Statistics

Days
Total          82 days
Bike           61 days
Build          17 days
Off              4 days

Distance
Total Mileage           4,247.9 miles
Average Miles          69.6 miles
Shortest Ride            27.8 miles (Twin Lakes, CO to (nearly) Aspen, CO)
Longest Ride            117.0 miles (Walsenburg, CO to Pueblo, CO)

Time
Total Time in the Saddle          327:04:41
Average Time                          5:21:43
Shortest Ride                            2:29:29 (Charleston, SC to Pinopolis, SC)
Longest Ride                            9:37:30 (Walsenburg, CO to Pueblo, CO)

Climbing
Total Elevation Gain               148,566 feet (28.14 vertical miles)
Average Elevation Gain          2,435 feet
Least Elevation Gain               34 feet (Colusa, CA to Davis, CA)
Most Elevation Gain               6,918 feet (Trinidad, CO to Walsenburg, CO)

Population
Smallest City          Wagontire, OR (1 person: Marty)
Largest City            San Jose, CA (998,537 people)

Day 82 - San Jose, CA to Santa Cruz, CA

We sure saved a tough ride to end on: 5,454 feet of climbing over just 58.4 miles. My quads were burning almost all day! I was thankful though to end on a hard ride as opposed to the typical 20-30 miles to the coast. I feel like we all got the chance to finish strong and make the last ride count as much as the first.

Over the mountains and through the woods, to Santa Cruz we go.

The tough mountain climbs were sweetened by the majestic redwood forests. One tree in particular had such a unique burn in its trunk I could technically bike THROUGH it.  

CHAAAARGE!!!!!! 

After sprinting into the cold Pacific, we celebrated in the ocean for about 15 minutes: jumping, screaming, splashing, crying, hugging, smiling...

Ready yourselves for the ceremonial front tire wheel dip... 

Oh, glory! 

What do you know about hella gnarly bike lifts? I know that they are sweetest after biking across the country. 

A huge "THANK YOU!" to my Mom...

...and to Teryl for flying out to see me complete my ride and for supporting me along the way.

A special thanks, too, to Erin and Erika for being my best friends. (Fellow Good Squad Members, I've tried multiple times to describe here what you mean to me and how you helped me...but I can't. Just know that I love you and I seriously couldn't have made it without you by my side. I'm thankful that through Bike & Build I met such wonderful people as you two.)

The Catty Corner: Erin won the Bipolar Paper Plate Award, for having the highest highs and the lowest lows. I won the Spirit Finger Award. Can you guess which one? I'll put it right next to Most School Spirit from high school.

Day 81 - Livermore, CA to San Jose, CA

WAHHH! Today we had our next to last ride, from Livermore to San Jose. All day long we rode in and out of a handful of cities. And all day long we stopped at red light after red light. It was kind of funny because we had all forgotten what it felt like to have to stop so often after being in such deserted regions for so long. Unfortunately, the stopping and starting up again also gave a lot of people, including myself, knee pain. We had a nice treat though at mile 60; Molly's boss cooked a huge feast for us including edamame with shiitake mushroom salad, cut-with-a-spoon-tender teriyaki flank steak, and fresh gazpacho.

I'm giving Erin the award for Best Bike & Build Tan Lines. 

In order to celebrate our last night we each had a 'Merica portrait made. I formally introduce to you: Machine Gun MG.

 The Catty Corner:
Q: How many Northern Californians does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Hella.

Day 80 - Davis, CA to Livermore, CA

I did not like today's ride at all. We were on some pretty bad roads as far as traffic and pavement quality were concerned. Then the weather, wind and heat, further complicated matters.  

I knew I was officially in the Bay Area at this point because we kept riding along and going over rivers of all kinds, specifically the Sacramento River and the San Joaquin River. 

Everyone was beat after second lunch and we were expecting an easy 18 mile finish. What awaited us, instead, was the illegitimate love child of Petit Jean and Texas headwinds. I was being blown all over the side of the road as I climbed a mountain. Some people rode as slow as 3 miles per hour. I'm not even sure how it was possible for us to stay upright. Needless to say, I threw my last temper tantrum of the trip in true MG freakout fashion.  

The Catty Corner:
Homeless Guy (who bursted into the laudromat): YEAH! Yeah! YEAHYEAHYEAH!!!!!

Day 79 - Colusa, CA to Davis, CA

I don't have too much to say about this ride. It was honestly almost the exact same as yesterday.

Today, we hit our 4,000 mile mark, chalked by Safety Katie, Mary, and Kaley! I can barely wrap my head around how far that is. And I've biked every mile of it...

