Rolling Home

I got up with the alarm clock on Monday morning and got ready for one last day. Cider stayed in bed and hit snooze so many times I almost hit his phone against the wall. I'd done enough electronic damage in the preceding ten days to last a couple of years, though, so I settled for turning on the overhead light. He made angry noises and covered his face.

"Time to go," I said.

"There's no need to be a dick about it," he groused.

"So get up," I said. I turned the light off again (my nod to non-dickishness) and went down to the kitchen, where I dug around in the cabinets until I found cups for the brewer.

"I see you found the coffee," Carl said, appearing behind me as I added milk to my cup.

"I can always find coffee," I said.

"I didn't think you'd be the first one up," he said.

I rolled my eyes. "I don't know," I said, gesturing vaguely upstairs. "I think he went back to sleep."

"No, he's awake," Carl assured me. "I saw him."

"Oh good." My opportunity to further ruin Grumpy's morning by jumping on the bed had disappeared, probably for everyone's good.

Alisia brought Vivi out to the bikes with us so we could update last year's photo of her on my bike.

Traffic was quiet, since we were opposing the natural direction of rush hour, and we headed into the rising sun and beautiful weather.

"Trying to cut out a gas stop today?" I asked at our first break, which was nearly 140 miles from Carl's.

"I'm not thinking," Cider said. "I'm just driving." He looked exhausted, and I couldn't disagree. We parked the bikes by a curb at the edge of the Sheetz and lay down on the sidewalk, he on his back and me on my stomach. I think we were both trying to pretend that we had some other choice than to get back on the bikes and do another 400 miles.

After a few minutes I got up and bought some french fries and espresso. While I was eating, some guys who had parked an electric truck behind us came over to chat.

"You don't build power line, do you?" one of them asked Cider.

"Yeah, I do," he replied.

"No way!" the guy said. "I could tell by your boots." We chatted with them for a few minutes, but eventually could no longer deny the fact that it was time to leave. I stored my extra can of espresso in my bag and off we went.

The music player in my brain was on as it usually is, but with no external iPod to change tracks for me, it got stuck. I listened to Like I Roll by Black Stone Cherry for that entire day, and I don't think I'll ever associate that song with anything but driving through Pennsylvania. It's quite appropriate, really; it talks about rolling through the hills under the sun, which is exactly what I was doing.

I was snacking on jerky at our next stop when a pickup truck pulled in and parked awkwardly at the curb by the store.

"The hell kind of parking is that?" Cider wanted to know.

"And he's shirtless," I said. Anything can seem relevant to anything else when you're tired enough. The driver got out and headed for the air pump, which at least explained the odd location of his vehicle.

"Not really the kind of shirtless I look for in a dude, though," I said. "Or, you know, something."

"Not the kind of dude you look for in a shirtless?" Cider offered.

"Yeah. That."

At that moment another Vaquero pulled in, also towing a trailer, ridden by an older couple. They parked behind us and Cider approached the guy to inquire about his trailer hitch. I tried to remember if I'd seen him approach anyone for conversation at any other stop. We ended up chatting with them for a while. The woman used to ride, but was having an issue with her hands that had forced her to passenger instead.

At the far edge of Pennsylvania we took a break at a welcome center. They had nothing that I considered food, just a vending machine full of cookies, so I pulled out the summer sausage I'd brought from home and sliced it up with my pocket knife.

I was chilling on the sidewalk, munching on my emergency sausage and admiring the trees, when a woman pulled in on a motorcycle and parked some twenty feet away. She was loaded down with gear and clearly on a long trip. I waited for her to get off the bike, but she appeared to have stopped only to manage her GPS and not to take a rest. Eventually I wandered over.

"Hey, where you from?" I asked.

"Massachusetts," she said.

"Where?" I asked.

"Um, outside of Springfield?"

"No way," I said. "I'm from West Springfield!"

"What!"

She was riding an old police bike, on her way to Virginia to visit her son and to look for a job. I told her to look me up on Facebook so we could do some riding when she returned, and she pulled out her phone.

"Roller derby?" she asked, clearly having found my profile. "That's so funny...I was skating with derby until I hurt myself last fall."

It was my turn for the "What!"

Before we parted ways, I invited her to our fresh meat night, since she was healing from her injury and looking to skate again.

"She's from Westside," I told Cider when I returned to the bikes.

