Day 16, meet 1,000 miles!

Woohoo! I just had to stop and take a photo when my bike's computer reached a total of 1,000 miles biked on this trip. Unbelievable. I cannot believe that at 20 years old, I am biking across the country. I feel so much older in my experiences. Yet, I still feel like a child, sponge-for-brain, soaking up everything I see and hear along the way.
For all of you faithful readers (I'm not sure if there are any, yet), here is a breakdown of our trip so far:
Day Miles
1 65
2 58.6--crossed into New York!
3 58
4 92.5
5 92
6 0
7 0
8 78
9 81
10 70 bike (30 car, flat tire; needed a lift to nearest bike shop)--crossed into Penn!
11 78--crossed into Ohio!
12 0
13 71
14 77.5
15 93.5--phew, we did this in the flats of Ohio and Indiana, but it was ALL headwind!
16 68

Tonight we are staying at another warm shower's contact in Wabash, Indiana. This is only my second day in this state, but the friendliness of the people in the Mid-west continues to surprise and delight me. This morning, a woman driving a mini-van took her time to pass me so that she could yell a greeting and wave nice a big from her open window: "Good luck! Be safe!" The distraction almost ran me off the road, of course, but nice nonetheless.

Since Gautier and I left Cleveland, it has been all corn and soybean fields all day. Flat, flat, flat riding, which is very nice, but the wind can be killer. It blows in all directions except from behind. Yesterday was frustrating, because we were trying to make it to a free bike shelter in Monroeville, Indiana, which was 93 miles from our starting point in Bowling Green, Ohio. We made it, but only after about 7.5 hours of biking. What my legs put out at 16mph momentum, the wind pushes back to 10 or 9 mph. A rider I met in New York said that she would rather climb hills all day than deal with the headwinds of the mid-West. Now I know what she meant, and I rather agree. But, yesterday was a "windy day," according to the locals of Monroeville. And, oh, what a sweet little town! Bordering Ohio, this little town of about 1,300 people gave us so much. Since the town is on the Adventure Cycling Northern Tier Route, it sees many cyclists from all over the nation and world. As a way to welcome these cyclists, they offer their community building as a free biker's shelter, with a kitchen, cots, warm shower, and facilities for free laundry. Gautier and I met Warren, who opened the doors for us, at 7:30pm, and we wandered right into the town's Lyon's club pot-luck dinner meeting. Starved, Gautier and I lingered around, with unsuccessful attempts to mop up the drool collecting at the corner of our mouths. As the meeting came to an and, Gautier just about pushed me into a corner to get to the spread of food when one man said we could fill our plates to "help them all take less home." Boy, did we help them. Heaps of potato and pasta salad, fresh little cherry tomatoes from some one's garden, baked beans, sloppy joe's for Gautier, and as many desserts as we could fit onto 3 heaping plates. All the cookies and brownies we smuggled from yesterday pretty much fed us all day today. The taste buds on my tongue have burned off from so much sugar. I need a hearty, healthy dinner tonight, even if I will be the one cooking it!

While we stuffed our faces in the community center, we were surrounded by the Lyons' club members, who were very curious to hear our story. Warren and another town official lingered for a while, and we chatted about how the town has changed since it's formation in 1855. Warren, retired in 1990, worked in a car factory outside of town. We saw a Japanese-0wned factory on our ride into town which manufactures car parts like windshield wipers and automatic window motors, and Warren told us of another factory in town. It seems that if you aren't a large farm owner, your only other option for work is at the factory. Many of the older men I tried to talk with continued to lean in their ear, muttering an "eh?" as if they were hard of hearing from years of working around heavy machinery.

We learned how farming has turned large-scale in this region of the country. Warren commented that in the 50s and 60s, a family could make a good living on 80 to 100 acres of farm land, growing everything one needed. The younger town official grew up on a similar farm, growing beef cattle, but left that life at a young age for cars and drag racing. Although he has seen all of the U.S. through his career, he commented that looking back, life on the farm was good. Warren got excited when we mentioned that we want to be self-sufficient farmers, growing everything that we need. He said that "now-a-days, to make it out here, you need to own at least 1,500 acres to farm." 1,500 acres! Wow! Farm auctions are very common in the area, where larger farms buy out the land owned by smaller farmers who just could not make it. The land appreciation is rising so quickly in this area that it is a smart investment move to buy so much farm land, if one can afford it. At a recent farm auction, land went for about $6,000 per acre! But, with all of this land, there is no food self-sufficiency in this little town where everyone knows everyone else's name. We passed two farm stands selling seasonal fruits and veggies (zucchini, sweet peppers, tomatoes, musk melon, pumpkins, squash), but all other farm land is dedicated to growing soy and corn. Most of this is sold for either grain or oil. As Warren worked in a car factory, he knew much about car mechanics, and we talked about ethanol production with all of the corn. Apparently, they are also producing a fuel with soybean oil. An alternative to petroleum fuel, but how will we feed so many people if all of our cropland is used to fuel our cars? I'd rather eat a balanced meal and ride my bike than have a car.