South Dakota

I rode through South Dakota as part of Ride America South to North, my 9-day ride from the Mexican border to the Canadian border.

The entire RASN route.

I've been wanting to ride in the Rapid City area for a while now, and part of the reason I chose to ride from El Paso to North Dakota instead of starting in California or Arizona was because this route took me through the Black Hills. That turned out to be a good decision!

Day 7 was the most important day for this post and the most scenic day of the whole ride.

Strava Link: RASN Day 7

The route itself was pretty good, though there were a few minor adjustments that I would have made. If you want, you can easily ride on the Mickelson Trail for 100 miles. I don't know about the whole trail, but the section I rode had great scenery and was doable on a road bike with 25c tires. 28s would be better if you have them. 

You could easily spend a week or more here just riding around and exploring. There are so many different roads and they all look awesome on Google Maps. Also, get on Strava to "Segment Explore" and you'll see what I'm talking about.

Thanks for the memories, South Dakota!

Nebraska

I rode through Nebraska as part of Ride America South to North, my 9-day ride from the Mexican border to the Canadian border.

The entire RASN route

Entering NE

My NE century

 I also made videos along the way. Here is the most relevant one:

Sunrise in NE

One of the dirt roads I covered

Strava Ride Link

As you can see in the video, I loved the scenery in this portion of Nebraska, but there was definitely a battle against the elements going on for this particular ride. I won't hold that against you, Nebraska. The plains wouldn't be the plains without the wind. In a way (after the fact, at least), I'm glad it was a windy day. That's part of the experience.

As far as the route goes, it was a solid one. Roads were quiet and there were wide open spaces all around. If I had just been going to NE for a ride, it would probably make sense to start in Scottsbluff and do a loop from there. That way you could start off with the bluff scenery, ride your way out to the plains, then return back to the bluffs. It would make for a fun day and I doubt any of the roads would be much busier than what I saw today, but I can't say for sure.

I know I'm a broken record, but Nebraska is another example that there are states out there that you wouldn't think of as cycling destinations, but nevertheless have their own areas with great riding. The fun thing about riding across the country or even just having a goal to ride in every state is that it forces you to go through some areas that you might not go through otherwise. Sure, I've gone through some bad areas, but more often than not I end up pleasantly surprised by what certain areas have to offer. This ride was a pleasant surprise and I would encourage you to come check out western NE if you have a goal to ride in all 50 states.

Colorado

I rode through Colorado as part of Ride America South to North, my 9-day ride from the Mexican border to the Canadian border.

When you think Colorado, you probably think Rocky Mountains. However, my ride took me through the plains in the eastern portion of the state. I hope to return to Colorado in the future and ride some of the big climbs there. For now, this will have to do.

The whole RASN route

Entering CO

My first CO century

My second CO century

 I also made videos along the way. Here are the relevant days:

As a whole, I was happy with the route. I'll be honest, the CO drivers don't have the best reputation for being friendly to cyclists, but I didn't have any problems. I spent most of my time on 71, which ended up being better than I expected. Traffic was mostly light.

If the Rocky Mountains didn't exist, I would give the route a high rating. However, Colorado has so many huge climbs and I'm sure there are hundreds of better rides to do if you're traveling to Colorado. Generally when I'm planning on riding a new state I try to pick the best part of the state to ride. Obviously that's always going to be up for debate and I'm sure I've done better jobs in some states than others, but I failed big time with CO. I hope to be back later to ride some of those better routes, then I'll add to this post.

Florida

In December of 2015 I headed to Florida for a few days to escape the cold in Reno. I stayed in Orlando, but drove over to Cocoa Village to ride the Intracoastal Waterway Century route.

Florida Route

Strava Link

Florida has a reputation for bad drivers and leads the nation in deaths of cyclists, so finding a good route was important. Unfortunately, this trip was sort of a last minute thing and I didn't have as much time as I would have liked to research. Good routes seem a little bit difficult to find. Most of the information out there is related to "bike paths," which most of you might know as MUPs, which are really not much more than glorified sidewalks.

I flew into MCO and rented a bike from Bikes and Blades. The bike was a Raleigh RX 1.0, which was listed as a road bike but was actually a cross bike with slick tires. No big deal. It was worthy for the road. The crank was a 46/36, but this is Florida, so there was no need for a smaller small ring. I'm not a strong guy, so the 46 didn't hold me back. In general I hate renting bikes on vacation, but Bikes and Blades made everything easy and their hours actually fit my schedule very well. The price was reasonable, too.