"What?" he said, raising an eyebrow.

"And she does derby."

"What!"

"Leave it to me to recruit for us in freaking Pennsylvania."

Our second-to-last stop was somewhere south of the Taconic Parkway in New York. Cider said something about waving to me from the highway.

"You're not dropping me off at home?" I asked. "You're not even going to give me a hug?!"

"I'll give you a hug at the last gas stop," he said. "Your place is 45 minutes out of my way and I want to get home."

"Oh," I said. "I didn't realize it was that far for you. That's fair."

We sailed up the Taconic, a beautiful four-lane piece of road where the halves are separated by trees, and the rest of the world is drowned out by more trees. It's reminiscent of the Trace but more interesting, since there are hills and curves. I found myself trying to enjoy it extra, knowing it was the last run of the trip. Some part of me hoped that if I focused hard enough I could make it last forever.

At a point in the road that felt oddly random, we turned off and dove into a small town. A lovely twisty back road lined with trees and pretty houses took us approximately north. Since Cider had told me the secret of the bikes - that the Hornet, as I'd started calling her, could easily take any curve that the Vaquero could make it through - I challenged myself to keep up with him, and I managed.

Just before the Mass border, we stopped one last time. I bought an ice cream sandwich, as much to lengthen the stop as to enjoy the treat.

"I can almost see it," Cider said, gesturing at Massachusetts. "So close..."

"Too close," I said sadly. "What are you going to do when you get home?"

"Shave this animal off my face," he said. "Take a nap. You?"

"Shower," I said. "Unpack."

"Meh. Unpacking can wait."

"Meh. What else am I gonna do?"

Finally I couldn't drag it out any longer. I wrapped my arms around him.

"Thank you thank you thank you," I said. "This has been amazing."

"I'm glad it was what you needed," he said.

We took 90 together as far as 91, where he went north and I went south. I passed him on the ramp, waved inappropriately, and took off. After a short, hot battle with the usual traffic, I was back in my driveway. Sass was just leaving.

"I unlocked your door," she said as we hugged. I'd had Cider message her to do just that, since my keys were theoretically locked in the house.

While unpacking that night, I found my keys - exactly where I had expected them to be. Exactly where I had in fact searched for them before we ever left my driveway. They'd been with me the whole time, all 4,412 miles of the trip.

Grumpy Cat and Nyan Cat Go to Pittsburgh

On Sunday morning, after 830 miles on Saturday and about five hours of sleep, the road crazies really set in. I dragged myself awake, cruised the hotel's breakfast bar, checked out, and met Cider at the bikes. We gassed up and cleaned our face shields across the street and then got back on I70.

I had coffee and music, and I was wired. The first hundred miles flew by as I rocked out to Bif Naked, glad to be wearing a full-face helmet so I could sing without eating bugs. Had I been on my own, I would've skipped that first gas stop entirely; I felt amazing, full of the joy of the open road. The air was pleasant, the sun beautiful, the traffic quiet.

The agreement (and requirement of the Vaquero's tank) was to stop about every hundred miles, so we pulled into a gas station somewhere in eastern Illinois. I parked at the edge, left my gloves and helmet on my seat, and went to pester Cider. After all, what else did I have to do?

"Hi!" I chirped, jumping over the curb and landing next to him.

He turned to look at me, wearing the expression of someone who was asleep but somehow still standing. "No," he said.

"Yes!" I said, grinning and bouncing.

"No."

"Nonsense!"

He put his hand in my face and gently pushed me backward, glaring while I laughed. I stepped away and hopped up on a railing. Cider moved his bike from the pump and then went inside. I considered getting a snack but thought it might mess with the perfect energetic equilibrium I had going, so I leaned back against the pump to wait.

I didn't realize I was grinning absently at the ceiling like a maniac until Cider returned and stopped several feet away from me. I turned to look at him and was met with a suspicious stare.

"What?" I demanded, then started cackling and slid sideways off my perch. He just shook his head and went to get a Red Bull from the trailer. I followed.

"There is something wrong with you," he said as I bounced up and down.

"Nothing's wrong," I said. "Are you kidding? This is amazing. The weather is great. I feel so good."

We got to talking about riding weather in New England, and I said most of the year wasn't good for riding.

"Most days in New England are great," he argued.

"No," I said. "Most of the days are cold."

