Live A Big Life Ride

living big to create opportunity

Day 33: April 6, Silsbee to Kirbyville

We had serious hopes of crossing the Louisiana border this day. We really wanted to make it happen. The weather, unfortunately, had something else in mind, and when we woke up this Sunday morning the sky was dark and there was heavy rain predicted that morning. Fortunately the RV Park where we were staying had a dreamy community center with a full kitchen and a big TV with two heavenly recliner chairs in front. It was a bit like this:

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Click on the picture to watch the scene

By the time we left Silsbee at 2pm we had eaten an entire loaf of bread and most of a block of cheese, oatmeal and most of a box of raisins, and about 6 cups of coffee while watching 2 episodes of Sportscenter and 3 episodes of Friday Night Lights. It was a splendid morning. But then we figured we’d better get on the road so we could  make it to Louisiana, so we put on all our reflective gear and headed down the highway.

But then, sure enough, it started raining and then it started pouring. The next and last town in TX was Kirbyville, and in the midst of a developing monsoon we frustratingly had to end our day prematurely and take cover in the one and only motel in town. So 30 miles and $45 later we safe and dry and on the hunt for food. There were only 2 options that were open because it was Sunday, and Jenny’s Fried Chicken got rave reviews.

Since we were getting fried chicken, we thought we’d health it up with some veggie sides. Between the two of us we got 2 orders of fried chicken, 2 orders of broccoli, a baked potato and rice and beans. 20 minutes later the waitress brought over a gigantic platter with paper plates filled with various colors of fried things and a huge potato smothered in sour creme and bacon bits. No broccoli to be found. Madeleine pointed to some mysterious fried nuggets and asked “what’s that?” The waitress said “yeah, that’s your broccoli.” What?? I took a bite: cheese sauce with miniscule specks of green bits (must be the broccoli), battered and deep fried. Broccoli.

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Post broccoli bite reaction

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The rest of our meal

That night it dumped buckets and buckets and we were very glad to not be in a tent.

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First Month in Review: The Good/Bad/Weird/Interesting/Delicious

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We started this ride on March 5, so yesterday was our one month anniversary! On one hand it seems like we’ve been doing this for months and months, and on the other it seems wild that it’s been a whole month. We really appreciate all of our friends and family that have been following the trip and who have contributed to our fundraiser, and we’re excited to keep going these next couple of months! As one of our friends from the road put it when we told her about our fundraising effort and the Live A Big Life initiative, a part of living big is seeing the world around you and learning all you can from the people and places along the way. We’ve really loved Living Big so far:

Favorite thing that’s happened:

MJ: Meeting our road pals!
SL: Going all these small, off the main road towns or communities that we would otherwise never find ourselves in.

Favorite place:

MJ: Oh man, I don’t know. Other than Blair’s house? I loved Marfa, TX and Silver City, NM. Austin was awesome too.
SL: Probably Silver City, NM. It has good people, good culture, good walking around, good coffee, good people watching, the whole shebang. It was a great place to spend a rest day.

Favorite day of riding:

MJ: Riding to Van Horn, TX. For the last 40 miles of the day we had our first (and still only) solid tailwind of the entire trip. It was an absolute dream. We just flew. I felt like I could have ridden forever. Maybe someday we’ll get another tailwind. Probably not.
SL: What she said. Also, riding into Del Rio was awesome because it was the turning point from being in the interminable West Texas high desert (grey, brown, little to no nature, little to no change in view) to suddenly seeing trees, flowers, lakes and animals. Very exciting stuff.

Favorite food:

MJ: Cochineal in Marfa. Amazing. Also thoroughly enjoyed my donut the next morning.
SL: Any one of the outrageous breakfasts we’ve consumed, most of them consisting of some combination of pancakes, eggs, toast, biscuits and bacon.

What’s surprised you:

MJ: Food deserts. We have ridden for literally days at a time without coming across any non-processed food. It is hard to imagine that people live in places where nutritious food is literally not available within a 50 mile drive.
SL: Definitely the same. It’s been like one big anthropological study of what people eat and what’s available where. It’s been really educational and valuable to ride into town after town and have our only options be a gas station mini mart and maybe a fast food restaurant, and of course the ubiquitous liquor store. We’ve gone a full week without being able to buy fresh produce. Crazy, interesting, and a little bit sad.

What’s been the most interesting part so far:

MJ: Meeting people who break with all the stereotypes I associate with a place.
SL: Going so many places that, were we not on bikes, we would never go and seeing what every town has (post office, liquor store), what few places have (fresh, healthy food) and everything in between.

Least favorite ride:

MJ: Riding over the mountains east of Phoenix to Globe was terrifying and miserable. We climbed 5000 feet in 10 miles but mostly I hated it because I was sure we would die. Luckily we didn’t but I would never do it again.
SL: 100% agree, that day was awful. In addition to all the vertical climbing we also had to go over 80 miles, including winding through this mountain pass with a narrow tunnel and no shoulder during any point. We both felt pretty happy to be done with that forever.

Least favorite place:

MJ: Fort Hancock, TX. Gross.
SL: Yes. Nothing good about Fort Hancock. We slept in our sleeping bags on top of the motel mattress because we were afraid of the sheets and covers, and ate peanut butter on stale bread in our room for dinner. It was  a low moment.

Favorite comment from a total stranger:

MJ: The multiple times we’ve been asked if we’re packing heat and subsequent suggestions that we do so.
SL: Guy at a gas station: “Y’all? California?! No shit. F*ckin’ California. Y’all?! Damn!” And got in his pick-up truck and drove away.

