Duchesne, UT to Dinosaur, CO

Today was a pretty smooth day although it was embedded with a little frustration, here and there.
We woke up, had breakfast, and hit the road. Today was another 90 mile ride. The first 30 miles weren’t bad at all. We were rolling. Today I was riding with Paul (U of Toledo), Zach (U of Houston), Brian (U of Colorado) and Bob, the father of the alumnus. Bob was a little bit better than yesterday, but he made some pretty big freshman mistakes. At the 30 mile mark, he decided to not warn us that he was stopping, and had a pretty big collision. Brian’s front wheel was completely unusable, and Paul hand had seen better days. Bob ended paying for all damages, but a mistake like that shouldn’t happen yet. Brian had to get racked for the rest of the day, considering that his bike needed major repairs. Luckily, I was the last one on the paceline at the time, and missed the collision. After a 45 minute delay, we hopped back on our bikes and did another 30 miles or so, until lunch. That 30 mile stretch was pretty rough. The scenery didn’t help much, considering that it looked like Nevada, all over again. After a quick lunch, we finished off the, but it was a struggle. The last 15 miles were really tough, especially from the humidity and the heat from the ground.We finally made it across to another state, Colorado. 10 minutes later, we were at lodging, in Dinosaur, Colorado, population: 300…humans. We set up our sleeping area, and headed to the welcome center, where there were showers. After a nice hot shower, we came back and pretty much passed out after a long day. We were woken up by 5 PM, where a few locals brought us dinner to the Dinosaur Elementary School (for baby dinos?). Dinner was real good, a nice hot home-cooked meal, with meatloaf, a fruit salad, and chocolate muffins to die for.After dinner, we took a little tour around the outskirts of the town. There were some really beautiful scenic areas, especially to see the sun down. We came back to the school, were we had the rest of the night off. There was a pull-up bar in the carpeted gym, so I got a little bit of a workout. After that, I pretty much called it a night, and prepared for another 90 mile ride.

Park City, UT to Duchesne, UT

Today was a solid day on the bike.
We woke up at the usual time, 6:00 AM, got packed up, and got ready for 90 mile trek to Duchesne, Utah. Today, the breakfast was sponsored by Bob Vael, a father of a former JOH cyclist. In fact, many of the meals and the hospitality of lodging were generously provided by Mr. Vael. The ride to breakfast was roughly 10 miles away from Bob’s house, the lodging for the night. We definitely earned our breakfast as we had a few lengthy climbs.
Breakfast was donated on behalf of Bob, by Joe’s Country Store, which served us steak-and-egg breakfast burritos. The meal gave us the perfect amount of energy to help complete our ride.
After Breakfast, we took off to Duchesne. Today, Bob rode along with us. Now, I have never met a man his age so excited about cycling. Even through the entire adventure of Park City, you could tell that Bob wanted us to see it all, never being satisfied. All though he was a little eccentric and jolty, you got to respect the guy for everything he provided the team, and his constant support for our trip. I had the pleasure of riding with Bob and learned some interesting and equally embarrassing about his Son and Daughter (Oh parents…you gotta love them). Bob works for a natural gas company, and I had an interesting conversation about the oil industry. I’m definitely interesting in working in the industry after graduation so he was a great person to meet and network with.The scenery towards Duchesne started off gorgeous. It reminded me of the song, “Country Roads” by John Denver. It was just amazing to see all the green color reflected across the Duchesne River…you just had to be there. As we departed Park City, the scenery started to become a little more arid, and by the 50 mile mark, it reminded me of Nevada’s desert openness that extended for miles.
Mile 60 was the placement for lunch. Today, lunch was provided by one of the cyclists, Jeff’s, parents. They donated some juice and icecream drumsticks, which were a tasty treat for all the hard work we’ve put in so far.After lunch, we coasted most of the way down to Starvation Lake. Overall, the ride wasn’t bad at all, except for the long climb to the top of the summit half way through the trek. At the end of the ride, we met another sponsor, also named Bob. Bob was kind enough to take his boat out to the lake and let us go tubing and water skiing for a few hours. I’m a big fan of water sports, so I was a lot of fun and great way to end a nice ride, to get thrown of an inflatable rubber tube at 20 mph and fly in the air for a few seconds before smacking into the water. It was a blast.
We took quick showers at the facilities near the lake, and drove to lodging, located at Duchesne High School. More or less, all of us passed out immediately after a long and tiring day. After an hour or so, we got ready for dinner, and walked to a nearby park, where we were greeted by locals, who provided us an amazing dinner. I know I say this a lot, but this meal was by far the best so far, and had hands down, the best dessert yet…oreo pudding cake. After out filling our bellies full of barbeque pork, cheesy potatoes, and fruit, we headed back to lodging, which felt a lot tougher of a walk back. Once back, we called it a night, where I headed to the store, picked up a few groceries. After I came back, I lied down on my sleeping pad, and gave my body what it was craving: rest.

Park City, UT (Day Off)

Today was our second day off. It was really nice to sleep in today, I probably went to bed pretty late at maybe 11 PM and got up really late at roughly 8:30 AM (yeah, it’s a completely different sleeping pattern than school).

I was sleeping in the neighboring house, so I woke up, and with the rest of the group, walked over to the other house for breakfast. The mother of the former Journey of Hope team member cooked breakfast which was absolutely delicious…it was real nice to get some home cooked food; eggs, bacon, cantaloupe, the works.

After breakfast, we got a chance to turn on the TV and watch some soccer. It may have been the second time I’ve watched TV this entire trip. It was nice to relax for a change.

By the time lunched rolled around, we hopped in the vans, and drove to the park. Today, we put together a little puppet show educating kids about people with disabilities. We then had bagel sandwiches for lunch (better than it sounds) and messed around in the Jungle Jims. It actually was pretty cool, because it turned a little competitive, eventually into a pull up competition.

After lunch, we headed straight to the top of the mountain. What does a cyclist do on his day off? He cycles. We ended up going mountain biking for a couple hours. It was all downhill so it was easy on our quads. It was pretty cool, as I have never mountain biked in my life before, and it was considerably different than road bikes. It felt a lot like a bmx bike. We ended up having to call it quits a little earlier than planned because of time. It was a great experience though, and I can totally see mountain biking in my future.

After a quick shower at lodging, I was the road marshall for tomorrow’s ride along with a couple of other guys. Basically, we scout the first 20 miles of the ride, and make sure there’s nothing too hazardous conditions. Although the terrain seemed a little challenging (I am not looking forward to those climbs out of Park City), the roads were fine, and we headed back to lodging to get ready for dinner.