"That's because you're a popsicle," he told me, and I broke my ten-second streak of calm and started laughing again.

"That's us," I said. "Lollipop and Popsicle, the Motorcycle Maniacs." Once back on the road, I realized we were really Grumpy Cat and Nyan Cat.

Very little of the rest of the day sticks in my head. There was one gas stop at a creepy, dirty gas station where I was serenaded by a woman screaming at her sister from the cab of a truck. Cider somehow missed the whole exchange.

At the last stop before hitting the Pittsburgh area, I tried to fill my Camelbak but the station didn't seem to have water. We were making good time and Cider was texting my cousin Carl with updates, since my phone hadn't come back to life. My iPod was dead again, refusing to take a charge.

The concrete skirt around the pump was tilted left. The bike leaned toward me as I dismounted, and I knew I'd need help uprighting her again when it was time to move. But by the time my tank was full, Cider had already pulled away and disappeared to another part of the parking lot. I decided to get on and try, and without interference from my brain, my body figured it out - I pushed her upright with my thigh before I was fully in the saddle, and we were off like nothing had happened. It only took me 3,500 miles to figure out the trick.

Still on 70 at the edge of the city, we hit a traffic jam. After ten minutes or so of walking, we took an exit for 470. Then we hit another traffic jam. That one took a bit longer to get out of. Eventually we made freedom, and then hit more traffic on 376. Headed toward the Fort Pitt tunnel we hit a fourth snarl, and that one was by far the worst. It took probably half an hour to get from the top of the hill into the tunnel. It was hot and sunny, and shady spots were few and far between. I killed the engine and walked the bike most of the way down using the momentum of the hill to carry me. I ran out of water and wished for more.

The tunnel itself took another ten minutes, and when we reached the bridge at the end, the problem became clear: someone had crashed their car in the middle of the bridge, closing two of the four lanes and forcing traffic to take the far left or far right lanes. I couldn't understand how someone had gained enough speed in that area to do the amount of damage that the car had taken. I thought some curse words at them for crashing where they had, then moved on.

Past the next exit ramp we finally got an opening, and we zipped out of the line of crawling cars and opened our throttles. That was when I felt a small but alarming tug on the cable plugged into my helmet. I didn't have to see it bouncing away to know my iPod was gone. We were in the middle of a curving bridge with no shoulder, so I didn't even try to stop; it wasn't worth my life or the bike. My shopping list lengthened to two iPods and a cell phone.

We arrived at Carl's in the late afternoon and invaded the house with our sweaty, sticky, gross selves. I introduced Cider to Carl and Alisia, and Vivi came running out with even more bounce than I'd had that morning. We sat at the dining room table and talked about travel and kids while Vivi climbed into our laps, poking at my labret and sticking her fingers through the tunnels in Cider's ears. She leaned toward him and made a ridiculous evil face, and he made one back.

"I like munchkins about your age," he said, and she giggled.

I killed three glasses of water in short order and then actually killed the glass by dropping it on the tile floor in the kitchen. Cider put his hand over his face.

"She's a disaster," he told Carl, and I had no grounds to deny it. I swallowed my hysterical laughter long enough to help him sweep the glass off the floor and soak up the puddle of water. Then I got myself a plastic cup.

"You sure you don't need a sippy cup?" Cider asked.

"I bet I can find one," Carl offered.

"I think...I think I can handle it," I said, not entirely certain I wouldn't be cleaning water off the furniture in the not-too-distant future.

Carl set out a selection of zucchini pasta, fish sticks, and dumplings for dinner, and we dug in. After we ate, the conversation turned to work, and Alisia told a story about one of her patients who had been dubbed The Naked Man after he bolted out of his room without clothes, ran circles around the table in the common area, and finally grabbed the documents she was carrying and took a large bite out of them. Carl followed that with a story of someone who had built "Stonehenge" out of potato chips and his own excrement. By that point I was resting my forehead on the table and nearly crying with laughter.

I realized after a very welcome shower that I'd left my sweatpants in Colorado, so I came downstairs and eventually went to bed dressed in a grey Rugged Maniac t-shirt, a blue tie-dyed skirt, and pink wool socks. It seemed like an accurate representation of the inside of my brain that day.

