Day 1

Update: Library found, pictures fixed. :)

More at eleven.

"It would rain, wouldn't it?"

Hello, it is I and dX here- reporting live from Fremont at host home 1. To get a few things out of the way: Yes, were not dead and yes we are dry (it took a while though). Also, for those of you trying to get ahold of us via dX's cell- don't. We'll call you, somehow. The phone situation is that we don't have one, basically- only for fire or medical emrgencies. Which is nice. And lastly- ignore the dates on the pictures below. The camera has amnesia.

Okay- I think a picture is in order to start this post off proper: here is us, just heading out from the Kittery Trading post:

You know, looking at this picture, it looks like its a nice day in Maine. That goes to show you just how crummy my camera is. Or perhaps, it means that this was taken during a break in the storm- we had a few of those that gave us false hope our journey would be a boring one. But don't worry; it wasn't.

Shortly after this was taken, we began on route 1 heading south. This was really fun- we were going about 16 to 18 miles an hour over a road that was just shy of an interstate, with water spraying up in our face and everywhere else. We were totally soaked within 5 minutes, and I mean TOTALLY soaked. But we weren't bummed- we were almost giddy even-we finally had left. We made great speed to Portsmouth and went on to fnd the next turn we needed to make. I was happy; we hadn't become lost yet.

Somewhere along route 33, we were going up a hill and we one of those awesome red bull trucks went past us. Just as dX started to mutter a "sweet" it started slowing down and pulling over in front of us.

"What?"

"Dude" we both said at the same time. The vehicle stopped and the doors opened. Out of them came bounding some young woman.

"Where you guys headed?" one of them asked.

"Towards newfields- trying to hit some trails up there"

"You guys camping or something?"

"Nah, were doing this bike thing- four days, starting today in Kittery, going around the state.

"Dude, you guys are ANIMALS!"

Me and dX smiled. It was a compliment of the obsucure variety- but we enjoyed it.

"Well how about we give you guys some red bulls for the ride out?"

We responded with exclamations that of "sure", "thank you", "sweet", "heck yes!" or some such. They sped off and our morale was boosted. Now dX doesn't have a water bottle mount, but I do. It was being used though, and I hadn't enough room in my backpack to take it out. So we started off chugging half the red bull cans at first, then we got back on our way down 33 driving with one hand and drinking with the other. Hmm... maybe I should have brought the tiki mug, Brad.

The trip went on pretty well and uneventful for a while. I have so far been pleasently suprised with my navigation skills- I am not geographically inclined like my father, and when traveling at high way speeds or in a moter vehicle for that matter, I tend to have to turn around and miss roads twice and some such nonsence. But I didn't lead us wrong at all today, for which I am stupidly proud. Because, eventually, it wasn't easy.

You see, I had a map of my estimated route that I printed off. I put it in my pocket for safekeeping and quicktaking. Dad wanted me to spray it with some waterproofing material or something like that- but COME ON dad, it will be in my pocket- how could it get wet there?

Well I'll tell you how it can get wet there- very very easily when its raining and the tires are spitting up water into your face, lap and everywhere else. So the map slowly became unusable- I took it out a few times on the way to and in portsmouth, but each time I realized that it was getting in worse condition. By the time we really started to need it, I could tell it was falling apart. Eventually, the papers resembled a large wad of cheap gum that has been chewed for 5 hours to long. From there, I had to go by memory of what I knew while planning out the trip and by verification of passers-by. It actually worked out very well. Everyone was really nice.

Okay, back to the main story. We got on a bike trail that goes all the way from newfields to Manchester. Its pretty impressive- mostly well packed dirty gravel- almost like a highway for bikes, I commented. We rode that thing at about 16 miles an hour sometimes, just about the same as we would a road.

These pictures are of us stopping for a little jerky and water break. Good stuff.

So this road was impressive, but we had to get to fremont, and my plan was to follow another trail that goes down a good ten miles or so from this one into the general area of fremont.

Thats where stuff started getting interesting:

Again, the camera is really not doing reality justice here. Everythings over exposed- let me fill in for you what the camera can't. You see those puddles of muddy water? Thats all there is for several miles- I'd say probably 4 at least, but I was to busy swatting flies and trying not to fall in to count them. This was easily the worst part of this day- we started off by riding through them but I stopped trying that when I sank almost up to the top of my wheels and almost fell in head first. It was like quick-sand mud in some places. We had to get off our bikes and walk around 4 our of 5 of the holes. There was also some rough terrain around here; when I got back on the road I eventually noticed my wheel was out of true- in other words, it was bent up.

Not much else to report of the trip that would be too exciting to you: we stopped at a school for another breather:

I got a rock out of my shoe there. That was good.

And then we finally made it to our host home! Mr and Mrs. C are so cool; they gave us an awesome homeade meal that filled us up much better then beef jerky, they let us have showers and they let us exist in an air conditioned house, all while making us laugh. Thank you!

Tomarrow we go for manchester, but we make a little detour through Derry to get my wheel taken care of. You see, I tried to true it but I made it worse- as usual. And its bent up bad- keeps hitting the breaks, and you can even see visibly where the wheel is bent just by looking at it. Soo... how am I going to get there? Well, on my bike of course. The work around I finally settled on was to unhook my rear brakes. Now before you all freak out, don't worry don't worry- I stop mostly with my front brakes anyway- my rears had some trouble to begin with. And actually not having rear brakes is no where as dangerous as my rear wheel anyway, so don't worry. But if you do want to pray for our saftey, as I know there are alot of awesome people who are reading this that do, pray specifically that my wheel does not collapse and that it does not cause me to break my axle. I'll be babying it the whole way to the shop, so I don't see why it should but its still a kind of big deal. I've never seen what its like to drive a wheel to destruction; on the one hand I'm curious what it would look like and on the other hand I'm really not wanting to find out just yet.

Now if you will excuse me, I have a book to read for tomarrow's lit class- if all goes as planned, I should still show up via bike.

Till the next entry,

---Us