Rockford to Joliet, IL
Something most people don’t usually think about as you drive cross country these days is all the smells you encounter when you’re out in the open air riding a bike. Let’s face it, most of us are riding with the windows up and the air conditioning on. Well, this blog is going to tell you about some of the smells we’ve encountered, or the things we think were responsible for those smells.
This idea came to Sabrina and I today as we rode past a place and we both said, “Smells like somebody’s baking a cake.” That’s when we noticed the factory off to our right. Definitely a Good Smell.
The Good … Onion and mint fields in Idaho. We could smell the onions and mint in Idaho even before we saw the fields. Steak house grill smells every state as we ride through cities that could account for all the steak dinners over the campfire. When we rode by Ethanol plants in NE and IA, we would smell yeast like bread rising. Thanks Aunt Evelyn, Ray and the kind campers in Chadron for supplying us with homemade breads. We noticed the Cadbury plant and were surprised that instead of chocolate, there was an overwhelming smell of chewing gum at the factory in IL.
The Bad …. Hog farms in Iowa. They grow a lot of Porkers in Iowa! Although it’s pretty cool to watch the Crop dusters do their thing, you get a different perspective when you smell herbicides. I would be remiss if I didn’t give thanks to the one helicopter duster who noticed me riding by and pulled up and made another loop before dusting right over the top of me. Thanks Mr. Crop Duster Pilot! We were riding past fields of soy beans in Iowa when we started to smell raw sewage. We noticed the ponds used for fertilizer (?) in fields. Manure in general at all the farms; however we’ve noticed a change from range fed beef to dairy farms manure smells as we come east.
Ugly Smells – All the Road Kill! You definitely smell it before you see it, and it is usually pretty UGLY! To immortalize the poor creatures, we smelled raccoons (sometimes whole families), deer, antelope, turtles (one snapper who’s eggs were strewn across the road), frogs, turkeys, hawks, quail, many gold finches (they must be bad judges of distance and speed), a few cats, coyotes, snakes and many opossums. Then there were also the many unrecognizable carcasses.
Today’s ride started off as usual. I mean that we started pedaling about 10:30. Isn’t this opening sounding like the norm, rather than new news? Mind you that today was scheduled to be a relatively long day, 90+ miles. It doesn’t pay to fret about it, I need to just go with the flow and finish when we finish. We had a nice stay at Mike the Rotarians home last night and when we got up to get going, both the he and his wife had already left for work. We brought all our stuff in from the truck and ate our own food and made lunches. One thing that held us up was that even at this late date, we still weren’t sure where we were going today. Campgrounds around Chicago are few and far between. So, this morning before everyone else got up, I went on-line and found this one, the Empress RV Resort and Casino in Joliet, IL. It’s South West on downtown Chicago and about 50 miles away. I can tell that we are starting to get into civilization because the roads and the number of cars have changed drastically in the last few days. These are older roads with no shoulder and there are hundreds of cars and trailer trucks. Ben and I are very concerned about Sabrina biking on these roads. Although she’s a good rider, she worries a lot and when you’re tense and on edge all day it doesn’t make for a fun ride. We do want this to be a fun experience, right? The hardest part is that she REALLY wants to ride. So anyway, Sabrina and I start riding on Hwy 20 which isn’t too bad, but degrades pretty rapidly to a condition that is not very safe for bikers. Meanwhile, scout Ben has been driving ahead to check out the route and phones back that there’s a problem. Right before Elgin the road turns into a divided highway and has a posting prohibiting bikes and pedestrians. Not only that but the connector that will get use the last 40 miles to camp is on a business/retail district road that has lots of cars and turn offs into plazas. See what I mean about the number of people here? Now it’s time to change the route. I break out the map and ask a truck drive at the next gas station and decide to take route 39, Randall Road, it looks OK on the map. It’s just a thin black line, not red, not white/red and not thick red. It should be OK, right? Well Ben has driven over from the original route and is now back tracking up along Randall Rd. and it’s not a heck of a lot better than the original, but at least I can get onto it. So, he meets us at the end of Hwy 20 and we load Sabrina’s bike in the truck and she grudgingly agrees to call it a day at 45 miles. Who would have thought that anything under 50 miles doesn’t feel like a day’s ride. So I’m on my own for the rest which is just as well because it was a rat race. Cars turning, trucks always passing when there is no shoulder and afternoon rush hour for like the whole 4 hours. I finally arrive at the Empress and about 7:00, really ready to call it quits for the day. Ninety tortuous miles in 90+ degrees. Well, tomorrow is a real rest day and we’re heading into Chicago to see the city and World Bicycle Relief headquarters.
Keep Them Wheels a Rollin’
Paul
Something most people don’t usually think about as you drive cross country these days is all the smells you encounter when you’re out in the open air riding a bike. Let’s face it, most of us are riding with the windows up and the air conditioning on. Well, this blog is going to tell you about some of the smells we’ve encountered, or the things we think were responsible for those smells.
