Bunyan Velo: Travels on Two Wheels, Issue No. 04

BUNYAN VELO TRAVELS ON TWO WHEELS // ISSUE No. 04

BUNYAN VELO ISSUE No. 04 – FEBRUARY 2014 Travels on Two Wheels

EDITOR and DESIGNER Lucas Winzenburg

CONTACT bunyanvelo@gmail.com www.bunyanvelo.com

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Logan Watts, Patrick Stephenson, Paul Errington, Jared Lelievre, Carl Gauger, John Watson, Gabe Ehlert, Daniel Molloy, Carrie Harvilla, Erik Jensen, David Thierry Knox, Tyler Hardie, Kevin Tweed, Devin OBrien, Jesse Lindhorst, Errin Vasquez, David Beachley, Randi Jo Smith, Scott Felter, Ben Hovland, Mike Riemer, Marina Mertz, Rene Costales, Gareth Lennon, Mario Villeneuve, and Gregory Brown.

CONTRIBUTORS Gabriel Amadeus Nicholas Carman Glenn Charles Przemek Duszynski Anna Edmonds Gabe Ehlert

Daniel Enns Jeffrey G. Frane Cass Gilbert Paul Henry Moore Donnie Kolb Rob Perks

Dan Powell Mark Reimer Logan Watts Virginia Krabill Lael Wilcox

PHOTO CREDITS Cover: Cass Gilbert Opposite: Nicholas Carman Contents: Przemek Duszynski

/bunyanvelo

@bunyanvelo COPYRIGHT

All content copyright 2014 Bunyan Velo. Contributions have been used with permission and are copyright original sources. No unauthorized reproduction without written consent.

MADE WITH PRIDE IN MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA

EDITOR’S NOTE When I started this project one year ago, I never dreamt that it would thrive as it has. Now, looking back at the first four issues of Bunyan Velo, I’m tremendously grateful for the incredible group of writers and photographers with whom I’ve had the pleasure of collaborating. All told, I’ve been lucky enough to share the work of close to 60 talented individuals from around the world. And, of course, none of this would have been possible without the support of our ever-growing community of readers. I couldn’t be more excited to present another 14 stories of two-wheeled adventure. This issue’s contributors bring us along for the ride as they explore roads familiar and unknown, from one of my favorite places here in Minneapolis, to dirt trails and dunes across the Western United States, to long and winding routes spanning far-off places like Lesotho, Peru, Morocco, and beyond. Sometime in late spring 2014, I’ll be launching a Kickstarter campaign in hopes of crowdfunding a printed anthology of our first year’s content. I’d love to have a Bunyan Velo coffee table book for my own home, and hopefully enough of you feel the same way and we can turn it into a reality. If I’ve sparked your interest, follow along on our Facebook, Instagram, or website as I share occasional updates about our Kickstarter and other projects. If you can, please consider supporting this independent publication by making a donation or purchasing a digital copy at bunyanvelo.com Thanks for reading, Lucas Winzenburg Editor

Contents 08 THIS IS NOT THE GRINGO TRAIL Cass Gilbert

22 IT’S ALWAYS SUNNY IN THE DALLES Gabriel Amadeus

38 WANDERLAND Logan Watts and Virginia Krabill

56 FOREVERSCAPE Dan Powell and Donnie Kolb

72 ČERVENEC IN CZECH Lael Wilcox

90 SEEKING STATES Gabe Ehlert

102 PRAIRIE SOJOURN Daniel Enns and Mark Reimer

118 OUTSIDE LOOKING IN Paul Henry Moore

134 BIKEPACKING MOROCCO Glenn Charles

148 I’M HAPPY AND I’M RIDING AND A 1,2,3,4... Przemek Duszynski

160 THE BOTTOMS Jeffrey G. Frane

170 LAST CHANCE, ARIZONA Nicholas Carman

186 TO WOO A HIKER Anna Edmonds

194 #COFFEEOUTSIDE Rob Perks

THIS IS NOT THE GRINGO TRAIL Written and photographed by Cass Gilbert

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oursing its way through the mineralrich mountains of the Peruvian Andes, lost amongst its innermost folds, a series of unpaved roads connects one mine to the next. Many are abandoned, darkened tunnels propped up only by old planks of wood, and the roads that lead to them are in a similar state of abject disrepair. Take the time and trouble to link this network up, and you’ll earn yourself over a thousand kilometres of mud, sweat, and toil. These rugged tracks climb incessantly, sometimes a Herculean seven thousand feet at a time, cresting high passes where condors glide and swoop. And they funnel back down again, through sheer-sided canyons, where patchworks of fields cling tenaciously to what little land can be tilled. Given their lofty elevations – in places, they reach almost 16,000 feet in altitude – their pitches feel unnaturally, unapologetically steep. To be sure, this is challenging country. Bunyan Velo 10

