MIT Spokes 2026

Author: MIT Spokes

  • Day 52: I Spy 8 Breathtaking Arches

    Day 52: I Spy 8 Breathtaking Arches

    Rest day in Moab, UT — 0 mi, 0 ft

    As Nate began to describe in yesterday’s blog, one of our team’s superpowers is that our very own Caroline Huang is a National Park (and monument… and historic site…) expert. She has been to over 150 of these National designations, earning junior ranger badges from the majority of them. Therefore, when it comes to National Parks, and Caroline says walk, we walk. When Caroline says jump, we jump. If Caroline jumped off a bridge at a National Park, I would jump off a bridge at a National Park. You get the idea.

    Anyways, this morning we woke up to our fearless leader’s direction to visit Arches National Park. I obviously was not fully in the loop about what to expect with this park, considering that I asked Caroline if we would only see 1 or 2 arches and she informed me that the park has over 2,000 documented natural stone arches (lol). The geographic formation of the arches is quite interesting, but we will get into that later when we make it to the Visitor Center portion of the blog.

    As soon as my phone flashed Nunu’s WhatsApp message in the group chat of “Guys thoughts on stopping somewhere for breakfast briefly,” I knew exactly how our morning would go. After a bit of debating between cheaper fast food and a coffee shop for breakfast, we settled on the coffee shop (shocker) and mobilized with all seven of us and Carlos in our orga{nunu}zed minivan. 

    At the coffee shop, various team members bought (and split) coffees and bagel sandwiches, but what most caught our eye was the coffee table book displayed near the counter. It was called “100 Photos: The Most Influential Images of All Time,” and it had the photo of the image inspiring the Edgerton logo (which is on our jerseys) directly on the front! We were all extremely excited to match the book, and I decided that I am going to ask for this book for Christmas so that I can display it on my apartment’s coffee table too.

    We were almost ready to finally hit the road to Arches, until we decided that we needed to make a brief pitstop at McDonald’s for some cheap fountain drinks and a bit more food. In no time, we finished the side quests, and we were off to the races with Caroline fearlessly navigating our car.

    As we drove into the park, I immediately saw that Caroline was not exaggerating. Hundreds of arches dotted the sides of the rock formations we drove by, ranging from collapsed arches to huge free standing arches to little ones that had just begun to form. Despite the hundreds of arch distractions, our eyes were set on the prize: the Delicate Arch. This is the arch that is featured on almost every representation of Arches National Park (plus Caroline said we needed to see it), so we really wanted to visit specifically this arch. We also knew that we wanted to get the 3-mile hike done before it got too hot, so we booked it to the trailhead and started moving!

    The hike consisted of a few winding switchbacks followed by a large exposed section where you just hike up a large slab of rocks. It was a great hike, and we were of course rewarded by a remarkable view at the top! 

    Unfortunately, our success was short lived, since the world decided to show us who is boss almost immediately. All of us were wearing our new Artemis hats, and the wind decided that it was unacceptable that we looked this good. With an extra sweeping gust of wind, Drew’s hat went straight up and over the trail and into the mini valley on the side of the canyon. For a moment, our team despaired, but then our heroes Aarushi, Carmen, and Drew valiantly (and very safely) retraced their steps back the trail to where it diverges from the valley and rescued the hat! We were overjoyed and celebrated by taking 1 million pictures, including the fabulous idea to mog the Delicate Arch with our own clearly superior arches.

    After the Delicate Arch hike, the team was a bit wiped, but we decided to gather our strength for a bit shorter hike to see the Double Arch. I stuffed my face with snacks to gather my strength, and then we hiked the 0.6 mi path to see the Double Arch up close. It was actually phenomenal, and I think that from an aesthetic perspective, I enjoyed it even more than the Delicate Arch. All of us climbed up high into the arch for some shade and cool pictures, and even met an MIT alumna who was doing the same!

    The rest of our time in Arches National Park consisted of a little more emphasis on driving around and a little less emphasis on getting out of the car (it was so hot… AC…), but we made sure to see the Balanced Rock and the Panorama Point on the way to the Visitor Center. On our way into the park in the morning we had already seen the Three Gossips formation and already spent time debating which team member was which rock, so we decided not to make an additional stop in the heat. See the photo below of me, Caroline, and Carmen trying to recreate the Three Gossips in the background.

    At the Visitor Center, we got to buy our cherished postcards, including a Canyonlands postcard for me, which made me very happy because the Canyonlands Visitor Center had been closed the previous day. I am personally hoping to have a postcard from each of the five Utah National Parks so that I can make a pretty collage on my apartment wall in the fall. This means that every time I have to choose a postcard, there is non-negligible thought put into which card looks the best and aligns with my other postcards. With us seeing so many awesome arches, I decided to get a few different postcards and mail them out to my loved ones!

    We also learned about how the arches formed in the geography in the first place. Millions of years ago, the area was covered by a sea, and as it evaporated, it left behind salt beds. This salt was later covered by sand and debris, but as water seeped through the top soil layer, the bottom salt layer became thinner, and the top layers above it cracked. Eventually, erosion led these cracks to wear out, creating thin parallel walls of sandstone, also known as fins. Over time, water eroded the lower layers of the fins, which have higher concentrations of clay, leading to the creation of an arch!

    Aside from discussing how cool the arches looked, a huge part of our day was also spent discussing the heat and how we would manage it on our upcoming bike rides, especially as our ice has been melting at supersonic speeds. Once our Visitor Center trip was done, we decided to address this issue by heading to a nearby bike gear shop and buying new metal water bottles, rather than our current plastic insulated ones. Though the first shop we visited only had smaller-sized water bottles, the second shop had what we were looking for! A team frenzy ensued, with everyone trying to select a different color water bottle while also being constrained by a limited selection. We ended up with Carmen and I having identical pink bottles, Nate and Nunu having identical silver bottles, and everyone else having their own unique colors. Especially with the discount provided by the kind man running the cashier, we were ecstatic to have completed this mission! I was so happy to have cold water that I couldn’t even wait and filled my water at the water-filling station right outside of the gear shop. Considering that previously, our plastic water bottles held ice for roughly five minutes and left us with hot water by the end of each biking segment, the metal water bottles are my new favorite thing in the world. We are in love with our water bottles. I could kiss my new water bottle. She is amazing and everything I could have ever asked for (and she is pink!).

    With some extra time left in the day, we decided to go grab a bag of peaches from a stand on the side of the road and head back to Milt’s, the burger place from the day before. It was THAT good. I had to take a call for 11.011, which is a class called Art and Science of Negotiation that I was a head TA for at MIT last year, so I ate separately from the group, but enjoyed my burger and milkshake tremendously!

