the midwest. What really makes our day many times, is the hospitality of the people here. Everywhere we are looked after and helped out, often invited to homes when asking for a campspot, and of course everybody wants to talk to us whenever we stop. When we are really tired and frustrated, sometimes it is hard to be really nice, when we have to answer the usual questions over and over again. But still we try doing so, since we have already met many very nice people and made some friends that way! Suddenly we are in Indiana, now we really had to pay attention because there was not even a sign on the road, so I could only tell by the changing license plates and by counting miles on my roadmap. Otherwise, still corn fields and nice people. And my reading about the "wild west" of course. One special memory is, when Ray invites us to stay at his place -in propably the nicest garage we have seen- there is an oldtimer museum and a retro barber shop neatly decorated, all with air con, tv, fridge...and of course we are invited to use the shower and kitchen and hang out with him and his wife over some drinks before going to sleep with the historic automobiles around us. He donates us a personalized license plate for our collection, too. In the evenings, we usually write our diaries and look at the maps, to get an idea where we will go the next days, and to change previous plans. This happens often now, as we get close to NYC and realize we have lots of time for that. so we don´t have to go straight east, but rather pick out some hopefully interesting things along the way, we think. Let´s go to Lake Erie, is one thought, so we head a little further north, and try to find a warmshowers host in Fort Wayne, and Toledo, since they are both big cities where we wont be able to camp. So we stay with April and Nathan and their baby boy "Bo", and finally decide to take a day off there. They are very nice and interesting personalities doing some very impressive creations of bike bags/panniers and other bags who they design and offer per website. They have also done some bike touring in the us, so we enjoy exchanging some stories about our trips... We reach Lake Erie shortly thereafter, but the biggest attraction here is definitely man-made: Cedar Point amusement park. The amusement park with the most rollercoasters! Wow, I´m sick already! To reach it, though, we have to be unlawful. And once again, we feel how USA was built around the automobile-there is a causeway to the peninsula, with a sudden and unexpected "no bicycles allowed on road" sign!!! What the ? How are you supposed to get there if you do not have a car? You are not supposed to go there without a car. Walking is illegal as well, so is hitchhiking. Concerning this, at least we saw a (slow but noticeable) change of conscience in some parts of the US, so there is hope. We get a discount for military members, because a nice man offers us to buy us tickets with his card! The park is crazy, full with people seeking the thrills..... We head out in the evening, our heads still spinning, to find a place to stay for the night. It seems impossible, we are going through a huge industrial and commercial zone. I see a firestation and some guys and decide to ask them for the first time in the US if we can stay there. They are really happy to help us out, and let us camp, and shower and even wash our clothes! Other than their southamerican colleagues, they frequently have to head out, so we get woken by the sirene once at night, but that just adds to the special flavor of staying at this place. In the morning, we share our story over some coffee with the new and the old shift, and take our photos with them, which you can also enjoy at their facebook page (perkins fire department Ohio). Oh, we are in Ohio, now. So its a big day in the States, 4th of July, independance day! In our imagination, every american is at a party on this day, grilling franks and burgers, drinking beer, watching fireworks. So we don´t want to feel left out and alone, and organized a warmshowers-stay in Wooster, Ohio. This is a special City, because my Mom was a young german-assistant teacher for one year at Wooster College early seventies. David rides out on his bike to find us and to make sure, we find his house. The warmshowers hosts ususally live outside of the actual city, and always up a steep hill. Few exceptions to this rule, and not today. We reach the lovely little house, where we are greeted by Daves wife Donna and, as reward for the steep climb, some cool beer! Also, Donna treats us with some Austrian chocolate! We are assigned a perfect room and after showering we are fed as if we had always been part of the family. We even get to see the fireworks around us, as we step outside to see them. Since we are not in a rush anymore, let´s check out this Wooster. We do a small tour through the beautiful college campus, and hang out downtown, which is quite pretty too. David likes to bake pies, and we like eating them, and this goes well together. He made us a Pekannut Pie, which was incredible. Dave made sure we find the right way out of town, passing by some amish farms, he showed us the less traveled roads leading towards our next destination then handing over the responsibility to our own fate. Right on the stateline Ohio/Pennsylvania, what was in Ohio riding over nice lil rolling hills, became here an actual rollercoaster ride! That also means for us, that its more interesting. The scenery has already changed to smaller farms with sometimes classical red barns, really nice looking. We see lots of Amish folks around here, too, and we are really happy, there are real people in real gardens, and also on the street. It is not often that we saw people outside, we have to say. That is one of the big differences to cycling in South America, where there are all those people walking around everywhere....Which is really very helpful if you do need help to ask for water, directions or a campspot. Anyhow, we enjoyed seeing the Amish working in their fields and gardens, the boys with the hats, selling the most delicious vegetables on the road, and the horsepulled carts...It´s definitely a different world. Pennsylvania is, as the name suggests (...