my heart distills my blood heliotrope looking for a sun
a plantation of hateful verdigris factors out to flow
out big star not too far severance runs rampant over
my tripartite welcome parse the light hiding from guards
foiling the crowds out in the rain
i care less each passing year
What I’m Reading:
Just as he was placing his camera in position, the sand at his feet began to move with a rustle. He drew his foot back, shuddering, but the flow of the sand did not stop for some time.
But you. Rain on the hot sidewalk. Turned mist. Handsome aura. Gone.
— Nicole Callihan / “Summer Elegy”
The sky is low and charged with snow that has not yet begun to fall. A flock of starlings keeps lifting off and landing, lifting off and landing. The sound of their wings all at once is soft and explosive. A hundred feathered concussions.
— Anne de Marcken / It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over
The universe demotes me, yet again, to coin-operated laundry, and each night, when everyone is sleeping, our tongues all migrate one mouth to the left.
— Josh Bell / “The War Against Birthdays”
The American narrative is morally unresolvable because the society that saved humanity in the great conflicts of the twentieth century was also a society built on enormous crimes—slavery and the extinction of the native inhabitants.
— Robert D. Kaplan / Earning the Rockies
Much like plate tectonics, poetry is a measure of time, decades and seconds felt equally, refreshed until we pass out or think of better ways to explain what this means.
— Jean Prokott / “Trust the Hours: Poetry to Reclaim & Rename the Sorrow”
I still lived alone in those days. The man who’d helped me make the baby had left to find his way into the television. Specks of skins of selves he’d been in other years still lay around me on the air; and, as such, I’d breathe him in. I pulled his long hair from the sink pipes.
— Blake Butler / Scorch Atlas
. . . mechanical autonomy on a bike opens other doors, such as going on long trips with the confidence of knowing you can face any technical problem.
— Laurent Belando & Louise Roussel / Practical Cycling
What I’m Listening To:
I’m lost at sea Don’t bother me I’ve lost my way I’ve lost my way
Only biking 11 miles feels as if something is lacking.
Not getting on the road and pedaling through the day seems as if I’m bereft of something.
But I’ll be back at it soon—making my way to Georgetown, SC—I’ve already reserved the car back and lodging.
But there is important life at home to be lived in the interim.
I’m certain I’ll be back love/hating every moment on US 17 soon enough.
Here: random shots of the bike on a drumlin atop Peter’s Hill with Boston in the distance — the Arnold Arboretum will be a tranquil stand-in for the immediate future…
What I’m Reading:
Getting started is partly stalling, stalling by way of reading and of listening to music, which energizes me and also makes me restless. Feeling guilty about not writing.
— Susan Sontag / “The Art of Fiction No. 143” / The Paris Review
I never set out to do an 83-mile day on Tuesday—in fact I’d planned a 42.5-mile day to Honey Hill Campground in the Marion National Forest. But I arrived at the campground at 12:45pm. It was much too glorious a day to stop so early. Also, the swarms of no-see-ums (tiny biting midges) were so thick and pervasive there was no way I was going to sit or lay inside a tent for 18-hours until the next morning.
Picture hundreds, thousands, of these tiny teeth swarming all about. If one stood still they’d be covered in dozens of moving black dots on one’s face, hands, arms, legs, clothes—and no-see-um bites rival that of mosquitoes or any biting bug, some say worse.
So I moved on.
Even though I’d scheduled out the next five days through Wilmington, NC, I decided on the spot to move on and skip camping and bike well into the afternoon.
Why ensconce myself inside a tent when there were 7-more hours of beautiful daylight? So I decided to move on without any particular plan where I’d end up. Schedules be damned.
So if you look at the last post’s pictures you see a variety of roads, national forest pics, burnt churches, cemeteries, the strangest Luna Moth sighting (on the wall of a Circle K) outside Georgetown, SC—and that I, indeed, made it to Georgetown, SC.
I found lodging and after 83.1 miles—my longest day biking this trip, and my longest ever—I found lodging by the water, inside four walls, and mercifully no-see-um free (although I was festooned with the earlier itchy bites).
My plan all along (and the cryptic birthday allusion) was that no matter where I was on the Atlantic Coast Route / East Coast Greenway I would take a break and head back home to Boston for my life-partner / wife’s—Pattie—birthday on April 1st.