Bike Talk in St. Louis

I don't know exactly what time we hit the hotel, but it felt reasonable; it definitely wasn't the next morning, at least. I threw my gear in the corner, stripped down to my sports bra and padded shorts, and flopped onto one of the beds. Cider started to remove his shirt, then stopped.

"Augh!" he protested. "Oh god. OW. Fuck." He got the shirt off and put his hands over his sunburn, wincing.

I crossed my arms. "No sympathy here," I said. I plugged my phone into the wall in the hope that it would come back to life, but it got stuck in a boot loop and still refused to take a charge. After a few minutes its constant flashing and vibrating got annoying, so I unplugged it and tossed it in a corner.

Cider disappeared to the ice machine, then returned, poured something into a hotel cup, and sat next to me.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Great, actually," I responded, surprised that that was the answer. "I mean, I'm tired, but...this is amazing. I'm having so much fun. What about you?"

"I'm miserable," he answered. "I hate this."

"Then why do you do it?"

"It's about getting there with the bike," he said. "I just hate doing these long days."

"I thought you liked riding," I said.

"I've been doing this for eleven years," he said.

"Maybe I'll hate it in ten more years, too," I acknowledged.

"There's McGillicuddy's on the desk," he said, and headed off to shower.

"That explains why you're drinking water out of a hotel cup," I said. "Because you're not."

I don't actually like drinking mouthwash, but it was more entertaining than water. I poured myself a drink and picked up my iPod. By the time he returned, I had pried the stubborn device apart with my knife and was poking around the inside. He looked at me askance as I stuck the blade into the hold switch. After a moment I found what I was looking for and released the actual hold switch, which was no longer connected to the button on the outside.

"Fixed," I explained, holding it up. Then I plugged it in and was happy to find that it actually took a charge, which it had refused to do earlier in the day.

"This has been interesting for me," I said, returning to the topic of motorcycling. "Riding with you has pointed out the edges of my skills. I've always ridden either alone or with people about as skilled or less skilled than I am."

"You're doing fine," he said.

"Yeah, I'm keeping up," I said. "But that road to Rye scared the shit outta me."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" he demanded, leaning away like I had told him I'd eaten dog shit.

"Um, no," I said. "I don't do a lot of mountain riding. That was really the outer limit of my skills."

"That was about the slowest I could possibly have done that ride," he said, and it was my turn to raise my eyebrows.

"I see." We ended up agreeing to go ride some twisties near home when we were there again.

"So here's the secret," he said. "That bike can do more than the Vaquero can. So if you see me do something on this bike, you can definitely do it on that one. I mean, the bike will do it."

"That's all I need to know," I said. "I trust you, and the bike."

I went to sleep without finishing my mouthwash, looking forward to riding with music the next day.

Kansas and Misery

Saturday began at 5am; miles don't happen without putting in the time. I put on the padded shorts I'd been ignoring since arriving in Colorado, then my leather and my rain suit, as it was pretty chilly. By the time I got outside, Cider had already moved my bike out of the gravel and hooked up the trailer. We packed the last of our things in, made the hugging rounds, and headed into the rising sun.

He had warned me that Kansas was a terribly boring way to go home, and that normally he'd take the extra hundred miles to go via I80 instead of I70. But I wanted to see my cousin in Pittsburgh, and besides, I'd get to add both Kansas and Missouri to my list of states I've ridden in, so Kansas it was.

The first stop, still in Colorado, was warm enough to remove my rain gear and hoodie. I got a coffee. A group of touring bikers with trailers came through the station at the same time, but I didn't get to talk to them. I've noticed that when I appear to be traveling with Cider, I almost never get approached for conversation. When I was traveling on my own, it was a rare stop that I didn't chat up some random stranger about bikes and road life. This time around, it was a rare stop that I spoke to anyone other than my road companion.

Part of it is that I approach others less often; there was more of a push to make time on this trip, so I didn't want to hold us up by getting chatty. But it's something else, too, that keeps other people from opening a conversation with me. Maybe it's just that I don't look lonely, or maybe it's that Cider's big-black-bike-and-sleeved-out-tats look scares people off. It's the only downside I've identified to traveling with company.

When I mentioned it to Cider, he said that he actually tries to look as grumpy as possible so that people don't approach him, because he hates talking to strangers.

"And it's always the little old ladies who come up to me," he said, "And ask about my tattoos! What the hell." He mimed someone pointing at his arms and imitated an old voice. "What's this one? And this one?"