-sylvania) still covered by lots and lots of woods, in history as much as 90 Percent of the land was covered by trees. So we hope to at last, find some good campspots for wild camping. Again, not so easy, because all the non-state owned land is private, and every 20 meters or so, there are signs devoted to keep the campsite-searching people out. Fortunately, we go through some beautiful state forest land, where we find our peace. We are visited only by wild turkey, whitetail deer and elk! We are so happy, that we have a campfire as well. And, in the morning: blueberry pancakes with fresh blueberries from right here out of the woods! This will be the last time camping out in the green before Sweden, most probably. We briefly visit our new warmshowers-friends the really fantastic couple Brett and Morgan in pretty little Danville, being picked up by Brett who is a real bike aficionado, then checking out the cool local microbrewery for dinner and a beer. Morgan accompanies us the next day to show us the secret bike routes, which go over a beautiful old iron railway bridge...Our motivation is now high again, few days are left to NYC and we have organized some warmshowers-stays for the upcoming days, so we won´t have hard times looking for a place to camp in the upcoming urban zones, which basically go all the way to NYC. Well, tonight, after an uneventful day through suburbs, we camp outside, that is, under a highway bridge, next to a little creek, actually way more peaceful and tranquil than the highway traffic would let you guess. There is also some nature around, so we are very happy: we have a roof for the rain above our tent, and a little stream to wash and get cooking water, and a little green for the eye. We even enjoy sitting by a small campfire before going to sleep. We are so happy we are under the bridge, when a heavy thunderstorm lingers for almost two hours, but as we are close to the stream, we are concerned about the water level, which seems to be fine, though. One last time we check before sleeping, lets us jump out of the tent! The water had suddenly risen all the way up to our tent, one side already under water, and a few items swimming in the now broad river! Agnes wades in the watermasses to save our Atlas, our stove, and other stuff, as I go toss our other stuff up to higher elevation on a hill and save the bikes, and the tent! How lucky we were, within a few minutes, the peaceful little water had converted into a pretty impressive and powerful river! We are happy, we notice we had only lost one bikeglove, one waterbottle, one cooking spoon, one (favorite!!) coffeemug. At least this makes for a good adventure we are sure! We are very happy to be able to spend the next night with our hosts Laurie and Ray in Philipsburg, N.J. and the night after with Karl, a lawyer who lives right Downtown (not typical for warmshowers hosts) in Morristown. We spend some time with him, and entertains us with fascinating stories of his life. We are very happy about meeting all these inspiring people along the way, and remind ourselves once again, about how special and precious those moments are. It´s the 17th of July, a very special day for us, the last day of cycling in both Americas, after 315 days cycling! Through slightly heavier traffic we follow small roads towards the huge city. Easier and quieter than expected, we get to Jersey City, via Newark. What a feeling, seeing for the first time the Statue of Liberty (from Liberty State Park), the symbol for all the immigrants seeking their fortune and lost hope in this country, this being their first sight of the new world, for us being one of the last sights, a monument of good-by, a reminder that our trip is slowly coming towards an end- in one week, we will be in the old world again! We take a short ferry ride from Jersey City/ Port Liberte to Pier 11/Wall Street on Manhattan Island, passing the Statue close enough to get a good view of it. We are so excited! Once in Manhattan, cycling through the Financial District, we are just amazed by how three-dimensional this city is! Then, on our way along the beautiful cyclepath along Hudson River, another cyclist, who will become a good friend, strikes up a conversation with me. Thurstan, too, is himself a legal alien, an Englishman in New York, but has lived for 26 years here and works in the financial sector, invites us instantly to a small party this night at his apartment. Also, if we´d need a place to stay, he offers to stay with him as well! We make our way to Chandler Wild, a young filmmaker, who has offered to share his apartment with us, since we are friends of his friends. Isn´t this amazing? We didn´t know these nice people yesterday but have already 2 invitations for places we could stay in Manhattan? Sometimes we think, we never can travel without a bicycle again- it is such a great icebreaker and bridgebuilder between people, we are amazed again and again. We check in at the apartment in upper west side, and get to know our hosts. Chandler is hardworking, but takes great care of us nevertheless. He barely has freetime though, so we decide to take the invitation of our English cyclist friend we met today (Thurstan Bannister) and go to his party, only a few stops on the tube. It´s an uncomplicated, small gathering, and Thurstan makes sure we get the appropriate attention for just having completed a transamerican trip, including raising glasses of Champagne to us and our achievement! What else could we have asked for? Chandler invites us to join him on his second job, which is doing food/historic tours through certain areas in NYC. We are invited to join him and his group as we taste our way through the best barbecue, pizzas and icecreams of Brooklyn, hearing interesting historic details. Next day: pastries, cupcakes of lower Manhattan. The days go by too quickly. When Chandlers family returns from a trip, we feel a little bad about taking up the rare left space in their apartment so we take Thurstans invitation and move about 50 blocks further downtown. He spends lots of time talking with us, and shares his and his family rich history with us, and even goes sightseeing with us despite having to work each day. He even seems to forget some days, that he has to go to work, because he is so much into the conversations in the mornings! We see museums, walk through central park, go to the Apollo Theater together....and the days are so quickly over! And off we go, back to good old Europe. Gracias, thank you, America, and here we come, Sweden!
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