Crossing the Midwest

Chicago was great but so was the arrival of our new panels. We had mentioned previously some of our solar panels were broken. So, fairly excited we left after a long night of fixing and mounting the new panel. After a not so minor complication with the bike computer (which regulates the motor) - I spare you the technical details - we left the Chicago area and entered the Midwest.

The Midwest

The Midwest reaches from Chicago to the Rocky mountains. It consists mainly of farmland and is as flat as a landscape can be. Also it is sparsely populated. Our original plan was to camp when at the end of the day where ever we are as we thought there is so much land and nothing happening, clearly one can just put up a tent. Of course we were proven wrong. The many signs of “private property”, “no trespassing” and the occasional “shot on sight” made it fairly clear to us already freighted Europeans we are not going to camp on any private property. Hence we did the only thing we could do, ask the people who put up the signs. And that actually worked really well. At the end of a day we would pull up to one of the many farms which always have massive yards and ask if we could camp. That worked every single time.

Of course, we also made use of warmshowers when ever possible and were not let down a single time. After now two weeks of having the new panels our setup works now more or less as we have thought in the first place. We can do the estimated 130 km a day with ease. But there is another factor what is at least equally important than having sun and working panels. Wind! We had most of the time steady wind from either side. Funny enough the direction changes often on a daily basis. But most of the time from the side (60 %) followed by headwind (30%) and of course close to never tailwind (10%). But going west this might be expected.

Last but not least there are a lot of thunderstorms and as we were told many times it is currently hurricane season (which sounds worse than it is, as it is nearly always hurricane season through out the year).

Just before we entered Nebraska the road network got sparser. From that point onward we had the choice between gravel roads or the highway. After a few kilometres on gravel we decided to stick on the highway our setup is just not made for uneven terrain. Judging by the name we had crossed all of Europe as we went through a surprising number of familiar sounding cities from all over Europe like Oxford or Salem.

At one point we found our self camping at the Mccook city park as a huge thunderstorm was approaching. Luckily for us the thunderstorm went just around us and only strong wind nearly ripped our tents apart and we could witness lightnings from afar. After it passed we thought that was it for the night. Little did we know the worst was yet to come. Just when we were on the edge of sleeping (pretty exact at 10pm) we got hit by a huge burst of water with so much pressure that the tents started to bend. The strange thing was it was clearly coming only from one side and not from above. After a quick investigation the cause was found. Sprinklers that popped up everywhere on the campground. To this day I wonder who would install hidden sprinklers on a dedicated campground that pop out and go off at 10pm when everyone is in their tents for certain. Luckily for us we didn’t put our tents on top of one of these. We fixed them by covering them up with our water bottles and had a pretty peaceful night.

After having cycled through the great flats for a long time we were really looking forward to go into the rocky mountains. During the last days the distance between cities got bigger and bigger and just before Fort Collins (where the Rocky mountains start) there was a gap of about 100km of nothing. On the day we reached the Rocks it was fairly cloudy so we were not sure for a long time if we see more clouds or already mountains but after another hour it got fairly clear. We made it through the flats and indeed in front of us were finally the long awaited Rocky mountains!