I cracked up and hoped that I would get to see this sight for myself.

Kansas was exactly as promised: long, flat, straight, and boring. Also hotter than the ovens of hell. My bike registered 93 to 96 degrees for at least eight straight hours, and there weren't even scraps of clouds to hide the sun. I sun screened my neck and shoulders, the only parts of me that were available for burning, and warned Cider to do the same. He said he'd be fine.

The first Kansas stop I spent hiding in the shade and eating jerky (after the horrified realization upon purchase that their sales tax is over 10%. Holy crap, Kansas). This particular gas station had a sign we both appreciated.

The next stop necessitated going inside a building for air conditioning and a milkshake (Cider) and fried might-be-chicken pieces (me). He slumped in his chair and looked downtrodden.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Miserable," he replied. "How are you doing?"

"Great!" I responded, licking honey mustard off my fingers. "I love the heat."

"I forget that about you," he said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, I may be native to New England," I said, "But I'm not really built like it. I hate winter. I'm built more like I'm from Texas."

"Why do you still live there?" he asked.

"It's home," I said. Then, as we were getting back on our machines, "Do you want some sunscreen?"

"Nope."

My iPod had died during the morning's riding; the hold switch that locks the buttons wouldn't release, so I couldn't operate it. Cider pointed out that I could download an FM tuner for my phone, so I did, only to discover at the next gas stop that it was actually eating my data at an alarming pace. Annoyed, I turned it off and rode without music.

We continued to rack up the miles as we baked our way through the afternoon, and eventually it was time for me to book a hotel. I picked one on the eastern edge of St. Louis so we could start the morning headed away from rush hour.

Cider's arms had gotten so red by that time that his tattoos almost seemed to be disappearing under the shell of a lobster.

"Can I please put some sunscreen on you?" I asked, waving the tube.

"Nope."

"That's gonna hurt."

"Yup."

"That's why I wear sleeves."

"I guess I could put the long-sleeved shirt on."

"That counts as sunscreen!" I encouraged him. He applied the sleeves and we rolled out again.

Around sunset we got Subway sandwiches for dinner, and I sucked down my third canned coffee drink of the day.

"How many of those have you had today?" Cider asked, and I told him. He gave me side-eye. "So you've had more of those than I've had Red Bulls. But half a Red Bull makes you hallucinate?"

"All I can think is it was the interaction of the Red Bull and the Tylenol," I said, shrugging. "I know it makes no sense. Maybe Red Bull alone is fine. But the other thing that doesn't make sense is trying it again when I'm still out here riding."

"True," he agreed.

Our last gas stop of the day was at the tail end of a beautiful sunset. I parked behind Cider, since it wasn't my gas stop, and got off the bike to take a picture. Then I looked at the front of the building and poked Cider in the shoulder.

"Did you see where we stopped?" I asked.

"What? No." He looked up and started laughing. The store was called Abel's Quik Shop. I took a picture of that too before going inside.

"Did you mean to do that?" Cider asked when we were back at the bikes. He was pointing to the spot where my hand guard was touching the top edge of his trailer.

"What can I say, I know where my corners are," I said. "I'm that good."

"It's only good if you meant to," he said.

"I meant to," I said, grinning.

"Nah. You didn't mean to if it's touching."

"Shut up."

We got back on the road to St. Louis as dark fell for real. Traffic got heavier as we closed in on the city, and I had to shorten the distance between us so we didn't get separated. My phone had decided that it would no longer boot or take a charge, so if I got lost, it would be tough to find either Cider or the hotel.

We'd done enough miles together at that point that I could read his mind about traffic decisions. I didn't have to wait for the turn signal anymore to know what the next move was going to be. It started to feel like having a good blocking partner in derby, when the communication is so fluid that you appear to move together magically, like the flock of sparrows that all change direction at once with no sound and no apparent leader. We zipped through traffic with efficiency, leaving the cars and trucks in our collective dust.

In the last fifty or so miles, I was reading his impatience and could almost hear the things he was saying to the cars blocking our open-road freedom. I tucked myself up against the corner of the trailer and waited for him to dodge into the other lane. And waited. Finally I ducked over and sped up, taking the open block to the right of the slow car hanging around in the left lane. I looked over my shoulder, encouraging him to take the space next to me, but he didn't.