Dinner was another friendship with the same organization last night. We went to a reservoir, which had an amazing view of a lake, to have a barbeque pot luck dinner. The participants of the camp, had related disabilities of blindness, so it was pretty interesting to hear their stories of their lives so far.

Following dinner, we filled up some gas, bought a few candy bars (its an inside joke) and returned to lodging. After a quick meeting, we called it a night, and got our rest for three consecutive 90 mile days.

Salt Lake City, UT to Park City, UT

Today was a really easy day. It felt like a day off, really. We headed off from Salt Lake City at around 6:30 AM. Our breakfast was sponsored today, so we met our sponsors at a nearby park. They seemed really nice, a little strange and perky, but really nice. They served us full bagels and coffee. It was the first time I had caffeine in quite some time, so one cup of coffee easily jolted me. There were a few former Journey of Hope members riding along for today’s ride. Additionally, we were greeted a cyclist whose name I completely forgot but apparently he was a top 10 American cyclist. You can tell his bike was state-of-the-art. We kept on telling about this small trek that we were doing today, roughly 25 miles, but all uphill except for a steep downhill section in the middle. He did keep mentioning that it was the founder of Garmin GPS electronics favorite climb.

That coffee really helped from breakfast as myself along with a couple teammates really took off and ripped apart the mountain. We were climbing pretty fast, and I guess we talked this mountain up too much. We kept on passing other cyclist waiting for it to get steeper but it never did…maybe we’re becoming better cyclists.

Park City was absolutely stunning. It easily ranks with South Lake Tahoe as one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever been too. I’ve never seen a city as green.

We rode our bikes to Olympic Park, where we had a sponsored lunch at Fat Mike’s Pizzeria. The food was really good, but the portions were really small. After lunch, we hopped over to an Olympic Museum. It was pretty cool to see all the memorabilia from the 2002 Olympics.

Most of us was still starving from lunch, so we went to Wendy’s to get us through the day. I had a couple burgers. Man, am I eating unhealthy.

Lodging today was at the sponsor’s home, and their neighbors. We were staying at their lake house, and wow, it a really beautiful neighborhood and a gorgeous house. At around 6, we got really for another Friendship Visit, where we went to this state-of-the-art facility. Basically, they were a retreat center that hosted a lot of corporation retreats, and used those profits to host other organizations helping the disabled. I was truly jealous of this camp. They had 30 horses for horseback riding, really nice lodging…better than Michigan dorms, a garage full of water sports equipment, pretty of bikes including different road and mountain bikes, a rope course and rock climbing wall. Yeah, this place had it all, and it’s main goal was to serve people with disabilities. After interacting with a few campers at a hotdog/burger dinner, we headed back to lodging to rest off.

Since we had the day off tomorrow, we decided to stay up a little late and watch a movie, “She’s Out of My League.” It was pretty funny, but kind of cheesy. After snacking a little bit on cookies and trail mix, I called it a night. It was pretty nice, I got to sleep on a coach today, which totally beats sleeping on a sleeping pad.

Payson, UT to Salt Lake City, UT

Today was a really good day, especially after a personally tough week.

We had a usual morning including the traditional breakfast, and headed out of the senior center/police station banquet center at around 6:30 AM, a pretty nice time for us, considering that we usually woke up an hour earlier.

My paceline for today was Tommy (U of Illinois), Alex (U of Illinois), Jason (graduate of George Mason), and Chris (Colorado). Jason was a three time Ironman, and Chris did Journey of hope a couple years ago. With that being said, we were expected to fly today as we took the lead GPS tracker, and we did not disappoint one bit. We destroyed Utah, absolutely wrecked it.

We were told it was 65 miles away from Payson. However, we had to backtrack about 15 miles to get to highway 68, so it really was an 80 mile trek.

One thing was for sure, the scenery was a lot more pleasant than Nevada. We basically road along Utah Lake, a pretty large freshwater lake. As we approached civilization, the roads started to appear nicer, traffic intensified, and there was a lot more scenery to look at.

For lodging today, we stayed at Zion’s Evangelical Lutheran Church. The place was pretty nice but it didn’t feel like the stereotypical church.

For dinner, we had burgers and hotdogs at Ragin’ Waters, which was a sponsor meal from one of the local facilities that works with disabilities. This was my first time at a water park in quite some time, so it was nice to have some fun and get a little wit. Some of those rides erred on a side of danger, which amplified the thrill to some extent. We interacted with a few participants. One of the kids I met, Ethan, was a pretty big movie buff, and it sound like he literally studied IMDB.com. Tell him a C-list actor and he could tell you all the TV cameos he was in. Ethan was also a Mormon, and we had had pretty interesting conversation about his religion.

Following dinner, we came back to the Church. I really wanted to explore Salt Lake City’s downtown, but ran out of time. I was pretty surprised at how big Salt Lake City was. I always thought it was just a scenic town like South Lake Tahoe, but it has quite a large population.

We ended up getting some fourth meal at TGI Fridays. It was nice, because almost everyone came to TGI Friday’s, and it ended up being an all right time. Came back to the Church to sleep off a hard day’s work. Not the first time I fell asleep at church…

Delta, UT to Payson, UT

When I woke up today, it felt like a nightmare. I was still in shock of the whole situation. I woke up at 6:12 AM today, 12 minutes late from when I was suppose to wake up. Regardless, I got ready quickly, got ready, packed up, and ate the usual breakfast, this time including a slice of banana bread. When we did our usual circle up, I brought up the situation involving my computer. Drayton spoke a little, but it was nice to get all the emotions off my chest. I know its just a computer, but the situation could have been handled a lot better. I really do feel a little bit betrayed. Immediately, people came up to me to give their expertise and their opinion. It got me thinking, there's some rally good people in this world, and I'm truly blessed to get to know a few of them this summer.As we started the ride, my paceline just started to roll. The road was pretty flat, which was my specialty. Maybe I had a lot of frustration, maybe I had a lot on my mind, but either way, I was cruising. Before I knew it, 40 miles were over. At that point, we got to a terrain I was relatively unfamiliar with: rolling hills. It put it to my hardest gear, built up enough momentum, and I literally destroyed those hills. I really don't know where all that energy came from, but I was flying. Soon, we got to the 60 mile mark, which was lunch. We had to wait 43 minutes for the next paceline to show up. 43 minutes. That's ridiculous. We ended up having an hour and a half lunch, just from waiting for the rest of the team to show up. If we skipped lunch, we would of made it to lodging by noon. Crazy to think biking 80 miles and to be done by noon. As we finished lunch, we headed to lodging. This was the last day we were on highway 50 AKA the loneliest highway in America. Coming back to civilization, it was weird to be past by so many cars. We got to lodging, which was a senior citizen center/police station (yeah, I don't really understand it either). One all the other pacelines returned, we went to a local high school gym to shower. The school seamed really big, which is a pretty good indicator that the showers would be nice. After that, I returned back to lodging, and a crew member drove me to the post office to send a my broken computer back home. We came back, and went went with a few team members to Walmart. Since my bag was a little lighter, I finally had room to store what my body was craving: protein powder. I bought half a gallon of milk (it was the best deal out there, for $2) and started chugging. Got back to lodging. There's this one kid in the group, Alex, who I guess loves challenges. Someone dared him to eat a "Mormon cricket" and to spare you the details, he did not disappoint.I couldn't handle it, so I opted to take a break, and get some fresh air as I went to Mexican fast food restaurant for some 4th meal. We went to TacoTime which was basically like a upper class TacoBell. It was alright but still kind of disgusting (I'm not a fan of fast food) but filling, nonetheless. Returned back to lodging and called it a night. It was a good recovery day, physically, sure. But especially mentally.

