Riding Across the US. From Cumberland, MD to Belmont, OH. Just Riding West 4

good morning uh just getting started here leaving Cumberland Maryland um I'm going to turn the camera around in a second so you can see what we're headed into today we're going up to 2,000 ft into [Music] this I'm really looking forward to it um I've been on flat ground for a day or two now I'm kind of excited to get up a little higher um have a little bit more variance in the kind of work that the legs are doing so I'll check in with you a little bit later for now let me just find this first push and get over it all right so this was a really pretty fun day um when you look at the elevation profile of this day it was kind of like what I expect to see in the Rockies where you know you're going about 2,000 ft and about 18 to 20 m mil but the grade is very consistent um so while my overall speed was pretty slow we were looking at you know 1 to 2% grade the entire time um and that actually made it kind of fun you kind of start to forget that you're going uphill um until you see views like this where um all of a sudden you realize that you're way high up above everything um and the landscape started to change a little bit uh things got a little bit windier you really felt like you were in the mountains um here's another one of these tunnels um these tunnels were super fun they were really dark you can't get a sense of how dark they were um with this video and I believe this was the last tunnel this is the big Savage tunnel um it was pretty dark uh it was pretty long it was really really beautiful I love the proportions of the entrance in the exit in this tunnel and if my memory is right when you get out of this tunnel um we were pretty much at the Continental Divide yeah and here is the marking of the Eastern Continental [Music] [Applause] [Music] Divide this day had a lot of these really big beautiful fistas as the old train tracks um cut around the edges of these mountains um they made these really beautiful U shapes uh and overlooked all of these gorgeous valleys had a great lunch at this place it was a short stop but it was really pretty tasty here's one of the big Bridges um I believe they're they might be viaducts but um really long Bridges to keep this grade going over some some deep valleys um some roads or streams below [Music] [Music] [Music] my previous set of gloves were out so I had to buy these new gloves at a bike shop um somewhere in Maryland this was the big long Viaduct um the wind direction changed dramatically uh and this one I don't know felt kind of Harry Potter like a big long valley really really high up and then of course we get into these forests where we're cutting through some rock and stuff really fun good morning uh no idea what day this is but I just woke up um on a chilly morning in the town of Rockwood Pennsylvania last night I stayed at a really cool hostel I was actually the only person there um so they had 12 beds in a shared room um and I was the only person so it was basically like having a Ultra cheap massive hotel room all to myself um had dinner at a local bar and dinner just so you guys know was jalapeno poppers and lemonade so um when I'm eating out I'm not eating out healthy there's something about those uh fried carbs that are really calling my name but uh this morning of course I'm having my healthy uh banana and oatmeal and stuff like that so um I'm headed towards Confluence and Ohio pile and hopefully tonight uh connelsville maybe even further not quite sure um this part of the trail is pretty easy um pretty fun but you know there might be a lot of cool stuff to see so you never know how far I can make it I'm hoping for um arrival at Pittsburgh on Friday night after Pittsburgh I'm going to be heading into roadcycling on West Virginia Ohio and Indiana um if I make it that far no promises um but anyway I'm going to get back on the road it is really nice to be waking up this early to a chill and to some light fog on the ground um it looks like it's going to be pretty sunny um so I'm going to try to get back on the bike get as many miles in as I can um and we'll see how we do all right so this stretch uh to Ohio pile this with the exception of something you'll hear later uh this was the most fun day I've had so far um we're coming down from the alagan and got to get real close to some of these beautiful rivers and streams um saw lots of wild life just I got to step my stick my feet in the water here um and I got to put my hands in the arrow bars and just cruise through all these beautiful Rock valleys um I was also really loving the cool weather on this day but ultimately this at least the first half of this day was fast easy beautiful it was everything you want [Music] [Music] all right good morning um so a few little updates yesterday was so fun um fastest average speeds the landscape was beautiful I got to uh put my feet in the water um it was just great all around I it was probably like one of the most fun days and then I came into the town of Ohio pile which is actually like pretty cute pretty neat had some vegetarian food options like it's a it's not my first time here but um I was really looking forward to sitting down and having lunch and um something really crappy happened I of all things I stepped off of a curb weird and twisted my ankle folded it all the way over felt like I heard a snap um um immediately all the all the worst thoughts came through my head like what if this trip ends because of me stepping off of a stupid 3-in curb in a weird way and you know after going through all of the worst thoughts I decided that probably the smartest thing would be instead of going out on a 17m Wilderness Bike Ride with an hurt ankle that maybe I should just get a room here for the night elevate it and ice it all night and so that's what I did um really comfortable little hostel here in Ohio pile um and pretty much all I did was just keep that foot elevated ice hit and watch TV um all in all it was a pretty nice break woke up this morning it is still tender I'm limping um I it definitely doesn't really want to have weight put on it but I think that I can ride a bike pretty easily we we'll see um it's 17 Mi to Confluence which is the next town I think by then I'll have a pretty good idea of how sustainable this is um because I really really really don't want to end this Tour on something so dumb like