"You don't understand," he explained to me later. "Once I start that shit, I don't stop."

"What, you think I can't keep up?" I demanded.

"I know you will," he said. "That's why I didn't."

I had no argument. That's a responsible friend.

Royal Gorge and Rum

Friday morning, Cider took Kimmy to the airport; her work schedule demanded that she leave a little early. Alan, Julie, and Dave were off to see the Royal Gorge, so I jumped in their car too and we headed south.

Route 115 took us along the edge of Fort Carson, where the installed military seemed to be running maneuvers. An Apache helicopter was circling the area, and Dave spotted a tank hiding beside a small hill. I didn't see it; I guess it was well-hidden.

On route 50 we turned west and shortly entered Cañon City. As we drove toward the parking lot for the Gorge, Dave mentioned that he had been here before, but not since the seventies. In 2013, a fire had destroyed most of the infrastructure at the Gorge, and they had rebuilt the bridge and visitors' center. Some of the boards from the old bridge survived, and they used them as siding on the new building.

Dave asked me if I wanted to do the zip line with him, and I said hell no.

"Wait, let me get this straight," he said. "Wrecker - is not going to go on the zip line?"

"Nope," I said. "I didn't bring clean pants. But thanks."

Alan was willing, though. The four of us set off across the bridge, admiring the slightly terrifying view and taking pictures. I accosted a random tourist to take a photo of us, and we in turn were accosted by another tourist, who politely offered to photobomb us. Julie said that was a great idea, on the grounds that he was adorable. Here we are with Spence, who promptly disappeared after the picture was taken, never to be seen again.

When we reached the end, the two guys took off to the zip line and Julie and I sat down to watch a band performing near the bridge. They were an Irish Gaelic rock band called Potcheen (apparently a type of whiskey) and they were amazing; I've got a video that I'll post in a future entry. I could have stayed all day, tapping my toes and singing.

But we wanted to get back to the other side in time to photograph Alan and Dave as they zipped across the gorge, so we walked back, stopped for ice cream, and parked ourselves on the balcony in the shade. That was when I realized my camera was missing.

I was pretty sure I'd left it on the bench in front of Potcheen. The visitors' center didn't have it, so I walked the bridge again and checked the stage area, giving a wave and a holler to Alan and Dave as they sailed through the air a few hundred feet away. The camera wasn't there, but the drummer, who was on break, said an employee had picked it up. After giving him a hug and a compliment on his band's music, I went to the movie theater, who called the visitors' center. This time they had my camera, so I walked back again.

By the time I was reunited with my technology, my three friends were sitting at a table indoors, discussing their ride. It was short, they said, but had a great view.

On the way back to Cañon City, Alan took us over Skyline Drive, a short one-way piece of road that runs the crest of a ridge. It's several hundred feet over the surrounding flats, with steep sides and only enough width for a single car. The view is just amazing, and there are dinosaur tracks on the northern end.

We returned to the house in the mid-afternoon, to find everyone sitting around the kitchen table, chatting and drinking.

"Make me one?" I asked Cider, who was refreshing his drink, and he nodded.

I got out the baking ingredients again and set about making more pie crust. I knew I had enough filling this time, having bought an entire bag of apples, and I found cinnamon and nutmeg in the cupboard (this rental house was stocked amazingly well, both with ingredients and with tools).

Dave and Alan set about peeling and slicing apples, and Cider handed me a glass that was at least half rum. I cut butter and divided dough and drank, and by the time the crust was chilling in the fridge, I realized I'd forgotten to eat lunch. But we had nowhere to be for the rest of the night, and I wasn't the first one into the booze, so it didn't matter.

Drunken baking is actually a skill I practice with some regularity, so the pie came out great. The human amoeba moved to the back patio, where Tracy announced that getting back together with this group every year was just like slipping back into a pair of dirty underwear. We all agreed we couldn't wait to do it again.

Pike's, Pie, and One Green Muppet

Everyone comes to Colorado to get high, or so they say. Most of us don't smoke, though, so we went for a natural high: the top of Pike's Peak.

My butt was sore from so much time in the saddle, so I jumped into the empty space in Dawn's van. Dawn, Kelly, Scotty, Danielle, Alan, Julie, and myself filled the van, and Cider and Kimmy followed on the bike. We formed a spontaneous news crew, Kelly calling out the temperature as we rose in altitude, Dawn giving traffic reports, and Julie taking on world news and events.

