Serendib

'Serendib' is the old Arabic, Persian and Urdu name for the island that later became Ceylon and today is known as Sri Lanka. It is also the origin of the English word 'serendipity', coined in 1754 by Horace Walpole and, so I am told,  comes from the legend of 'The Three Princes of Serendib', in which our happy-go-lucky heroes were making discoveries of things they had not searched for.

And so it was, after making a side trip from our base in Ellsworth over glorious rolling hills to the tiny village of Surry and back, that we happened upon a sort of hole in the wall distinguished by the Sri Lankan flag hanging in front and the name 'Serendib'.  Inside we discovered a delightful dish by the name of Lamprais, which, as the menu describes it, is a "Dutch Burgher influenced dish comprising of a fragrant suduru samba'  rice, mixed meat curry, brinjal pahi, seeni sambol, blachan, and frikkadels wrapped in a banana leaf and baked."  Not having the faintest idea of what any of those things look or taste like, we decided to take a chance.  Granted that almost everything tastes great on a bicyle trip, we were not prepared for this little slice of culinary heaven prepared by owner and chef Sanjeera Saresaskera, who will also regale you with tea, stories and charm.  If you are ever in Ellsworth, perhaps on the quest to get to Bar Harbor, don't pass it by!!!! Pure serendipity.

Room With A View

For anyone in a rush to reach Bar Harbor, our advice is don't.  Tarry awhile.  Camp a day or two at Lemoine State Park, where you can claim a campsite like this one if you get there early in the day. We spent a wonderful three nights there dallying in the precious sunshine and enjoying the campfire.  Tip: make sure you stock up on supplies before you leave Ellsworth.  There is a general store 5 miles down the road from the park but the pickings are limited, mustly canned goods and hot dogs. Somehow it doesn't matter.

Ever-returning spring

All along the road, especially north and east of Sabago, we are treated to the incomparable smell and sight of lilacs in full bloom.  The faintest whiff of lilacs never fails to bring to mind Walt Whitman's soulful commemoration on the death of his beloved President, Abraham Lincoln. There is no evidence that I know of that Whitman ever actually met Lincoln, but when did that ever matter when the passion is for an ideal and  for  promise  only partially fulfilled?  It is a good thing that poetry, like the smell  of lilacs and the sight of  the drooping great star, outlives us all. And why, on remembering lilacs and reading Whitman, do I feel a sense of mourning or maybe simply resignation as we head into the election season?

The full poem has 16 parts, here are two of them for whatever road you are taking.

When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd
And the great star early droop'd in the  western sky in the night,
I mourn'd, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring
Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring.
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

In  the dooryard fronting an old farm-house in the white-washed palings,
Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shaped leaves of rich green
With many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love,
With every leaf a miracle--and from this bush in the dooryard,
With delicate-color'd blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
A sprig with its flower I break.

Moody's Diner Don't Miss It

Suddenly or not so suddenly the hills became less treacherous as we rolled into the posh seaside resorts of Rockport and Camden. The high point of the day was finding Moody's Diner, thanks to a lady we asked for directions at the top of a hill in Waldoboro. She was planting spring flowers and was quite startled that we hadn't heard of Moody's, which was back DOWN the hill and apparently in every travel magazine in the country.  Started in 1927, the place used to rent cabins out at $1/night.  Our server at present-day Moody's, Jill, steered us toward a mobile exhibit of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, and not only loaded us up with the best Reuben sandwich ever created but filled our bottles with ice water and road advice.  Only two  stiff hills, she told us, between there and Rockport.

Jill and Mike at Moody's.  Don't miss the Reuben.

We didn't take the detour to the mobile memorial, having spent hours in the permanent one in Washington one rainy morning, wondering why our country has failed to learn the lesson of Vietnam.  So many lives lost on both sides for no gain.  Bumper sticker of the day award: MAKE AMERICA KIND AGAIN.

Ready for Day 5  from Duck Puddle Campground to Rockport or Camden! Sun's out, light breeze, gorgeous day.

MOMentum

On our very first ride through this part of the ecosphere, our (then teenaged) son Eliot taught me how to take advantage of momentum to tackle the next hill. I'm still trying to perfect the technique here in Maine, where the roads offer up a never ending chain of increasingly challenging hills.  The trick is to get enough speed on the downhill without crashing to make it up the next without bonking. I'm doing better, Eliot!