Baker, NV to Delta, UT

Today was by far, the toughest day of the trip both, mentally and physically.
A usual wake up and breakfast. The morning was nice and warm, a good change from waking up freezing, but as I would find out, only led to a very hot and sweat-soaking ride.
The first 20 miles or so, were pretty easy. I cruised through them in no time. It felt like a good day, little did I know. The term even played a game to get us through the century ride, called sharks and minnows. Basically, the last paceline and sweeps start off as sharks and everyone else is minnows. When the sharks catch up to the next paceline, then that next paceline turn into sharks and so on, until everyone is sharks. To distinguish between sharks and minnows, the sharks put chain grease on their face, it got a little ridiculous but it was pretty funny.One guy had a fu-manchu and have may have sacred a few little children along the way.
At the 20 mile mark, their was too much construction on the road to be deemed safe to bike ride, so the project manager made an executive decision to rack ever one onto the vans, drive past the construction zone into a safe area to return to biking. Sounds like a good idea. Only problem was that this was just the beginning of a complete disaster.
We unracked and I started biking again. It took roughly an hour to rack and unrack, so my legs were pretty tense by the time we started riding again.
We also met another group of cyclists, who were cycling for aids victims. There was only 2 of them cycling, and since their support van pretty much ditched them, we decided to rack them and bring them across the construction zone. Although this seems like a the right decision, it was the not safe, and more importantly, the not the right thing to do in this situation. Once I started biking again, I felt awful. I was way too tense, the sun was out, and boy, was it hot and humid. The next 50 miles to lunch were absolutely miserable. I managed to get through it all, some how. We had the usual crew stop lunch, consisting of a turkey cheddar sandwich (two meats, one cheese), a handful of chips, an apple, and two small cookies.
Getting back onto the bike is always rough after lunch, but given the circumstances, was really tough today. The weather made a turn for the worse appearing hot and muggy. Throw in some difficult terrain including steep hills, and for the first time, it was really tempting to call it quits. I kept pedaling but a headache to form. WIth constant headwinds and bike noises, the headache started to grow to considerable pain. By the end of the ride, I was really thankful that it was over, and really felt accomplished. I did feel bad that I didn't ride those 10 miles early on (which was ll downhill and thus, would be really easy) which puts me a total of roughly 30 miles that I couldn't ride, either because of bike issues or safety. I am proud of the fact that I road every mile I possible could, which totals over 750 miles.
The scenery progressed worse and worse as the ride continued. At one point, all the shrubs and bushes looked gray and dead, straight out of the "bad guy's" hangout from any common fairy tale. It was pretty depressing. Little did I know...
Once we arrived, the misery didn't end, unfortunately. I looked at the table inside gym (which was surprisingly a high school gym considering the massive size of the "arena") and there was my backpack complete, for lack of a better word, dissected. The computer was sitting on the top of the bag, and it was a really sore site. Now I don't want to sound materialistic, but my computer means the world to me, I have so much on there: pictures, movies, school notes, engineering programs, expensive engineering programs, it goes without saying that it was priceless in my eyes. To see it in such a destroyed state like that felt worst than a nightmare. I really couldn't believe my eyes. Why me? Granted, at least I was safe, at least I didn't break a leg during today's ride, but why my computer? I even managed to put Leopard OS dual booting it with Windows XP...not a simple task. After turning it on, I figured that i worked but it's screen was completely cracked and unusable, and considering that its a tablet computer, the screen is the most expensive and important part of the computer. Along with my computer, my cellphone charger was smashed into multiple pieces, and my backpack completely ripped up with the zippers absolutely useless.
At that point, I decided the best plan of action was to have a cool head, and to make sure I figure everything out, and get all the details to the situation. After speaking with the project manager, I attached it to an external monitor, found in the janitors closet. What really irritated me, as I was still trying to figure everything out, the project manager, Drayton, ditched the situation and left to go see a movie (Toy Story 3, I hope it was great) when I was in complete shambles. I literally felt ditched. It was a complete slap in the face...that we flat out didn't care. Trying to figure out how this happened, I stated talking to everyone i could. I guess the crew chief, Trevor, moved my bag from inside the van to on top of the van during 10 mile stretched we were racked. He didn't make sure it was properly secured a tarp and bungee cords. The end result being that it fell from the van...when it was going downhill...probably at 50 mph. From what I was told, it was just my bag and another kids bag, both fell out, mind being in much worst condition with the backpack ripping open and the computer laying out completely vulnerable on the road. When they figured out that they were missing two bags (which probably happened 20 minutes after falling), they turned around and looked for them...at that point, I was "lucky" that it was still there. After talking to a few other cyclists, I found out that no one hand any idea what happened to me, and my situation, they were completely left in the dark. Again, I was pretty proud of how I handled the situation...with a very cool head. After a suggestion from another cyclists, I wrote down all my thoughts, finalized it, and presented it to Trevor and the project manager, Drayton. Basically, they told me, that I "was responsible for my personal possessions," implying that it was my fault. After thinking it through, I still think the whole situation, I decided that the whole situation was unjust and completely unfair. Had I moved my bag to the top of the van, it would be a a completely different story. In fact, I would feel completely responsible for the all the damages to the computer. However, the truth of the matter is that I didn't even know they moved my backpack, which I feel was a complete breach of my personal property. They were completely wrong in my opinion to move my personal items without my consent. Like I said earlier, I was pretty irritated that Drayton basically ditched the situation by seeing a movie. Regardless, I kept a cool head, pulled him aside, and spoke to him about my feelings about the situation. I emphasized that there was no reason to rush the situation. There was no rack point, all we had to get there by 5 or 6 pm, and we would be fine. Another thing that irritated me was that I had to go find Trevor and Drayton. Had I been in their shoes, I would have made sure to apologize immediately and explain every detail of what happened. When I spoke to Drayton, he kept on mentioning that "space was an issue." If space was an issue, why did he rack those Face Aids cyclists, or since time wasn't an issue, why didn't we make multiple trips? It basically felt like I was told, life is not fair...get use to it. False, that is not an acceptable answer for what happened.
To walk things off, I walked to a 7-eleven and picked up a muscle milk, came back to the gym, did my daily pushups (184 for today), which really helped burn off a little frustration. I pulled Drayton aside again and asked him to reconsider not telling the rest of the team. As I laid down on my tiny sleeping pad, all I could think about was how horrible this day was. But I'm no quitter. I bet there are going to be worst days that fate has in store for me. But tomorrow is a whole new day...hopefully its better and I wake up from this nightmare.

