- Idaho we thought was the most beautiful state we biked through with amazing trees and forests as well as an abundance of  beautifully clear rivers that flow forever.  We very quickly fell in love.

-America might very well be the most most magnificent country ever.  We biked through so many different landscapes.  In any other part of the world we would have crossed 7 different countries but here in America it was all one big country.

-I finally understood why people in the middle of the country have such different political views than we do.  I grew up in a city of 8 million people.  I just finished biking through towns which had 100 people in them, or even 1,000.  In my city there was no escaping that people were struggling.  You would walk by the homeless every day and it would be impossible to ignore them.  I grew up seeing first hand the need for government run social programs so the homeless wouldn’t just die on the streets.  In the towns that we were in the community rises up and helps each other.  Everyone knows each other and has known each other because families have been on the same land for 3 generations.  They don’t witness the social programs that I see first hand so why would they think they were important?  Much like I don’t witness the needs of farmers or ranchers so its hard for me understand what they need.  In such a large and diverse country you only see and know what you see and know first hand.

- We learned that while doing a trip like this your gear is very important.  The most important thing that we had was our thermarests.  The mats were light and got pretty small but when they were inflated we could throw them over anything and not feel anything rough under us.  I recommend for a long trip like this go a bit bigger… the comfort will make up for the weight.

- The most useless thing we had with us was also the heaviest.  Because of my profession I packed a very complete first aid kit filled with everything I thought we might need if one of us got sick.  Every time we lowered our weight and mailed more things off the first aid kit was off limits.  Well, no one got sick and we lugged around 5lbs of prevention.  It was not worth a pound of cure.  The lesson in this… don’t let a naturopath pack the first aid kit…

- Always travel with duck tape, zip ties, a universal tool, lots of tubes, one of those ultra small can openers, and a needle and thread.  All of them will come in handy at some point… trust me.

- You don’t need to travel with a solar panel, a water filter or a 5 lbs first aide kit.  If your traveling on American roads there will be clean water and electricity

- If you do a trip like this you should buy a whisper light international stove.  It runs on gasoline so you can fill that up everywhere and its light and compact.

- Pack rain gear, even when you don’t need it for weeks, you will eventually need it.

- Head flashlights are amazing.  They are lighter then maglights and shine bright.

- If your doing a longer bike trip at least 2 pairs of bike clothes are mandatory.  And when your wearing bike shorts with shammies don’t wear underwear.  They will just add to more chafing.

- When packing for a trip like this what you need is 1 outfit for warm weather that could be used if you need nice clothes as well.  One outfit for cold weather.  On sweat shirt.  And 3 pairs of socks.  You will go through them especially when its raining.

- Initially in the beginning of any long bike trip your butt will chafe.  Wise Women’s – Bottoms up balm is the best salve I ever experienced to help heal this problem.  I would apply it nightly and by the morning the chafing would be healed.  This little trick was passed along to me by one of my students and it was the best things ever.  This little secret could help a lot of hineys.

- Bring a book on a long trip like this.  It will be your most valued possession.

- Organization is key on a trip like this.  We ended up breaking our daily use stuff into 3 different pencil case bags.  One for tooth brushing, one for shower use and one for dishes.  We started with everything in 1 bag and that really didn’t work at all.

- At the end of our trip we had a lot of chain issues.  Its a good idea to either travel with a replacement chain or some replacement pins and links.

- I found my camel back invaluable.  I could carry 2 liters of water on my back, it would stay cool and it was always accessible.

- Travel with some travel games.  Justin and I would enter and restaurant and immediately start playing cribbage.  It made it really easy and fun when we had time, which we had a lot of.

- Bring flip flops.  They are light and convenient and there will be a whole lot of showers that you use where you don’t want to be in bare feet.

- We also learned that we loved doing the blog and getting to stay in touch with all our friends and loved ones.  Thanks for cheering us along and touching base.  We felt like you were hre on the trip with us.  Don’t be a stranger.  Drop me or Justin an email or a call.

Ilana – ilana.gurevich@gmail.com

Justin – Justinlevy010@gmail.com

Love you all!

We made it through 10 states total, had countless experiences and are eternally pleased with our trip.

In the end we ended up riding on the Katy trail for 230 miles and it was the perfect way to bring things to a close.  We had miles of beautiful nature, no cars, quaint little biking towns and easy riding.  In fact the Katy trail was the easiest part of our entire trip.  If you are looking to start bicycle touring but are nervous or you just want to go on an easy bike ride that lasts a few days or a week, the Katy trail is the way to do it.  We met a couple on the trail who took a week and came out to bike the Katy.  They spent every night in a different Bed and Breakfast along the trail just leisurely riding it.  It is basically flat and really scenic.

We ended our trail and our trip at the place where Lewis and Clark began their journey west.  In fact, I’m not sure if we stated it before but Justin and I were following the Lewis and Clark trail across America in reverse.  Here is the sign that we saw for all 2,600 miles that let us know we were on the right track.

