thee istsfor manity reader

Sun Makes Another Appearance

As you see at the base of the Precipice Trail, in Acadia National Park, above the sun made a rare appearance this week. It spent most of the mid-morning g to mid-afternoon putting on some Vitamin D time for us. 

The Precipice Trail is still closed for nesting falcons until later in the spring.

And just a couple of miles later, as you see above, in Thunder Hole the fog socked the park in and visibility was less than half a mile…

… all throughout the eastern portion of the loop trail it was as if we were cycling during another season.

Christopher and Dan, a couple of the 13 riders making their way down to Washington DC.

Today’s loop ride was a shakedown ride for the group leaders to gauge rider’s abilities, and for the riders to make any last minute gear adjustments.

Blue sky broke through again for a fleeting view of Cadillac Mountain in the fog-shrouded distance, as seen from Otter Cove.

By midday the sun was shining again and the loop road was wide open for biking as traffic was relatively light.

A view of a glacial erratic in the distance above the sign identifying it on the North Bubble.

Full sunshine at Eagle Lake at the last of today’s 10 climbing summits. From here it was nearly 3 miles all downhill.

Bike Day: Shakendown Ride Around Loop Road
Start: Bar Harbor, ME
End: Bar Harbor, ME
Miles: 22.06

Even though today, Friday, May 9th is tour day number three, it’ll actually be the first day we make positive miles on the East Coast Greenway Trail, i.e., actually biking the trail south towards Washington, DC, and we’ll do so now for the next 30 days.

What I’m Reading:

We are what happens when the seemingly
unthinkable celebrity rises to power.
Our existence makes my eyes hurt.
People are forever thinking that the unthinkable can’t happen. If it doesn’t exist in thought, then it can’t exist in life. And then, in the blink of an eye, in a moment of danger, a figure who takes power from our weak desires and failures emerges like a rib from sand.

— Lydia Yuknavitch / The Book of Joan

another day, more of the same

this is a dreary weather pattern to be stuck inside of: fog, rain, 40 degree weather, just enough of the sun peeking out to dash one’s brief hope

i swear the atlantic ocean is out there beneath the fog 

bear brook pond is barely visible from acadia national park loop road

best to head back and warm-up, check-out, start over and meet the group of bicyclists i’ll bike with to washington, dc

the sun battles through the clouds briefly for the low tide walk across frenchman’s bay to bar island 

yes it might make an appearance

tomorrow we’ll all pedal the loop road as a shakedown ride

What I’m Reading:

once I buried a pit in the earth; &
nothing happened; the pit is poisonous

in my mouth; like other things
buried inside me; & nothing happens;

— Katana Smith / “& Nothing Happens”

Every Sign Points To A Cold, Rainy & Foggy Day

Later Today all the riders meet at 4pm for the orientation on the East Coast Greenway Trail Tour. 32 Days. May 7th — June 7th, 2025. Bar Harbor, Maine to Washington, DC. 1,256 miles. Bike rain, fog, sunshine, hail—whatever the universe throws at us. We’ll pedal through it.

What I’m Reading:

This is an openly supremacist project. The supremacist ideas surge when they are needed to rationalize monstrous policies. This accelerated during Covid. For people who wanted an argument about why they didn’t need to do anything — whether it was mask, or get vaccinated, or close their yoga studio, or whatever it was. People started playing with: “Well, what would it feel like to just not give a shit if people die?” And once you play with that, you’re playing with fire. And it starts spreading. And it becomes, “Well, who else could we say it’s OK if they die?” 

— Naomi Klein & Tim Dickinson / “Naomi Klein: What They Want Is Absolutely Everything” / Rolling Stone

What About A Rain-Free Day?

What about overhead footsteps? What about a break in the weather? What about a weathervane windowpane, and standing up to pedal? And don’t gloat that the weather was fine and the riding was fairly easy and breezy.

And I checked out of comfort for a tidal flat on the bay…

… and a pond on a saturated cerulean blue day — so blue it chased the blues away…

… hey what’s that you say, your favorite national park on an azure May day?

… yes, lucky you, to see it on your bike this way—look it’s Bar Harbor at the far side of Frenchman’s Bay…

… and you feel like a fried rice poke bowl because today is Musubi (Hawaiian Spam Ham Fried Rice) day?

… eat it this this way… I shan’t nay… eat it all you burned all those calories away…

… look, it’s Mount Dorr! You can see it in the distance today!

And there is the Anchorage, the place where you’ll stay…

… and there’s your bike—in the room stowed away…

… and a dinner fit for a twelve year-old, because “fried” is the way!

Bike Day 29:
Start: Ellsworth, ME
End: Bar Harobor, ME
Miles: 25.57

And… apropos of extortionate lack of proportion…

… and just because I haven’t forgotten that this is a creative writing blog — not exclusively a bicycle tour journal — an influx of redux… and a 12 year-old’s dinner (not a protein within a dozen miles of this immature meal of poutots and pickle fries, something only possible when you burn 1,609 calories bicycling away)… I am not allowed another fried meal until October… “carb bombs away!”