    While I was taking the call, Aarushi drove Drew back home to rest, and then came back to take the rest of us BACK TO THE AMAZING SHIRT PLACE!!!! What ensued was quite comical. We each wanted to get a shirt with the design that Nate mentioned yesterday in the blog, but we didn’t know if we should all match or get our own colors. This meant that each person had to choose their shirt color, shirt size, shirt style, and color of the design. Lots of decisions, and a couple of indecisive people. The situation went something like this. Nate was immediately set on his pink tank top with no further discussion (it looks sick). Caroline, Carmen, and Nunu did a normal amount of deliberating, with some hesitation from Nunu between tie-dye and a solid color, but quickly resolved on solid for Caroline and Carmen and tie-dye for Nunu. Aarushi and I took the longest, deliberating between shirt sizes and colors. This involved lots of changing and showing other people our shirts for opinions, but I finally settled on a light blue baby tee, and Aarushi picked an oversize rainbow tie-dye shirt. In my opinion, we look extremely lit!

    With the shirt debacle complete and our stomachs fed, we spent a bit more time exploring the town and wandering between shops on the main street. Lots of them had artwork from different local artists, including an insane photography shop and an indigenous store, and others were more clothing boutique stores. Not much was bought in this period, but lots of dilly dallying was done, and lots of great vibes were had!

    At the end of the exploration period, we realized that we had not taken a photo all together in our new shirts. I made everyone change, to which Nate took a beautiful approach and decided to show off his master “change in public” skills.

    The photos, I think, are worth it 🙂

    Finally, with a long day of exploring and being outside, we all headed home to rest. Aarushi, Carmen, and Caroline finished Cars 1, watched Planes, ate leftover Thai food, and worked on various tasks. Nunu and Carlos went on a drive together. Drew, Nate, and I each called our various family members and rested. Overall, it was a phenomenal day of Spokes in Moab, and we were so happy to have our own beds to rest up in before our next day of biking.

    With more love than the number of arches,

    Tatiana ❤

  • Day 51: does it count as a rest day if we have to bike?

    Day 51: does it count as a rest day if we have to bike?

    Hittle Bottom Campground, UT to Moab, UT — 32.14 mi, 1703 ft

    We didn’t finish our ride yesterday so we have to spend today biking to finish the ride. Strictly speaking, we don’t “have to” since we could’ve just SAG’d the last 30 miles of yesterdays’ ride after we got caught in a pretty bad thunderstorm. But we also don’t “have to” bike across the country. 

    We had left our bikes locked up at a campground along our route last night with the plan of coming back to pick them up and finish the ride in the morning. It didn’t take any convincing to get the bikers to agree to finish the ride on our rest day, 30 miles is a super short ride anyways and is an easy moral victory over an otherwise unnecessary SAG. The one who we did have to convince though, was our driver Tatiana who wanted to sleep in. It took a non-trivial amount of convincing, some laundry day trades, and coffee + pastry offers, but eventually we convinced her. 

    We woke up at 7am in our super nice Airbnb kindly donated to us by the owners. We spent a quick 30 minutes getting ready, deliberating on whether we should wear our white jerseys again or cycle forward to black jerseys (we ended up with black), ransacking the fridge’s ice machine for all its ice, and dragging Tatiana out of bed at the last possible moment. Much faster than our usual 2hrs when we have to pack all our stuff + the car. 

    We arrived at the campsite at 8:30am where we were super happy to see our bikes had neither been stolen nor blown away. 

    We then got to work on topping off water, packing snacks, and applying sunscreen. Since it was a short ride, the plan was to do the 30 mile ride unsupported (e.g. pack all of our own water and food with no car to give us supplies along the route). By the time we were ready to head out at 9am though, it was already feeling a bit toasty and we were probably a bit worried about having enough water in the heat. We headed off though, knowing that our fearless driver would come help us if we needed water and surely would not still be asleep when we finished the ride (Hint: she was asleep, but its ok we didn’t need water). 

    The ride itself was super pretty, and getting biking meant the wind helped cool us off and alleviate any heat/water concerns. The ride started in this huge “bowl” of open space within a canyon for 5 miles. These 5 miles of open space were also the primary concern we had yesterday when deciding not to bike in the middle of a thunderstorm. 

    Swimming in a bowl of canyons.

    We then went into the canyons along a river running through them for the next 15-20 miles. Super pretty stuff. 

    The canyon + river we biked along for 15-20 miles.

    It’s interesting that we had seen the entire route on the drive from the Airbnb to our bikes, yet everything felt so much prettier when we saw it from our bikes. Tatiana pointed this out in her recent Day 45 blog, saying that every view feels prettier when you feel like you’ve worked for it, and I 100% agree. 

    We barrelled through the mile 15 rest stop since we didn’t see any reason for a break on such a short ride, and since we wanted to finish as soon as possible to get back to our previously scheduled rest day. 

    After biking through the canyon a bit longer, we exited out into the city of Moab and biked 8 miles uphill to the exact opposite end of the city where our Airbnb was. Having this house was certainly worth it, but boy did they make us work for it. 

    We arrived at the house one by one between 11am and 11:30am just as the heat was picking up and then headed off to do some combination of showering and napping until 12:30 when we decided to go get lunch at a burger place called Milt’s that Drew had seen along the route. 

    Now, there’s been a lot of deliberation this summer over the best burger restaurant, mainly between the In-N-Out camp and the Freddy’s camp. Both camps came together on this one though, Milt’s was some phenomenal burgers. Best of the summer for me. 

    The team enjoying Milt’s unaware that by saying it was the best of the summer I’ve likely started a war in the comments.

    After chowing down, we headed over to a cafe to do some work rather than be outside in the 100° heat. The work included: writing blogs (10 days behind as of now), calling friends/family, reading, and, in my case, completing background checks for the job I’ll be starting after Spokes.

    Carlos, Nunu’s boyfriend, was visiting the team for the two Moab rest days, and he arrived at the cafe around 2:30pm. After a fun mix of greetings, introductions, handshakes, and hugs, Nunu and Carlos went off to explore the town. Seems like everyone else slowly got the same idea because by 3pm I looked around and I was the only one left in the cafe. Everyone’s stuff was all over the cafe, so I called them back (and inadvertently put them back to work) since I needed to go back to the house to grab my portable charger. 

    I drove back, didn’t find my portable charger after looking in the bed for 20-30 minutes, found it on the bedside table, and then headed back to the cafe. 

    After getting back around 4:15pm, all 8 of us (7 + carlos) went for a quick stroll to check out Moab’s main street and immediately got sucked into a t-shirt store where you can print designs onto different t-shirt blanks. Aarushi and the girls really wanted to buy shirts with a matching “Moab, Utah” design with cartoon-ish bikers on it. 