Day 32: April 5, Shepherd to Silsbee

We made the mistake of dawdling a bit when we woke in Shepherd, and rather than making a quick exit we wound up in an interminable line of our fellow Shepherd Sanctuary guests to use the kitchen and bathroom. So for no good reason we finally rolled out around 9am and resumed our trek in East Texas, as the hills dwindled even more and the tree and ranch-lined roads went on and on.

It was a fairly easy day of riding, we were thinking of making it a long haul of 90 miles to Kirbyville but instead stopped in Silsbee because the NCAA basketball Final Four was on at 5 and we wanted to make sure we were in a good position to watch it. As we approached Silsbee we suddenly slammed on our breaks: in a wooden bar/shack on the side of the road, dozens of pickup trucks and Harley motorcycles were lined up for what appeared to be a BBQ cook off! As we decided whether or not to go in, a lady outside in a full leather suit waved at us and yelled “Y’all hungry? Come on!” So we did.

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Nothing could really capture the people watching we did, but here’s a small slice

Unfortunately we seemed to arrive just as the trophy ceremony was taking place, and therefore the eating was over. But we did hang out for a few minutes, soaking in everything we saw and heard: cowboy hats, head-to-toe camouflage, head-to-toe leather, Keystone lights as far as the eyes could see, “Just you two? Riding through here? I know y’all are carrying guns. What? You’re not?! You’re crazy!”

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Wings and fried pickles and cowboys and country music

We stopped at the grocery store in Silsbee to get some provisions and headed over to the RV Park where we were camping. We made fast friends with the Park hostess, Miss Rita, who gave us a tour on her golf cart and then brought us out some freshly baked and delicious cake. Right next door was the Texas Honky Tonk, clearly a local hot spot where they agreed to put on our basketball games. Surrounded by cowboys, crappy beer and fried food, we made an evening of it until the indoor cigarette smoking became too much, and we finished off our evening eating non-fried food and watching basketball in the RV common area. RV Parks are the best.

Day 31: April 4, Richards to Shephard

During the night in Richards there was a big lightning storm and a ton of rain, so we were relieved to see that it had stopped by the time we were up and ready to go. We stopped at the one place in town for breakfast, since we had aspirations of going 90 miles and knew that a good breakfast would help us accomplish that. We walked in and a young guy fully clad in camouflage asked us before we sat down “Y’all know what you want?” Not being regulars we did not, but it was nice to be mistaken for one anyways.

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Leaving Richards, where we stayed on a cattle ranch

Soon thereafter we headed out, but something wasn’t sitting right with me and I wound up spending the day good and nauseous and therefore slowed us down a good bit. It wasn’t until later that day when we realized that the local water back in Richards was loaded with sulfur, including the cups of coffee I drank (whoops). We finished up Texas’s rolling hills and enjoyed the fact that they were flattening out, but because of my sulfur plague we only made it 60 miles, to just beyond Shepherd, TX. We rolled into the Shepherd Sanctuary campgrounds to find an eclectic series of cabins that looked straight out of Alice and Wonderland, a fire pit, and a dry place to camp. It was run by a woman named Peach, who was hosting her 30 year high school reunion (class size: 18 students) from the next town over, and was a rare liberal-minded, liberal politics gem who proceeded to feed us delicious soup with homegrown kale and a blackberry tart. We spent the evening chatting with her as well as three other cyclists, which is always a good opportunity to share battle stories.

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Creative local church signs

Day 30: April 3rd, La Grange to Richards

Somehow, we are still in Texas.

We found a lovely little coffee shop in La Grange this morning with delicious coffee and, mysteriously, free refills which we took full advantage of. It was clearly the only show in town because the joint was hopping with all sorts of locals. Among them was a guy who was super duper talkative. We learned many things about him including, but not limited to, that he was a youth minister in west Texas for a while and now has pictures of all his guns on his iPhone. Also, he said he’d been to California once and he liked it until he went to a gun shop and they wouldn’t let him even hold a gun because he didn’t have a valid state drivers license. It seemed weird to me that he would be just checking out a gun shop while on vacation but then it occurred to me that maybe people who are into guns do that, just for fun. Like how Sophie and I like to stop into local bike shops just for fun. Add it to the list of things we’ve learned on the road.

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Some Texan scenery

After our extended morning at the coffee shop we got a bit of a late start. We stopped not long after we started when we ran into the antique fair that apparently happens twice a year on the road heading into Round Top, TX. It is literally five miles of antiques. At least. It is crazy. And people really seem to get into it. They bring U-hauls to truck away all their goodies. Sophie misplaced her sunglasses this morning so we stopped when we saw a tent selling some. She picked up a pair of gangster shades and we continued on.

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The roads were lined with endless ranches

For some reason we stopped a million times today and the day seemed interminable. When we were about 11 miles out from our intended destination a truck pulled over ahead of us and the driver got out and walked over to us. He asked where we were headed and where we planned to stay. Turned out, he owned the B&Bish-type-place we were planning to stay. This place is a working cattle ranch and the owners, Ernie and Doris, have built bunkhouses so travelers can stay. They allow camping, which we had intended to do, but it seemed like it was about to rain (which it did) so we opted to stay in one of the bunkhouses. It is awesome. We have matching twin beds with Harley Davidson sheets. We also did laundry and cooked a hot meal in the kitchen. It’s almost like we’re real people! There are six other cyclists here tonight which is great.

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Head to toe in Harley gear

Maybe next time I write a post we will have somehow, some way, emerged from Texas.