IT’S ALWAYS SUNNY

IN THE DALLES Written and photographed by Gabriel Amadeus

January, 2014. “It’s always sunny in The Dalles” is a phrase frequently muttered when we’re deep in the trenches of Portland’s dreary, dripping winter days. Weather fronts come barreling in off the Pacific Ocean, hit the cold coast range, condense, and come to a sputtering halt—directly on top of the Willamette Valley. Specifically, Portland. Then they just sort of sit here, trapped by the Cascade range to the east, daring us to venture out of our cozy coffee shops and bookstores. The common refrain is that if you drive through the Columbia River Gorge to the other side of the Cascades you’ll usually be rewarded with vitamin D, dry trails, and a chance to break out those dusty Ray Bans. Usually. 01/19/2014, 5:30am, Portland, Ore., 32°F. It’s early. We’ve got to ration our meager winter daylight, so (1) My favorite maps are the old USGS Quad maps because they contain all sorts of roads and trails that don’t exist anymore. They’re half history lesson, half guarantee you won’t be getting home in time for dinner.

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if we’re going to complete the 60-mile route I’ve teased out of some old topos1, an early start is necessary. I packed the night before and planned out my coffee stops: Water Avenue pour-over at home, to-go Barista drip for the car ride, a small Holsteins cup at our rendezvous, and with any luck, some high-octane trucker fuel mid-ride in Klickitat. 01/19/2014, 9:26am, The Dalles2, Ore., 30°F. We have to assume the sun has risen to the east of here by now, but I’ll be damned if there’s much to show for it. A dull, colorless Gaussian blur has enveloped an already bleak town. Dalles Mountain is somewhere across the Columbia River, but the edge of the earth rises up and dissolves into the sky before our eyes can get that far. And it’s bitterly cold. We are: Gabriel Amadeus, Nick Groesz, Jason Britton, Dan Powell, and Shawn Small. A powerful team, really. Combined, (2) The Dalles is the only U.S. city in which the word “The” is part of the official name.

these dudes have enough riding experience under their belts to crush me while nonchalantly chatting about bike geekery I didn’t even know existed. Yet here we stand, shivering: “Forgot my jacket, guess it’s a hoodie ride.” “Anybody bring chamois cream?” “Have you actually ridden this before?” The plan is to follow the path of VeloDirt’s Dalles Mountain 60 over the Columbia River into Washington, climb Dalles Mountain, veer north into unfamiliar territory, and eventually link up with the Klickitat Rail Trail, following the grade back downriver to The Dalles. We ascend into the clouds. Though more of a hill with a radio tower than a mountain, Dalles Mountain is still a ten-mile dirt

climb with 2,200’ of elevation gain. Most of the time it has some of the best views of Mount Hood and the gorge as a backdrop. Today however, it has some fresh, loose gravel and only about 200’ of visibility in every direction. The hard rime ice forms alien crystals on every blade of grass and barb of barbed wire. The fence lines meander off and lose themselves in the thick, dead soup. And our ragtag group of five is spread out in this mess, each laying his own wobbling, plodding tire track upwards through the otherwise untouched surface of the road. 01/19/2014, 11:12am, somewhere on Dalles Mountain, Wash., 31°F. “I think we’ve gotta be close to the top by now.” “My camera’s not working right.” “My face hurts.”

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Wande

rland Written and photographed by Logan Watts and Virginia Krabill

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ne of the priceless perks of traveling by bicycle is the unfiltered, free access to people and places that are virtually untouched by outsiders and the authentic experiences that come as a result of these encounters. This skeleton key does not come without its costs. In exchange for such access, one must be willing to delve headfirst into the abyss and surrender to the unknown. At times, it may just be a matter of taking off down a dirt track with no predetermined place to take rest for the night (or two) and no clear sense of when or from whence your next meal will come. The reward for accepting the inherent risks of being out of touch, sometimes far away from civilization, and embracing uncertainty is the amazing depth of experience that comes from simply letting situations unfold as they may. Things don’t necessarily happen the way you would choose, but sometimes a series of events occurs that feels as though an invisible magic carpet is guiding you along. Not

