Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
is beyond me. Issues evolve, but it's hard to account for the evolution of our national
temperament, with a ratcheted-up vehemence and implacability that strikes me (and a
lot of other people, too) as poisonous.
When I pulled into little towns like Canby and Wagontire in 1993, looking for a diner,
a motel, a milkshake, or a cold beer, not necessarily in that order, I was received, most
often, with curiosity and warmth. And now? How well will a complete stranger on two
wheels be welcomed in places he's never visited before? It's telling, I think, that this time
I've had many people ask me if I'm carrying anything for protection. In the world I'm
used to living in, the implication has generally meant a condom. At this point, I don't
think that's what they mean. For the record, I'm not carrying a knife or a gun or mace or
any other weapon—or any form of contraception, for that matter.
What else might be different? In 1993, neither cell phones nor personal computers were
the ubiquitous human appendages they are today. The GPS was yet to be invented; I
stopped at dozens of 7-Elevens along the way for local maps, which turned into a sig-
nificant budget item. The stories I wrote for the newspaper about once a week were
scribbled longhand in a notebook—then I called them in from a motel room or a road-
side phone booth, reading them aloud into a tape recorder to be transcribed by a typist
and passed along to an editor.
Quaint, right? The newspaper's recording room doesn't exist anymore. Among other
things, this process kept me at a remove from the people who were reading my work, not
to mention from my friends and family. The series generated more mail than anything
I'd written before for the newspaper, but I had no idea of it until I found the stack
of letters on my desk when I got back. People really liked the idea of the trip; they
found it romantic—and I think they were amused, learning where I was popping up
from week to week—but I didn't know that while it was happening. Aside from other
cyclists I encountered on the road occasionally and the people I interviewed along
the way, I pedaled along in pretty much total isolation until the technology of the
day—television—intervened.
After a handful of my newspaper columns were published, the
Today
show on NBC
sent a crew—a producer, a cameraman, and a driver—to meet me in Rapid City, South
Dakota, and we spent a sweltering day cruising side by side through the Badlands, I on
a bike, they in a van, the cameraman leaning out of an open door and taking endless film
of my churning feet.
Some three weeks later,
Today
broadcast its piece, which included a live roadside in-
terview with me on the outskirts of Atlanta, in north-central Michigan, conducted by
