Last Chance to St Francis, KS - May 22

Dawn in Last Chance

One month on the road and it's still windy!

We got up at 5 to get some hours in before the winds picked up.  Unfortunately, the winds never really died down but the early morning was beautiful.

We stopped in all the little towns along our route to find most of them pretty much like Last Chance - abandoned.  

As the day wore on, the winds and the temperatures increased and we really needed ice cream but the town of Joe. s had none.  Joes did have a nice thrift store where we talked to the people working there and almost got one of the women to join us on the ride.

Just before 2 we made it to a small cafe in Udalia that served ice cream.  We chatted up the folks eating and working there before handing my bike over to Sean who needed a ride while Catherine and I were pretty much done in by the wind.

Right now we are parked at a funky RV Park charging up batteries and the van.

Parlier today we stopped in the town of Anton and did some small shopping in the only grocery store.  They sold filtered water and when we asked why, the woman working at the store told us that the nitrate level in the water was too high to pass EPA regulations so the water had to be filtered.  So all of the nitrogen based fertilizers that have been dumped on the land over the years have finally poisoned the drinking water.  In predictable human fashion, the woman we talked to only saw the inconvenience of having to filter water as the problem.  The fact that years of toxic agricultural practices caused the problem doesn't seem to register.  What does it take for people to start thinking in terms of systems rather than as merely reactive mammals??

For those of you wanting numbers about energy consumption, stay tuned.  We are collecting data that should satisfy your curiosity and as a teaser, there is huge variability resulting from human pedal power.

Trying to Cope

Destroyed grain storage building- Watermelon sized hail?

Betty Shaw who shares the same birthday as our mother - But she's only 83

Betty gets back to work

Almost got ourselves another Green Rider

Garden art in St. Francis

Looks good enough to eat . . . not!

Denver to Last Chance - May 21

It took us forever to get going this morning following the trauma of a failure with the new electric bicycle.  When we attached the front wheel with the motor in the hub, we didn't have everything quite right so after a couple hours of riding, the wheel fell off.  Sean was and still is pretty upset about his new baby's health but we expect he'll have a full recovery.  Since we don't need the bike until after getting to brother Peter's house next Friday, we have plenty of time to figure out a good way to fix it and then with Peter's help, we'll get Sean's baby healthier than its ever been.

We portaged a few miles out of Denver to avoid traffic and headed east with a gentle breeze, light traffic and gently rolling hills.  Within about 1/2 hour, the gentle breeze started picking up and soon we were facing 25 to 30 mph headwinds coming from about 2 o'clock outré of the south east.  We struggled along for about 40 miles before deciding to call it a day with the plan of starting early before the winds pick up tomorrow.  We are at a junction in the road that used to have a town called Last Chance.  We are parked behind an abandoned "Dairy King" restaurant, hoping that the baseball sized hail that is predicted for this area doesn't show up! A couple of high school kids came by to warn us about the hail and parked one of their cars under a tree to protect it from the weather.  It's 6:30 now and we hope the threat of the storm is over although the wind continues to batter us about.

Aside from being exhausting, our 4 days in the Denver area were educational and  inspiring.  Also being able to share and connect with people who we only knew from phone conversations and emails was very rewarding.  Seeing Catherine's son Daniel and cousin Jim's family added to the warmth we are feeling about the people we spent time with. 

On the educational front, our visit with Jim Fournier and his biochar project was both educational and inspiring. As I've said before, Biochar holds huge promise for cleaning up unwanted biomass, creating a non-toxic soil health product and sequestering CO2.

Building the electric bike the following day was not only very educational but the open hearted generosity of both Dean and Chuck gives me hope for the kind of businesses that will succeed by creating communities of trust through good service and products.

Learning about Boulder's bicycle and city planning from a group of bicycle enthusiasts who love their jobs was great fun and way more information than I can retain.   It's all available on the City of Boulder's website that I can't look up now since I'm writing this way far away from internet service.

Last evenings event for Sustainable Colorado was sobering and somewhat depressing.  Being reminded of the horrible state of the world by really smart people tends to get me down.  They did offer solutions but walking out of the event and into the Denver streets where there was no sign of those threats, made me realize what a huge job lies ahead and how unprepared our civilization is to deal with what's coming.