Rolling Home V is upon us. Getting the sleeping bags packed and tires pumped. Long hiatus since Rolling Home IV, filled with excruciatingly sad and difficult projects in South Sudan (2013) and Yemen (2014).  We came away from both with many wonderful colleagues and remain hopeful that the terrible wars in those countries will allow them to one day live in peace. We are ever more aware that in this interconnected world, we in the West are complicit in the suffering of the poor and marginalized in those countries (among others) and will continue through our biking adventures to spread that message. More recently, an exciting project in Uganda (2015) and the candidacy of Bernie Sanders has given cause for hope for a future we and the younger generation can believe in.

So now, before returning to the important work of education for peace, justice and preservation of our natural resources, the time has come for Rolling Home V, a modest three week door-to-door exploration of the coast of Maine.  There may be a part 2 later in the summer, a train and bike combination revisit to Idaho and Montana. Stay tuned for more posts and pictures very soon.

He's Got a Ticket to Ride

Doon at Green Mountain Bikes, Rochester Vermont

This was a tough decision. The bike mechanics who helped us solve various problems all along the route were outstanding. Dean, the irrepressible 'host with the most' we met along the Pere Marquette Bike Trail near Midland, Michigan, not only fixed Jean's slipping gears within a matter of seconds, but proceeded to invite us to a swim and cookout in his back yard bordering a brilliant green corn field, then spent the evening entertaining us with stories of his years as a DJ. The shop that takes the prize, however, belongs do Doon---Green Mountain Bikes in Rochester, Vermont is simply one of a kind. When we reached the college town of Poultney, Mike realized that the wheel he'd had built in Fargo was beginning to disintegrate, literally, not-so-tiny cracks were beginning to spread like spiders. We sat in the garden of a lovely little cafe desperately making phone calls to shops all over the state, none of whom were willing and/or able to build a new wheel for the Sojourn; that is, until we found Doon, who knows the bike, has the tools and loves to build wheels.  Miraculously, a wonderful pair of nearby diners who also happened to be bikers happened to overhear our dilemma, and in the end offered to drive Mike and the broken Raleigh the 50 miles across the mountains to Rochester and back, while Jean set up camp on Lake Ste. Catherine. He was back in no time with a beautiful, sturdy new wheel, which has yet to drift out of true.  We were then treated to an evening out with our son's friends Kyle and Dawn listening to Kentucky (Vermont style) bluegrass on the deck of the Poultney Pub.  Another cool thing about Doon's shop is that he uses as roll of movie admission tickets as his business cards. Good old Vermont.

Best of Tour Bed and Breakfast Award

Hands down, the Marble Mansion in Fair Haven, Vermont takes the Rolling Home BoT B&B Award. The sheer beauty of the inn and and comfort of the rooms is one thing, the fresh berries and cream for breakfast another, the fascinating history still another, but the real clincher is the warm hospitality of the hosts.  After an unusually grueling day, we were offered help with our bags, a personal touch we had not experienced during the entire journey.  Once comfortably settled into the cozy Jane Austen room, we were presented with a crystal pitcher of ice cold Vermont water.  We couldn't remember anything tasting better.

Best of Tour Most Idyllic Campground (East) Award

Erie Canal by Night

The choice of winner of the MIC (East) Award was made easier by the rapidly diminishing frequency of low- or no- cost, easily accessible campgrounds as we pedaled eastward.  In more than one case, we were unable to find a patch of grass on which we could safely and legally pitch our tent for the night, and more than once found ourselves at the mercy of sympathetic passers-by who kindly offered their lawns, and in one case by a motel owner in Clintonville, Wisconsin who offered us gratis the spot behind the motel where his son used to set up his tent on warm summer evenings. More often, we found ourselves twisting and turning through the night on the hard pebble tent sites offered at state and provincial campgrounds, often at what we considered extravagant prices.

Quebecois Friends

Hiker/Biker/Boater Campground at Middleport

 Once we made the crossing from Ontario into New York State, The Erie Canalway Trail between Lockport and Palymyra offered welcome relief in the form of Hiker/Biker/Boater campgrounds, grassy areas abutting the canal offered at no cost and blissfully free of mechanized traffic.  Our favorite of these was the HPB campground at the Village Canal Park in Middleport, where we were not only welcomed by the bridge tender but provided with a code to a building with clean bathrooms and hot, steamy showers. Heaven.  We enjoyed an evening with a group of French Canadian cyclists who had whizzed by us earlier on the shady, crushed stone canalway trail, slept on the soft grass and woke up refreshed and ready for more. 

