Cycling Coast to Coast Across the USA

Although I am in the UK again today, back in 2005 I cycled across North America, from Orlando, Florida to Portland, Oregon. A friend of mine is setting out on a similar trip next month and he has been asking me an endless barrage of questions about the trip, which has brought back a lot of memories.

Whatever you may think about the USA, its politics or the tourists that you come across in England; the truth of the matter is that the United states is a truly enormous place with a huge population meaning that there are both good and bad things about it like anywhere else. After you get out of the major cities, you will find that most Americans are very nice – if perhaps a bit simple – people that are proud of their country and very enthusiastic about European visitors. It is a bit off putting since this is a side of America that is rarely portrayed on television or the movies and certainly took me by surprise.

As for the actual cycling, the trip is incredible. I started my trip in March in Florida and it was always getting quite warm at the time. Despite the stereotypes about the American Southeast, I found most people to the very nice and quite excited to see a British cyclist going across the country. I also met quite a few other cyclists doing much the same thing, especially heading towards California (instead or Oregon) and most of them were Americans. I think this might be part of the reason that so few (proportionately speaking) Americans travel abroad, their own country is so large and diverse they can travel endlessly within their own borders.

Moving out of the “Deep South” into the “Great Plains” was at first quite stunning, with endless fields stretching out apparently forever and an enormous sky. It is something to see, but it also makes for some incredibly monotonous cycling after a couple of days: flat, featureless, and endless. This is what makes the Rocky Mountains so absurdly impressive. Of course it is a truly impressive mountain range in its own right, but after days and days of flat, featureless plains, the mountains just seem to tear out of the ground in an incredibly dramatic fashion. The mountains are truly beautiful by any definition and this was probably my favourite leg of the trip. After this you enter semi-arid desert and then into dense forest and eventually end up on the Pacific coast.

I would strongly encourage anyone with the opportunity to take this trip and have a few tips to offer: (1) keep your schedule fluid, like it or not it will be almost impossible to keep to a very strict time table (not to mention you probably want to take the time to appreciate what you see); (2) while you want to carry a hydration pack and a food/get supply, do not be shy about just cycling up to rural farm houses and asking to refill your water or the like, most Americans in the country are very nice and perfectly willing to help; (3) bring your MP3 player or some other music player with you because some of the stretches become truly mind numbing after a while (like the middle of Kansas).