Sufferfest Berea

On our first day, we hilariously ended up right back where we started. Literally, you can see the glowing sign of the hotel we stayed in last night from the picnic table on which I type. It’s glow will probably keep me awake tonight while I lay in my tent, but hell this is an adventure!

We didn’t make it to Natural Bridge State Park, which is fine. We got a little turned around. Truthfully-we were crazy for thinking that we should go ahead and deviate off our trusty, easy to understand, and made especially for bicycling maps from Adventure Cycling.

But, here’s the story. Riding from the hotel, was more like plunging head on onto something like the indie 500 race track. Picture the Atari game Frogger, then substitute two bikers crossing with their loaded touring bikes. That’s what we looked like, as we walked our bikes, then paused in a clear lane, took a few more precarious steps into the turning lane, and finally got across this 4 lane highway.

The bikes were loaded down and predictably hard to control. We headed off, and rode for about an hour when I finally snapped out of denial, and acknowledged that my front derailleur was not shifting at all. I was stuck in the big ring! On hills! With 500 pounds of gear weighing me down like an anchor. So, after pulling over, sweating a lot, and staring at the unmovable derailleur, we decided to head back to Berea.

Fifteen dollars later, and we were back in business but it was getting late. Thanks to the Appalachia bike store and the two very bearded young guys who pointed out that I was carrying too much stuff while they fixed my bike. I could have done without the commentary at that point, but the bike shifted great on the way out of Berea, AGAIN!

We were determined to try to get to The Natural Bridge. Natural Bridge Ahoy! And so, to that end, we pedaled out to the middle of nowhere Kentucky.

The hills were unridable and pitiless, so we pushed and pushed the bikes while walking beside them, sweat dripping off my elbows and running into my eyes. It was more of a bike push than a bike ride kind of day. There was nobody around, except cows and flies. However, we continued on, mostly because nobody wanted to be the one to call it quits. Brooke was using her most optimistic voice, meanwhile her face read “Oh F*C&&$^%!. We pedaled on.

Finally, off in the distance I spotted someone who appeared to be checking a mailbox. I pedaled like a mad woman hoping I could reach him before he disappeared into the sanity and comfort of his air conditioned home. Thankfully, he was about 95-years-old, and he was moving slow. So, I asked for some directions.

“Where Y’all headin,” he asked. To which I replied, “Natural Bridge Park” as casually as if I’d been asking for directions to the local library. His eyes smiled at me, but immediately they were overcome with fear and concern for my life. Once he knew I was serious, he laughed, and then said, “Ya’lls three counties away...” So, back to Berea again! I have to say, after all of that, I am impressed with my patience. I’m not known for my cool, calm and collected personality, so this was a good test! It eventually became funny, and we laughed and pedaled, passing the same goofy mailboxes, and the now familiar junk along the road.

We arrived at a campground, and miraculously we found it without having any problems at all. Just as we pulled up, relieved (not at all smug or cocky) that we did something right for once, I noticed the sky looking gloomy and dark. Great! So, we hiked off to the campsite in a huff trying to beat out the impending storm. “Hiked” is too strong a word, since hiking is something you generally do in the woods. We walked, and pushed our respective balls and chains.

Our “site” was astonishingly located up a big hill covered in dead brown grass beneath three crosses! I was feeling so sorry for myself because of Sufferfest Berea I thought I might as well just hop right on up there, and Brooke could use the tent stakes as nails!

Thunder was going off in the distance, and the scary clouds accompanying the thunder were rolling in! We whipped out the tent, and it’s various foreign parts and dohickies. We’d set it up that one time in our bedroom, and that went well, so we didn’t practice setting it up Ever Again. Not too smart. But, now, it was showtime and I was trying so hard to be positive! I was thinking, “forget about the past and what you should have done to make your present more bearable, live in the now!” “be present, even though it’s miserable and kind of scary!” Brooke says I was crying, I don’t think I was, but okay.

I was flinging tent stakes, and pounding them in the hard dead grass with my bike shoe, while Brooke was trying to match up the zippers and clips, when she wasn’t tripping over my tent stakes. We looked mentally deranged. We’d used up our patience stores for the day. Alas, we got the tent up and got our stuff inside it. It was still hot as hell, and by this point the layer of filth on our bodies went sweat, sunscreen, sweat, bugspray, sweat.Now it was time to fire up the camp stove and cook dinner! We were so exhausted, even trying to find the campstove and food took too much energy. Our campstove is great. It’s all the rage with the minimalist Johnny Wilderness types who like to carry gear sparingly. But, the thing shoots a soccer ball sized flame up towards your head when you light it, and the flame is white hot as the sun. So, the stove, once lit and under control heats things nicely, it boils water like nothing I’ve ever seen. But it scares us. We cringe and tip toe around it. We try to get a safe distance from all things that we would like to keep, rather then see go up in flames. We got the thing lit, and had a manageable flame, and I cooked up some black bean and rice. It tasted great, and we got to eat it as the sun was going down and the sky was turning pink.
We’re loving the challenge, and life is so unpredictable! The last thing I have to say on the subject of bike touring is that it will make you eat like you’ve never eaten. While Brooke wasn’t looking, I dug my sweaty fingers into the peanut butter jar just because I was that desperate for sustenance and didn’t have the energy to hunt for my knife, which at that point would have been like finding a needle in a haystack.

Melissa