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to sound existential, or to paint the surrealist picture that bike touring is the magic Kool-Aid, but it does seem that our current trip has, at times, been sprinkled with a touch of fairy dust. We had left the recently paved A3 that snakes across Lesotho through the middle portion of the Sky Kingdom. At some point we made the decision to traverse a very thin green line on the map that equated to dirt road on the legend. In hindsight, I’m surprised it is considered a road at all. No doubt, only well-versed 4x4 enthusiasts could forge many of the steep, narrow, and rough areas that include river crossings, water holes, and boulder fields, especially now, in the rainy season. Day one was not only an indulgence of breathtaking scenery and a window into a vastly different culture; it also proved

to be a test of our endurance and emotions as we rode some fantastically challenging dirt tracks and were temporary held hostage by two wonderful, remote Basotho villages. After stopping to filter water at the bottom of what looked like yet another several-hundred-meter climb, a distinguishedlooking gentleman approached us on horseback. As it turns out, we had made the acquaintance of near royalty. The chief of the area villages, a very nice man, offered me a ride on his horse and laughed somewhat maniacally when I said I’d prefer to stay on my bike. After a few minutes of broken conversation (in and out of English and Sesotho, with a healthy dose of sign language added in), he introduced us to two other gentlemen who seemed to have been summoned from doorways in the giant green hills that surrounded us. We weren’t exactly sure what was going on, but were rolling with it as best we could. As it turned out, he assigned one man to escort my wife Virginia up the massive hill on his

horse. He assigned the other to push her bike. I was left to pedal the nearly impossible, winding, rocky route, but the sheer and beautiful strangeness of the situation made it an enjoyable and humorous ride. After clearing the crest of the hill, we came upon a village where dozens poured out of grass-pointed huts and greeted us with frenzied whoops and whistles. I can’t be sure of it, but I think they may have mistaken Virginia for some long-lost village princess. The impromptu parade that formed included several daring villagers, each contestant attempting to quickly learn how to ride Virginia’s Surly Troll by mounting the saddle whilst two others held each side of the bike to keep it from falling over. After crossing the couple hundred meters that constituted the village’s length, we were dropped in the front pasture of a pair of stone huts. As we overlooked the high meadow bowl formed by

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FOREVERSCAPE Written by Dan Powell, photographed by Donnie Kolb

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower, Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour.” William Blake

ÄŒervenec in Czech Written and photographed by Lael Wilcox

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e cross the border from Germany to Czech on the afternoon of July 18, my birthday. Border crossings in the European Union are relaxed; this one a footpath with a wooden bridge over a creek. The Federal Eagle is perched beside several numbered bike routes, guarding Germany. Across the bridge, in Czech, there are purple and yellow cross-country ski signs and a wooden hut. We peek into the cabin. Inside are a narrow bed and a stove. Floral drapes cover the window and a well-worn, striped quilt lines the bed. The cabin, a haven for skiers, is abandoned for the season. For us, it's too early to look for camp and the weather is definitely too nice to sleep inside. I shut the door of the hut and we pedal into a Bohemian fairy tale. By crossing the bridge, we enter the first post-Soviet state of our trip, the Šumava National Park and the Southern Bohemian region. The border is open, but dramatic. The language changes. The currency changes. Even the air is different. Somehow, entering Czech feels quiet and calm and tolerant. We are on our way to Prague to meet some friends, riding our mountain bikes from the sticks to the city. We take dirt when we can and back roads when we can't. Červen and Červenec, red and redder in Czech, are the names for June and July, and they relate to the ripeness of summer fruit. Roadsides are often lined with fruit trees. Mid-July, cherries and plums weigh heavily on branches, bearing so much fruit it drops into piles around the trunks. We fill our saddlebags. It’s hot, sunny, and humid here in July. We pass our days pedaling between picnics, swimming holes, and beer gardens in the countryside. Every town has a small shop manned by an aproned matron. She keeps her register above a deli case. Just as in the last town, there is a sparse sampling of sausage and cheese inside. Tomatoes and cucumbers are in season and we live off veggie-mayo sandwiches on poppy seed rolls. The food isn't refined, but it's good, honest eating. Everyone goes out for beer in Czech. The beer in stores isn't refrigerated because bars are so common. At a dollar a pint, it's actually cheaper than bottled water. Friends and generations of family sit side by side at the bar, drinking beer and eating ice cream. People take their time. Even the bartenders pour slowly – filling halves of half liters and letting the glass settle for a minute before topping them off. Bunyan Velo 75

