4/10/2015 0 Comments TRECYCLE - Ready, Set, GrowIt is just one week before the TRECYCLE adventure to cycle 333 miles across the state of Ohio on a recumbent trike to raise awareness and support for native tree reforestation in response to the loss of millions of ash trees to the Emerald Ash Borer in Ohio.
Thank you! First off, to all who have supported with pledges towards the goal of $1,000. I actually haven’t made it to the online goal, but some have sent me checks and handed me cash that exceed the $1,000, so we are in good shape - in fact added another park. Thank you to Ed Kapraly of Riverside Native Trees who grew the trees and will be delivering over 50 trees and shrubs to the 8 parks on Monday and Tuesday April 13 & 14. Here is a list of parks and the foresters and volunteers I have been working with and need to thank as well:
I wish to thank David Cornthwaite, from the UK who is advising me and other adventurers on our journeys to plant 1,000,000 (1 million) trees! TRECYCLE will begin in Cincinnati on the banks of the Ohio River on Sunday, April 19, 2015 and ends on the shore of Lake Erie on Saturday, April 25. The week encompasses the Environmental holidays of Earth Day on Tuesday, April 22 and Arbor Day on Friday, April 24. I will be travelling about 10 miles per hour, around 50 miles per day. It looks like lodging is all lined up and there are some interesting local places to eat along the way. Folks are welcome to join me on the trail or visit with me at the dining stops. I have a timeline and a map posted at my web site: Link to TRECYCLE Timeline LINK to GPS Map of the Ohio to Erie Trail TRECYCLE Ride And what adventure would be without its own logo and line of t-shirts? Thank you to my daughter Christine for design and to America Stevens of Swirly T-shirts who helped me recycle over a dozen perfectly good t-shirts inside out with new TRECYCLE logos. Thanks the Greene County Parks & Trails for donating a dozen used Trail Sentinel jackets to be recycled with new logos for the adventure. See you on the trail in one week!
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2/19/2015 0 Comments TRECYCLE Adventure BeginsToday I declared my plans for an adventure to cycle 333 miles across the state of Ohio on a recumbent trike to raise awareness and support for native tree reforestation in response to the loss of millions of ash trees to the Emerald Ash Borer in Ohio. This trek is inspired by world adventurer David Cornthwaite from England who is advising as many as 200 adventurers, each taking their own journeys with a goal of raising funds to plant 1,000,000 (1 million) trees! I plan to raise at least $3 per mile, a total of $1,000 or roughly $150 per day to support the planting of 50 trees (7 x six foot 3 gallon trees per day) in City, County, Metro Park and National Park locations along the trail. The TRECYCLE adventure begins in Cincinnati on the banks of the Ohio River on Sunday, April 19, 2015 and ends on the shore of Lake Erie on Saturday, April 25. The week encompasses the Environmental holidays of Earth Day on Tuesday, April 22 and Arbor Day on Friday, April 24. I will be travelling about 10 miles per hour, around 50 miles per day. At that rate there should be time each day to participate in tree plantings and speak with any groups who would like to hear about the adventure. Weather permitting I will camp in parks or lodge in warmshowers.org host homes, hostels, bed and breakfasts or hotels along the way. LINK to GPS Map of the Ohio to Erie Trail TRECYCLE Ride My dream is that this adventure can further inspire fellow Ohioans to take their own adventures right out their front door or driveway on the Ohio to Erie Trail. If you are interested more in this adventure please contact me. If you’d like to join the trek there's room for more. If you’d like to contribute and sponsor me in this adventure, see details below or link with the TRECYCLE Indiegogo Life crowdfunding site. If you are just curious about this crazy adventure and you’d just like to follow along I will be using this blog to report progress. I've done a few charities in the past, but it has been a very long time since I've solicited my family and friends for donations. Usually I will just cover the minimum pledge out of my own pocket so as not to bother folks. Well this time it's different. I am about to embark on my longest adventure - a 7 day, 333 mile journey. Its a cause I care about and hits close to home since I have three trees affected by the Emerald Ash Borer in our yard that have to be sawed down this spring. Remember you are joining a cause much bigger with adventurer David Cornthwaite of England to plant 1 million trees around the world. Here are a few suggested sponsorship options: $3 sponsor one mile $5 sponsor one seedling $20 sponsor one sapling tree $40 sponsor 2 trees $100 sponsor 33 miles $143 sponsor me for a day Thank you! 2/8/2015 0 Comments Cycling NumbersOne thing I've done since I began regular cycling again in 2010 is to log my mileage each day. That has become data that just begs to be analyzed for the fun of it. Well according to the numbers I passed 2 major milestones in cycling this past week. The first was 15,000 miles ridden by bike or trike in the 4 ½ years since August 2010. That’s about 9 miles a day. Roughly 6 of those miles per day (70%) have been for commuting purposes (to work and back or to do errands – any trip I otherwise would have driven a car.) By cycling instead of driving a car I saved 13,650 pounds or 6.2 metric tons of CO2 emissions from entering the atmosphere. The second milestone was 1,000,000 calories burned during 1,668 hours of cycling. That is roughly the equivalent of burning 286 pounds, or the caloric equivalent of 1,494 Burger King whoppers, 3,707 scoops of Graeters Ice Cream or 5,888 Guinness Stout Ales. No fitness club was necessary. Imagine how absurd it would seem