Oxford, OH - Had a pleasant day on the bike heading into Ohio, which holds the distinction of the only state on our route (sans VA and DC) that I have previously visited. To be honest, my only real associations with the state are Cedar Point and a certain regrettable speeding ticket while driving Jim Rampton’s giant plum mobile back from Michigan. Oh well, time for new ones. After a day on the bike that included a ride along from crewmember JT (an avid smoker who surpassed everyone’s expectations on the bike) and a questionable Amp energy drink shotgun challenge, we arrived in the cool college town of Oxford, home to Miami of Ohio. We received a warm reception at the local chapter house (which was coincidentally in its last night of Pi Kapp operation), and settled into our home for the night - an on campus wooden lodge. While unloading my bike accessories, I noticed a few of us had been approached by a group of tourists. It turns out they were from China, a country I have had the great fortune to visit, and wanted to take pictures with us! The strange thing was, they had no idea we were cross country cyclists and, well, actually the whole thing was pretty strange. That night we checked out the movie “Funny People” (which was pretty “eh”) and were even a bit late for curfew. As my teammate Isaac Polanco would say, “Scandalous!”
Cincinnati, OH – Hands down one of the most hilarious cycling experiences of the trip. This may or may not be correlated to it being the shortest ride of the summer… who knows. What I do know is that the ride along of Trevor “Tink” Brink, a crewmember who has quickly become one of my favorite people, made the day. I was in Tink’s pace line for the day and he took the ride on like a champ. There were a few struggles with hills in there (including what could be a straight up priceless prolonged final ascent into lunch), but that’s to be expected. Flattering picture of Tink post-ride below!
That afternoon we were visited by a pick-up wheelchair football team. The team was composed of some cool guys (including a slam poet who performed some of his colorful work for us) and they were happy to get us involved. I’ve previously played wheelchair basketball, and I actually found football a lot easier. It was a blast to maneuver around and play and I was glad to get to witness this kind of action, since we unfortunately had a visit with a “murderball” type team cancelled earlier in the summer. Maybe that was a good thing, who knows! That night we all went to check out a Reds vs. Rockies game that failed to hold my attention. I did, however, make sure to waste money on an overpriced soft pretzel/soda combo because, after all, that’s what a ball game is all about.
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