    The girls spent ~30 minutes figuring out what type of shirt, color of shirt, and color of design they wanted. They didn’t even finish deciding since we had to run to dinner at 5pm, but we made plans to go back tomorrow. Drew and I were skeptical of getting shirts. Drew decided he didn’t want one. I said I’d get one if I could get it as a pink tank top, but I was told I was not allowed to get the pink tank top.

    This is the t-shirt design by the way, for those wondering. 

    We had been very generously donated a dinner at Arches Thai, a Thai restaurant in downtown Moab, at 5pm, and walked 2 blocks down to the restaurant. The food was truly really good, I really wasn’t expecting Moab, Utah to come out with full swing with such great food, but it really hasn’t disappointed at all. 

    The food from Arches Thai, which all had these crazy carrot flowers on them.

    Nunu trying to demonstrate how to make the carrot flowers.

    Around 6pm, we left to go check out Canyonlands National Park. At the exact same time, it became super windy and started raining + thundering lightly. We trudged our way to the cars (our minivan + the Jeep Carlos had rented) with our eyes covered to stop the sand from flying into our eyes, and then started driving ~1 hour towards the park.

    Proof of the storm. The sand stopped blowing right when I started taking a video but it was crazy I swear.

    Throughout the ride, we were receiving various “Flash Flood Warning” notifications to our phones. Resident National Parks Expert Caroline Huang said we’d be fine though, so we stayed on plan to visit the park. 

    Good thing we did too, because when we got there we pretty much had the whole park to ourselves. Even the park rangers had gone home: the front gate said “pay at the visitor center”, but the visitor center was closed. Luckily, we already support the National Park system via our annual National Parks pass, but it still seems crazy to me that we only saw like 3 cars the entire time there. 

    The park itself was stunning, and the storm gave the whole park a sort of other-worldly feeling to all the already other-worldly canyon views throughout the park. There was one instance where Caroline, Drew, and Carmen felt their hair starting to rise, which prompted them to start running to the car (without telling the rest of us!?), but otherwise the storm only meant we got slightly wet while taking in the views. 

    For the record, if I was running from something I would at least tell everyone else they should run too…

    We checked out the iconic Mesa Arch, saw a double rainbow at Green River Overlook (+ also saw where the rainbow ended, no pot of gold unfortunately), and took in some other crazy views throughout the park. 

    The iconic Mesa Arch

    Double rainbow and the end of a rainbow 🌈🌈

    Some other crazy views throughout the park (and everyone taking pictures of them)

    When things got dark enough that we couldn’t really see anything anymore around 9pm, we drove back to the house. We put on the movie “Cars” for a bit until we all started falling asleep an hour in, and then decided to hit the hay at 11:30pm. 

     – Nate

  • Day 50: 100 miles in 100 degrees

    Day 50: 100 miles in 100 degrees

    Grand Junction, CO to Moab, UT — 122.5 mi, 4092 ft (actually 87.9 mi, 2257 ft)

    I try to imagine the sweat on my skin is the glaze of a Krispy Kreme donut. That’s the only way to get through times like these. Only the occasional gust of wind provides some unsatisfactory relief in this land of nothing taller than a toddler. The hair on my arms and legs, usually black, have been bleached blonde by the sun, offering an unfamiliar contrast exaggerated by my skin also being a shade darker than usual.

    My water, as it dripped on my lips from my “insulated” squeeze bottle, was indistinguishable from the hot murky liquid you leave in the pot after boiling a hot dog. 

    Tatiana [today’s driver] calls. 

    I reach in my jersey’s back pocket and scramble for my phone to answer before the call goes to voicemail and the one bar of cell service God endowed me with inevitably fades away.

    “Hey Drew, there’s no ice at all of the 5 gas stations within 30 miles, and I will have to go back to Grand Junction…. 

    I can barely hear her over the sound of the wind in my face.

    …I’ll meet you in…”

    She cuts out.

    I’m out of water. It’s over 100 degrees. The lightly colored packed dirt reflects the sun’s rays back up, cooking me from both sides. 

    Off in the distance, Nate and I see a bridge that gets closer and closer over a period of time that felt like an hour but was probably closer to 15 minutes. We pass by something that looks like a well. I get off my bike and turn the handle– nothing happens. I realize I probably shouldn’t be messing with random plumbing on the side of the road and decide to keep pedaling without the water. We get to the bridge– the first shade we’ve encountered today since the cliffs of the Colorado National Monument 60 miles ago… and we’re only halfway done?

    How did we get here?

    The rolling hills faded away over time revealing an expanse which felt like a static portrait.  I pedaled, nothing got closer. Occasional cameos from different wildlife told me that I was getting further from the place where people should be. We saw a bald eagle and sang him his favorite song (The Star Spangled Banner). 

    I think he liked it.

    Upon reaching the Utah sign, we found a gap in the barbed wire fence that separated our trail from the interstate to which the sign belonged. We all squeezed into through the gap to take a picture with the sign. Meanwhile, Tatiana called us in distress about the car potentially flipping over on the uneven bike trail leading up to the sign. I don’t think anyone on the team, including Tatiana, knows why she decided to use the uneven bike path instead of staying on the highway where the sign was. Perhaps she wanted to push the limits of our rental Toyota Sienna with 3 inches of ground clearance could do. That way, we could have a reference point of what we could do with it in the future, when duty calls. The rest of the team served as counsel over the phone as she went backwards up the path and found her way back to the interstate where she rendezvoused with us at the Utah sign.

    We took the photo. In the background, the sign read “Welcome to Utah.” Everyone smiled, and more. 

    The flow of traffic on the interstate seemed to somewhat fade away as a family of three get out of a car to take the same picture as us. The family, composed of an infant, a middle aged woman, and an elderly woman are discussing a car accident that they witnessed prior to arriving at the sign. We took photos for them, then we squeezed back through the barbed wire fence to access the trail that we were on to avoid proximity to interstate traffic. 

    We resume the trail, which had a lot of up and downs across various terrain types, including sand. It intersected a gravel road which served the purpose of getting us in the general direction of Moab while avoiding interstate traffic. We look to the right and saw a cloud of dust approaching with some large vehicles visible in the foreground. The majority of the team preferred to wait out the passing vehicles and dust. However, I decided to turn anyways, and Nate followed shortly after upon realizing that there were hundreds of cars not passing anytime soon. At first, we had the hopes that we could bike faster than them, as they were going quite slow, however, we soon found ourselves engulfed in a cloud of dust birthed by the passing cars. We covered our mouths and noses with one hand and steered with the other as cars passed one-by-one for over half an hour. I assume this was a detour to avoid the car wreck which had been mentioned by the woman who asked us to take her picture. We came out here to avoid the interstate, but the interstate came to us.

    I’m not aware of how the rest of the team decided to handle the traffic, however, after turning off of the gravel road, it was down to just Nate and I. We turned onto another detour which took off in a random direction into the desert. It added about 4 or 5 miles to the route, a tradeoff I feel is worth avoiding being near cars.