This idea came to Sabrina and I today as we rode past a place and we both said, “Smells like somebody’s baking a cake.” That’s when we noticed the factory off to our right. Definitely a Good Smell.
The Good … Onion and mint fields in Idaho. We could smell the onions and mint in Idaho even before we saw the fields. Steak house grill smells every state as we ride through cities that could account for all the steak dinners over the campfire. When we rode by Ethanol plants in NE and IA, we would smell yeast like bread rising. Thanks Aunt Evelyn, Ray and the kind campers in Chadron for supplying us with homemade breads. We noticed the Cadbury plant and were surprised that instead of chocolate, there was an overwhelming smell of chewing gum at the factory in IL.
The Bad …. Hog farms in Iowa. They grow a lot of Porkers in Iowa! Although it’s pretty cool to watch the Crop dusters do their thing, you get a different perspective when you smell herbicides. I would be remiss if I didn’t give thanks to the one helicopter duster who noticed me riding by and pulled up and made another loop before dusting right over the top of me. Thanks Mr. Crop Duster Pilot! We were riding past fields of soy beans in Iowa when we started to smell raw sewage. We noticed the ponds used for fertilizer (?) in fields. Manure in general at all the farms; however we’ve noticed a change from range fed beef to dairy farms manure smells as we come east.
Ugly Smells – All the Road Kill! You definitely smell it before you see it, and it is usually pretty UGLY! To immortalize the poor creatures, we smelled raccoons (sometimes whole families), deer, antelope, turtles (one snapper who’s eggs were strewn across the road), frogs, turkeys, hawks, quail, many gold finches (they must be bad judges of distance and speed), a few cats, coyotes, snakes and many opossums. Then there were also the many unrecognizable carcasses.
Today’s ride started off as usual. I mean that we started pedaling about 10:30. Isn’t this opening sounding like the norm, rather than new news? Mind you that today was scheduled to be a relatively long day, 90+ miles. It doesn’t pay to fret about it, I need to just go with the flow and finish when we finish. We had a nice stay at Mike the Rotarians home last night and when we got up to get going, both the he and his wife had already left for work. We brought all our stuff in from the truck and ate our own food and made lunches. One thing that held us up was that even at this late date, we still weren’t sure where we were going today. Campgrounds around Chicago are few and far between. So, this morning before everyone else got up, I went on-line and found this one, the Empress RV Resort and Casino in Joliet, IL. It’s South West on downtown Chicago and about 50 miles away. I can tell that we are starting to get into civilization because the roads and the number of cars have changed drastically in the last few days. These are older roads with no shoulder and there are hundreds of cars and trailer trucks. Ben and I are very concerned about Sabrina biking on these roads. Although she’s a good rider, she worries a lot and when you’re tense and on edge all day it doesn’t make for a fun ride. We do want this to be a fun experience, right? The hardest part is that she REALLY wants to ride. So anyway, Sabrina and I start riding on Hwy 20 which isn’t too bad, but degrades pretty rapidly to a condition that is not very safe for bikers. Meanwhile, scout Ben has been driving ahead to check out the route and phones back that there’s a problem. Right before Elgin the road turns into a divided highway and has a posting prohibiting bikes and pedestrians. Not only that but the connector that will get use the last 40 miles to camp is on a business/retail district road that has lots of cars and turn offs into plazas. See what I mean about the number of people here? Now it’s time to change the route. I break out the map and ask a truck drive at the next gas station and decide to take route 39, Randall Road, it looks OK on the map. It’s just a thin black line, not red, not white/red and not thick red. It should be OK, right? Well Ben has driven over from the original route and is now back tracking up along Randall Rd. and it’s not a heck of a lot better than the original, but at least I can get onto it. So, he meets us at the end of Hwy 20 and we load Sabrina’s bike in the truck and she grudgingly agrees to call it a day at 45 miles. Who would have thought that anything under 50 miles doesn’t feel like a day’s ride. So I’m on my own for the rest which is just as well because it was a rat race. Cars turning, trucks always passing when there is no shoulder and afternoon rush hour for like the whole 4 hours. I finally arrive at the Empress and about 7:00, really ready to call it quits for the day. Ninety tortuous miles in 90+ degrees. Well, tomorrow is a real rest day and we’re heading into Chicago to see the city and World Bicycle Relief headquarters.
Keep Them Wheels a Rollin’
Paul
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Well I'm glad you all are watching our for Sabrina - she (we) ain't as young as we used to be... We need Sabrina back in one peice for the Ben Taylor concert at Jonathan Edwards on 8/27. Let Ben know that my "training" here in OLyme is progressing well. I was just thinking about the whole smell thing today on our 6am ride. Riding a bike definitely gives you a different experience than a car. My rides have been filled with gorgeous scents! I'm so glad I got out there!
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