On my day off in Mt. Pleasant, when the bike was being serviced, I worked out Wilmington, NC, as the point where I could rent a car and be in Boston by April 1st. But it was cutting it close, and I was running into some difficulty arranging for a car hire in Wilmington—a convention or Spring Break?
So when I realized how much of a chunk I bit off biking 83-miles, leaving a mere 16-mile ride the next day as per plan, I thought I’d check to see if I could move the visit up a few days.
As nice as the Lowcountry waterside setting in Georgetown, SC is…
… spending a few extra days with Pattie seems like a better alternative. No contest! So I quickly came up with an alternate.
I was able to secure a one way rental car to Boston, MA. Note here the first pannier is already in the car…
… and now the entire kit and bike. (Who’s behind that shadow?)
Yes, that’ll do nicely.
Now for a longer day driving 880-miles, through torturous beltway traffic around Washington, DC: because 15-hours of driving is nothing next to the joy of spending Pattie’s birthday with her, instead of dodging cars, screws, nails, and every type of road detritus imaginable (and now no-see-ums).
This will be bliss!
And so, with this short break—I do have 2,000 more miles to go to get to Canada—on a bike, yesterday, I also hit the halfway mark of my goal to bike 3,000 miles this year. So Canada seems imminently doable — after this brief pause.
Yeah, that’s me… and all this time you thought I was a mere shadow… stay tuned for the conclusion.
What I’m Reading:
Americans are most themselves and most likeable when on the road. We are a restless nation. Adventurism, for better or for worse, is the bedfellow of optimism.
The bike looked naked this morning stripped of its panniers, rack, and assorted bags—only the fenders and the small seat bag (which has the flat repair kit) the bike is pared down to is essential state. Which is much more maneuverable and fun to ride sans the extra 25 lbs of gear.
As expected, other than a tune-up, it needed a new chain—as chains in these conditions will be at an optimum for 700 or so miles. Otherwise, after an hour, the bike was ready to go, but first I had to trash my well-worn Merrells (really hiking / backpacking shoes which I use for biking all the time) which I purposefully brought out here to use to exhaustion after two years. I also purchased another tube, at the rate I’m going through tubes—and my 650b-sized tubes being less common—I’m now carrying 4 spares.
Many thanks to Kent and Cody in the bike dept. at REI for getting me back on the road quickly, and Marisa and Sean who helped with local camping information. I’m finally using my tent tomorrow night after 1,000 miles.
At REI I also met a couple of other bike tourists—Karen and Alex—who started in St. Augustine and are going through to Virginia and Gloucester, MA, respectively. But they seemed on a tight schedule as they were in and out of the store quickly. But we all quickly agreed on one thing about the routing and US 17—Karen said it: “Are they trying to kill us?”
Finally someone who instantly, and precisely, understood exactly what we’re dealing with.
At REI I was told about the resident alligator often seen around the ponds in the area, and upon looking I found this fierce reptile:
Keep Your Distance. It will strike terror in any unsuspecting passerby.
Lunch at San Miguel Mexican restaurant featured the best Carne Asada platter I’ve ever had… there, there it is… the ribeye is below that mound of onions and jalapeño. It seriously was excellent.
Careful, more fierce reptiles about…
… bathing!
They ain’t Merrells and they sorta’ look orthopedic, but these Giros will get me through the next 1900+ miles.
Day 24 Mt. Pleasant, SC 0 Miles
A productive day despite only pedaling 5.5 (unburdened) miles to try the new tune-up out. New chain, new shoes, extra tubes, and laundry done. And I worked the logistics out for this next week. A bike trekker can’t ask for more…
… well, they can… to stay off of US 17… and I did!
What I’m Reading:
on the other end of the best steak of your life is a cow moaning a song of agony.
— José Olivarez / “Poem with Corpse Flowers & No Corpses”
Or some such distracted nonsense. Specifically because I was distracted (and maybe a two-glasses of wine lightweight) I didn’t realize until this morning that I’d left my credit card at the restaurant last night after dinner.
Not a great awakening—much less on the day I was intending to tour Charleston, SC at leisure. I instead lost four hours of prime tourist time waiting for Zen Asian Fusion to open so I could retrieve my credit card—which I assumed, but was not sure, was in the possession of the restaurant.