Happy blue sky day!

a module script failed (redux)

(thanks to John Coyote for reminding me I wrote this…)

i cant move

importing a module script failed
butterfly wings detached
a planet catches
fire on the screen
truer more visceral
than life itself

we are drunk on simulacra
we are a sick clan
we are death
incarnate

waiting to bloom

What I’m Reading:

Death became history, geography rewrote itself. And yet earth was reborn. It was not a miracle that life was destroyed and then re-emerged. It was the raging stubbornness of living organisms that simply would not give in.

—Lydia Yuknavitch / The Book of Joan

rain rain rain

It’s been raining, virtually nonstop, since I started pedaling south on the East Coast Greenway three days ago. I experienced nearly 90 minutes of sunshine on Saturday when I arrived at the Sun Shed farm. I was awarded with a bald eagle drifting overhead as an augury of sorts for more rain—because it rained all day yesterday on my ride down to Ellsworth, ME.

But before I left Rebecca and Varien were kind enough to give me a tour of the farm. Here’s some of the menagerie:

Baby rabbits in their “zoomy stage”

A few of the the two different types of porkers on the farm (bred for different purposes)

An alpaca, sheep, and goats galore

Tiny piglets, no larger than the length of my feet

They’re predominantly a breeding farm for pets and service farm animals. Great tour, great stay. Thanks to Rebecca and Varien!

But I had to get on with the pedal pushing, despite desperately wishing to stay warm and dry.

The Narraguagus River inlet on a prototypically rainy and foggy late-Spring May day.

My first stop was the Milbridge House Restaurant for the first real (non-energy bar) meal since lunch the prior day. And this sheet of a cheese omelet, sated my hunger…

… and I had a leftover breakfast sandwich for later, to boot.

The hour I spent inside the Restaurant was the driest I’d spend all day.

Even though I’d stop at Traceys Seafood Diner later in Sullivan, ME, I was so deeply chilled and wet that I had to keep repeating the adage on the wall to myself.

After all, I chose this adventure so I have to take the crappy weather with the good weather to come—though it won’t be for another six days as this weather system of rainy 40 to 50 degree days is stalled over the region.

But there’s plenty to see through the fog and rain. Like long cove at low tide before the diggers go out to harvest clams.

Or the peaks of Acadia National Park in the distance across Frenchman’s Bay…

… just kidding, the peaks—Mt. Cadillac, Champlain and Dorr Mountains are completely socked in by those distant clouds. But it’s, nonetheless, a beautiful scene in this light, too.

No funky farmhouse in Ellsworth tonight just a cheaper hotel. But it will provide what I sorely need: warmth, dryness, laundry and a hot shower.

My surgically repaired right knee is cranky again. But that’s become par for the course on big elevation or big mile days. Today was elevation, as the miles were modest.

Bike Day 29:
Start: Cherryfield, ME
End: Ellsworth, ME
Miles: 38.40

The knee will be back to (somewhat) regular size tomorrow morning. And tomorrow morning I’ll head to Bar Harbor, ME, to await the tour group. We’ll all meet each other for the first time on Wednesday. The “down” weather days at least will be tempered by good company. There’s how “Life Is Good.”

Here’s the cure… plenty o’ ice!

What I’m Reading:

Much of what we see now is fake, and the reality we face is full of horrors. More and more of the world is slipping beyond my comprehension.

— Jia Tolentino / “My Brain Finally Broke” / The New Yorker

Let the Clouds Come

If yesterday was BRACING, today was RAW. At least early on, and for most of the day.

Raw as in 40 degrees, fog, rain, and the sun breaking through for an hour and a half at midday.

As you can see above the Inn at Schoppee Farm was socked in by fog and drizzle early this morning. There is actually a healthy, roaring river—the Machias River—behind the buildings.

A wet dog of a day.

At least the riding was peaceful and isolated again—other than a few times when I was routed onto US 1 (which has a lane-wide shoulder through most of this area in Maine), most of the route plotted through backcountry, hilly roads.

Had to stop here, after a climb with an 11.8% grade summit! Oy, the climbing—but it was cool and quiet.

Seemed like I was riding through the moorlands for most of the morning.

And then it got RAW at Columbia Falls. Heavier rain started with a cold wind assist—but right across the street…

… a government building awning did the trick. Took a 15 minute dry-ish break under the Columbia Falls Post Office awning.

Half hour later, in Columbia, a food truck on the side of US1, after another brutal climb, provided a lunch spot.

Grilled cheese and cole slaw—the preferred lunch of cold, wet bicyclists… or so I heard (or just made it up).

The sun did break out as I approached my destination in Cherryfield, ME—but I hit a road closure and a minor setback to my goal.