Ely, NV to Baker, NV

Today was suppose to be an easy day. 60 miles, a lot of it downhill. Instead, it was pretty frustrating.
I decided to ride with Trend and John. However, I didn't realize they wanted to sweep for today. In cycling terms, sweeping means being the last cyclist during the entire ride, making sure no one is left behind. However, there was a rack point today, 45 miles by 10:00 AM (roughly 3 hours from the start), a pretty lofty goal. I was real nervous I would be racked, so I rushed my paceline to the point that we were a few bike lengths apart from the next paceline.Unfortunately, we could never past them because we were the sweeps. It seriously felt like a Greek tragedy enforced by Zeus, himself. Although we didn't make rack point, the crew decided not to rack us, as we were still good on time.
As far as scenery goes, there is noting more boring than the Nevada, tundra-esque desert. Throw in the occasional slimy snake and 4 inch lizard, and you got Nevada wildlife in a nutshell. I did see signs for some wild bull, but all it led to was real big disappointment.
Once we arrived, we set up lodging at the local townhall/school gym/church/recreational arena/multipurpose building. To give you an idea of the town, it felt like nothing had changed since the 1950's with the exception of age. It looked a little decrepit. And with a population of 57, the nightlife wasn't exactly booming. There was no cellphone reception, but surprisingly, there was wifi at the local "trad'n'post"/restaurant/grocery store...seriously, this town knows how to multi-task.
After talking to a few locals, I guess Baker is known for its quality tasting water and Los Vegas is planning on stealing its water, kind of like what LA did to central California in the early 1930's, which would literally turn Baker into a ghost town.
The locals here was real friendly. For dinner, we were greeted by a pot luck dinner from the entire town. The home cooked food was a real treat, definitely top 3 meals so far on the trip. The main meal was pulled pork but the real winner was the homemade barbecue sauce that had a little kick like no other. Likewise, for dessert, the icecream and brownie cake was great and all, but the homemade hot fudge made it legendary. After a great meal, we introduced ourselves. I find it a little embarrassing that my "claim to fame" on this trip is my ridiculous tanline...seriously, I've been applying SPF 90 every day. After dinner, we returned back to lodging where we rested for tomorrow, our second century ride.

Eureka, NV to Ely, NV

Today, we woke up at 6 and had the similar morning. Packed up, breakfast, bike maintenance, and got ready to leave. I’m starting to lose track of the days, I had no idea it was Tuesday or even that it was June. I think that’s a good thing.

We started to head out, past the first summit with little ease. I was feeling real good about today. I got to say, I’m getting a little sick of the Nevada scenery, it literally never changes for miles. With that in mind, I have a ton of time to think, usually about nothing. Soon, I was 40 miles deep, past the second and third summit, piece of cake (it was actually called “the pancake summit” ironically). We were told that we weren’t far from lunch, so I stopped snacking on clif bars…I bad idea. Lunch was on top of the fourth summit. I end up bonking and struggled to get to the top of the last summit. For those non-cyclists out there, bonking is term for when the body stops feeding off of carbs for energy and starts feeding off a fat. This sounds good, but it actually really bad. Energy from carbs burn faster, and thus, give you more energy quicker. Thus, when you bonk, you feel really sluggish. After 20 minutes of bonking, we finally made it up the last summit. Then, we stopped for lunch, my Achilles heel. I tried not to eat a big lunch, but I was starving and couldn’t help myself. Luckily, the rest of the ride wasn’t too bad, it was actually downhill for the most part. We arrived at lodging, which was at a high school gym (White Pine High). Ely was actually a nice town. It was pretty small, about the same size of Fallon. It didn’t have much, but it did have a Meijer-esq grocery store and a mcdonalds, so not exact the biggest destination by any means.

After we showered up, we got ready for dinner. Dinner today was an empathy dinner with the student council of the high school. Basicallly, an empathy dinner is when part the table simulates people with disabilities and the other part helps those. Thus, someone simulated blindness, while someone simulated being mute, etc. I was the “helper” but it was a pretty cool experience. I’ve never done anything like this before, so it was pretty impactful of an exercise.

After dinner, we just hung out at the gym, playing a little b-ball and volleyball. A few of us made a run for the Laundromat and Micky D’s. A pretty uneventful evening, which is a good thing, cause I’m pretty tired, 80 miles does a toll on ya. Until tomorrow…

Austin, NV to Eureka, NV

Today, riding-wise, I had one of my best days.

Similar wake up like usual. Got breakfast and a leftover cookie. It was freezing cold. It may be June but when you’re up 6000 ft of elevation and add a little wind, it gets real cold.

We headed out as the second or third to last pace line. The first 10 miles, I was struggling. It was pure hills plus head wind. After an hour or so of misery, we finally got to some flats and the occasional downhill plus head winds. Now, to give you an idea of how big an impact wind has on my day, I’ll throw around a few numbers. A few days ago I was going 30 mph on flats effortlessly, mostly because of tail winds. Today, I was going 10 mph of flats wasting so much energy, mostly because of head winds.

So here we were going 10 mph, but we were working hard. Harder than all the other pacelines. We past the endless vast Nevada desert and eventually got to Eureka, Nevada, the closest town from Austin worthy of the title, “civilization.” As we entered the town, we arrived at lodging, today at an elementary school. To give you an idea of how hard we worked, we were the first pace line to arrive at lodging and the next one didn’t arrive until 45 minutes. It’s the past few days that gave me a little realization: I have some of the strongest legs in the team. Now, don’t get me wrong, I have a lot of room for improvement, but I’m real glad that I ran almost every day, because I feel like not only do I have some of the strongest cardiovascular strength but also one of the quickest recovery time. You can hear a lot of people complaining about their quads and their hamstrings, and Ill I got to say is that I’m thankful that I but in the time in the tredmill. I might not have the best technique

of cycling on the team. I would even say, I’m one of the worst cyclists when comes down solely on technique. But I definitely make it up in endurance.

