Neil Hanson’s “Pilgrim Spokes”

A few years back, I spent a weekend with a group biking the Katy Trail in Missouri. The trail is widely known among biking enthusiasts across the country – it’s the longest (and narrowest) state park in the United States. A former rail bed, the trail stretches from Clinton in western Missouri almost to the Mississippi River in St. Charles County, just to the north of St. Louis. And there are now plans to extend the trail from Sedalia to Kansas City.

The trail is almost completely flat. It generally follows the path of the Missouri River, and in fact the river is often just to the right of the trail. It passes through forested areas and farmland, a tunnel or two, along the bottom of towering bluffs, and alongside open road. Even on weekends, it’s rarely crowded, and then only near popular tourist spots like Augusta (and its wineries) and St. Charles. And what you find yourself doing while biking the Katy is thinking, reflecting, and meditating.

That’s exactly what Neil Hanson did when he biked the Katy as part of a longer journey, described in Pilgrim Spokes: Cycling East Across America. After completing the first half of his ride, recounted in Pilgrim Wheels: Reflections of a Cyclist Crossing America, he continued east to Annapolis, Maryland. (I should point out that he was 60 when he finished, and consider what good shape he was in to bike 100 miles or more a day.)

Hanson finds the people of the American heartland, but he provides an unromanticized picture of them. It’s generally a positive picture – generous people, people interested in what he’s doing, people who tell him stories of their lives and towns. But it’s also the occasional rude and mean people – like the pickup truck driver who threw a bottle and hit him while he was riding in western Pennsylvania.

Hanson reflects on his own life, but also on the areas and regions his traveling through – the old National Road, how U.S. 40 has dramatically changed over the decades, the beauty and history of covered bridges in Indiana, the (varying) quality of food available in small towns and small cities (he’s biking, so he can eat a lot of chicken fried steak), and more. In between the wo books, his marriage of 30 years had dissolved – dissolved is the right word – and he reflects on that as well.

Neil Hanson

Pilgrim Spokes is a wonderful biking story, but it’s far more than a trail and travel guide. It does two things simultaneously, telling the story of a journey across the country, and telling the story of one man reflecting on his life, its high points and its imperfections. And his view of his own life is just as unromanticized as his account of the people he meets.

It’s the kind of book that stays with you, because it’s the kind of book that tells what happens when you balance yourself on the two-wheeled frame and take off, the air moving around you, your legs pumping the pedals, the trees seemingly flying past like smudged paintings.

Related:

My review of Neil Hanson’s Pilgrims Wheels.

Top photograph: cycling the Katy Trail, via Neil Hanson web site.

The Natural Poetry of the Biking Trail

A Sunday afternoon in late May: I’m biking Grant’s Trail in suburban St. Louis, roughly 17 miles of an asphalt trail that at one time was a railroad track. Add the mile-and-a-half from my house to the trailhead, and I have a relatively flat 20-miles roundtrip.

I’ve been biking this trail since 2005, when it was three miles shorter, and a rather bumpy ride over old railroad bed gravel. My first ride over the pre-asphalt section led me to the discovery of the unexpected hole. Fortunately for my dignity, no one was nearby to witness the aging cyclist hit the hole, fly up from his bicycle seat, and spend the next few seconds (eternity in the moment) struggling to stay upright. I managed it. Barely.

But the unpaved became the paved, the whole was filled in and covered over, and the ride became less eventful.

Until the day of the snake. The black snake. The big black snake. The big Missouri black rat snake. Did I mention it was BIG?

To continue reading, please see my post today at Tweetspeak Poetry.

Photograph: The eastern end of Grant's Trail in suburban St. Louis.

The little wooden bridge

A power ride, it was

165 miles, graveled and

pounded flat, with rutted

stretches appearing

unexpectedly, like

the occasional snake

and critter darting

across my path, uneventful

until the little bridge,

the little wooden bridge

across the little creek,

the bridge with its construction

sign, narrowing the way,

slowing the ride, dutifully

I slowed the ride, the handlebar

hooked the board, hooked it

hard, the bike slammed down,

slammed down hard, I’m

thinking I’m seriously hurt,

I see the blood on my leg,

broken mirror, I stand up

on the little wooden bridge

and walk for a time, then

climb back on the bike

to finish the final 15 miles,

not much else I could do,

not bad for someone (as

it turned out) with four

broken ribs and a partially

collapsed lung. It did

hurt, though, once I got

off the bike.