    Statistically speaking, the most likely thing to kill us on this trip actually isn’t dogs or lightning. It’s drivers. Some drivers are bad intentionally. There have been several occasions of pickup truck drivers pulling up next to us, slowing down, and actively trying to run us off the road. I will never understand this behaviour. Like, I get that having to make the conscious decision to move left to pass a group of cyclists is a little annoying, and you feel the need to have some kind of revenge. But I promise you, Mr. Pickup Truck Driver, your life is not harder than mine. You are in an air-conditioned box pressing down a gas pedal; I am pedaling up this hill in 100 degree heat without the help of a V8 engine like a big boy. 

    But, even scarier than people who do see us and decide to be mean are the people that don’t see us at all– the unintentionally bad drivers. And that’s why I’ve found myself in the middle of this desert, with Nate.

    After trudging through a miserable 28 mile stretch in 100 degree heat, we set up a rest stop under a bridge and waited for Tatiana to get there. She arrived after ~20 minutes around the same time as the rest of the group, who had routed themselves onto the interstate💀shoulder to avoid the extra mileage. We camped out there for almost 45 minutes enjoying the shade and recovering from mild heat exhaustion. 

    The next stretch was mostly downhill as we descended into the canyon through which the Colorado River flows. The downhill, commanding much less exertion than the previous leg,  made the heat a little bit more manageable. At our second-to-last rest stop, we decided to swim in the river as we waited out the peak afternoon heat. This would require that we bike in the dark, however, the road was very low traffic, so we decided it was a worthy tradeoff. 

    Swimming in the Colorado river was kind of tricky. Sitting still was hard because the water has a pretty strong flow and the riverbed is mostly loose rocks. Some of us resorted to laying on our floaty tied to a boulder (that they made me move into the river).

    Some of us decided to walk upstream and just float back down. Tatiana was doing her own thing where she grabbed onto a rock and just sat there floating on her belly; it looked really funny.

    By the time the sun decided to obscure itself behind the canyon walls, we were ready to start rolling again, prompted partially by impending darkness, but more so by the suspicious clouds behind us. The next 4 miles where very out of the ordinary. Aarushi was setting a crazy 20 mph pace as we all ripped the next couple miles, biking in a beautiful formation that resembled a 6-count half carton of eggs.

    But, as the dark clouds devoured the sky in front of us, and the winds decided that they did not want MIT Spokes on the road, we were forced to turn back to shelter in a chaotic frenzy intensified by the sudden-onset darkness. 

    Nunu handed out tasks as we repacked the van in a way to accommodate 7 passengers, sort of. 

    We decided we would lock up our bikes at this campground and finish our ride tomorrow, since it would be a rest day. After a quick food run at the Moab Wendy’s, we all went to sleep in anticipation of getting up extra early. This plan, of course, hinged on someone being willing to drive us back to the spot where we left our bikes. So we bribed Tatiana with by offering to do some of her chores, and she reluctantly agreed to sacrifice sleep on our behalf.

    …to be continued.

    – Drew

  • Day 49: MIT Soccer (fans)

    Day 49: MIT Soccer (fans)

    Parachute, CO to Grand Junction, CO — 53.5 mi, 1427 ft

    Nothing will motivate our team more than… the World Cup final! Yes, you read that right. On any other morning we would snooze our 6am alarms and take a couple extra minutes sleepily packing up our things but this particular morning was the morning of the World Cup final. You would think we were a soccer team instead of a biking team with how locked in we were this morning as everyone sprung up from bed and got ready faster than I’d ever seen. We were staying at a hotel last night that was very kindly provided by Tatiana’s mom, auntie Olga. Soon enough all our belongings were piled high onto a luggage cart outside in the hallway of our two rooms and everyone was wheeling their bikes down the elevator. Nate and I began to push the luggage cart down the elevator too but it required such a huge effort since it was so heavy and hard to steer and everything was so delicately balanced. As we pushed it through the elevator doors our basket of miscellaneous toiletries and items fell and some mysterious items dropped down the elevator shaft, oops.

    After we’d all scarfed down the hotel lobby breakfast which consisted of bagels, poptarts, and tangerines, we started our bike ride! The reason for our haste was that we wanted to make it to our end destination by 1PM Mountain Time for the World Cup Finale with Argentina vs Spain. Knowing our team, this was an unlikely feat but we were determined. Specifically, Caroline, Tatiana, Aarushi, and Carmen were the most determined and the rest of us just followed suit. Luckily, today’s ride was relatively short and mostly downhill. It was Me, Drew, Carmen, and Caroline leading the way.

    Because the road is also basically free of cars, we take up the entire lane and Drew decides to play a trick on us and sneak up behind everyone to try and take their phones from their back pocket. Here’s a video of Drew chasing Caroline down.

    At one point, we end up on highway 70 next to the Colorado River and it’s just beautiful.

    At another point, our route tells us to get off the highway and onto a mysterious bike path that’s overgrown with trees and bushes to avoid the highway 70 tunnel that bikers aren’t allowed to go through. Getting through this overgrown path was quite an ordeal as we had to keep unclipping and clipping so we wouldn’t run into the trees completely.

    We were so fast that we all beat Nate (our driver for the day) to the rest stop by about 10 minutes. Caroline set a 15 minute timer so we would make sure not to overrest and keep biking and we all quickly stuffed our faces with snacks and fuel. When the alarm went off, Nate jokingly complained that we only ever went fast when he is the driver (Nate loves going fast).

    Close to the end of the ride, we stopped by a peach stand in the Palisades and ate the most delicious and juiciest peaches.

    Not before long, we were at our final destination, a restaurant/bar in Grand Junction with a dedicated watch party room. We proceeded to stay here for the next three hours eating food and drinking our unlimited refill lemonades and iced teas.

    To be honest, most of us were slightly rooting for Argentina to win because we felt like the Argentinian goalie deserved it as he was making save after save after save. This summer is also the first time I’ve ever properly watched soccer before and I’m just so impressed at how coordinated everyone on the field is despite how fast things move.

    After the game ended, we finished the last three miles of the ride to our hosts house for the night, Greg and Stephie. Upon arrival we were greeted by a tub of watermelon and a very excited dog.

    After a quick shower line and dinner, the team debated going to see the new movie, The Odyssey. I was initially very down along with Aarushi, Tatiana, Drew, and Carmen while Nate and Caroline were going to stay back. Unfortunately, I was incredibly behind on my blog writing and had “lapped” as today was my blog day while I still hadn’t finished my blog from last week. Consequently, I decided it was more responsible for me to stay back to finish my blog. Caroline was also convinced to go instead. Nate still stayed back so he could fix his bike that had a tire puncture.

    As the only two people who stayed back, we also got put on laundry hanging duty.