And it was! Thanks to the conscientious workers there I was reunited with my credit card at 11 am , and was able to get on my bike trekking way.
Very good pan-Asian food by the way.
Back on the West Ashley Rail Trail for the final handful of miles into Charleston, SC proper.
The tidal marshes as one arrives in Charleston by bicycle.
And quickly on to the Battery 2 Beach trail.
Which runs the perimeter of the Charleston peninsula and fringed with beautiful waterfront homes.
But there’s always work to be done, and a detour leads to interior homes and streets…
… and the “birthplace of preservation…”
… this site commermorates the “seizure of the Planter”—where Robert Smalls, an enslaved man, commandeered a Confederate transport vessel and delivered it past Fort Sumter to the Federal fleet.
Much, including the historic color schemes, is preserved in Charleston, SC.
These cobbles are absolutely bone-jarring to bike on, so I mostly walked through these spots.
The area around the Old Exchange Building was the site of one of the most active slave markets in the 1800’s. Preserved for prosperity, but nothing to be proud of—history requires remembrance and accounting.
The Saffron Cafe & Bakery was an excellent lunch place…
… just in time to almost chuck-up lunch going over the 2.5 mile long Ravenel Bridge…
… not terribly steep, but a good sustained 4-5 percent grade on the middle section…
… which was busy with walkers, runners and bicyclists.
It’s not the 7-mile bridge in the Florida Keys, but it’s much taller and pitched, and I believe it’s the next longest bridge on the Atlantic Coast Route thus far.
On to the eastern side of Charleston—Mt. Pleasant—and a significantly less busy road running parallel to the US 17 traffic madness.
Before the day’s endpoint I stop by REI—where the bike will get a tune-up and refresher, and where I’ll resupply after the first 1,000 miles.
Even though I’m a third of the way through this bike trek, I feel the thousand-yard stare delirium. I think the difficult conditions—as it pertains to the exposure to dangerous traffic—takes a bit of a toll when one does it for many hours daily over three weeks.
I’m feeling a bit of shell shock, or traffic delirium as it were. So tomorrow the bike gets the spa treatment of sorts.
Where I’m bedding tonight, just a quarter-mile away from the REI.
Day 23 Start: West Ashley-Charleston, SC End: Mt. Pleasant-Charleston, SC Miles: 20.46
I started this trip in an abstemious state of mind—no drinking and eating healthy… and I kid you not, this is a manifestation of a dinner brought on by hundreds of miles on US 17.
Laundry, bike tune-up, gear changes, and no US 17 tomorrow! Dinner of Champions! I’m a traffic-shocked wastrel…
What I’m Reading:
… but the only thing ultimately worth your concern is the anguish of your fellow passengers on this hell bound train…
I’ve seen this sign (above) at too many places in South Carolina. First two places I saw them were outside a high school and later an elementary school. Also, outside of a couple of churches. This one was at the hotel last night. You may draw your own conclusions on the state and health of our country.
As usual I include a shot of the first road I’m routed to by (my less than spectacular routing) my gps unit. This was SC 63 / Alt US 17, no shoulder, but very lightly used on an early Saturday morning (lucky for me).
I pedal before you as a chastened rider. I will no longer create my own routes as opposed to the Atlantic Coast Route maps—unless I’m in an emergency.
I’m sticking with the Atlantic Coast route map I have from Adventure Cycling, which shares a great deal of the route with the East Coast Greenway. They’re mapping professionals and I’m not—no matter how creative I get with the routing.
They naturally choose the safest routes and keep one off of busy/dangerous routes like US 17 as much as they are able. That way I won’t end up on crazy disappearing dirt roads like this one below that caused me to backtrack and get on the busier road anyway.
Although some shoulder-less roads like this are so infrequently traversed that it makes for care free riding.
This is busier Alt. US 17 but it had a good and mostly debris free shoulder that made it a safer alertnative route.
But eventually, even though this is a state road below—it’s loosely packed sand that makes for a challenging ride (again, my own route, not the Atlantic Coast or East Coast Greenway route).
About an hour later I caught up to another touring cyclist—Kathy S., note the lack of a shoulder on US 17 here in Jacksonboro, SC. This is a busy road, and not the safest to say the least. Luckily it was a short span.