The generosity that Paul Sheldon of Natural Capitalism Solutions showed us over the phone as we prepared for this trip was  surpassed by his open hearted enjoyment of our visit and his eloquent support of our project.  He made us sound like real heroes which we don't really feel like but we do love the support we are getting from people we admire and respect like Paul.

Catherine returning with groceries as we head off for Kansas

Heading east towards Kansas

Sean checks out some Last Chance real estate

Our campsite behind an abandoned "Dairy King"

Catherine looking like a serious biker

What Boulder is doing

The Green Riders and Colorado Governor Ritter!   

We actually slept in until about 8 before heading off to Boulder to visit with Chris Hagelin and others who work for the City of Boulder.
We met at the Dushanbe Teahouse which is where we had dinner with Elliot the night before.  The teahouse was a gift to the City of Boulder from somewhere in Asia and Boulder sent them an internet cafe. It's a wonderful place with great food.
After lunch we rode around Boulder a bit with two other City employees.  We learned about how the many miles of bike trails along the creeks were funded with a combination of flood control money and local money dedicated to improving bike routes.  The results are spectacular.  The creeks are beautiful, the trails are well used and flood control is accomplished as well.  Boulder is rightfully proud of their system of trails that also includes lots of very comfortable bike lanes on surface streets.  Their premier bike lane is called the "contra-flow" lane.  They took a two way street and made it one-way with bikes having priority in the traffic lane.  Then they planted a berm that divides the one way car lane from a dedicated bike lane that goes the other direction.  It works great and it gives priority to bicycles over cars.  It also crosses the main downtown mall area giving easy access to bicyclists so that they won't be tempted to drive into central Boulder.
After getting video of what I just described (to be posted soon), we rode about 6 miles out of Boulder to the Water Treatment Plant.  Most of the ride was along Boulder Creek and it was beautiful.  The Water Treatment Plant has a 1 megawatt solar array that is about to be turned on and we also learned about water rights issues, solid waste disposal and methane production for the creation of fuel provide some of the electrical needs of the plant.  The plant uses about 750 KW of power a year.  The solar will contribute about 250 KW and the methane already does contribute another 250 KW.  Apparently, the Water treatment plant is the largest consumer of electricity in the area and they want to get as much as they can without using coal fired electricity which is still the predominant form of electricity generation in the area.
There was so much more information that we got that I can't really remember but overall, Boulder is doing a great job of managing its traffic, supporting the use of bicycles and busses and dealing with their waste water in as positive a way as possible.  Our guides for the day were very gracious, curious and supportive of our adventure and seemed to really enjoy their work, largely because they know they are pushing the envelope when it comes to creating more sustainable communities.  Chris gets multiple calls every week from other municipalities who want to pick his brain about what Boulder is doing.  We hope to help spread the word that lots of what Boulder has already done can be replicated in other towns and cities for the benefit of creating more livable, sustainable communities.
After visiting with cousin Jim, his wife Regina and their son Logan, we headed back through ridiculous rush hour traffic to Denver.  We rushed over to an evening event where we got a chance to listen to Governor Ritter talk about the advances that Colorado is making as a serious adopter of renewable energy.
David Orr also spoke and the featured guest was Lester Brown who depressed us a bit about the state of the world and offered hope about humans ability to save civilization.  As Lester Brown says:  "Saving Civilization is not a spectator sport!"  So we ride on tomorrow!!

Chris Hagelin enjoying the Dushanbe Teahouse

Our bicycle escorts - Ready to ride

Chris and Joe at the Water Treatment Plant - See the coal fired plant in the background

Solar array at the Water Treatment Plant- Ready to plug in

Joe - Wishing he could join us

We did it! - Electric bicycle conversion in one afternoon!