The rental bike and the rental car. They almost match.

The rental shop was right on the West Orange Trail, so I got in about 50 miles before I headed off to the hotel. It's been a long time since I've ridden on an MUP and this ride reminded me why I hate them so much. Riding the MUP really is like riding on a sidewalk. Pedestrians aren't paying attention and every street crossing becomes more dangerous than it would be if you were riding on the road. I was actually considering doing my century on a different bike path, but this ride made me reconsider.

I came across the ICWC website and it seemed like a decent route. Often times when I'm out of state I'll just find a local organized century and ride the route solo. This has worked well for me in the past, but obviously isn't a foolproof solution. Just because a route is good for an event doesn't mean its good on its own. You never know if portions of the route have a police escort, are closed to traffic, have a ton of warning signs, etc. On top of that, there's an increased perception of safety when you're riding in a huge group. I say "perception" because there's no way of knowing for a fact that riding in a group is safer. However, there are portions of the RAIN (Ride Across Indiana) route that I wouldn't necessarily choose to ride on my own but feel perfectly fine on event day.

Anyway, I decided to just go for it. As bad as Florida's reputation is, I'm simply not one to be afraid of riding in traffic. The route ended up being a decent one. I would say it was good, but not great. For the most part I felt safe, but there was one section towards the end (somewhere around miles 60-70) on S Tropical Trail that was narrow and had a lot of traffic. Maybe I was just hitting it at the wrong time. Looking at the map, I doubt there's an alternate route that would have been any better.

My biggest complaint would be the portion of the ride near Cape Canaveral. Talk about a tease. There I was, riding on NASA Parkway on this neat little stretch of road in the middle of the river. It was super windy, but I could see these neat looking NASA buildings off in the distance. As I got closer I even saw an old rocket straight ahead. Maybe all of this riding in the wind was going to be worth it. All of the sudden there's a right turn and the route leaves all of that stuff behind. What a disappointment. I wish I would have kept going on NASA Parkway. Then again, maybe it just ends at a parking lot and you can't really see much. This is probably one of those places that's better seen off the bike.

The last 25 miles or so were great. Highway 1 had a bike lane and that final stretch on Rockledge/Indian River was very scenic and had almost no traffic. Best of all, the weather was fantastic. It's been a cold winter here in Reno, so I was happy to be riding in just shorts and a jersey again.

For some reason most of the pictures I took didn't get saved. Here are the ones I do have, plus a turtle and a gator I saw while riding west of Orlando the next day.

Turtle (blurry phone image)

Gator. I was coming from the other direction and almost ran over its tail. I wasn't expecting a gator in the road.

Gator

Alabama

In the summer of 2015 I rode across the country. As part of that, I rode across Alabama. Here's an overview of the route.

Alabama Route

Here are the Strava Links for both days: Petoji Day 20,  Petoji Day 21

Day 20

Day 21

Both days included portions in other states, but more than 100 continuous miles in Alabama. Here are the logs for each day.

Day 20

Welcome to Alabama. Only 2 states left to go. The day started out hot, but rain came rolling in later on and things cooled off considerably. More importantly, there was less of a headwind along the way. I was coming off of a short (83 miles) day on day 19, so I was feeling pretty fresh out there. However, Day 21 was the last big day left at 168 miles, so I was careful to save a little energy for that.

Another waste of a good shoulder

Day 21

This was the last long day and once it was over I knew I was actually going to achieve my goal of riding across the country. I had a few long days before this- 178 on Day 5, 175 on Day 7, and 180 on Day 13. The same rules applied on all of them: don't fall behind nutrition and hydration.

It was foggy early, which was fun and added to the scenery. As the day went on the fog wore off and it got hot and humid. By the end of the ride there were storm clouds in the distance and I saw a rainbow. There was a little bit of everything on this ride. It seemed fitting that the day would end with a rainbow. Petoji was almost over and my pot of gold was just within reach. I only had 121 miles on Day 22 and 60 miles on Day 23.

Welcome to Georgia

It's been on my mind for a long time!

Rainbow

Rainbow