    With that, we ended the night until around 11PM or so. I woke up to the rest of the team stumbling in from their movie and quietly slipping into bed.

    See you next week hopefully not lapped,

    Nunu

  • Day 48: the menagerie

    Day 48: the menagerie

    Glenwood Springs, CO to Parachute, CO — 47.6 mi, 1705 ft

    This third stretch of the trip has become far more. The first was spent trudging up and down PUDS in the east and midwest, the second staring at endless planes of farmland biking on highways. In the third, we have seen shorter mileages and many more centuries, far less elevation and far more striking landscapes. Longer rest stops and fewer sidequests, more luxurious housing and more visits from family.

    It seems we’re building up to something by approaching these extremes. In a good story, the ending is as great as the build up, satisfies the tension woven through the beginning and the middle, and gives purpose to what has been endured. I hope this will be a good story.

    In keeping with this theme of extremes, we woke up at what might be our latest time ever: 10:20 am. But we were all okay with this, since today was also one of our shortest days ever, only 47 miles. 

    Since we got back to our host’s house at 1 am last night (this morning??), we did not have the chance to eat this wonderful key lime pie Greg made for us. So our breakfast consisted of fruit, key lime pie, and the most delicious buttery, flaky, perfectly sweet homemade pastries called Kougin-amann. We all ate two and the smartest of us packed some in the car for later.

    Greg not only provided breakfast, but entertainment while we ate. He pulled out his numerous decks of playing cards and a blue mat, on which he was able to fan out cards in the same way a stereotypical magician might. We sat there watching him do card tricks for about an hour. We tried to reason through how he might make some cards reappear or how he knows to choose the exact same one we had, and normally we made it halfway, understood it was some slight of hand trick, but then got stuck on the rest, unable to figure out how he would signal for the correct one. 

    After the first six tricks or so, Nate and Nunu came inside to let us know they were about to leave and start the ride. We eventually followed suit, but not before my mind was sufficiently blown by this sorting card trick. Essentially, you get a deck of cards and are told to sort the black ones into a black pile and the red ones into a red pile without knowing the color, and then switch sides of the piles halfway through. The story is that Greg has “performed it for Obama” who of course got everything correct because he’s a smart man who was trusted with our national security. So should I be in charge of this country too? Apparently so, since I was able to sort them perfectly with no mistakes. All of us were incredibly confused, until Tatiana remembered that Greg flipped one pile around 180 after turning the cards face up, to give the appearance of the black and red checkerboard piles. But really, there must have been black and red stripes, so all I did was distribute the black cards evenly to each side, and then the red. Sorry for spoiling this one Greg. We were all so excited that we managed to figure out one of his tricks. The other 19 or so are still a mystery though.

    Eventually we had to get going, but Greg gave Tatiana one last magic trick to go: a deck of cards that she’d open later on a call. She’d be doing the magic and surprising even herself. 

    Since Nate and Nunu left earlier, and Drew was driving, it was Caroline, Aarushi, Tatiana, and I who all rode together. The first leg was relatively uneventful, a lot of calling family and old friends. The first rest stop however, was absolutely amazing. I can say that because I was the one who chose it last night, as Aarushi and I put the route together in the dark the night before.

    When we got to the rest stop though, Nate and Nunu hadn’t yet arrived. I had no idea how this was possible, since they left like an hour earlier. But apparently their desire for speed didn’t align with the universe’s, since Nunu had a nail go through the side wall of her tire, which caused it to start spraying bright blue sealant everywhere. After exchanging back tires with Drew, they were on their way, and only arrived a few minutes after us.

    The carnage 😦

    We stopped at an…alpaca farm! They were utterly adorable. All of them must have recently been shaved, since every alpaca looked like a poodle, with fluffy legs and a big floof of slightly matted hair on their head that remained. They also liked to spit at whatever they could target. So we became victim to a few of their attempts.

    fatter, lazier poodles
    Nate was the first victim

    Behind the alpacas was the enclosure for the highland cows. They were also perfect in every way. A little scary to pet though, since their horns could definitely take someone out. 

    Spot the difference

    After spending enough time with animals, we decided to change it up and take the next rest stop with a different kind of animal: homo sapiens who yell at soccer games on their tv. We met up with Tatiana’s mom, Olga, and grandfather, Victor, at a Mexican restaurant with a sports bar in Rifle to watch the World Cup third-place playoff. 

    Soccer obsessed zombies

    When we got there, the game had already been going on for half an hour or so, the score was 4-0, England to France. We didn’t expect much to change, but it turned out to be one of the most exciting games to watch. France locked in and scored three more goals, thanks to Mbappé which secured him the Golden Boot (meaning he’s now scored the most goals at this World Cup), almost tying England. But then England had to go score a penalty kick or, making it 5-3, then 5-4, and then England scored at the last second, making sure France never got a comeback at 6-4. 

    I’ve never been one to pay attention to sports of any kind, but because of this summer, and because of Caroline’s extensive knowledge of soccer lore, the team got me into watching the World Cup. Surprisingly, it’s more than just kicking a ball around on a field while the crowd looks on with crossed arms and concerned faces. Each player on each team has a back story, each team formed through a complicated series of negotiations, each country with a unique history.

    According to Caroline, England’s fans are notoriously obnoxious, but that’s because their league is the most popular. Every player on their team is some famous superstar. France has several star players and apparently young ones with a lot of potential. Both teams lost in the previous round, and in this game were playing for third place, not with any serious hope of advancing rank. The typical way is to play defensively, by focusing most effort towards blocking the other team from scoring a goal. But in these conditions, where the pressure was halfway off, both teams played more offensively and focused on scoring as many goals as possible. Who knew there was an actually very interesting strategy behind each game? Those who avoid ignorance through their curiosity. I’m trying to become one of them.

    From there, we continued biking along this relatively peaceful side road until we reached the hotel in Parachute, graciously provided by Olga.

    My view during the last several miles

    We unloaded as usual, and then split up according to who did and did not want to take a dip into the Colorado River behind the hotel. Caroline, Drew, and I were the first ones out, opting to stay back, shower, and work on our blogs instead. 

    the unpacking ordeal we have to go through every night
    Drew becoming Mrs. K

    Caroline and I then went to a nearby gas station to get some drinks for our evening work session, still in our bibs and shoes. We must’ve looked incredibly stylish because we were stopped by this one random lady outside the front entrance who was showing off her guard dog, this large stuffed St. Bernard, that she carted around with her. It was around this time Aarushi called me to say she made up her mind, wanted to stay back to work as well, and if it was possible to split the drinks. I of course said yes. 

    I realized we had no good way to carry the drinks back besides stuffing them in our jerseys, and so with each of us filling up our back pockets, we looked like ridiculous pack animals, maybe a couple of two-humped camels.

