Happy New Year, Oscar's Dad! I haven't posted since I replied to you in November, but that doesn't mean I haven't been pondering and investigating. I drove out to California to visit family at Thanksgiving and on the way back took the opportunity to do some reconnoitering of parts of the Southern Tier and Bicycle Route 66. Given the choice of starting or ending a coast to coast ride in Santa Monica or San Diego, I would definitely choose San Diego for a number of reasons (amount of urban/suburban riding, the routes into/out of the costal basins, etc.), but I'm HEAVILY leaning away from both of those alternatives.I've driven between the central U.S. and the West Coast many times over the past 40 years, many times paralleling Route 66 and the Souther Tier. On my trip 6 weeks ago I was struck anew by just how many miles I would spend on a road bike trip in the American Southwest along the Southern Tier or Route 66 on the shoulders of interstate highways, on frontage roads immediately next to interstate highways, and on other roads paralleling interstate highways and within a mile or so of them.
When I returned to Oklahoma I did the math. Starting in Santa Monica and taking Bicycle Route 66 to Chicago I would be on or within sight of or earshot of interstate highways for about 877 out of 2528 miles (35% of the time) on that portion of the trip. From San Diego on the Southern Tier, then cutting up to Bicycle Route 66 on the Grand Canyon Connector the numbers would be similar, 867 out of 2489 miles (35%). I'm not knocking interstate highways per se. They're certainly the fastest way to get from point A to point B in that part of the world, but I don't want to spend that much time on a bike looking at them or listening to them.
Since then I've spent a lot of time looking at other alternatives. I don't really want to do a complete Southern Tier tour, even though it's the shortest route across the country. I've spent most of my adult life living in Texas, Oklahoma and Mississippi, so I've seen a lot of Southern Tier country. The remaining alternatives are farther north. I considered the Transamerica Trail in its entirety until I discovered that it crosses the Continental Divide at above 11,500'. It will be enough of a challenge to go the distance next year at age 70 without adding the insult of extreme elevation to the injury of thousands of miles of riding. I looked at the higher elevations along the other major east-west routes, and I think I've come up with a plan, which I pitched to my brother yesterday.
I'm proposing starting on the Transamerica Trail on the East Coast in early May (maybe a little earlier), and heading west to intersect the Great Rivers South route south of St. Louis, then cutting north to intersect the Lewis and Clark Trail west of St. Louis and following it to the Oregon Coast using the Blackfoot option on Map 6 of the Lewis and Clark to cut off the huge southern loop on Map 5). As far as I can tell the highest point on my proposed route would be the 5610' Rogers Pass at the Continental Divide between Great Falls and Missoula, Montana.
I was originally wary of the "headwind" issue for an east to west ride. My experience in the southern plains of the U.S. is strong prevailing southwest winds in spring and summer; however, my (limited) experience in the northern plains tells a different tale. I rode west to east across Nebraska in 2012 and 2014 and west to east across South Dakota in 2015. My notes from those rides complain of easterly headwinds on most days. In the end it will be a crapshoot regardless of the travel direction.
So, that's where I am right now. Today I ordered the maps I need to further evaluate the new plan. How is your planning going?