this um and for those of you who have known me for a while have known that I've broken one of my ankles twice and folded it a bunch yes it was the same ankle that I always hurt so it's just like a real butt head of an ankle and that sucks so anyway um I'll show you guys The View uh it's it's just lovely over here I to give you some sense of how pretty it is um I was unable to fly the drone at all yesterday um I really wanted to but pretty much every little every you know 5 600 ft there was another fly fisherman and I didn't want to fly a noisy drone over fly fisherman but really um you know for 30 mil this this River was filled with fly fishermen um for anybody who knows Ohio pile this is one of the I I think one of the best whitewater rafting I don't know some kind of rafting areas um in the country so pretty much the whole industry here is like rafting Outfitters and stuff and obviously this bike trail running through here is also a big industry so yeah beautiful five fisherman her ankle sorry for no drone stuff but the very last thing I want to do is upset any birds or fishermen or do anything that uh you know disrupts the pristineness of this landscape which is really just pretty exceptional all right see you guys so I headed out this morning with pretty much a lot of uncertainty I know in the last clip I sounded pretty confident but I really had no idea how this ankle was going to hold up on a stretch of road and really the only promise I made to myself was to get to Confluence which is that first seven uh 17 M leg um but you know weird things happened and I just got an energy in me and uh made a push and this ended up being the most productive day of the entire tour um at least so far I think I hit 75 maybe 76 miles on the day um and I'm also going to let you in on a little secret um not a secret but I am pretty much just filming the stuff that I think is really pretty and really beautiful um um if I'm struggling or if I'm tired or if there are some massive Hills or even if it's a section of Trail or road that is not super attractive odds are I am not going to have the energy to pull out a camera and document it so as you're watching these videos when you start seeing stuff like what is going to happen as soon as I start getting closer to Pittsburgh so when you start seeing you know gosh not a lot of footage of this section of the trail odds are I was either struggling um you know mentally feeling down or the roadway or the experience was just not that pretty so this first part of the day um I was in the forest and it was gorgeous and I was happy and I was hauling ass but as we get closer to Pittsburgh I'm starting to feel um feel tired burning up it's hot the road starts getting kind of crappy and all of the scenery started to get very industrial and steel and Coley and all of those things that you might expect when you close your mind and imagine um you know Pittsburgh or the Ohio River valy all right guys a pretty loud Fountain here I'm not sure you can hear me but um I thought I'd give you an update since the last time we talked obviously I'm here I made it to Pittsburgh so while the ankle that I hurt in Ohio pile still is a little tender turns out riding a bike actually makes it feel kind of better uh uh that that straight motion kind of loosens everything up and by the middle of the day I'm just feeling pretty good it's it's mostly when I'm like waking up at night where it's like oh oh so the last time I talked to you guys I was going to see how far I could make it out of a high pile on that injured ankle and as it turns out I had the longest most productive day of the whole trip I went 75 miles uh pushed to my friend Henry's house here in Pittsburgh and then yesterday uh just spent the whole day with those guys hanging out eating really good food snuggling with a puppy had a great rest day um we saw all the sites we went to the markets bought some cheese bought some pickles and then had dinner at an unbelievable vegan restaurant last night called UPA um which was so so tasty so today um it's a bit more of a mystery not quite sure how much I can accomplish uh I have to make it over the big Hills West of Pittsburgh um and then hopefully into West Virginia or definitely I'll make it to West Virginia today um but the question is how far into West Virginia the there are no campgrounds and there's very few hotels so I have to kind of play it smart maybe cut the day short or decide whether or not I have it in me to push really hard and and make it a long distance um because the hotel scene is a little bit weird um it's also going to be significantly Hillier than the last couple pushes I've had on the Gap and the cnno trail so I'm going to let you guys go um I'm going to enjoy this view here in Pittsburgh right here at the point um and uh yeah just see how far we can make it today check in a little bit later on all right bye all right and so just like I mentioned before um this was one of those days where it was kind of a it was a struggle getting up out of Pittsburgh was hard um and there wasn't that much to look at um if you're doing this trip I don't want to discourage you but just be prepared that um the area of called the West Virginia Panhandle um didn't have all that much sort of Natural Beauty on offer at least not on the roads that I was taking um what they did have on the offer was uh an enormous amount of ultra steep hills and so I pretty much didn't film any of that struggle to get me to this place here which is the Ohio river that I crossed over to get to one of the only hotel rooms available um there were no campgrounds available and the next morning I left Stubenville crossed that bridge to get back to West Virginia and then started on what I had always been thinking was going to be the hardest leg of this entire Journey at least the hardest leg east of the Mississippi and that was getting down to Wheeling West Virginia and then trying to climb out of the Ohio River Valley to get um on my way towards Columbus and that has proven and continues to prove to be uh the hardest thing I've encountered on this whole trip so as I sit here um in a nice air conditioned room keeping mind that I am not out of the Ohio River Valley and that I am still struggling um the sun and the hills are really taking a toll on me um but we will find out how I made out in the next video thanks so much for watching [Music]