Over at Tweetspeak Poetry, we’re discussing Spin: Taking Your Creativity to the Nth Degree by Claire Burge. One of the exercises asks the question, when have brake figuratively failed you with surprising consequences? In the true story recorded above, the brakes didn’t literally fail, but the resulting bike crash (2009) led eventually to an overnight stay in the hospital and reading Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places by L.L. Barkat straight through to 4 a.m. the next morning. And that led to being part of something called Tweetspeak Poetry, and that led to a book called Poetry at Work being published next month.

Who would have thought a bike crash on a little wooden bridge would lead to that result?

So check out the discussion on Claire’s book at Tweetspeak Poetry. However, I don’t advise bike crashes as the easiest way to creativity.

Photograph via Pryor Area Cycling Enthusiasts.

Biking with an Eagle

There is a section of Grant’s Trail in St. Louis (mile marker 1 on the map) where a biker or walker (and sometimes a blader) is almost guaranteed to see wildlife, and not just rabbits or squirrels. One summer a nice seven-foot long king snake slowly meandered its way across the trail, pausing long enough to stop foot and bike traffic in both directions. Then there was a family of wild turkeys – two grown birds and several chicks. I slowed and then stopped, just watching the two grown birds herd the kids across the trail. And there’s the herd of deer that inhabit the stretch. I’ve seen them from some distance down the trail as they quickly crossed; fairly close as three of them, as close as five feet away, stood and watched me bike by, and once when several suddenly darted across the trail, right in front of me.

I braked hard. It’s bad enough to hit a deer if you’re driving a car. Hit one when you’re biking, and you, not the bike, will sustain most of the damage.

There was also the time on the Katy Trail, a stretch in St. Charles County near St. Louis that’s heavily wooded but adjacent to the Missouri River. I was biking by myself, when I heard a huge rustling in the tree limbs overhead. The next thing I knew, what caused the rustling was flying alongside me, and we continued together (once I resumed breathing after the shock) until it rose and soared off toward the river. “It” was an American bald eagle; I could have reached and almost touched the tip of its wing next to me.

Over at the High Callings Blogs, we’ve now finished week 8 of our discussion of Gerald May’s The Wisdom of Wilderness. And a family of wild turkeys and a bald eagle are characters in this chapter. The turkeys seem to serve as a digression for May, and how Benjamin Franklin wanted to have the turkey as America’s national bird. But his eagle story – when an eagle flew straight at him as he was in a boat -- resonated. He dodged that eagle, but along came a second one. And both did exactly the same thing – attempted to defecate on him.

Despite the funny story about the eagles, of the eight chapters we've read so far, this one has the least to recommend it. It begins with a veer toward a rant about rejecting the “dominion” over nature God gives man, as recorded in Genesis. (And this is one of the reasons May rejects the inerrancy of Scripture.) This is a point at which the book is beginning to show its age – there’s been a huge development in Christian thought about nature and the environment in recent years, and what “dominion” actually means. And it’s not “plunder and pillage,” but more like “use and be good stewards.” And the chapter finishes with the eagle story. I’m not sure where May was going.

But the eagle story is funny.

The Final Leg of the Bike Trip, and a Crash

After the 93 miles of biking on Saturday, I slept like the proverbial rock, finally stirring awake at 5:55 a.m. Todd, our trip leader, was starting to get breakfast together – oatmeal banana pancakes (bikers need carbs), sausage, coffee and juice. The pancake recipe came from cyclist Dan Schmatz, a native St. Louisan who became famous in the Tour de Missouri for crashing when he hit an armadillo. (The pancakes were fabulous, by the way.)

At each meal, Todd led us in devotions. All of our devotions had been centered on one verse – I Peter 3:15: “But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (New International Version). Sunday morning, Todd put the verse in the context of Todd Beamer, one of the heroes of United Flight 93 who brought the terrorists down in a Pennsylvania field on Sept. 11, 2001. He read the eulogy given by Todd’s father at his son’s funeral. More than one of us wiped away tears as we listened.

We packed everything up and headed out for the bridge over the Missouri to return to the Katy Trail. The plan was to travel together across the bridge, and then bike as the spirit moved us on the trail. We had gone approximately 100 yards when a pedal came off one bike. Another 50 feet and BOOM – a tire blew (loud enough to bring some residents out of their houses). As we circled the street, another rider had a minor crash. We decided we were getting all the bad stuff out of the way early.

