Happy Birthday to Me

Sunday morning had me riding the short (only 4 hours!) road to the Windy City, where I met my long time friend Kate. We went to college together, and Kate's now a lawyer in the big city. She hiked the Appalachian Trail last summer with her brother and friend Emily, and she's now working with her friend Jay to splice together an awesome documentary about the adventure. It's amazing how many of my gripes about this trip are the same ones she had about the Trail... Kate and Jay took me out in Chicago to celebrate my birthday with some Giordano's deep dish pizza, a visit to the famous "bean" and a private screening of the movie's rough cut.

The "bean", as photographed by a professional...

Much better in real life...

I think I need a haircut.

Iowa City, and an Unexpected Donor

Iowa City, home of Iowa University, is home to a small, but well organized city department. The guys took me in and showed me the kind of hospitality I've grown accustomed to. It wasn't until I got up in the morning, though, and talked to the oncoming shift that I got a sense of how meaningful my visit was.

On the wall of their day room, there's a cork board with a pamphlet from Christopher Bok's funeral. Chris, or "Bok" as the guys called him, was a beloved Iowa City Fire Lieutenant. He was diagnosed too late with colorectal cancer, the 3rd leading cause of death by cancer, and died on May 29, 2011. One of the firemen gave me his memorial sticker - the letters BOK in a spiderweb, because of his love for Spiderman. I was honored to affix it to my helmet, as one of the men observed that "Bok would've liked that, riding around the country on your helmet."

At breakfast, one of the guys slipped me a donation; I found out later that his wife had died from ovarian cancer. And while I was enroute to my next destination, I got a very generous, and completely out of the blue, donation from Karen Bok, Chris's widow. She's on a mission of her own to educate everyone she can about the early signs and recognition of cancer. I was so touched, I was speechless...

Chris and Karen

Beginning of the End

 Wyoming was freezing cold, and Nebraska gave me my first rain experience. Even though the sky was occasionally clear, the intermittent drizzle coupled with the less than breathtaking scenery was enough to begin breaking my spirit. 


After hours of uninterrupted boredom, I got to Grand Island (which is a misnomer), the third largest city in Nebraska. I happened to be wearing a Kentland t-shirt, which led one of the firefighters to ask me if I had ever "been to that place". Turned out that this guy took one of Matt Despos's auto extrication class a few years ago. What a small world. 

The Grand Island FD went to a fire the night I was there, but I've been too tired to ride at most of the places I spend the night. I didn't miss much though, as their "blaze" was is a commercial trash compactor.


The department is much older than I realized, organized in 1874. A lot of cool history remains on the walls of even their newest station, alongside the most modern of training tools.

Cheyenne

The guys in Cheyenne treated me really well. So, of course, I forgot to get a picture with them. Here's the oncoming shift the next morning instead...

Salt Lake City and into Wyoming

I'm a few days behind, again, so a quick recap of my last few stops:

In Salt Lake City, I bunked at Engine 1, where backsteppers Mike and Amy were enjoying one of their last shifts on the unit, as they were being transferred to a slower house to make room for paramedics. Or was it Hazmat techs? I can't remember now...

Anyway, they took me for a tour of the city and showed me the one redeeming factor of their future house: the view.

 According to Capt. George, the ski resorts still have 16 feet of snow, and are going to stay open until July 24th. That's right, July.

I guess that should've been a warning about the upcoming weather. When I left in the morning, it was freezing cold. In fact, I shivered the entire way to Cheyenne. It sucked.

Photos from Wyoming and Nebraska upcoming, I'm on my way to Iowa City now...

Scenes on the Road to Salt Lake City

Mad Max!

Actually, his name is Leland, and when I passed him on I-80, I did a double take. With some creative hand signals, I was able to get this road warrior to pull over so I could snap some shots of his monster machine, which started life as a Toyota pickup. Leland is on a cross country tour of his own, visiting campsites and taking in all the beauty of the land.