I actually met Kathy the day I rode into South Carolina at the Taqueria las Abuelitas in Hardeeville, SC—just before Bluffton, SC. We’ve leap-frogged each other on the trail over the course of a couple of days through today in Jacksonboro, SC.
She’s riding from Melbourne, FL to Charleston, SC. She heads back to California on Tuesday. She stayed on the Atlantic Coast Route while I went off on my self-mapped route at Old Jacksonboro Road…
… which led to this: 2 miles of sandy unpaved road…
… which then became a paved road before it once more petered out to an unpaved surface… interesting to say the euphemistic.
Then back on shoulderless US 17–which looks empty and safe enough, but that’s more a function of me taking out my camera only when there isn’t a car in my rear view mirror for a mile or more. I wouldn’t dare split my attention when the speeding cars, SUV’s, and tractor-trailers are coming within two feet of me. Why? Oh, why, did I make this route up myself?!
Did I mention that I’m chastened?
No more.
Only the Atlantic Coast Route mapped routes from here on out. I made this unnecessarily unsafe for myself while attempting to be safer.
One of the days highlights was finding the Yodi Dog Coffee Truck on US 17…
… and getting a boost from a homemade energy drink with 120mg of caffeine—that’ll get me the last 10 miles into Charleston, SC.
This is not a dirt road, it’s the hard-packed and very rideable gravel West Ashley Rail Trail—which is a nice way to enter the Charleston, SC area instead of US 17. This IS on the Atlantic Coast Route map.
The rail trail features nice areas to pull aside and enjoy the Lowcountry marsh views.
Very nicely done. Kudos to South Carilolina for this and the Spanish Moss trails.
I’m done. I’m chastened. I promise to stay on-route.
But first, a high metabolism appetite-driven dinner!
Day 22 Start: Walterboro, SC End: West Ashley-Charleston, SC Miles: 49.53
Tomorrow historic Charleston proper and a ride out closer to REI where I’ll get the bike tuned-up after 1,000 miles on Monday—which will probably be another day off—for gearing up for the next 2,000 miles.
But first, I need to make it safely out of South Carolina.
Yeah, I inhaled that dinner, too!
What I’m Reading:
Be the weird you wish to see.
— Austin Kleon / “Be the Wierd You Wish to See” / Substack
has a kind way of remembering those who mark it for slaughter,
and those it marks for life.
— Fady Joudah / “[…]” / […]: Poems
A poem is supposed to be upsetting—a poem is for upsetting the status quo.
—Terrance Hayes “The Art of Poetry No. 111” / The Paris Review
US National Institutes of Health (NIH) officials have warned researchers not to mention mRNA vaccines in their grant applications, reports KFF Health News. Despite messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines against COVID-19 having been safely administered billions of times, and saving millions of lives, the Nobel-prizewinning technology has been the subject of conspiracy theories that have gained traction among the Trump administration and its supporters. “There is a real climate of fear in academia about this now, especially among vaccine scientists,” says an anonymous senior scientist, who says that he was told by an NIH official to avoid even mentioning the term.
— Arthur Allen / “Scientists Say NIH Officials Told Them To Scrub mRNA References on Grants” / KFF Health News
About suffering they were never wrong, The Old Masters: how well they understood Its human position; how it takes place While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along
— W. H. Auden / “Musée des Beaux Arts”
The shriek of glass on glass peeled my skin. The screech of all things scorched around me. The brassy, tinkled detonation. Shards of wronged birds. Real birds impaled and writhing. Even the sun had hid its eye. We were several layers under now. We could not think of other times. We called truce and splayed our fingers. The sky would not forgive.
— Blake Butler / Scorch Atlas
No clouds on the skyline, the sunlight awful and brutal. A motorcycle rips the day open with its wretched and intentional sound.
— Adam Clay / “Some Mood”
the fact that there’s a lot you have to blank out if you want to get through life
— Lucy Ellmann / Ducks, Newburyport
What I’m Listening To:
The roar of unceasing traffic in my head—morning, noon, and night. I’m destined to be hearing deficient on my left side by the end of this ride… who has time to listen to anything under these circumstances… I don’t!
— The unceasing din / “ceaseless traffic in my head” / US 17
thee istsfor manity reader 