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

Mountains of coal, columns of grain

Manitowoc, Wisconsin...SS Badger in port

Shadows on the enormous mountains of coal waiting to fuel the SS Badger caught my eye. The day was foggy and the smoke from the ship mixed with the fog hid the grain elevators. We had been admiring the beauty and functionality of the grain elevators in each of the raiload towns since Montana, especially the way their shadows revealed their form. In the port at Manitowoc, the elevators are enormous, and I had never seen mountains of coal so high. It seems a central point in vast system of moving agricultural products from one place to another. As we pedal on muscle power, thinking about the dependency of this system on fossil fuels, I wonder if as a society we have become dwarfed by the things we make.

Lake Superior South Shore near Port Wing

County Road West of Minot

These rolling hills seemed to go on forever.

Saco Dry Goods

Saco, Montana (population 145); June 3--- An abandoned dry goods store with traces of its 'Osh Kosh B'Gosh' slogan has been left to lean with the wind. Across the street, the old Ford auto garage no longer shows its logo. In the evening, people walk by these relics, leaving the overalls and spark plugs to yesterday, pass the old bank that was changed into an hotel, now a delapidated rooming house, and head to OD's saloon to join in the community barbeque. Norman Mavencamp saw us on the road and made certain we knew about it. Norman had supplied the meat. He runs each year in the senior Olympics. He is 86.

MJ

Cabinet Mountains, Kootenai National Forest

The Long Haul for Haiti

Welcome to the Rolling Home Tour, 2010 edition.

After many years in the dreaming, we are finally ready to move into the reality of Summer, 2010 and the long-awaited opportunity to complete a coast-to-coast bicycle tour. In May of 2009, when we managed to pedal up and over the snow-capped Cascade Mountains from Whidbey Island in the Pacific to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho in a 'trial run.' This year, the trip resumes with what we think are stronger legs and what we are sure is a worthwhile cause. We are resolved to go the distance AND help raise funds for a very special community of children in Jacmel, Haiti.

Art Creation Foundation for Children, a non-profit arts organization created to serve children in need, is truly a community. Having survived in the immediate aftermath of the January earthquake, these young artists and scholars are filled with resilience and hope. There were 60 children and youth at ACFFC pre-earthquake and now approximately 20 more have become a part of the art creation and learning community in Jacmel. They are the future, the hope for Haiti.

But they need our help, both now and for a long time to come.
Please consider making a donation directly at:

http://www.artforhaitianchildren.org/

Please watch for new posts of our 'carnet de voyage' beginning in May, 2010

Montana

The first five hundred miles from the shores Pacific across the Cascades to Coeur d'Alene and then on to Heron, Montana were a tantalizing taste of more to come next summer. After you are on the road for a while, the destination matters less than what you experience along the way. Time slows down and days melt into nights and then more days. Returned reluctantly to the East Coast by air to fulfill work obligations but with a solemn oath to return to Spokane by train and then Coeur d'Alene to pick up the trail in 2010.