Post Bike Tour Withdrawl

So here's some random blurbs of statements regarding statistics about trip and other random information no one really cares about...

Total Trip miles: 4, 148 miles
Total days of trip: 41 days
Total days of riding on velo: 38 days
Zero days/days off: 3 days (1 in Missoula, MT and 2 in Boulder, CO)

Avg miles per day for the 38 days of actual riding: ~110.5 miles/day

Most miles in one day: 161 miles (Larned, KA --> Cassody, KA)
Least amount of miles in one day: 72 miles (Lexington, VA --> Sugar Hollow Dam, VA)

Avg pace: 13.4 mph

Avg calories consumed/day: dont' have official number, but if I had to guess by the types of food and amounts of food....between 5,000 and 7,500 calories/day

Number of flats: 2 (1 in Idaho while winding down the Snake River on a long hot day...most likely d/t underinflated tires...2nd one while biking thru Yellowstone Park...small piece of glass found to be culprit...damn those litter bugs!)

Number of times changed tires: opted for being lazy and kept the same pair of tires on for entire trip....I should prob change them now though

Mechanical/bike issues: seat-post rack broke in Eastern Colorado, bike hit by lightning

Number of times crashed: 1 time..thank goodness....descending down Lolo Pass into Montana when caught the rear wheel of Stephen's Bob trailor....cause me to go sliding down middle of the road for a good bit resulting in injuries on left lower leg, both sides of hip and left elbow...

Favorite Part(s): all the folks I met along the way, scenery, obtaining a better understanding of small town America, learning a lot about what I'm able push myself to do physically and mentally, biking on Trail Ridge Road and being up over 12,000 feet elevation...basically everything

Least Fav Part(s): rednecks who yell at you randomly....mainly in Missouri and Virginia, crappy roads of Wyoming, crappy road construction in Wyoming, washed out roads in Kansas, not having music/guitar/banjo with me

Gear I wish I didn't bring: I really think I planned things very well with this trip and I felt I had packed just the right amount of stuff and didnt' find I was lacking in any gear (well, a guitar would have been nice...but other than that...)

Toughest Part of trip: biking thru Missouri until got out of Kentucky....climbs were tough along with the humidity and crappy roads/increaed car/trucker traffic, headwinds of Kansas


I also want to thank all my family and friends for puttin up with me as I chase this "crazy" goal of mine...also, thanks to East Coast Bicycle Academy in Harrisonburg for helping me out pick out gear and answer all of my rambling questions from week to week prior to departure. Thanks to all the great folks I met on the trail and helped me out with food, shelter, friendliness, and companionship.

Though I've only been back for a couple days I've already learned how odd it is not to be sleeping in a tent and actually have been having some trouble in sleepin on a mattress...in a bed...with pillows...with a bathroom...with variety in foods to eat....with a computer with dial-up connection..My legs still seem to think that I'm just taking a few days off and will be gettin on the velo in a few hours.....it'll be tough to tell them the news that I reached trails end a few days ago...Part of me really wants to get back out there and just keep riding on and on and on...but the other part of me is glad to have time to relax and pursue some other interests...I've learned a lot of lessons that will carry me far through life and will def carry over to my next goal/adventure I plan on doing.

As of now my post-touring plans include: spending a week up in Maine with Loretta and relatives, starting first nursing job on Aug 20th, and after a week or two of no physical activity I"ll start up training for my, hopefully, first marathon (Philadelphia Marathon) which is sometime before Thanksgiving hoop-la festivities....The Appalachian Trail still becones for me to come, but I think I need a couple years of work experience under my belt first, money saved up, and Loretta may want to hike parts of the trail with me as I work way up the trail, so waiting for her graduation before that can start...but, there's a lot I can be doing in the meantime to occupy my restless mind....how cool would it be to kayak down the entire lenght of the James River watershed..ending up in the Chesapeake Bay? or maybe the Shenandoah River? I think it'd take only a week or so, but would be cool....so yeh, stuff like that.....wow, just rambling now about things things.....anyways, that's what one does early on a Saturday morning when there's no more biking left to do....at least for the time being.