    Showing off our haul

    We got back and soon after learned that Tatiana, Nate, and Nunu did not get the chance to swim, since the river was moving too quickly.

    An unimpressed Tat and Nate

    So we further divided into groups of who wanted to go back to the hot springs we were at last night, and who wanted to stay. 

    In the middle of this discussion, we got a surprise delivery from Olga: Artemis hats! We all were incredibly excited to receive this awesome gift, we even heard our picture would be shared on internal NASA channels?? These engineers and astronauts must have had an appreciation for 7 MIT students biking across the country and teaching STEM along the way.

    NASA hats!!

    Continuing our discussion that tends in a circular direction, I saw our two options as such: 1.) Drive 50ish minutes each way to the hot springs, get back in the early morning and miss out on some good hotel sleep, be forced to wear my same unwashed sulfury rotten egg smelling swimsuit from yesterday, and potentially change the magical memories from last night, OR 2.) Go because there might not be another chance. 

    Apparently there wouldn’t be another chance to swim in the Colorado river or jump in a hot spring for the rest of the trip, fears which a quick google search was able to rectify. But sometimes fear of what might not be is greater than what could be.

    Needless to say I stayed back, along with the same people previously hard at work, now plus Tatiana. I enjoyed my quiet night in trying to be productive, an opportunity I haven’t had in a while. Nate and Nunu enjoyed the hot springs and a midnight McDonalds run. 

    The McDonalds workers were as happy to see them pull up at 12:30 am as Nate looks here

    Sleeping in a queen bed was a wonderful feeling. 

    – Carmen

  • Day 47: hot springs and hot people

    Day 47: hot springs and hot people

    Learning Festival in Glenwood Springs, CO — 0 mi, 0 ft

    The nice thing about learning festival days is that we can sleep in. 8 am most days is a late start — thus, our 8 am alarm on these days is a sweet treat, and we had a nice rolling start to the day. To make things even better, we decided to stop by a coffee shop for breakfast, a semi-regular routine ahead of the learning festival. Nunu, Nate, Carmen, and I drove the van downtown and walked into the shop (Drew biked to Wendy’s instead, Aarushi and Tatiana were staying in a hotel with Tatiana’s visiting family). Along the way, we saw a cute doggy daycare van picking up a dog for the day. Honestly a dream job, just picking up adorable dogs and watching over them.

    So cute!! There were dogs inside already, greeting their friend as they got on.

    The coffee shop’s name was Wild Coffee, and true to its name I spotted some interesting speciality lattés that were calling my name. I ended up choosing a Raspberry Danish Latté and a breakfast burrito, all of which were quite unique but delicious. I also liked the decor a lot, as I noticed a quote from Mary Oliver that my favorite English teacher in high school would always quote and centered our graduation speech about: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Clearly, Spokes is a part of my answer to that question, even if the rest is not planned out yet. I’d love to challenge others to think about this too!

    After filling our hands with too many drinks and things to eat, we got back into the van to rush to the location of our learning festival: the library. Turns out, we really didn’t need to rush to the van, as the library was a whopping one block away. We spent more time trying to find marginally closer parking than it would have taken if we simply walked there. Finally walking into the library, we were reunited with the other 3 members of our team, all coming from different directions and beautifully coming together at the front doors. 

    Thank you so much for having us!

    The library team showed us to the room we would all be doing our workshops in, which had plenty of room for all of us to spread out. We’re rarely all in the same room, so it was nice to share a space and get to see each other’s faces throughout the day and escape the bubble of our workshops for a bit. However, first things first, Nunu and I ran through the well-practiced routine of pulling out our templates, papers, rulers, markers, colored pencils, tape… the list goes on. Quite chaotic, but there is a method to the madness, I swear. I took bites of my burrito in between supplies, scarfing it down with as much dignity as possible (spoiler: there wasn’t much). 

    As we neared setup completion, Tatiana brought the kids in for her activity of choice — Simon Says! I always look forward to seeing what activity Tatiana picks or comes up with each festival to get the kids going. I’m still traumatized by winning the rock-paper-scissors tournament twice, so I was glad to see this one return. Except these kids were the worst group ever at this game. I don’t know if they’ve ever played Simon Says…? Even when Simon (Tatiana) was clearly not saying to do something, they would still all do it. It was very entertaining to watch, regardless. 

    After getting the energy out, we split into four groups, roughly sorted by age. Nunu and I got to work with the youngest kids first, and worked our way up to the oldest group at the very end. We often adapt the projects we do based on age level and ability, but today we had a large variety, ranging from the traditional houses to fun animals and cacti. One of my favorite interactions was with a boy who initially wanted to create a cardboard dog like the one we have in our examples. However, during the process, he messed up his design a bit such that the dog wasn’t salvageable. Instead of giving up, he reassessed his materials and realized that although it didn’t look like the dog he was aiming for, it would still make a great bird — thus, he pivoted to creating a bird, the first of our workshops. The end result was amazing, and he received a lot of compliments for it, especially with how unique it was. I think it was an interesting lesson on adaptation and persistence. It’s easy to perceive many things as “failures,” especially during the design process, but allowing yourself to continue and consider new pathways can result in even more special outcomes. 

    The bird + an impressive giraffe made by another student

    For lunch, the library graciously provided us food from a local restaurant! I scarfed down most of my fish and chips before it was back to regularly scheduled programming.

    A glimpse of how messy our table gets + the completed houses

    While demonstrating the cardboard animals, I also made an elephant I thought was cute, so it’s getting its own moment to shine. 🙂

    Ignore the abnormally wide legs

    After debating World Cup teams and listening to jokes I felt too old to understand, the day came to a close and the kids were slowly picked up. We all took a breather and planned out the next couple of hours. It was imperative that we stuck to our schedules because at 5:00 pm, we were meeting up with STANFORD SPOKES!!! They were graciously making the longgg 2.5 hour drive to meet us for dinner and hot springs, after a long day of biking nonetheless. Although we were both in Colorado at the moment, our route goes parallel but north of theirs, subsequently requiring a bit of driving to cover the gap. We ran back to our host’s house, changed, and went to the restaurant to get a table. Funnily enough, the restaurant was the same as where we got our lunch from! 

    As we waited, we were split between waiting at our comically large table and outside, not sure what was the least awkward way. We ended up doing a halfway meetup, which was more complicated than if we had just chosen either one. The way we choose to operate is fascinating sometimes… But once we were seated together, we immediately started chatting about each other’s journeys thus far. We traded stories, taking turns to laugh at funny scenarios and understand difficult challenges we’ve all faced. Paisley, one of the Stanford Spokes, had just been attacked by a BEAR earlier that day (read: taken a nasty fall) and still bore the fresh scars. I really admire her ability to get back on the bike after that and also still come all the way here, being positive about it. She said she took her bandages off to look cooler coming in, and they definitely were all super cool to talk to. I also found my non-driver counterpart, Ian, and got to bond over being flamed for not having a licence. Funnily enough, the 4 frosh (Carmen, Drew, Ian, and I) were all together on one end of the table. Maybe we identified each other subconsciously?