After we arrived, I’ve was exhausted. I set up my sleepbag and pretty much passed out for an hour. Woke up, and by then a few people arrived. Killed some more time, and finally got ready for lunch, which was 1pm at this point.

We went to diner called DJ’s for lunch. Immediately, they all served us a double cheeseburger and fries. Maybe it was the exhaustion but these burgers were amazing. If you’re ever around Eureka, Nevada, I would definitely stop by.

After lunch, we came by and showered up. We had to walk to the local swimming pool to shower. Since we were there, and since I guess no one goes to the swimming pool, we took a little dip which did wonders. Came back and got ready for dinner. It kind of sucked that we had a late lunch and an early diner, but hey, beggers can’t be choosers.

Dinner was provided by the local Lion’s club. They gracefully served us spegetti and salad. I personally couldn’t even finish my plate, I was that full. I did save a little room for some “spice” cake, which was pretty good.

After dinner, a few of stopped at the store and picked a few necessities up, before heading back to lodging to call it an evening.

A couple of notes about Eureka. Eureka is actually one of the richest counties in Nevada (per capita) if not the richest. This is because it is a huge mining town. Until the late 1800’s, it was mainly a huge coal and copper mine. Then after the gold rush, it because the “town” in the desert. Conveniently, there is a closer city than Eureka to the mines. So most of the miners live in a town near the mines, which is in a different county. It sounds a little confusing, but basically, the town is filthy rich because of miners who don’t live there, and because of the mine which is 45 miles always from Eureka.

Because of all the money the town has, Eureka has a ridiculous school system. So far, this is the nicest gym I have stayed in, and its an elementary school gym…in the middle of nowhere. Its kind of crazy that all the kids from Austin, which is 70 miles away, take a school bus everyday to Eureka for schooling…not very economical but who am I to judge. The town still has its old-time look but there’s constant construction (a good sign for a wealthy town) and the roads are pretty nice.

I hear tomorrow is a pretty tough day as I pass over 4 summits. Fun.

Fallon, NV to Austin, NV

Today, I finished my first century ride, over a 100 miles, 110 to be exact. The same old usual morning. Woke up at 6 am, this time at an elementary library. Got ready and had the usual breakfast except we each had one poptart. Being in such a small town, it was pretty cool to see a few of the towns members we met yesterday wish us off.
We headed off and darted to Austin. My paceline consisted of Jon (RIT), Trent (U of Nebraska), and Brad (UNC), and man, we were rolling. I guess we all were pretty similar, as we all started cycling within the past year, but all of us were distant runners. We started the day as the second to last paceline but not much later, we became the second paceline. Before we knew it, we were done with 20 miles, then 40, then 60, and then 80 and had to stop for lunch. This is when things got considerably harder. Since we were ahead of most people, we had to wait for them to arrive at the lunch spot, thus my muscles tensed up a lot. After serving lunch, which was basically leftover meat from the day before, we headed out. The major problem was, that I destroyed that lunch. I probably ate in under 10 minutes. And when you eat so much right before cycling, it’s a guaranteed cramp. So I still had 30 miles to go, and man was it a struggle. After much delay we finally arrived at Austin.
So let me paint you a picture of how the scenery was today. For majority of the day, it was southwest desert. Plain mucky sand with random shrubs. Civilization ceased to exist here. After 30 may 40 miles later, we passed a phone booth, dubbed the loneliest phone booth in the world. Another 20 miles or so, we passed a Shoe Tree. Now, money trees may not exist, but I have pictures that an actual shoe tree exists. Basically, it was a random giant tree in the middle of nowhere when hundreds upon thousands of shoes. Besides that, there was nothing much in Nevada. It was so plain that I could see cars miles away…the road was ridiculously flat for majority of the ride. To entertain ourselves, we played a little golf during the crew stops. Once we arrived at Austin, we saw why no one really lives there. It was basically a ghost town. I would imagine there were a total of 100 people living there, but there was so many abandoned wooden shops, kind of like a western, or a shut down Connor Prairie. Don’t get me wrong, it was pretty school to see this side of America, but man, was it empty.
After we arrived, we went straight to lodging. Today, we stayed at town hall, which kind of gives an idea of how small this town was. Once we arrived, we had to take a van to the public pool to take a shower.
For dinner, we were taken to a picnic area. We were presented with a home cooked meal from a Lady rotary club. I didn’t really understand who they were, but they donated a meal from the goodness of their hearts, which was really nice. The food was delicious. It was a lot like thanksgiving as there was turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing, and mash potatoes. They also made strawberry shortcake. After dinner we were surprised by a stop at a ice cream parlor. The project manager, Drayton Perkins, keep the JOH tradition alive by giving all of us milkshakes because of our accomplishment for our first century ride. We returned back to town hall for a good nights sleep.
Before I end this entry, I wanted to wish my Dad a happy Father’s day. There’s no way I would be going to my dream school if he didn’t push me, and there no way I would be doing Journey of Hope if he didn’t give his encouragement every step of the way. Thanks Dad (and also Mom too).

Carson City, NV to Fallon, NV

Today was another easy day, a good day to rest and prepare for tomorrow. Same old wake up at 6 AM. Breakfast today was actually sponsored by the Kiwanis club of Carson City. They're basically a service club. They were kind enough to serve us some hot pancakes and sausages. It was neat to meet a few of the club members, as a some were from Michigan. With that being said, I made sure they bleed blue and are true wolverines.

After breakfast, we headed straight off to Fallon, NV. The ride was pretty simple. A couple small sized hills embedded into the trek, but otherwise was flat if not slightly downhill. Add a tail wind and we were going at 25 mph effortlessly. With that speed, we arrived at the elementary school before noon.

Now there isn't exactly a lot at Nevada. I was pretty surprised that the town we're staying at had a walmart. Basically, the ride to Fallon was a whole lot of open space. In order to keep things interesting, we do stupid stuff to entertain ourselves. We call these challenges. I told you one of these challenges (the least stupid one), to do 2 pushups per every mile. The challenge for today was to put our hand for 15 seconds on top of an angry fire ant hill. The prize...an extra slice of meat for lunch. For me, the end didn't justify the means. For another kid, named Alex, it did. With that being said, that was 15 seconds of the funniest things I have witness on the trip.

Once we got to the school, we put all our stuff in the library (our lodging for the night), and had lunch. Instead of the usual lunch, we just had leftovers from last night's dinner.

After lunch, we relaxed for a bit, played a little basketball, showered up and got ready for dinner. Tonight's dinner was provided by Fallon Industries, basically a Good Will that also holds the communty center. What's great about FI is that they employ and house people with disabilities. They served us a tradional southern dinner...barbeque, followed by them raffling off donations including a plasma tv, and finished with a little dance to old 90's club music. Awkward at first, but once everyone got into it, it turned into a good time.