The anticipation was immense.  Sean was all a tingle as we headed to Boulder to attempt the amazing feat of building an electric bicycle in a day.  We stopped at cousin Jim and his wife Regina's fine home and tried to be relaxed and calm while internally chomping at the bit to get the build underway.  After admiring Jim's solar electric and hot water systems and eating a fabulous lunch, we grabbed the bicycle that Jim agreed to contribute to the cause and headed down to Pete's Electric Bike Shop to start the conversion.
Dean and Chuck, the owner's of the shop were busy hanging an electric bike from the ceiling and very generously stopped and helped us get oriented.  It turned out that they had already gotten an older steel framed mountain bike off of Craigslist for our conversion.  We quickly figured out that using the frame they got would work out better than the one that Jim offered so we got to work.
Between 12 and 4 Sean did most of the mechanical things that needed doing like changing brakes, cables, messing with racks changing tires and wheels and mounting new handlebars.  Around 4 some folks who had been invited to join us showed up and amidst the hubub of answering questions, giving rides and checking out a very cool hand build "pusher trailer" built by local enthusiast, Sean, Dean and Chuck hooked up the controller, battery rack and front drive wheel.  All did not go smoothly with the controller but fortunately, Dean pulled another out of a box and it worked.  Catherine and I had a dinner date so when we left at 6:30, Dean said they had about an hour left and sure enough, Sean showed up about an hour later to join us for dinner.
Dean and Chuck have the best electric bike shop we have seen.  They carry a number of different types of ready made bikes and scooters and they love doing conversions.  Sharing the shop space with us was a tricycle that they were outfitting with an electric drive system and there were other trikes on the floor that were going to be converted.  They have another shop in Minneapolis and they are opening a shop in Aspen in a couple of weeks.   Until meeting them, I thought that operating an electric bike shop was an act of charity.  Dean and Chuck don't see it that way.  They have a model that includes rentals, sales, conversions and excellent service and it looks like it is working.  We know that when people try electric bikes, the experience is usually very positive and for people who like to putter with bicycles, adding the electrics adds another layer of challenge which I noticed Sean certainly enjoyed.
Without Dean and Chuck's expertise and extra parts, we would not have been able to complete the conversion in a day.  Their record is just over 4 hours for a conversion!

The other exciting thing about this conversion is the cost.  We have built a strong, hopefully reliable electric bicycle out of a $140 Craigslist purchase that we added new fenders, tires, tubes, quill stem, handlebars, cables and housings, used front rack from the shop and the electricals.  Excluding the $400.00 battery and motor kit, we built the whole bike for $300.  The motor kit retails for under  $400.00.  So for around $1,100, we've got ourselves an awesome electrical bike.

One of the visitors at the Bike Shop yesterday was Tom Weis, an environmentalist and wind power activist who is planning on riding an electric bicycle from Boulder to Washington DC in September.  Needless to say, we had a lot to talk about and he is completely delightful.  We ended up having dinner with him, Paul Sheldon from Natural Capitalism Solutions and my dear friend Elliot Hoffman who happened to be in Boulder for meetings with Hunter Lovins and her crew.

Starting out on the conversion

Dean helping out

Chuck adding his touch

A "pusher" trailer that hooks onto a bicycle and pushes it down the road

The designer builder showing off his invention

The finished product - Minus fenders and front rack

It really works

Trying out the electric Miles car

Very cool car

Great to see Elliot in Boulder

He joins the Green Riders for as long as it took to put on and take off the T-shirt

Tom Weis talking to Catherine about his upcoming electric bicycle cross country tour.

Denver and Golden BioChar

Catherine and Daniel spent the morning cruising thrift stores in Denver while Sean and I cruised the bike stores.  We both got caught in thunderstorms and while Catherine and Daniel waited out the storm under an underpass, Sean and I got Japanese food for lunch at a very friendly, very tasty small restaurant.

Later in the afternoon, we headed up the 20 mile bike trail to Golden to participate in the BioChar event.

So what is biochar?  I think it's one of the best kept secrets in the sustainable solutions portfolio.

Biochar is basically charcoal created out of woody biomass.  Wood chips, straw and any other relatively dry biomass is burned in a chamber with controlled air intake so that the biomass only burns down to char, not all the way to ash.

This process accomplishes two very impressive results.  First, the char has hugely significant value as a soil enhancer.  In agriculture, it improves the quality of the soil so that both water use and fertilization needs are greatly reduced.  There was also talk at the event about the value to damaged topsoil from mining and drilling operations.  There were a number of scientists at the event who are doing studies with the biochar including people from the USGS (United States Geological Survey) as well as some from the USDA (United States Department of Agriculture).  BEC (Biochar Engineering Corporation) is working closely with both groups tho help with the educational process around the value of Biochar.  Which brings me to the second impressive result resulting from the creation of Biochar.  Once the Biochar is in the soil, the carbon still remaining in the Char will stay in the soil for 1,000 years, effectively sequestering carbon.  So, Biochar offers a way to improve soil conditions while taking carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it in the soil.  That's why I think Biochar is the best kept secret around.