    We kept talking and talking, causing our poor waiter to have to wait much longer than usual to take our orders and to start eating. Carmen and I split a veggie mac n cheese and a mediterranean salad that was SO GOOD. I haven’t had a salad like that in a long time, one that I kept scarfing down. 

    Sooooo yummmmmm

    After eating, we debated our initial plan to go to the local hot springs. It was getting late, and Stanford Spokes had to leave in an hour or so to make the long drive back and meet their WS host. We decided it wasn’t worth paying like $30 for one hour of the springs, and head to a local park instead to chill and talk. We got a tour of their fancy cargo van that is actually capable and can fit sooo much stuff. I mean I’ve grown fond of our minivan, but it gets absolutely mogged by their van. They have a whole seat dedicated to their pillows… the world is truly unequal.

    Dinner + really checking out the Stanford van

    We got to the park and immediately started brainstorming what to do for like 5 minutes. Frisbee, football, volleyball, all the sports were thrown out there, immediately throwing away our initial priority of just hanging around. I don’t think “chilling” is in a lot of our vocabularies, and with that we settled on toilet tag, suggested by Freya. Toilet tag is one of many variations of freeze tag, where when you’re tagged, you kneel with one knee up and another arm raised . To get untagged, someone must sit on your knee and push your arm down like a toilet flush. I think it’s so interesting that everyone has different versions of freeze tag they’ve played as a kid, yet the basic principle of the game is so universal. 

    We chose our taggers and locked in. I was returned to 5th grade, running barefoot at full speed away from reaching hands and watching the chaos unfold between all of us. It was such a goofy sight but so much fun. In everyday life, when else do you get to watch others sprint as fast as they can? It was also surprisingly tiring, and all of us took a couple of minutes of deep breaths afterwards and made jokes about how we’re literally biking across the country, but this was some of the hardest things we’ve done. My personal highlight was faking Drew out while standing still, feeling like I just performed a crazy move in the NFL instead of a random park in Glenwood Springs.

    Feeling tired, we decided to pivot to a slightly less demanding activity — volleyball. We used a fence as our net and split into 2 groups: Aarushi, Tatiana, Drew, Jack, Logan, Freya vs Nate, Nunu, Carmen, Ian, Paisley, and I. If you know us, you know one side is extremely disadvantaged height-wise relative to the other team. Luckily, we had the powerhouse of Nate, Nunu, and Ian (all people with some level of volleyball experience) to carry us, while Carmen, Paisley, and I supported as much as we could. Ian in particular was a libero in high school, so he performed some INCREDIBLE saves that kept us afloat and even leading for quite a bit. Apparently I’m decent at tossing the ball in? We ended up losing in a close battle and graciously shook hands through the fence.

    Fence volleyball with the beautiful setting sun!

    With it getting dark quickly, the Stanford folks had to unfortunately get moving. We took our final photos together and said our goodbyes, thinking about how impactful our meetup was despite how short it was relative to our trip. We’re two groups that are doing the same thing at the same time, and we got to share a space for just a couple of hours before setting off to continue the long journey. While many of us may not see each other again, it was special to do so (especially being the first groups in a couple of years). Thank you Stanford Spokes for making the effort and being so lovely! Nate was the saddest to see them go, joking about joining them so many times that I don’t think it’s just a joke to him…they definitely needed to check their trunk for stowaways.

    Imposing the jumping photo way of life (rather unsuccessfully)

    Once they left, we got in the car to drop off Tatiana’s grandpa Victor back at their hotel. However, during this ride, we floated the idea of still going to a hot springs since the next day was relatively short and we could afford a later night. We found a natural and public hot spring just a 10 minute drive away and decide to go, avoiding overpaying and being constrained to a private hot spring’s open hours. As we dropped off Victor, Drew took the opportunity to reunite with his one true love: Pepsi. Nate snuck these photos of this fascinating behavior, however, not without being noticed.

    We got there in the dark at around 9:30 pm, changing into our swimsuits under the protection of the night. It was a short walk there, and we found a couple of murky pools and found a nice one for ourselves. Right before getting in, there was a suspicious UTO (unidentified turd-like object) that Tatiana herocially removed for us. The water was perfectly warm and also muddy at the bottom, which took some getting used to but was comfortable. I did fish out mud from my swimsuit afterwards.

    The UTO
    Guess who parked after dark!!

    We sat in the pools, talking about everything and anything yet nothing at the same time. The night stretched on, we observed lighting flash in the distance, and we watched the clouds clear above us, taking the opportunity to do a bit of stargazing as well. We spoke in mostly in low tones, trying to preserve the tranquility of the environment, and took a couple minutes of silence. No photos were taken during this time since we were so in-the-moment, but I can only describe it as magical. When I reflect on this trip in 10 years, this will definitely be a night that stuck out.

    At about 12:40 am, we begrudgingly got out of the warm water and of courseee had to grab some food before getting to bed. Luckily for us, there was a McDonald’s open! Not so luckily for us, it closed at 1:00 am and our eta was 12:55 am. We rushed there, saw a McDonald’s worker outside (probably under the illusion no one would show up 5 minutes before closing at this hour) and saw the same worker run inside as soon as they saw us pull into the drive-thru. We were probably their worst nightmare: a van full of hungry, sulfur-smelling bikers with a big order ahead of them. 

    Our EXTREMELY pruned hands post hot springs
    McDonald’s hates to see us coming

    Finally, a couple burgers and fries later, we arrived back at our host Greg’s house and quietly got ready for bed. A much more active learning festival day than most, but it was full of coffee, new faces, adventure, and minimal biking. What more could you want on this trip? 😉

    See you soon,
    Caroline

  • Day 46: 100 PICTURES ARE WORTH 100000 WORDS

    Day 46: 100 PICTURES ARE WORTH 100000 WORDS

    Breckenridge, CO to Glenwood Springs, CO — 105.7 mi, 3537 ft

    7:00 AM

    8:00 AM

    9:00 AM

    10:00 AM

    11:00 AM

    12:00 PM

    1:00 PM

    2:00 PM (switch to drivers Nunu and Caroline POV halfway)

    3:00 PM

    4:00 PM

    5:00 PM (back to Aarushi POV)

    6:00 PM

    7:00 PM

    8:00 PM

    9:00 PM

    10:00 PM

    11:00 PM

    12:00 AM

    In honor of (my) first century, I finally brought out the digicam to take 105 pics for 105 miles!! This meant snapping a pic every 10 minutes today, so I hope this is like a pictoral version of my last blog post (how many steps of the spokes routine can you spot?) that provides you with a better sense of the ratio of time we spend on biking and eating and blogging and magic card tricks etc., and how quickly scenery can change in one day, from mountains to canyon to desert!