On our journey we learned a whole ton about their journey… and it turns out we had it a lot better than them.  For one we did not have to hunt or forage for our food.  We didn’t almost freeze to death, have to worry about war with the Indians, no one died on our journey or was flogged on our trip either.  Most importantly however it took us 3 months and them 3 years.  Yet another thing we are grateful about.

Here is a shot of the last moments…

Some of you have wondered how we planned to get back to NYC.  Well we rented a car.  I got a huge deal on a compact car with the intent of hanging the bike out the back of it for 20 hours of driving.  When Justin learned that I chose the compact car instead of the larger one he was sure we wouldn’t be able to do the drive with the bike.  Well we did it and here is how it looked:

Back view

Front view

My view

We ended up making it from Missouri to Chicago to spend some time with Justin’s cousin Lisa and her family before our final head to NYC.  In total we drove 5 hours on Friday and then 14 hours on Sunday with our car filled with a taken apart bike and all of our stuff from the last 3 months.

We are now securely at my parents house and ready to begin the next leg of our journey.  Settling in NYC.

Justin and I have discovered that our beloved maps which have guided us so easily through the country and have labels for bike shops, stores and campgrounds, are missing 1 very important label.  We like to call it “the janky town label”.

Now most of you might not know what Janky is.  Urban dictionary defined it as following:  (adjective) inferior quality; held in low social regard; old and delapidated; refers almost exclusively to inanimate material objects, not to people

One day we pulled into our first town that perfectly fits this description and we knew the map was missing a key something.  Our map marks all towns that we pass along the road as equals.  Therefore in many ways when we pull into a town we don’t know what to expect.  One day way back in Montana we started our ride early in the morning at around 6.  We rode about 15 miles until we hit the town of Geraldine where we were to have breakfast.  This town was janky at best.  It had a real dark energy to it.  The people weren’t friendly in the least and we wanted to get out of there as soon as we came in. Then 30 miles down the road was the town of Denton.  Now till this day we still tell every biker we meet about Denton.  It was by far our favorite small town.  It had that great pool with the diving board and slide as well as Sheri the kindest person we met thus far.  Both towns were on the same map with no difference between them on paper but huge difference between them in reality.  After that Justin and I would always wonder out loud… Will the next town be a Denton or a Geraldine?

We bumped into another one of those towns yesterday.  I had to take pictures so I could share with you all the jankiness of some of these towns.

The pile of garbage is a tell tale sign of a Janky town

Anything that looks like its been 100 years since someone cared for it... Janky town.

All 3 of these were taken in the same town not 100 ft from each other

So if (and when!) he finishes it, he’s going to hand it over to the math geeks at Princeton to check his work.  If he truly solves it, he’ll win a million dollars, receive international acclaim and show what a real amateur mathematician can do.  And you met him here first!

We had a great talk with him, and not just about math.  Life, society, wilderness, college… Real great guy.

Meet Mike the math wizz. And his very heavy pack.

Yom kippur is a day when Jews fast and pray.  The essence of the holiday is that 10 days prior on the Jewish new year (Rosh Hashana) the lord will write down in the book of life who will live and who will die.  He writes how your life will be in the upcoming year.  For 10 days Jews repent and apologize to all that they have wronged.  On Yom Kippur god signs that book of life and your fate is sealed.  For Rosh Hashana I couldn’t find a temple so I was really happy that I could find one of Yom Kippur.

Justin and I set out early from Boonville to ride the 50 miles on the Katy trail to get to Jeff City (as all the locals call it for short).  We rode slow with no hurry at all.  Services started at 7:30 on Friday night and we were only riding 50 miles so whats the rush… right?

At 6:30 it was time to have my last meal before that fast and that’s when we stopped at the Claysville General store for fried chicken and salads.  By the time we were back on the trail with 6ish miles to go it was getting dark.  Really dark.  We rode on wondering if we were lost.  We were looking for a small spur off of the Katy trail which would lead us over the Jeff city bridge.  We searched for about an hour forward and back tracking until we finally met someone who gave us directions.

This bridge was not a bike friendly bridge.  This bridge was more of a freeway with cars flying by at 70-80 mph. There was a bike lane on the bridge that doubled as a pedestrian lane.  Unfortunately, it was closed! Justin and I had seen plenty of “closed bridges” on our trip, and we had managed to navigate some of them anyway so we decided to push through.  We were almost at the end of the bridge when re realized just how closed it was.  There was a lot of construction equipment blocking the path and no way we could get through.    We turned around and headed back.

At this point it was 9pm.  There were no hotels to rent, no campgrounds around and no options.  I called Ann Tettlebaum at the temple (the woman who I had been in touch with around me attending services) and told her that I didn’t see a safe way to make it into town and I didn’t think I could attend.

At this point Justin started joking about how god was making it very hard for me to pray.  Justin and I thought our only option would be to backtrack 40 miles to Columbia, MO where there was another Jewish temple.  If we did that however I wouldn’t be able to fast, which would be a big deal.