We passed dozens of sunflower fields on the ride today. The majority of the sunflowers were dead and drooping. They all looked really sad actually, as if they were hanging their heads. I tried to brighten things up a bit.

Tonight, a Bike & Build alum named Megan, who lives in Davis, threw us a kegger, free of cost to us. We all had a great time drinking and dancing and celebrating the close of our great ride across the States. 

Ladies and gentlemen, meet the happy couple: Jim and Heather. These two are inseperable. They even pass out at parties together. To be fair, we can all fall asleep pretty much anywhere at this point. I fell asleep on the concrete floor during our build in Chico. Easily.

Erin and I played a game where we took turns grabbing objects within arms reach, just to see how many weird things we could find. She found a wax glob and pretended it was a bug eye. I had said something funny to evoke such a wild response, but I can't remember what it was now...

The Catty Corner:
Erin (text to the GroupMe): "Bags at 8:30. Just kidding. No strikes."

Day 78 - Chico, CA to Colusa, CA

Flat, flat, flat! And no headwinds. That's just the way I like it! I did get my sweat on though... The Central Valley is pretty hot, but it's really cool to see all the produce that is grown here.

Southern made the front page of the paper! Well Bike & Build did. But her picture was featured and she was cheesing hard when she first saw it. 

My only goal (apart from blogging each day and finishing the trip with minimal van time) was to eat an entire roadside cantaloupe. As I was riding this morning, I decided that today would be the day. After all, time is running out and we just happen to be going through an area that produces over 230 crops and 8% percent of the nation's agricultural output by value. I started seeing signs for Barb's Produce Stand starting about 5 miles away and my excitement began to rise. We had to ride a mile off route to get there and I was highly disappointed when I arrived to find that they were out of cantaloupe. Still, I didn't want to give up so I found Barb herself and told her what I was doing and asked if she had any in the back. She was so enthused to meet my friends and I, and she raced into the back refrigerator to get me the last cantaloupe; she had hidden it away because it was becoming too ripe on the stand. She even cut it up for me to eat and didn't once mention the price. As I ate in utter euphoria, my friends munched on free nectarines.     

After I ate the cantaloupe, I asked Barb how much I owed her. She said I didn't owe a thing; she only wanted a picture with us. Meeting Barb (and eating her cantaloupe and playing with her cat) was one of my favorite moments of the trip. Her excitement and interest in us was completely genuine. She welcomed us to her stand and went out of her way to make my dream come true. It was amazing!

Aw... Tonight we our last family meeting. Apparently, Sam and Logan thought this deserved a standing ovation. I don't disagree...

The Catty Corner:
California: the Land of Fruits and Nuts

Day 77 - Chico Build Day

For our build day today we worked with Butte County Habitat for Humanity on a 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom home for a woman named Elena and her kids. This house was farther along than any of the houses we've helped build this summer so we were able to do tasks that we haven't done before; I really enjoyed learning some new skills. 

I spent the day installing drywall. When we arrived, the inside of the house was only framed but by the time we left two of the bedrooms were completed, closets and all. It was cool to see the house take shape and come to life in a more recognizable way.

It takes extreme concentration on Molly's part to hold such a serious face. For me, it comes naturally; I learned how to smolder and harness angst in my preteen years.  

Jake manned the drop saw and cut pieces of window trim for others to install.

Suzette primed the underside of the roof overhang.

Tom and Jim installed exterior window trim. 

Erika and Southern worked on the shed out back. Well, Southern worked. 

Eric and Heather installed a plywood ceiling on the front and back porches. 

Mary Kate and Sam installed cement fiber siding.

At about 3 o'clock we walked across the street to the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company for a tour of the brewery. I learned all about how beer is made and even got to sample some of the beers at the end of the tour. During different stages of the brewing process the soon-to-be beer undergoes a series of chemical reactions in various stainless steel kettles. Some of the kettles there were decorated to look like the copper, German kettles that were first used at SNBCo about 30 years ago. 

Hops on hops on hops... Hops are flowers that release alpha acids during the cooking process to turn sweet wort into bitter wort. 

Sierra Nevada Brewing Company produced 1 million barrels of beer last year (1 barrel = 2 kegs worth). 

SNBCo partnered with 12 other craft breweries around the country to make a unique 12 pack with 12 different one-time-only beers to promote and distribute at 7 festivals this summer. The operation was called Beer Camp Across America. We were able to try 4 of the beers after the tour: Double Latte (Ninkasi), Electric Ray (Ballast Point), Yvan the Great (Russian River), and Yonder Bock (Cigar City).

The Catty Corner:
Q: Do you know why beer goes through your system so fast?
A: Because it doesn't have to stop to change color.