After a 2-mile roundabout, just in time for the blue sky highlight, I made it to Sun Shed Farm. I’m staying inside this sun shed. Why a sun shed?

Because it fits a queen size bed under a half-ceiling of windows. And the bike fits in too.

And it comes equipped with a guard kitty as a standard amenity… heh!

There are lambs, goats, ponies, a mule, cows, chickens … and piglets! On the farm, not in the shed with me.

Did I mention the guard kitty…

All done just in time for the rain to start again. While I, unfortunately, won’t be stargazing tonight with the heavy rain, I’ll be warm and dry inside the sun shed.

Bike Day 28:

Start: Machias, ME
End: Cherryfield, ME
Miles: 30.35

In case you’re wondering why the low mileage… I have 6 days to fill before I meet my tour group in Bar Harbor (which is not cheap), so I’m taking it slower and staying at more economical and interesting places until then. No crazy mileage days now—as the tour of the East Coast Greenway Trail to Washington, DC, will provide plenty of those.

What I’m Reading:

But cover up the stars, the stars
are the absence of clouds.
Let the clouds come, clouds
are vague.

— Patricia Hampl / “Tired Of”

the blah blah blahs

I had “first-day-back fever.”

Fitful sleep—and raring to go and pedal south and finish this end-to-end cross-country ride.

Bracing! Temperatures in the high 30’s to start with an intermittent light rain for the first 2-hours of the ride.

And lots of elevation gain and loss. This isn’t the flat south. This is serious rolling hill country on the edge of the American-Canadian border.

Lots of up and downs, up and downs, up and downs. But blissfully isolated and lightly trafficked roads. Going through national preserve and state lands. Mostly Moosehorn National Wildlife Refuge early in the day.

Errant picture snapped (below) during a quick rain jacket stop. A cold rain in 40 degree weather while doing 8 to 31 miles per hour is… BRACING… to say the least. You can catch a lot of speed doing steep downhills—and a bone-deep chill too!

I was riding in the middle of the lane for an hour as there was such light traffic in northern Maine. Felt truly alone on the edge of Round Lake… except I was standing across the street from Calais Gun and Rod Club building—luckily no one was about with shotguns or fishing tackle.

But some serious gusts started blowing out of the Northwest. The low 40’s temperatures felt like 35 degrees with the wind chill.

Always encouraging to see I’m on the right track… but I’m always put off by signs sprayed with shotgun blasts… fun on a Friday night?

This section started the roller coaster effect in earnest—there were 14 sustained climbs over the 47.5 miles I covered today.

Short break by Clifford Stream, about 32-miles in, just before a climb. It was so cold and windy here I could only tolerate a 5-minute butt break, but I was staring straight up at the steepest pitch of the day.

Spotted the distinctive Sturdivant Public Library Building in East Machias just before the rain made a reappearance.

The day’s destination is about 1.5 miles away here, and it felt like it couldn’t come quick enough. I loved being back out on the trail, but I had very mixed feelings about being cold and wet for 5 hours.

That’s bike trekking…

The riding was a continual roller coaster wave cycle: the riding was up, the riding was down. The weather was up, the weather was down. And I’m worn down after the first day back.

But it’s a good-healthy tired!

Staying at an 1800’s farm house converted into an inn on the banks of the Machias River. Finally warming up!

Biking on the ECG / Day 27:
Start: Calais, Maine
End: Machias, Maine
Miles: 47.58

What I’m Reading:

And the only sound is the rustle of metaphors
crying out and the surprise is that nothing
we say or do not say or say again can hold
here in the crush of one thing into the other…

— Jenny Xie / “Le Temps Mort”

Bike Tour Will Recommence… Tomorrow

I am in Ellsworth, ME. Later today I’ll take the bus up to Calais, ME—which is on the Canadian border. 

Tomorrow I’ll start to pedal south—from the northern terminal point—on the East Coast Greenway Trail towards Bar Harbor, ME.

Next week, in Bar Harbor, I’ll meet 13 other riders, and 2 tour leaders, and we’ll start our inexorable bike trek south to Washington, DC. It will take us 32 days to cover the 1,256 miles—3 off days are scheduled into the ride. We’ll arrive in DC on June 7th.

After the others have dispersed to their respective homes, I will continue southbound  approximately 688 miles, over the course of 2 weeks, until I arrive at Georgetown, SC—thereby completing the entire 2,900+ miles of the East Coast Greenway Trail.

This is what the ECG is if you are unfamiliar with it:

https://greenway.org/about/the-east-coast-greenway

When I’m finished in mid-June, I will have biked 985 miles northbound and 1,944 southbound in March, May and June 2025.

My knees ache just thinking about it!

Thanks for reading and dropping by to see what’s happening in my neighborhood. 

What I’m Reading:

I’m catching up with who I want to be.
I’m saying day after day, I live

the harder it will be to kill me.

— Gabriel Ramirez / “Learn Your Song”