JC reporting for fun!

Ah but another place to post about the extravagant and highly enjoyable bike trip around the World! Its been amazing week meeting up with Cycle-@-Circus now back up to 6 members and we've been working on polishing a street performance act. Its also nice to take a little break at an Organic farm here in Madison, Wisconsin to recharge my batteries and catch up on sewing projects and whatnot. Anyway, I've also got my own livejournal which I try to keep up to date as my own travel log that dates back to when I was in Europe at:
www.livejournal.com/users/yanomamo/
and I'm uploading pictures sometime while I'm here as well (I have about 360 to go through) and I've already got some pictures from this trip as well as the one to Europe at:
http://s144.photobucket.com/albums/r182/offthegridteam/

Minnesota trapped us

Well, as Jon indicated, Tyger and JC met us in Minneapolis on Sunday. This of course required that Jon's secret army of ninja spies be executed. This, combined with the copious amounts of wine consumed Sunday night, got us off to a late start on Monday. We stayed at a park close to the Wisonsin border, and biked to a town just across the state line, Prescott, and ate breakfast at a picnic table by the Mississippi River the following morning. And then, we were lured back to the other side of the river and spent the day in a place we'll call Frerret. I spent the entire amazing day sitting in the river with water to my neck, the current running toward me, reflecting on this trip and how amazing it has been and how amazing it was that I was sitting in the Mississippi River between Minnesota and Wisconsin and how beautiful and awesome life is and how beatiful and amzing people are, and how beautiful it is every time our lungs breathe this life and our hearts pump blood through our veins and how soul-squishing capitalism is. Everyone else spent the day juggling and playing music. It was a glorious day. So we slept there, then went back across the river to Prescott in the morning, and found ourselves eating breakfast at the same picnic table. Then we had a brilliant plan to build a raft but Prescott failed us with it's lack of materials. So we went back to Minnesota and hung out in the park for a few hours. I crossed the river so many times, Minnesota Wisconsin Minnesota Wisconsin Minnesota Winconsin. Anyway, we finally got on our way, and our now in Pepin, WI. We stopped here for lunch and swam in the lake and now there is a severe thunderstorm warning, so we are still here! But we are well on our way to Madison, and excited to spend some time there.
The ride today was absolutely beautiful. We finally hit some hills again, after lots of flat. Up and down is fun.
It's super fun with the new additions to the group. They bring lots of positive energy and excitement and humor and insight and free-food scoring skills.
I can't believe it's already nearing the end of July...
Also, we saw a fox and the moon has been beautiful.

Kaite

6 again

i'm still not quite sure how they did it, but tyger & jc caught up with us today. they biked 145 miles yesterday to make sure they were in minneapolis before we left. with new vigor circus practice has resumed. lillia has out done us all in busking moneys, kaite even scored more watching our fleet of heavily laiden bicycles which attract a fair bit of attention than tony did juggling knives today at the farmers market. outside the window of gabe's house i see levitating bodies and flashes of flying clubs. we're working hard on aquiring lilia an accordion within our budget, those fuckers are expensive. we'll be leaving for wisconsin in the morning.

-jon

Minneapolis

we must be in a hip town i'm blogging at a tattoo parlor at 11pm. We just had delicious Thai food and lilia's the only one who's gotten any beer. mmmmmm......
Biking in cities is scary. We were lucky to have a bike trail for a good 100 miles or so. Micah got lost one night and followed a dirt road for fifteen miles and got three flat tires.
We are expecting more bike paths out of here. yey!!! Also we got to go.
Post comments!

omg tempeh

freaking out in grand forks, an actual co-op and shit with real food! an d the internet omg i want it all!

-jon

mmmm, Spykes....

MT ended! We didn't know if it ever would but on Saturday we had our longest day yet; we started at 6am, rode 103 miles, and made it from Wolf Point, MT to Williston, ND. We are now in Minot, ND, staying at a house from the warm showers list. We were fed a delicious meal, complete with ice cream sundaes. We collided with a storm today, so it was so nice to have a house to come to.
Everything is getting greener and people have sweet accents. In MT we kept meeting people that made us say "people in MT are so nice", and now in North Dakota I keep finding myself saying "People in North Dakota are so nice." I continue to be amazed by the generosity and kindness of people, by the good intentions and the genuine desire people have to help each other out. Some days I feel like I could do this forever, like there is so much to see and learn.
So many white people in MT warned us about the reservations, in a really dehumanizing and racist way, like they are scary people and we should just pass through as quickly as we can and avoid staying there or talking to people. Despite these warnings, people were nothing but friendly and awesome and helpful. It's amazing what happens when you talk to people...
After a long run with no flats (no one has gotten one since Micah, before Seattle), between Micah and I we have gotten 4 flats in the last three days...
We should arrive in Grand Forks either Thursday or Friday, where we will hopefully pick up another rider and then on to Minnesota! Woohoo!

Take care y'all
-Kaite

...does montana ever end?

now we've made it to wolf point idaho, as of a hour ago or so it was 102 degrees and somehow the headwinds haven't gone away. we're doing great, ppl continue to be nice as all hell even though now we're on a reservation(gasp). we spent last night in a mobile home owned(?) by a local lutheran pastor that stopped on the highway to invite us to stay there, that was all we ever saw of him. looking forward to North Dakota and how it's barely over half the distance across as montana.

It seems that a lot of our new friends in spokane are feeling a different kind of heat. stay strong friends!

-jon

Pink Unicorns are the Most Real Thing on the Planet

Greetings from Wolf Point, MT. It's been a slow week, with a combination of hail storms, 100+ degree weather, and winds blowing strongly in the opposite direction of us holding us up a bit. It looks as though we will finally leave MT tomorrow! woohoo! People continue to be awesome and nice. It's been interesting to see the ways things are different and the same in different places. Businesses that want to charge you to fill up water bottles, libraries that won't let you use internet without an address, the "Real Change not Spare Change" signs that "discourage panhandling" but encourage the use of the food bank and Salvation Army...because clearly they're all about real change...the anti-meth ads all over these rural parts, the ways we are taught to fear what we don't know and dehumanize and blame others. But we continue to be helped out in amazing ways. People are awesome.
It will be so exciting to reach a new state! MT is taking forever...we are melting in the heat today.
Take care of yourselves and others. Rock on.

-Kaite

thunder storms and head winds

delays due to weather have held us up in NE montana, the ppl continue to be friendly (& a little racist). Looking forward to taking a day off, maybe tomorrow, cercumstantially on the 4th of july. my thoughts go out to those 50,000 hippies in some remote part of arkansas who will be ohm'n for peace tomorrow, take a second and listen mybe you'll feel their presence over the the typical militaristic mock war celebrations of empire.

-jon