to me now if I had to drive to the fitness club to ride a stationary bike! All in all I have saved 683 gallons of gas, worth $2,298. If one calculates all savings, in addition to the gas, such as car maintenance, fitness club savings, less parking fees, lower insurance costs and all the indirect savings to the environment, highway maintenance, etc. then by some calculations at the generally accepted figure of $1.00 per mile the savings altogether are estimated at $15,000. That has more than paid for my original bike and the new trike, the velokit and all the maintenance since. Contrary to what it may sound like I do not ride every day. On average it comes to about 3 out of every 4 days or 70 % of the time. Riding can go in spurts, my longest stretch has been 35 days, but there have been droughts of one or more days due to more important family activities, terribly bad weather, long, long distance travel days, illness, laziness, or having no particular reason to ride. One thing that has extended my riding into the winter months has been the green velokit which protects me on 5 of 6 sides (left, right, front and back and top – nothing on the bottom.) I have logged 3,250 miles in three seasons with the velokit. It keeps me dry, cuts the wind and keeps me relatively warm in my upper body. The kit was made in Ohio by a fellow named “Krash”. It was handmade, mine was the 62nd one he produced and possibly last one, as he announced last year on his web site that he has retired from the velokit business. More blog topics ahead…
1/21/2015 1 Comment How triking Began (for me - bd)...In the spring of 2010 at age 51 I was in miserable health. I weighed an all time high 230 pounds on a 6'1" frame and my knees ached so much that I asked my doctor about knee replacement. The doctors told me that I was too young and there was nothing they could do for the arthritis settling into my knees but to give me some fish bone supplement and take two Aleve a day. I began taking the medication. I mentioned to my wife that I would like to get a new bike to inspire me to begin riding. She countered by sharing one of her many questions, “You don’t even ride the bike you have now, why should you get a new one?” After the pain in my knees had subsided some I decided to begin riding my old green Trek hybrid bike to school one day. I rode the bike another day, then another day and I continued riding my bike to work day after day through the fall of 2010 determined to save enough gas money by bike riding to justify the purchase of a new bicycle. I rode all the way through to the fall of 2011. By then I had lost close to 20 pounds and my knees began to feel better. On one fateful morning while riding to work in the dark – dressed in light colored clothing and with my bike lights on I entered an intersection with the right of way on a green light, but was struck by a white pickup truck turning in front of me. This sent me to the hospital with a broken collarbone (required 11 screws and a plate to fix) two broken ribs, one which punctured my lung cavity and later resulted in what is known as a collapsed lung the next day. I spent nine days in the hospital. While there I dreamed of a safer more comfortable way to ride a bike. I went online and explored options to buy a recumbent trike. Over the next two months of my rehabilitation I hiked through the snow to and from work dreaming what my new trike would be. I traveled to Fairfield Cyclery near Cincinnati Ohio and purchased a shiny new red Trident Transport trike. I brought it home and rode it for the first time on Valentines day February 14, 2012. Within two weeks I decided to ride my trike 75 miles to Columbus, Ohio in 20° weather with a 20 mile-per-hour wind from the west pushing me much of the way. It was a bitterly cold but glorious ride sailing along at times between 25 and 30 miles an hour on the Prairie Grass trail to Columbus. Thus had begun my new love affair with riding a recumbent trike. Since then I’ve had many adventures on my trike. in the summer of 2012 my wife qualified for the International Masters swimming meet and I tagged along as support for her during the week long swim meet in Riccione, Italy on the eastern coast along the Adriatic sea. I worked out an arrangement with American Airlines to fly my tricycle over to Italy. Riccione is only 20 km from the small mountain republic of San Marino. I rode up and down along the castle walls in front of the walled city of San Marino, then packed up the trike and we drove on in a Fiat station wagon to Switzerland, Monaco, France, Andorra and Spain to ride my bike each stage of the way between sightseeing and camping. in Leon, Spain I began a 210 mile pilgrimage journey on the Camino de Santiago Compostela. My wife Michele provided support in the Fiat. We met at the end of each day in the center of the next city on the route. I rode much of the way with two Spaniards, Gonzalo and Yolanda Ainaga. Thankfully they spoke some English and helped me navigate, in particular the long trek up to the historic mountain village of O Cebreiro, a one days climb of over 800m in elevation in 90+ degree heat – over 100 degrees on the pavement. After that challenge it is was a beautiful and glorious ride sailing triumphantly into Santiago Compostela to pay homage to the relics of St. James and receive my compestela or certificate for completing the pilgrimage.. We drove further on to Portugal where I had a chance to ride along the coast. Since then I have had other adventures here in Ohio and also traveling to ride in 10 other states on my tricycle. One of my latest adventures was riding solo on the famous Katy trail in Missouri - 230 miles in 5 days from Clinton Missouri to Machens, Missouri on one of America’s first and longest rail to trail. I have big dreams of other adventures coming soon... |
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