After a solid evening, we headed back to the elmentary school to rest up for a big day. Tomorrow is 125 miles and much of it is a steady incline, from what I heard. If I finish it, it would be my first "century" ride. Until then...

South Lake Tahoe, CA to Carson City, NV

Today was a total rollercoaster of emotion. It started as the perfect recovery and transition from the epic climb of Kirkwood. We began the day like usual with an early 6 AM wake up, followed by a tradition crew chief breakfast.

We began are departure to Carson City, which was seriously the easiest ride of the trip. It was a total 35 miles. The first 5 miles were kind of tough…a steady 9% grade incline. Next 10 miles were remarkably beautiful…a quick 9% grade decline. I was flying down the mountain reaching speeds of 40 mph. I could of gone faster but I value my life. The rest of the trip was completely flat but we had a tail wind which made it even easier. We were biking 20 mph effortlessly.

Once we arrived at Carson High School in Carson City, we were police escorted to the Boys and Girls Club of Western Nevada, basically a summer daycare center for kids from K to grade 12. We interacted and entertained with the group of maybe 400 kids. After a good lunch, we entertained them with a little educational puppet show about different disabilities. I got to say, its nice to be a kid. All they do is play video games and tag. We retreated back to the high school where we received some rather sad news. One of the kids on my team, David, was leaving the trip for personal reasons. We’ll miss you man.

Before dinner, one of the local bike mechanics was nice enough to look at all our bikes and do maintenance for free. He helped straighten out my wheels so the bike should make in to DC on time. During dinner, I actually had a pretty interesting conversation with him, as he was also a mechanical engineer and his son is doing his PhD in ME.

For dinner, we went to a cookout sponsored by the local rotary club. I know I say this a lot, but this was the best meal of the trip so far. Steak. Usually that would be enough to satify me, but there was so many other great foods like ravioli, tortellini, deviled eggs, potato salad, Caesar salad, tri-tip steak, and other entrees. Now if that was enough, there was a ridiculous amount of desserts; cake, cookies, baskin robin icecream, brownies, fudge...did I mention cake? Man, I must have gained an easy five pounds that meal. Luckily, I probably would lose it the following day, but if I’m eating like this daily, it could be trouble. After the good meal we went back to lodging.

A few of us decided for some fourth meal and got some in’n’out burger. I wasn’t really hungry but I thought I might as well eat my last in’n’out meal for quite a while. I just got the usual animal style French fries. After that, went back to lodging and went straight to sleep.

South Lake Tahoe (Day Off)

So today was the first day off and man, it was refreshing. I got to sleep in today, so I slept in til 8am. Woke up, and went to the motel lobby for some continental breakfast, raisin brand never tasted so good. I was still pretty sore from yesterday. For the past year, I more or less ran every day so my legs had a pretty quick recovery time, but my quads were tired.

After breakfast, a group of us went to a nearby shopping outlet. Everything was overpriced, but it felt like South Lake Tahoe was a ghost town...I could totally see this place being packed in the winter. For lunch, we went to this place called Fire & Ice. Its was pretty much an all-you-can-eat Mongolian Barbecue, and I just went to town, I must have had at least two pounds of sirloin. During lunch, a bunch of the locals were telling us about this "castle" where Queen Elizabeth had tea at or something and was somehow connected to the vikings. We decided to check it out. We went there and we saw the most beautiful view of Lake Tahoe. I really have never seen any lake

blue-er than that. We hiked a couple miles down to the beach which had the whitest sands. As we approached the "castle", we were quite disappointed. I guess it was hyped up to be something special, nothing near the caliber of vikings or Queen Elizabeth.

We came back to the motel, took a short power nap and departed for a sponsored dinner at 5. The dinner was at this English pub and was sponsored by two guys that did Journey of Hope in 1994. It was a little different back then. There wasn't as nearly as organized, or had as many sponsors and a few other minor details. After the dinner, we came back to the motel. I went to a local laundromat and did a quick load. Came back, and went straight to sleep...a solid day off.

Jackson, CA to South Lake Tahoe, CA

Today was Kirkwood. The day I have been thinking about for the past two weeks. Arguably the hardest day of the summer, by far the hardest day so far.

Woke up at 5. I'll tell you one thing, sleeping in a high school gym doesn't do wonders for your back. Regardless, I tried to shrug it off. I needed full concentration for today. 95 miles. 65 miles uphill (hard), followed by 20 miles downhill very steep (harder), followed by an additional 10 miles of uphill (hardest). We went to the same Lion's Club/local restaurant for br

e

akfast. They literally gave us an all-you-can-eat buffet, and by all means, the food was delicious: scrambled eggs (yum), pancakes (yummy), and bacon (yum yum). After some tips from previous JOH riders, I made sure I didn't eat too much, which was pretty tough, because the food tasted soo good.

After the breakfast, we darted off to Tahoe at around 7 am. For today, we had assigned pacelines, mine having 5 members instead of the usual 4.

We climbed and climbed and climbed and seem to be going so slow. Literally, we were going roughly 6 mph...I could run that. After the 2nd or third crew stop, we decided to break up the group, and my half decided to pick it up. I don't know how we did it, but me, Tucker (from Iowa State) and Jeff (from Kansas State) managed to fight through it and make it through Tahoe. I don't how I could of done it without them and their encouraging words.

The scenery was incredible. I have never seen anything that beautiful. The pictures speak for themselves.

I was pretty nervous for today but I ended up doing really good. After running and biking everyday for the past year, I feel like I was pretty ready for this trip, and today was proof that I was. However, once I got to Tahoe, man was I sore. They had some pizza ready for us which I devoured. I ate a ton of food today...maybe pushing 7000 calories. At least 6 cliff bars, a couple electrolyte chews, a turkey sandwhich and chips for lunch, and the 4 slices of pizza for dinner. It's okay though, cause I know I easily burned off all those calories and then some. Today we get to stay at a motel 8 for the night...a very nice treat. We also have the day off tomorrow to relax our muscles. I would go out tonight, but I'm way too tired and probably just going straight to sleep. I would write more and edit my thoughts a little better, but I'm way too tire to do that...its been a long day.

By the way, this is for you, Mitchel...IronHorse (the bike) made it all through Kirkwood without breaking the bike chain.

Sacramento, CA to Jackson, CA

More or less the same usual wake up, except today was at a gym. Woke up at exactly 5:00 AM from the blaring music of “Party in the USA” and the eye scorching lights. Packed up and had the usual breakfast, except today, we had co-co puffs as our cereal, yummy.

