Monday July 6, 2009

BEAUTIFUL DAY FOR RIIDING. The weather was perfect, cool and clear. The scenery was tremendous, the Potomac on the left, C&O Canal on the right, canopy of tree cover overhead and riding through the forest I saw a lot of wild life. Deer were plentiful, I saw woodchucks occasionally and I even saw a fox.
I have met some really nice people so far: A man and his teen age son from West Virginia, a couple from Washington DC, a mother and daughter walking their dog and the daughter now lives in Spanish Fork Utah. I am even more friendly on the road.
Today was the day that I had my first episode of compensating for a less than perfect situation. I also had an accident. With the bike loaded the way it is, it tends to wander back and forth. The part of the C&O trail that I was on is quite narrow with steep drop offs on both sides. I was moving pretty fast, probably about 12 – 15 MPH and the bike floated to the left. I went over the embankment and got slammed pretty hard. The bike helmet broke in six places. My head would have broken if not for the helmet.
After doing damage assessment I found that I was bleeding from my head, the ortlieb panniers took a beating but nothing broke, the front wheel was bend so bad that it would not rotate.
I cleaned up my head and tried to figure out how to get the bike fixed. It was about 10 miles to a bike shop in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. I found that if I removed the disk brakes that the wheel would rotate so I removed the disk brake assembly and went for bike repairs in Shepherdstown.
I bought a new front wheel and a new helmet. The bike mechanic at “Shep Peddle and Paddle” was named Alan. He installed a new wheel, the disk from the old wheel and reinstalled the disk brake assembly that I had removed.
Alan told me if I put most of the weight on the front rack that the bike would handle better. I tried it and it worked amazingly well. The bicycle steering is now much more stable.
I did not make much progress today but at least I got the “trip accident” out of the way and I am back on the trail.
The crash happened at Dargan Bend – Milepost 63.
Got the bike repaired in Shepherdstown, WV – Milepost 73.
I camped at Big Wood – Milepost 83