Day 19

We got up early knowing we had to go across the street for breakfast and with the detour we had two options, 50 miles to just over the Wisconsin border or go another 30 past that to the next town with anything in it. Breakfast was good and we headed back to the room. 

As we got ready the dark clouds slowly turned to rain. Looking at the weather app I saw we would be riding across bands of rain. Knowing the road had a detour that would force us to go extra miles and that we would be in and out of the rain all day did not make me look forward to the day. 

Luckily(?) I have little to no rain gear so once I pulled out my rain jacket I was ready, knowing I would be wet. I looked at buying a real bike ready rain jacket before we left. However I found anything worth having was way out of my price range. 

Side Note: 

I read about how it doesn’t matter how much money you make, what matters is how much you spend. I mean it makes sense, maybe even obvious… If you make 1 million dollars a week, but spend 1 million and 1 dollar a week, you’re broke. It seems pretty basic when you look at it like that. When I started thinking about it like that I started thinking about what I wanted in life. If I want to spend 100 dollars next week, I need to make 100 dollars this week. Now most people can’t just choose how much money to make this week, knowing what they want to do next week, and it’s hard to plan years in advance, but this has been my modus operandi for most of my career. 

When I decided to join Jerry on this tour I had a few months to prepare. Therefore I had to decide between having nicer gear or needing to come home earlier, or not do other things I’ve done this year so far. I understand this is not a perfect system especially since I have to make choices like will I have a rain jacket that will keep me dry or a jacket that will stop the rain from hitting me, while I get soaked in my own sweat. Booties that would keep my feet dry would have been nice too but … To be fair, all of my gear is really suspect. The bike I’m riding is nice, because it is Jerry’s old bike. Panniers, Jerry’s. Even the bike shorts I’m wearing are Jerry’s old shorts that were too old for him but not trash. I’m a big believer in the gear doesn’t make the athlete. Michael Jordan would destroy me in basketball, no matter what shoes either of us had on. As I type that, I think maybe I might tie him if he had concrete shoes on but other wise… 

So it rained. And rained. We pressed on. Neither of us were happy about it. The road was detoured through the hills, and the rain bands moved east seemingly leaving us with ebbs and flows of more or less rain on each hill. Unfortunately it never actually ended. 

When we finally crossed the Michigan / Wisconsin border we were pretty water logged. I had a good quarter inch of rain in each shoe, and my shirt was soaked with sweat. 

As we made our way through town the idea of stopping for the day became more and more appealing. Neither of us wanted to risk catching a chill and having a cold for the rest of the ride. And the idea of getting into the next town and needing to rush to get dinner, especially if it was going to rain the entire way, and potentially tomorrow as well. We could dry off, get a good rest and hopefully have better luck with the wether in the morning. And this way I might even have enough time tonight to figure out what I’m doing wrong with the website. 

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MikeDiazTheFirst

Mike was born in Queen, New York to a blue collar family. An avid self educator, artist, and traveler he’s traveled around the globe three times while immersing himself in the culture of 48 different countries and counting.  Read about his journeys and musings here.

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