The units that BEC manufacture are small enough to fit on a flatbed and can be hauled to the biomass, rather than hauling the biomass to a central plant. This eliminates the huge financial and emissions cost of hauling biomass to a large central facility.  To learn more about the process and the company, check out their website www.biocharengineering.com/.  
After the event, Daniel, his friend Megan and Sean rode the bikes back to Daniel's house while Catherine and I drove home.   They were very late getting home and Catherine and I felt like worried parents.  I guess it comes natural to parents to worry!.

Bike shop Cruising in Denver - Looking for parts for tomorrow's "build"

Bike Shop with the same name as our electronic readout units.

Proprietors of our lunch spot covering my bike to protect it from the rain - So Sweet!!

Tour guide Daniel bringing us into Golden

BioChar unit in Operation

Daniel in his element

Soil Scientist Francisco Calderon slipping off with a couple of bags of Char for his work.

Jim Fournier - CEO of Biochar Engineering Corporation - A great guy

The sun is shining on The Green Riders and some of the BEC crew

A little "event side" bike mechanics - always

Two New Videos - Durango Reactions'' and 'What the ride is about'

From the road in Durango ... including  "poppa wheelies" bike delivery service checking  out the bikes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0OOLVdRHGM

Jeff Litton of ugena.org  joined the Green Riders for the first couple of days of the ride and created this video which is a great introduction to what the Green Riders are  doing and why. http://ugena.org/thegreenriders/

Fairplay to Denver

What a treat to wake up in a warm room with the outdoor temperatures in the low 20's.  And what a treat to have no wind blowing at us from any direction.
Our ride during the morning was some of the best riding of the trip.  We had small passes and wide open views, very little traffic and good roads.
Our final official pass was 10,000 feet and the descent was fabulous.  The first part of the descent was steep and fast and then leveled out and followed a beautiful creek for quite a number of miles.  What a delight!
After lunch the traffic and the road got worse but the thrill of the morning kept us happy.  The final descent out of the Rockies and into the plains was unreal.  Catherine handed over the reins of her bike to Sean and we got a good 10 mile downhill run with speeds way too high to talk about, and turns that put the tires sidewalls to use.
When we finally rolled out of the Rockies and into the flat lands of Denver, we loaded up the bikes and drove to Catherine's oldest son's house.  Daniel met us in the street and we enjoyed a delightful afternoon with him in downtown Denver.   We dropped cousin Jim off at the bus that took him to Boulder where he lives.  He called later in the afternoon tell us about the bike he has and it  will work for our electric bike conversion project.  It was great having Jim along.  We took lots of trips together as children so being together now as "old farts" was a real treat.  Lots of memories to share and stories to retell.
Walking into Downtown, we crossed over a bridge and saw an endless line of rail cars filled with coal.  We are in coal country now and seeing the miles of coal cars that wind across the nation is daunting.  Not only do I see coal cars but I see destroyed landscapes, poisoned air and water and and a suffocating atmosphere.
On the other hand, Downtown Denver has recently added a bicycle rental system similar to what exists in Paris.  The bikes are beautiful, durable and we did see people using them.  There are also lots of bike trails along the rivers and we saw more people on bicycles than we've seen since we left home. We were also treated to a very intense downpour that provided great entertainment as people decided whether to wait out the rain or run through the rain to their destinations.
Daniel is a sustainability hero.  He recycles everything, buys almost nothing new, uses house paint from discarded Habitat for Humanity stock for his artwork and thoroughly enjoys his simple, satisfying life.
Sean is so happy to be in a city again where he can hang out with people who are under 50 and wear shorts in the warmer temperatures.

Local color in  Fairplay

Capitalizing on the South Park TV show

Catherine and Cartman

On the Colorado Serengeti 

Incredible views all around

The last official pass over the Rockies

Board and tired

This is the real place