We departed straight off to Jackson, CA. I decided to ride with completely different people, and I actually rode with some of the fastest people on the team. One of the members in my paceline has done 3 ironmans (if you don’t know what it is, its intense…look it up) and another has done Journey of Hope 2 years ago. It was roughly 40 miles, but we booked it, riding on average at 17 mph. Luckily, the land was pretty flat, expect at the end with elevation started to pick up. We started at the end of the pack, the last paceline. Before not to long, we started to pass one paceline and then another, sooner or later, we led the the pack, getting “red flag” way more than I usually do. A “red flag” is given to pace lines when there aren’t enough support vans ahead of them. By far, this was my best ride yet, although this was also one of the easier days.

We rode into Jackson and had lunch at a facility center for people with disabilities. It more or less was a banquet with at least 100 people total. Everyone was super friendly, and treated us like kings as we rolled in. I met a sad girl named Belany who was at one point in tears because her friend Sarah was in the hospital. I tried to get her mind off things and started talking to her, and at one point made her laugh. I felt pretty good about that.

After lunch we started to ride to another gym. During the ride, we got to the road which had the steepest road I’ve ever seen in my life…steeper than San Francisco, literally 45 degrees. I had to go into my absolute lowest gear and even needed a little push from Tanner Bacon, one of the chief directors. It was pretty good practice for tomorrow, where we ride the epic mountain Kirkwood. Tomorrow, I’ll be in Lake Tahoe, 95 miles from where I am today. At least 75 miles of those are uphill. I project that I will be riding late into the night, provided my chain doesn’t break during the ride. Many have said this is the hardest day of the trip. Am I scared? Sure. Am I nervous? You betcha. Will I finished? We’ll find out tomorrow.

Once we got to lodging, I started doing my push ups. During orientation, my team decided to do a push up for every mile we did. That’s 4000 push ups. There must be at least 10 of us doing it. I decided to up it. I’m going to finish this trip with 10,000 push ups. That means I have to start the trip by doing twice as many push ups for every mile. Half way across America, I need to do three times as many push ups. It’s a challenge, but I’m up for it.

After a short break, we had dinner prepared for us by the local Lion’s Club. The food was really great, and I had irresitable chocolate chip cookies. I’m pretty good about eating healthy, but I seriously could not stop eating these cookies. The Lions were very nice and entertaining and was a great dinner. We headed back to the gym to get a good nights sleep for a killer tomorrow.

Napa, CA to Sacramento, CA

Today was a relatively easy day. We woke up at 5:30, got breakfast (half bagel, half banana, and cup of cereal), and packed up. We were supposed to be packed up and ready by 6:00, but we were late by about 10 minutes, so tomorrow, we get to wake up at 5:00 =(. We immediately started to bike towards Sacramento, CA. At first, we were cruising at like 18 mph. Then we hit the first medium sized mountain, followed by a larger sized mountain. Like most people, I was struggling, especially by my lack of hill terrrian preparation (c’mon, there’s no mountains in the Midwest), but managed to climb ‘em at the pace of 5 mph. One of the kids in my place line was struggling and giving up after ever 10 minutes or so. Luckily, we helped motivate him enough to get over the hill. After the climb, we had a pretty steep downhill. Looking at my bike computer, I was reaching speeds of up to 35 mph, the fastest I have ever gone on a road bike. After we past the hilly terrain, we had good a good three and a half hours of flat land. We were a little behind pace, but we manage to cruise again at 18 mph. We finally made it to Sacramento where we were greeted at a park by a former member of a Journey of Hope team, who donated lunch to us, consisting of a Subway footlong sandwich, Sacramento Root Beer, and a couple cookies…the perfect lunch for a group of hungry cyclists.

After lunch, we rode to the state capital building of Sacramento, where we were greeted by participants of the Southland Facility Center. I must say, the capital building is by far the nicest I have ever seen for a state…tis tis Govenator.

We finished our journey by riding to lodging, where today, we stayed at a local middle school’s gymnasium. The school was alright, but the locker rooms could have been a little less gross. Hint to California: less money in the state capital building, more money to the school system. After we showered up, we went to the Southland Facility Center. All the participated greeted us with giant smiles and were awesome. After meeting a few of them, you could tell they were the happiest group of people in Sacramento. They had their inside jokes, and their disappointment in the Sacramento Kings. One of the cool ideas behind the center is their idea of to form a band. I guess they got a bunch of instruments donated (electric guitar, drums, keyboard, etc) and they had all the participants play each instrument. After a great pizza dinner, they gave us a little taste of their music. Wow, it was incredible. Everyone would play a different instrument for each song. They played songs that everybody knew like “girls” by the beastie boys. And you could tell they have been practicing a ton, before they were in sync and sounded great. It was cool to see that they sell CD’s and also artwork and sculptures that they make. Some of the lamp tables made out of stained glass were absolutely gorgeous. And the really neat part, was that whatever they make, they get to keep all of the profits. Overall, I really think what they are doing here is truly amazing and I’m glad that they expanded to 120 other “chapters” across the nation, because music can really bring out the best in people. After the successful friendship visit, we went back to the middle school gym for a good night’s rest.

San Francisco Final Day

Today was the final day of orientation at San Francisco.

We woke up a little earlier at 5:30, loaded up all our luggage up on the vans. From University of San Francisco, where we stayed for the past few days, we took off to the Golden Gate Bridge, roughly a 2 mile ride. After arriving there, we had a nice breakfast and were greeted by a nice crowd of friends and family. The CEO of PUSH America gave quite an inspirational speech followed by a prayer. The entire morning was pretty cold, I was shivering nonstop. On top of that, I was pretty nervous. Today was the first day of actual riding and I had no idea what to expect.

As we rode across the golden gate bridge, much of my apprehension and shivers started to disappear. The main objective started to simplify: just continue to pedal.

After we crossed the bridge, we separated into 4 cyclists pace lines. In my group was Rudy, John, and Marshall.

We breezed through the first 30 miles, much of a repeat of the day before. The day was just perfect. The suns rays shinned on our backs but there was that easy breeze that kept us cool. The best way to put it, is that it would like we were in a video game, where we picked a level: Sausalito, California, and then raced through the streets of the peaceful but gorgeous downtown.

We stopped off at a park for lunch and had the usual Crew Chief Lunch, a deli sandwich and chips. Me and couple guys tried to optimize our sandwich but putting peanut butter and honey in between the turkey sandwich. Sounds disgusting but, ah, its filling I guess.

After lunch was a lot tougher, although there was less hills on the terrain. I, more or less, struggled. I one part, I was having a mental block, something that has happening to me, training wise, since last summer. I managed to get through out until the 50th mile. I hit a pothole, and my rear wheel just got out of wack and got a little bent. The crew tried to fix it, but no luck...I needed to get a new wheel. In its defense, the wheel was pretty old. I end up getting racked at the 50th mile headed to the bike store to get a new rear wheel. On the positive note, I didn't get injured.