PRAIRIE

SOJOURN Written by Daniel Enns, photographed by Mark Reimer

be shared within in a small community of like-minded individuals. The evening ahead will be challenging but rewarding—a real adventure! Escape from the monotony of my day job, the pressures, commitments, and social realities of an urban society to the wilderness where I need to rely on myself and my small group of companions for survival. We’re heading outside of the services and support infrastructure of the built-up, populated environment. I’m last to arrive at the local bike shop, our arranged meeting point. Hal, Ian, Mark, Lyle, Graham, Brad, and Josh are already waiting and ready to go. After hearty greetings and excited small talk, we re-apply our outdoor gear and abandon the comfort of insulated buildings and automatic heating systems for crisp winter air. We are a motley crew, and our bicycles reflect this. Everyone has opted for a different setup, drawn from our respective collections of equipment. Hal and Lyle are on fat bikes. Ian, Josh, and Brad are on mountain bikes (Brad is towing a BOB trailer). I chose my touring rig, Graham his cyclocross bike, and Mark has a Surly track bike outfitted with wider tires and a front basket. It’s clear we’ll all be experiencing the ride in very different ways. We’re taking this trip together, but will all have different experiences and goals along the way, dictated by our equipment choices and our mental state. Some of us are winter cycling experts, others novices. This overnight trip is the perfect type of outing to try out new equipment, packing strategies, or even just experiment with the concept of winter bikepacking. Our convoy rolls out down ever-smaller streets and we quickly make our way to isolated walking paths. I can already feel my feet beginning to succumb to the forces of thermodynamics, but so far my upper body is doing fine. Strategic layering is a substantial challenge for any long distance winter cyclist. One must create an equal battlefield against the forces of nature. Body heat must be retained, but also allowed to escape so the body doesn’t overheat and sweat. Some parts of the body require more insulation and protection than others. Exposed skin can freeze. Feet and hands do not have much movement and need to be protected, but the upper body is warm and is easily overheated and sweaty. In the battle for warmth and comfort, sweat is the cold’s back door to victory. Too many layers of insulation permeated with sweat will freeze when stationary, chilling the body and creating a dangerous situation. There is danger, but there is also community. We stop periodically to regroup and confirm we are all okay. Riding in mid-November is risky, as the change of season typically happens around this time in Manitoba. This weekend is particularly cold, -19 and expecting to fall to -25 overnight, not including the wind chill. Extra Bunyan Velo 106

Outside Looking In Written and photographed by Paul Henry Moore

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ust as pro surfers use jet skis to swiftly propel themselves into the biggest waves, I use my wood-paneled 1995 station wagon as a launch pad for quick overnight adventures. The odometer recently rolled past 150,000 miles and the sunroof ’s leaky seal ushers in rainwater when I park on a decline during Seattle’s soggy season, but a couple of bikes fit snugly in the back and the butt heaters in the front seats still work on cold days. Working full-time often forces me to get creative with my days off. I’ve found that the fastest way to get close to the best trails, fire roads, and camping spots around the Northwest is by driving and stashing my wagon somewhere, then venturing out via pedal. The station wagon introduced me to the outdoors, camping, and hard-to-reach single track trails at a young age. My family used to meander through small towns along the Washington and Oregon coast with a loaded bike rack strapped to the back, my siblings and I maxed out on an old futon stretched across the backseat, my parents in the front. The Moore family chalked up highway miles in style. I bought the car from my parents a few years back and have continued its legacy as an adventuremobile in wood-grain, soccer-mom disguise.

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Bikepacking Morocco Written and photographed by Glenn Charles

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bag, tent, or stove. We looked at each other and then at the bike, quickly realizing that our trip was going to be completely different from anything we planned or expected. The good news was Mohammed spoke both Arabic and French, the two principal languages in the country. I spoke neither, and Richard had a workable knowledge of French. We now had the ability to communicate in a country where very little English is spoken. However, I was effectively cut out from all conversations, as Richard would speak to Mohammed in French and then Mohammed would speak to locals in Arabic. This insured that I never knew what was being said and that Richard would only know what Mohammed told him in French. This would prove to be a constant blessing and a curse as we traveled across the countryside together. Leaving our hotel, the first order of business, and also our very first introduction to life in this industrious country, was a search for someone in the old town who could put a rack on Mohammed’s bike. We knew there was no way he could travel with us without the ability to carry gear. Carrying it all on his back and handlebars, with the huge sleeping bag that we had borrowed from the same folks who gave us the pedals, would be nearly impossible. Riding through town was an abrupt assault on the senses. We were surrounded by donkey-drawn carriages, pedestrians, cars, and a sea of mopeds, all spewing a toxic and acidic smoke that caused our eyes to water and our lungs to burn. It reminded me of a game of Frogger as we searched the mechanic shops for someone who had a bike rack and could make the appropriate modifications to the bike. Without having gone more than a mile, we were already hot, sweaty, and dirty. I was afraid this would not bode well for the rest of the trip. However, we did successfully find a rack and were able to convince two teenage boys working in one of the many repair shops to undertake the bike modification. I watched in amazement as these young boys banged and pried and eventually welded everything into a workable solution. Finally, after a quick stop at the market, and with very little daylight left, our adventure was underway. The twists and turns were only beginning to unfold.