We stopped at the reservoir to take pictures and feel how cold the water was. It was definitely chilly, but honestly, I would have gone in it. The sun was high and the air was still summery.

Our next stop was the peak, but getting there was a trial. The driver two cars ahead of us seemed to be unfamiliar with mountain driving, and slowed down to walking speed for every single curve (and there were many of them). Julie started fretting about Cider and whether he could keep the bike upright at this speed. We craned our necks around at every turn to make sure he was still there.

"I need to calm down," Julie finally said. "There's nothing I can do about this."

Someone decided there was actually something we could do: express our frustrations to that driver very loudly.

"Idiot."

"Fuckwit!"

It quickly became a contest.

"Douchecanoe!"

"Asshat."

"Fucktard."

Scotty put on a New York accent and quoted South Park. "You're worse than a pussy!" he called out. "You're just a pussy faht! Fuckin' queef!"

"Haha, queefahhh."

"Fuck face."

"Assclown!"

"Dickweed."

"Dick salad!"

Eventually we made it to the top and found parking. Cider got off the bike long enough to say they were going back down, as the altitude was getting to him, and he and Kimmy took off.

I took some obligatory tourist pictures with the sign, admired the scenery, and wandered through the gift shop. Dawn and I found each other near the front door and made a loop of the peak together, stopping to admire the rail car as it went by. For being in such a small area, the group dispersed with remarkable effectiveness, and it took us a while to put everyone back together again. Several people were having issues with the altitude, so we headed back down to thicker air. Scotty had bought donuts for all of us, and I spent half the ride down noshing and pulling crumbs out of my lap. At one of the stops, we pulled over so that Kelly and Dawn could see snow. The rest of us were nonplussed and stayed in the van, but the two Arizona girls were excited.

Back in town, we headed to Pizzeria Rustica for lunch. We sat outside, where they provided water for the dogs, and we did an awkward dance trying to move the umbrellas around for maximum shade. The patio was uncomfortably hot, but the food was excellent. I was especially impressed by Dave's pesto.

After regrouping at the house, a handful of people went off shopping and a few more went to Seven Falls. I watched Kimmy and Cider play cards for a while, then went up to the kitchen and started making pie crust. During a discussion on food and cooking the day before, I'd admitted that my specialty was pie, and some smart person had said they doubted me. There's no better way to get me to do something. Besides, other people had been showing off their cooking skills at breakfast and dinner; Dawn had made frittata and breakfast burritos, and Gene even converted me to biscuits and gravy. I felt it was my turn to pitch in.

I'd gotten ingredients the night before but underestimated the amount of filling the house's pie dish would hold. I looked around for filler but found nothing satisfactory. I was relaxed and wearing sandals and really didn't feel like going to the effort of pulling the bike out of the gravel patch just to go buy berries. After debating for a moment, I asked Gene and Bekah if I could borrow their car.

Gene ended up driving me to the store, because their "car" is a behemoth with very poor visibility. I was puzzled by how he even got it to fit down the side streets in the neighborhood. When we arrived at the grocery three blocks later, I felt like an idiot and wished I had Googled the location of the store before asking for help; I could have walked. Partly to justify the use of the vehicle, I bought ice cream.

Cider and Kimmy had gone to dinner in an airplane (a decommissioned aircraft turned into a restaurant), and the three others left in the house were chilling out. With the kitchen to myself, I had nothing better to do than lattice the pie, something I almost never bother with. I'd done the crust from memory and the filling from invention, and was hoping for the best.

When the diners, the shoppers, and the sight-seers returned home, they all announced how good the house smelled. Everyone gathered in the kitchen.

"Who wants a piece of Wrecker's pie?" Cider asked, and suddenly the pie jokes were flying. They continued until the pie was just a memory and the dish a mess of crumbs. Kelly found something sticky on the floor and asked what had been spilled.

"Wrecker's pie," Cider answered. Then, "Hey, I warned you I don't have an off switch."

After pie there was more fire play, and then Scotty got out his guitar. I'd heard tale of his version of the Rainbow Connection, and it was everything it was cracked up to be (which is saying something, given how favorite stories can grow with time). If I closed my eyes, I swore I was sitting next to Kermit the Frog.