Best of Tour Most Idyllic Campground (West) Award -- Mikoti, North Dakota

One of the most welcome surprises faced by the bicycle tourist covering the long distances between towns through most of Montana and North Dakota is the 'City Park' tradition of welcoming campers and (usually) providing restroom facilities, even hot showers. Best of all, cyclists can pitch their tents on soft grass and spread out stuff on sheltered picnic tables, sometimes even plug in phones to live outlets and find wood or charcoal for an evening meal. The City Park that stands out most in our memories, and therefore the winner of the Best of Tour MIC (West) Award is located at the edge of  the friendly town of Makoti, North Dakota (population 145), some 100 miles east of Williston and just south of Rte. 1804.  We camped on this quiet piece of the prairie next to the ever-present grain elevator with only the songbirds for company, found fresh towels in the shower room, but could find no one to pay the $5.00 fee. Mikoti, we owe you!

Best of Tour Most Incredibly Beautiful Road (East) Award -- East Nabobish Road, Michigan

The Michigan section of the Tour was full of pleasant surprises, but the most delightful, in our view, was a section the route east of Bay City, just south of Saginaw Bay.  Perhaps it was the afterglow of an usually hot and humid day, perhaps sheer relief after the navigation difficulties we had of getting through the congested urban area that led us to feel that the flat, straight section of road through the quiet farmland was a slice of heaven.  Like the BIA Route 1 in Montana (winner of the Best of Tour MIBRA West Award), East Nebobish Road takes the weary rider a few decades back in time.  If you are lucky enough to be blessed with a northwest wind, you will also experience a cooling breeze from Lake Huron, but even if not this virtually deserted farm road abuts what seems to be a very old canal cut through tangled vegetation and separating fields of cultivated land.  There are no stores, no gas stations, not even a post office for at least 25 miles from the point this photo was taken, only the canal, the breeze and the road. It was eerily quiet and incredibly beautiful.

East Nebobish Road, between Bay City and Fair Grove, Michigan

Best of Tour Most Incredibly Beautiful Road (West) Award --BIA 1, Montana

Looking back over our trip photos and remembering all the incredibly beautiful roads we have been able to travel, it became more and more impossible to select just one for the prize. After hours of deliberation, we decided to split the Most Incredibly Beautiful Road Award (MIBRA) into two categories: east and west of the Mississippi River.

With the note that this award is ENTIRELY SUBJECTIVE and has a lot to do with the weather and how we were feeling on particular days, the 2010 Rolling Home Tour MIBRA West goes to:

MIBRA West: BIA Rte 1 (Indian Road) Fort Peck Indian Reservation (between Nashua and Oswego, Montana) This road is more than another gorgeously scenic route along the Northern Tier; it takes you back on a spiritual journey at least half a century to experience the way the prairie must have felt before the age of fences, megafarms,
semis, Bud Lite and electronic casino games.
of the oncoming traffic here.

Heading East toward Malta on BIA 1

Fearless Turtle on BIA Route 1

 ..

The ride is over, but long haul is not...

'The Route' page has just been updated with a general description of the Eastern sections of the Tour.  We calculate the total mileage from Spokane, WA at 3,212 (5,138 km).  If we tack on the first leg from Port Townsend, WA to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho in 2009, our coast-to-coast distance was 3,611 (5,777 km).  

During the coming months, we plan to complete a number of works of original art from our observations across the continent for the 'Rolling Home Art Show' opening in Portsmouth, New Hampshire on January 7, 2011.  In addition, we will be adding more poems and stories to the Blog from our notes, and collect additional road poems and songs in English, French and Kreyol.  These will be organized and posted on the Blog along with an album of the art on a separate page, so please keep checking in.

In addition, watch for a BEST OF TOUR posting coming soon. Categories will include, after great deliberation, our choice of:

• most incredibly beautiful road
• toughest climb
• most amazing story
• best bike shop
• 'the host with the most'
• best camp spot
• best B&B

Through these media and whatever additional ways we find, we hope to keep raising awareness and funds to help continue and expand the work of the Art Creation Foundation for Children in Jacmel, Haiti.

Finally, with the exhilaration of this amazing experience still fresh in our veins, we will be dreaming of and planning the Rolling Home Tour 2011 edition.  The idea will still be to combine cycling, art, poetry and at the same time promote a worthy cause. Please let us know your suggestions, keep biking and think about joining us next summer!

There's no place like home...

August 18, Bedford, NH west of Manchester...off to an early start from the Hill-Brook Motel, knowing that with less than 50 miles to go we would probably make it to the Atlantic before dusk. Filled with delightful anticipation, but also some trepidation about coming to the end of the tour.  These three months on the road have overflowed with rich experiences, the retuning of bodies, minds and imaginations set free.  A part of both of us wants to keep pedaling forever. Random lines from the Beatles' 'Two of Us'  pops into my head in high fidelity---'You and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead...'  A vivid flashback to Ontario where the melody and words floated through the air as we rode down the main street of Port Dover looking for a place to stay. The rhythm finds its way into my legs and I am able to ratchet up the pace. We're going home.