Back on the trail, we were riding toward the Treloar station, about 20 miles away and the first rest stop. This section of trail and the 10 miles after it afforded the occasional spectacular view of the Missouri River, corn field after corn field (interspersed by soybeans) and the tree-arched trailway. It was also what cyclists call a false flat – the trail looked flat, but it was actual an incline eastward, a long incline, like 16 miles of incline, rising with the bluffs of the river.

Most of the Katy Trail runs through woods and rural areas, and so the opportunity to see wildlife is ever present. One of the cyclists hit a groundhog. I sighted one deer, three very aggressive brown squirrels, scores of bluebirds, a bunch of rabbits – and Mr. Snake. Fortunately, Mr. Snake was moving faster than I was riding, and he slithered quickly about two feet in front of me across the trail. I don’t know what kind he was; I didn’t hang around long enough to find out. He was coming from some standing water on the right side of the trail. He was dark-colored. I was out of there.

We stopped for lunch at Dutzow. We were joined by a cyclist named John who was riding a recumbent bike from Astoria, Oregon to Yorktown, Virginia this summer. He'd already covered 2800 miles. We'd met him at the campsite Friday night in New Franklin and kept running into him. (He left Dutzow a good 30 minutes before we did; I passed him later near Augusta.)

This lunch was special -- our last meal together and our final devotion time. Todd asked each of us to give a reason for Christ’s hope in us, and it was humbling to listen to 13 men do that. Then we each prayed for the man on our right, and that was even more humbling. It was one of the best moments of a trip that was chock full of best moments.

From Dutzow, we headed to Augusta (another center of Missouri wines) and Defiance, close to the final home of Daniel Boone. The closer we got to the St. Louis metropolitan area, the more crowded the trail became. A short break in Defiance for water and a Hershey bar, and I was off – the final 17 miles.

Two miles later, I approached the bridge over the Little Femme Osage Creek and saw that it was half-closed – only one lane open and a barricade of two-by-fours on the closed side. I’d been careful to watch my handlebars the whole trip – those on my hybrid bike are wider than the handlebars on my road bike, and I’m usually on the road bike.

I biked on to the bridge, and had made it about halfway when my handlebar caught part of the barricade. It flipped me forward, and down I came on my left side. And I came down hard. With the bike on top of me. My first thought was, “I am seriously hurt.” I struggled into a sitting position, pushing the bike off of me. The bike looked okay, but the mirror was broken and the chain had popped off. I struggled to my feet and walked the bike off the bridge. I stood there shaking, determined not to throw up or faint (both were becoming distinct possibilities). Then I noticed the blood dripping down my left leg. My left shoulder hurt, and I felt like I had scraped my right arm and leg as well. “Okay,” I thought, “I need to let someone know, in case I keel over down the side of the trail.” I found my laminated card with our cell numbers, and called Todd, letting him know I'd crashed. He offered to cycle down to where I was, but I said I thought I could make it. Of course, when you’re 15 miles shy of completing a 160-mile trip, you know you’re going to finish, even if they have to pull you in on a rope. It's a guy thing. A dumb guy thing.

I fixed the chain, got back up on the bike, and slowly pedaled to the Weldon Spring station, where I used toilet paper in the bathroom to clean up the blood. Then I biked on, and did manage to complete the last part of the trip. Dave, the assistant trip leader, checked me at the Green Bottom Station, but I was actually beginning to feel pretty good, although I did say a prayer of thanks when I rolled into the parking lot at St. Charles. I got off the bike, and immediately discovered I felt better on the bike. Everything was starting to hurt. I changed to shorts and a t-shirt in the RV, and found multiple scrapes on both legs and my left shoulder, and a nasty looking bruise on my upper thigh. And my left side still hurts today. But it's OK as long as I don't cough, hiccup, laugh, stand up, reach for anything with my left arm or pick up anything on the floor.

As serious as it could have been, it didn’t take away my enjoyment of the trip. I loved doing this trip. I liked being with other men from our church, doing something slightly crazy like this (all bikers are at least slightly crazy). I liked getting to know them in a way I never could on Sunday mornings or at deacon meetings. I think all of us felt the same way.

So Paul, Jim, Deno, Dennis, John, Ron, Nate, Bill, Bryan and Ben – thanks for a great time together.

Todd and Dave – more than anything else, you demonstrated servants’ hearts this weekend. Thank you for all you did, and thank you for the example you gave us.

This was special.

UPDATE: John Hamer, one of our number, took some photos, including Mr. Snake's identical twin brother. http://www.flickr.com/photos/hamerii/sets/