After the ride, the group went to a little league baseball banquet. Now this isn't a regular little league baseball league. It's actually a league composed of people with disabilities. Everyone was very kind and treated us like kings. All the participants had huge smiles, and you could tell we would making their day just with our presence. I met this 25 year old named Casey. The poor guy lost his mother, his caretaker, a few years ago, and you could tell all he really wanted was some company. More importantly, all he wanted was a friend. Now, I'm by no means perfect but to see him smile ever for a few minutes put me on the verge of tears.

The banquet also had great food. The fruit there was amazing. I've never tasted fresher fruit in my life. Literally, every fruit, strawberries, blueberries, pineapple, grapes, It was all so fresh and so perfect. We left from that friendship visit with our bellies filled, and more importantly, with smiles on our faces.

After a long day, we left back for lodging. Lucky for us, we are staying at a Best Western, which guarantees a hot shower. I swear, they're spoiling us.

San Francisco Day 4

Today was the first day of actual riding.

Woke up like usual at 5:30, and had breakfast at 6:00 AM (half banana, half bagel, and cup of cereal). We then packed up and went to Sausalito, California, to do a practice ride. We got there by 7 and did a few pace line drills. All instructions were done by Marion University's cycling coach. After the half hour warm up, we began our 20 mile bike ride. Being from the midwest, my cycling experience is (unfortunately) limited to flat lands. However, much of Sausalito's terrain is quite hilly. I expected to struggle on the inclines, but I was pretty nervous about the declines, especially concerning the speed. Nevertheless, I managed to get through the ride without any trouble. Unfortunately, the rest of the team had some issues getting through it.

With that being said, I learned a lot about cycling technique today and hopefully can apply it from this point on. Tomorrow, we will do this same ride tacking on 50 miles in the direction of Napa.

After the ride, we had our usually deli sandwich lunch. We went back to U of SF to rest a little bit before we were treated at Buca Di Beppo's for a send-off dinner. The CEO of PUSH America, Chad Coltrane, gave us a few words of encouragement along with a simple message to "do our best" and to have absolutely "no regrets" after the trip. The message really rang home especially since I have the same philosophy on academics especially finals.

Following dinner, we were given the rest of the evening off, in order to prepare for a long and difficult day tomorrow.

San Francisco Day 3

Today was real treat.

5:30 AM - Woke up, packed up, and brought my cycle outside and had a quick breakfast consisting of half a banana, half a bagel and a cup full of cereal.

6:15 AM - We had the first biking experience of the trip : assessment. There was a four part course which we needed to pass. Stage 1, we had to bike in a straight line, clip in and out, and drink from our water bottle and be able to look back...with my practice, it was a piece of cake. Stage 2, obstacle course, weave in and out of the cones and point out the dangers while pedaling. Not as easy as it sound, but I never hit a cone, no problem. Stage 3, paceline training. We basically rode in groups of four, and practice reverse leapfrogging. Since I always road alone, I was most nervous about this but I dominated that. Stage 4, changing a flat tire, my first

time doing this. I never had to do this before and I hope that I never will again this year (pretty improbably but we'll see).

11:00 AM - After the assessment, we went to check out Golden Gate bridge. It's truely remarkable to witness one of America's most majestic works of architecture

.

12:00 PM - Return back to U of SF. We had a quick lunch consisting of a ham sandwich and chips, and explored San Francisco around.

1:00 PM - We explored a little of the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco. The area was interesting to say the least. It was a fusion between Berkeley's 60's hippy culture mixed with San Francisco cutting edge. I've never seen a place like it before. One second, you pass a regular bike shop. A few shops later has smoke free blowing out the door and a huge colorful

mural over the bricks of its front wall.

3:30 PM - We were put in vans and took a tour of a different area of San Francisco, Fisherman's Wharf. As we made it there, we took the long and windy road down Lombard Street. I do wish I could bike down Lombard Street (uphill, not so much).

4:00 PM - Fisherman's Wharf was pretty cool. I was looking forward to meeting Chris Sorenson and Jeff Sklarin there but because of miscommunication, I never got a chance to see them. Sorry 'bout that guys...I felt pretty bad about that.
On the plus side, I satisfied my 11 month craving for In n Out burger. Man, I tell you, it just gets better. Double-double with grill unions, and animal style frenchfries. Honestly, thats all I need in this world. The world is definitely a better place because of In n Out. For all those that haven't tried it, thats just sad.

6:15 PM - We returned back to U of SF, and just relaxed for a little bit. A few of us played some ultimate frisbee on U of SF's quad. I was ridiculously quick, no big deal.

9:30 PM - Grabbed some fourth-meal at a hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant down the street. The place was pretty good, especially with its heated salsa.

10:00 PM - Returned back, and started to get ready for tomorrow. Tomorrow we start the actual biking, with a practice 20 mile bike ride in the suburbs of SF. The adventure begins.

San Francisco Day 2

Today was the second day of orientation.
Ill give a quick recap of yesterday. I arrived at the U of SF at around 3 o'clock. I checked in and saw a ton of other pi kapps. After checking in, we all gathered around and did a few ice breakers followed by a pizza dinner. I met my roommate for orientation, Marshall. He's from U of Nevada- Reno, and has some pretty cool ideas related to philanthropy. And that was pretty much all.

Today was a pretty long day, but an easy one, i suppose.
I woke up at 5 am. We did a practice pack, and put all of our belongings and got our bikes out, just to be ready for sunday. Soon after, we had some cold breakfast.

The next 4 to 5 hours were absolute hell. I had to sit though all the paperwork, and safety rules and procedures. We had a some deli sandwiches for lunch, which I guess will be the norm for the next 2 months. After a long morning, the day winded down with a "friendship visit". A friendship visit is basically a volunteer effort where we go to a camp which works with people with disabilities and get acquainted with the faculty and the campers. During this friendship visit, I played some basketball with some of the campers. I also met Audi, who was an aspiring artist, and is fighting his condition of cp. The whole visit gave me some food for thought for the rest of the night.

San Francisco Day 1

Just arrived in San Francisco yesterday. I'm staying at my Uncle

Kaushik and Aunt Suzi's place in Oakland, until I begin orientation later today at U of SF.

Man, its nice to be back in the bay. The only question in the back of my mind is how long will I have to wait to get my hands on a double-double and some animal style fries. Seriously, there's nothing better than in n out burger.

As for fundraising, I have raised a little under $4500 out of the $5000 needed for the trip, so i'm really close.

I still have the freshman jitters about the trip...but, I think I will be fine though. I've unpacked and put together the bike, and it looks like its in good shape. I guess only time will tell...