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I’m Happy and I’m Riding and a 1,2,3,4... Written and photographed by Przemek Duszynski

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e were kids once, standing high on our toes by the window, watching... eagerly waiting for the last bits of snow to melt. Winter be gone. The first sunrays would come to our relief, revealing lost paths, pavements, and streets. Then, we would go out and ride our bikes with no gears, no suspension, no goal. A pack, pointlessly riding the same loop around the block time and time again. Those bikes and whatever clothing we had were all we needed to cast happy grins on our faces. Sometimes, we would spice things up by playing policemen and smugglers, using rowan berries as contraband hidden in our handlebars, saddles, or pockets. Time passed and we grew up one year at a time. Going to school, working, some of us getting married and having kids. Gradually riding less and less, in some cases completely forgetting about days long gone. But sometimes, sometimes, we would look back and remember how much joy cycling brought into our lives back then. A call, deep inside. Yet, things were different. Those silly little bikes would not suffice. Numbers started to play a more substantial role in our lives. How many gears, millimeters of suspension, hours, miles... try not to ride the same route again... latest gadgets to achieve our goals, stay warm, dry, get ourselves oriented in an unknown environment. All of these things are thrown upon us by the smart and clever marketing machine. We wanted to ride more, faster, further... into distant routes. A path, one way or another, shared by many. Riding more, with more. But was the enjoyment the same as it was back then, smuggling rowan berries around the same roadblock over and over again? It's so easy to forget that sometimes less is more, and I was about to discover that myself. Not so long ago I suddenly found myself in a foreign country, alone, with a broken heart and lots of time to spare. I have always enjoyed staying outdoors, but I had long since lost my childhood love for cycling, opting for hiking instead. Going high, at times wondering what I was doing, but only until that moment when I reached my goal, a vast landscape lying beyond, beauty the name of the game. Yet my backyard at that time was flat and felt uninspiring, unlike the mountains and hills I had learned to love so much. Weekends dragged endlessly, one by one. It was then that I spotted my old mountain bike gathering dust in the corner of my flat. In this I saw an opportunity. More could be seen with this thing, I thought to myself, definitely.

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Last Chance, Arizona Written and photographed by Nicholas Carman

miles further west, Flagstaff is similarly covered in snow. Outside of town, dirt roads and trails on the Colorado Plateau are an impossible quagmire of mud and ATV ruts. This section of the AZT is effectively closed for the season. Disappointment is a good motivator to discover new opportunities. At least the pavement is dry. Two days further south and 3,000 feet lower, we trade mittens and down jackets for t-shirts, at least in the afternoon. By now, we’ve hatched a new plan. Lael has been hunting for a race to run all summer. Each day while on tour, she laces up her shoes to go running. She’ll often run away as I am packing in the morning, or when I fall into the grass in the afternoon with a baguette and Brie. She knows that if I have food and a body of water to swim in, or a good internet connection, she can leave me for an hour or two. The result of so much riding and running are legs that look like they belong on a racehorse. She figures, “I might as well run a marathon.” About once a year such aspirations lead her to a race, and each year she rides to the start and places first, or third, or fourth. We’d barely missed some races this summer in Poland and France, but the Tucson Marathon fits our approximate schedule. Now, more like tramps than tourists, we ride pavement and hitch some of the remaining 300 miles to Tucson. In a week, we cover nearly as much distance hitching and riding as we did in five months in Europe on our bikes. An alarm wakes us from our camp spot on a small patch of desert across from a Shell gas station just outside of Tucson. We stuff our sleeping bags and strap them to the bars. A quick visit to the gas station yields a hot cup of coffee and a can of V8, which will be Lael’s only pre-race fuel. In the dark, we ride up the street to the high school where the runners are loaded onto school buses to the actual race start thirty miles away. I begin to ride the route in reverse, so that I can spectate and follow the runners back towards the finish. Lael runs well, and is the fourth female finisher. Back at the parking lot, we sit and enjoy a can of beer on the sidewalk, watching runners hobble back to their cars. They lift tired bodies into their vehicles, relieved to be back in familiar Bunyan Velo 183

#COFFEEOUTSIDE Written and photographed by Rob Perks