That’s when Ann and the Jewish community at Temple Beth-el came to our rescue.  Ann and her husband Harvey have a large farm outside of the city.  Because of that they have a pickup truck.  Ann was kind enough to drive home and pick up the truck so that they could tow our bike and gear over the bridge to the temple.  I then spent the day with them praying.  That night Barbara and Allen (2 other very active people in the community) invited Justin and I into their home to spend the night.  They had never met us before but without any reservations they invited us in.  The next morning Harvey reloaded the truck and drove us back up and over the bridge so we could continue biking.

Barbara and Allen (on right) and Harvey on the left. We were so grateful!

This community was amazing!  They are a small group so don’t have a Rabbai full time.  Instead they brought in a Rabincal student, Ari.  I was so impressed with him.  His voice was amazing, his sermon was really moving and just his overall presence showed how kind and sensitive he was.

The congregation as a whole was so kind to us.  There was a very strong feeling of community that day and they all totally made us feel really welcome.  I was so grateful that they had opened there doors to me and gave me a place to pray and meditate on the highest of all high holidays.  Yet again amazing people who had been so kind to us on our journey.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

At this point Justin and I have voted Missouri the most surprising state.  So we left Boonville and started on the Katy trail.  The Katy trail is a huge endeavor that Missouri has taken on.  They have converted over 200 miles of former railroad into hike-able and bike-able trail.  This trail puts you right on the edge of the Missouri river on one side and amazing gigantic bluffs on the other.  There are no cars or motorized vehicles allowed on the trail.  You are smack in the wilderness until, out of nowhere you come onto a small town which is bike centric.

Justin and I on the Katy trail... all geared up

Me entering a tunnel in the trail outside of Rocheport

My view going through the tunnel

It was in one of these towns that Justin and I finally let go of any notion that Missouri was a normal state.  In fact it happened in Claysville.   We were on the trail when all of a sudden Justin had a hypoglycemic crash.  He got light headed and sweaty.  We backtracked to a store we saw just a few minutes back.  When we walked in they were having a private party and the restaurant wasn’t officially opened. They were kind enough to serve us however and boy were we happy they did.

That night we ate what Justin describes as the best friend chicken he has ever had.  (I don’t eat friend chicken since its breaded but I trust his discerning taste).  Justin went on a 5 minute shpiel about how fried chicken needs to be crunchy on the outside while moist on the inside and that is a hard thing to do.  We thought it couldn’t get any better until we tried their pie.  The pie was so good in fact that we had 3 pieces total.  Oh my lord!!! These people know how to cook.

We were so impressed that we met the owners and they gave us a brief history.  Turns out they bought the land and a broken down building that at one time had served as the old general store in the 1800s.  They rebuilt it and opened the restaurant.  They are only open to serve Saturday dinner and Sunday lunch.  On top of running the restaurant they both (a married couple) work full time.  That means that this family works  7 days a week.  And if their food is any sign they must love it.

We were eternally grateful that they were there…

I immediately got on the phone with the bike mechanic in town while Justin tried in vain to fix it.  Then out of nowhere about 5 minutes later this guy pulls up followed by another guy.

It turns out the first guy was Chuck the bike mechanic.  He came because he didn’t have much faith that Justin and I would be able to fix the chain.  The second guy however was a huge surprise.    He was Bob Bosma a local radio newscaster.  Turns out every morning yahoo does a search for him to look for Boonsville being mentioned online.  He read our last blog post and came looking for us.  It just so happened he found us exactly when our chain broke and Chuck found us.

Meet Bob... the man who made Boonville so amazing for us!

Bob preceded to interview Justin for the radio while I went with Chuck to fix the chain.  When Bob found out where we were planning on staying (the cheapest motel in town) he thought he could find better.  He disappeared for a little while and then returned telling us that the Hotel Fredrick would put us up free of charge.  Now this is no normal hotel room… Its amazing.  The room is spacious and wicked comfortable.  And the bathroom… Oh my lord the bathroom.  There is a walk in shower as well as this huge luxurious tub that fits both of us.  We walked in and realized just how lucky we were.

The bathroom....

We then got a call that a local newspaper reporter was here to interview us about our trip.  And when we were done with the interview the mayor of Boonville treated us to dinner at the best restaurant in town!

All in all this town has been really great to us.

Boonville is a lovely little America town where everyone knows everyone else.  It has a pictureque Main street with really old architecture and history.  Bob was telling us that Boonville was home to a big civil war battle and this city was a huge hub during the steamboat era, the train era and the highway era.  This town has stayed strong.  We love it here and we are so happy that we got to stay and take a day off.  Tonight the city is having a Festival of lights that Justin and I will check out tonight.

Tomorrow we are starting the Katy trail.  We will ride to Jefferson City where I have found the only temple in miles to go to for Yom Kippur.  The congregation there has been nice enough to welcome us and give us a place to stay.  It is very lucky that I found it.