In the middle of the steamy Manchester morning, we stop at an espresso shop that looks oddly out of place in this old New Hampshire mill town. Three tired-looking customers sit at a table on the sidewalk reading newspapers and smoking, taking little notice of us and our heavily loaded bikes. A beautiful, haunting melody drifts out of the dark interior. Are we in Egypt? Macedonia? Really so far from home? The owner, we learn, is from Bosnia, and the coffee is strong, sweet and cheap. And so on through the gray, depressing city streets until we reach the eastern side of town and the pastoral, hilly farmland until, finally, we cross the Lamprey River south of Newmarket and are almost home. We rush to unload the bikes and find the energy for the final push to the seacoast at Rye Harbor and are elated to see Eliot and Heather there with big smiles and two bottles of the best champagne this side of the Atlantic.  We are home at last.

Eliot and Heather with the bubbly

Ritual dipping of the wheel

Sunshine overhead, WSW wind at our backs, rolling home to the sea

In the hills just west of Manchester on Rte 47 we stop at the old meetinghouse in the village of Francestown to rest. It seems like we have been here before...maybe we have. The inscription on a stone bench next to the small church cemetery says, 'tarry awhile.' As we get closer to home, the prospect of arriving  is both comforting and unsettling.

None too soon

 Francestown, New Hampshire (60 miles west of home)

A spire to inspire 

straight paths amid

sprawling undergrowth

the tangled dry weeds and

gnarled roots

Riding through 

on an easterly path
to the sea and home

Travelers in these
strangely familiar hills
Under these stones
lie the bones of those
whose legacy rolls on,
rolls on in lines 
in destinations.

Almost home,
here we pause and
tarry awhile

Caution signs

Fair Haven, Vermont...

Caution signs in Amish country

After days, weeks and now three months of dodging careless (and sometimes enraged) drivers, passing the sad carcasses of too many wild animals in varying states of decay, and hearing the tragic stories of joggers and cyclists struck down by speeding, overpowered machines, it seems to me that respect for life is a state of mind. I thought of the followers of the Jain path in India who carry brooms to sweep the road ahead to prevent ending the lives of the tiniest animals, and wondered how many flying insects I had inadvertently collided with. I thought too of the gentle Amish people we had met, whose everyday practices so purely express their religious beliefs. Extreme, perhaps, to believe that all loss of life cn be prevented, but Jacques tells us that the practice of caring for others is fundamental to peace and happiness, and this is his dream for Haiti. If we could successfully cultivate this state of mind as part of educational processes, could there be just one composite caution sign? I imagine that the North American version might look something like this.

no

passing

narrow shoulder

blind corner rock falling

cattle roaming foxes chasing

cougars turtles dear elk children

crossing life is sacred slow

down save one

when you

can

Familiar signposts

Boonville, New York...

As we get ever closer to home, the signs of home are everywhere. License plates from Massachusetts and Vermont, yesterday a cluster of white birch trees and even a Red Sox bumper sticker brazenly displayed here in Yankee country. Sometimes the signs can take you to another continent altogether. As one of our fellow cyclists put it, the thought of reaching our destination is accompanied by mixed emotions. On the good days, one wants to keep riding on...

On the pavement thinking about the government

After a delightful but expensive week in Ontario, we ended up gazing dumbstruck at the awesome majesty of Niagra Falls along with a gaggle of tourists and honeymooners from around the world. Jacques was duely impressed with the Falls and sorry to leave the company of scores of Canada geese we encountered along the trail.  From there, we crossed the Lewiston-Queenston bridge and re-entered the USA, getting temporarily lost in the maze of power stations and bleak industrial landscape before finding the relatively low-traffic Upper Mountain Road through the Tuscarora Indian Reservation on the way to Lockport and the start of the Lake Erie Canalway Trail.  In the meantime thunderstorm clouds were gathering once again. We took temporary refuge from the rain at a Tuscarora trading post, where we were offered free coffee, conversation, a rain cover,and a bumper sticker that reads "Sure you can trust the government...JUST ASK AN INDIAN." This gave rise to a flurry of thoughts about, among other things, who owns the maginficent natural wonder we had just witnessed and the massive industry and urban sprawl that has sprung up around it, the wars, the high-rise hotels and clogged highways. Grateful for the coffee and rain cover, we pedaled on to Lockport, where the heavens finally burst open and gave us a thorough soaking but also welcome relief from the heat and stifling humidity.