As we talked and sang and enjoyed the fire, thunderheads were forming on the northern horizon, and flashes of lightning started to make themselves seen over the flickering of the fire. A few people packed it in and went to bed, and a few of us moved our chairs into the middle of the lawn to enjoy Mother Nature's show. It never actually rained where we were, so we sat out for quite a while, taking pictures of the sky, before finally turning in.

Bishop's Castle and a Family Visit

In Rye, Colorado there's a place called Bishop's Castle. One man has been building it by himself since 1992, and he allows people to explore and take pictures and climb into the towers, asking for voluntary cash donations in return. Kimmy heard about the place while looking for things to do, so on Wednesday the three of us got on the bikes and headed out there.

We headed south on 115, then turned left. I hadn't bothered to map the route or learn anything about the road; I was so accustomed to following Cider that it just seemed unnecessary. What hadn't occurred to me was that I was accustomed to following him on the highway. We sailed into the first hairpin turn doing the same speed, and halfway through it I had the bike in a deeper lean than I was comfortable with, and I was forcing myself to breathe. We made it through, and not half a mile later there was another one. After another five seconds of pants-shitting terror, I made it through that one as well, and I decided to slow down and inspect the turns for myself.

The road to Rye was quite fun, really. There were sweepers and switchbacks and nice long runs with a mountain view. I pushed myself carefully, reminding myself that there was nothing wrong with hanging back and taking my time, and that if we got too far from each other he'd find a place to wait for me.

We reached the castle together, no waiting necessary, and the three of us climbed into the drawbridge tower and photographed the great hall and ascended the hand-built wrought iron staircase into the iron cage above the dragon's head. I didn't make it all the way to the top level, but came down again from one level below. The tower was shaking with our movement, and I felt that pushing myself to go all the way to the top might sap some of the focus I needed for the ride back.

We met John Bishop, the builder of the castle, briefly. He was carrying a bucket and looking very hurried. He gave us a gruff hello on his way to whatever the day's task was.

We went back to the house, and Mike showed up not long afterward. He asked if we had witnessed him nearly drop his bike trying to park it in the driveway. We hadn't, but I assured him that if he had, he wouldn't have been the first.

I was sorry to miss out on the rest of the group's evening, but I had my own plans in Denver. After stopping for wine, I arrived at Steve and Ann's almost on time. There were hugs all around, and when Ann asked how my drive from the Springs had been, Steve said, "What? You drove here all the way from Colorado Springs?"

I raised an eyebrow. "I drove here from Massachusetts."

Ann laughed. "Sometimes we forget the relevant facts," she said.

Steve grilled steaks for dinner, which were so good that I actually had seconds. My food habits on the road basically consist of "eat very little," but occasionally I can be coaxed into eating more normally. After dinner we went up to the porch, where Steve directed me to his favorite chair and told me to slouch until I couldn't see the houses anymore. I understood his excitement over this view; the porch rail blocked off the rooftops, and all that was left in my field of vision were trees and mountains. I could easily imagine watching the sun rise with a cup of coffee in hand, pretending the rest of the city didn't exist.

Steve not only allowed but encouraged us to sit on his kitchen counter for this photo. I'm pretty sure Hell has frozen over. (Steve, if you're reading, I love you guys!)

On my way south again, I stopped for gas and found a text from Cider saying that everyone was going to bed but the back door would be left unlocked for me, and would I please remember to lock it before bed. I said no problem.

I made it into the driveway this time without incident, and unloaded my things and walked around to the back door. It was locked. I jiggled the handle a few times to be sure, then left my things on the porch and walked around to the front door. That was also locked. I sent messages to both Cider and Kimmy, but either they were asleep or their phones were off.

Ditching my jacket with the rest of my things, I started inspecting a window into the kitchen. The screen raised without a problem, but the window itself was locked. I tried another one, and another one; same situation. I tried sliding a credit card into the jamb of the back door, but the weather seal foiled that plan. Finally I decided to knock and hope that either a human or a dog would hear me.

I should have tried that first; Julie was awake and let me in immediately. An hour later, I had taken a shower and was chilling on the couch when Cider walked in from the kitchen and gave me a confused look. Poor cell reception in the basement meant that my message had just gotten through and he thought I was still outside. He shook his head at my apparent nonsense and returned to bed.