    Logging off,

    Carmen,
    Tatiana,
    Caroline,
    Drew,
    Nate,
    Nunu,
    and ME ❤
  • Day 45: I’m On Top of the World

    Day 45: I’m On Top of the World

    Idaho Springs, CO to Breckenridge, CO — 56.0 mi, 5927 ft

    Though I am not a native Coloradan and have never officially lived in the state, I would consider it one of my homes. Specifically, the ski slopes dotting its landscapes that have hosted my family and me year after year for our annual spring break trip. 

    Today was the first day that we would be officially passing through resorts that I had grown up visiting, specifically Keystone and Breckenridge, and understandably, I was extremely excited. Today was also the day that our team would be crossing the Continental Divide through Loveland Pass, a monumental bike ride marking our ascent to the tallest point of our ride as well as the geographic ridge that separates the Pacific and Atlantic watersheds. Additionally, today was also the day that I would get to see one of my best friends from home, Ashley Fisher and her family. They were visiting Ashley’s brother, Kenny, in Denver, who joined us for dinner on Day 42, so I had already been looking forward to their arrival for a few days. Momentous day in my book, and I am grateful to get to write about it.

    When we woke up in the morning, I was confronted with my biggest daily dilemma: what do I eat for breakfast? Seeing as we were still staying in the extremely kindly donated Airbnb in Idaho Springs, breakfast thoughts converged on the snack box, and the seven of us descended like vultures on any food still available in the fridge and pantry. For me, this consisted of stuffing my face with the pasta and salad from two nights before, and consuming a random assortment of snacks.

    This bizarre “breakfast” prompted me to think about what exact amount of random food and junk I consume in a day on this trip, which inspired my idea for a theme of this blog (on top of the amazing things that already happened during the day). Today I will record everything I consume in one day, along with a simultaneous recording of everything Drew eats for comparison. When we decided this and I informed Drew I would be monitoring him for the blog, I added a comment about his eating habits, to which he promptly responded, “I EAT A LOT SO I CAN HAUL THIS A** UP A MOUNTAIN.” Point taken, Drew. I have been told that we burn ~4,000 calories a day on these bike rides, so we will see how our calorie intake fares up to our a** hauling.

    Tatiana’s Breakfast:

    1. 1/2 bowl of Nunu’s vodka pasta with chicken sausage
    2. 1 Gogo squeeze
    3. 1 brownie
    4. 5 bites of Aarushi’s garden salad
    5. 1 grapefruit piece
    6. 2 dried mangos
    7. 1 cup of water

    Drew’s Breakfast:

    1. 2 donut sticks
    2. 10 donut holes
    3. 1 lemon lime Gatorade
    4. 2/5 of a sesame chicken Chinese takeout
    5. 1 fortune cookie
    6. 1 bottle of water
    7. 1 Advil (for pain from a previously tweaked neck muscle)

    Nate looked especially stylish during breakfast, demonstrating a previously unheard-of leg-sleeve look at the table.

    Once the face-stuffing had commenced, our team descended down the incredibly steep gravel driveway to the road, with Aarushi and I opting to treacherously walk our bikes down the path rather than risk road rash from falling down. Funnily enough, on this perilous walk down, Aarushi was also inspired by the same leg-sleeve look as Nate, suddenly looking extra stylish.

    The first stretch of our ride was spent almost completely uphill, though at a moderate grade, cluing Aarushi and me into the ascent yet to come at Loveland Pass. Our ride was interrupted by our fearless driver, Carmen, letting us know the rest stop had moved CLOSER to us (always a win) and by a detour at the dam monitoring the lake’s water flow with gorgeous scenery.

    Once we arrived at Carmen’s newly prescribed coffee shop rest stop, we were greeted by the wonders of a perfectly curated store with our favorite things: coffee, art gallery, book nook, and outdoor supplies. Could it get any better? The team spent some time loitering around, with Drew deep in thought, Aarushi, Caroline, Carmen, and I exploring the art gallery, and Nate and Nunu wandering off to explore the nearby lake.

    Tatiana’s Coffee Shop:

    1. 1/2 Arnold Palmer
    2. 1/2 Beekeeper’s latte
    3. 1 bottle of water
    4. 1/2 fig bar
    5. 1/2 s’mores bar

    Drew’s Coffee Shop:

    1. 1 Sprite
    2. 1 bottle of water
    3. 1 Nature Valley strawberry wafer bar

    One thing this blog may clue you in on is exactly how much I enjoy sharing food with my friends. It is definitely one of life’s greatest pleasures to get to try two things and share both 🙂

    After securing prints from the art gallery and chatting up the leader of a Federation of North American Explorers group who had brought his troupe to Colorado, Aarushi and I finally set off towards Loveland Pass!

    At first, the two of us stayed together, with rest stops every five miles to split an energy bar, but as we hit the final 4 miles and 1,500-foot ascent to Loveland Pass, Aarushi went forward, and I took my time going up the trail. Simultaneously, seeing as crossing the Continental Divide is a momentous occasion for bikers, Carmen hatched a plan to leave the car at the top of Loveland Pass, bike down to the 4-mile mark, and then bike back up to meet us at the top.

    Tatiana’s Mid-Ride Snack:

    1. 1 bottle of water
    2. 1/2 cookies and cream bar
    3. 1/2 strawberry bar

    You can probably tell by the numbers themselves, but this ascent was steep and brutal. Especially combined with the high altitude, I could feel my body straining against the mountain, eager to ascend and complete the climb but exhausted from the required effort. My goal of stopping every mile transitioned into stopping every half mile, and then at the very end, every 100 ft of elevation as I felt my body hit my last energy stores. I played one of my favorite reflective songs, “Que Sera, Sera” by Doris Day, to gather my strength, and willed my body to keep pushing up the mountain. As I rounded the final corner, barely pedaling and 0.2 miles away from the end of the climb, I saw my team waiting for me at the top of Loveland Pass. I began to weep tears of pride, joy, and exhaustion, making the final ascent into our highest peak and seeing my team waving and cheering me on. 

    I am used to being the last one to rest stops, especially since my greatest enjoyment from biking comes from taking the rides slowly and enjoying the surroundings, but this time I felt especially grateful to be last and fall into the open arms of my teammates. Our team was truly ON TOP OF THE FREAKING WORLD!!!! Seriously, look at the photo evidence.

    Though Loveland Pass is nothing close to the end of our journey, I felt such immense pride for the fact that our team has hauled a** on bicycles for all of the 11,990 ft of elevation needed to reach the summit. It truly is such an accomplishment, and one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen. It reminded me of when Aarushi and I backpacked 23 miles to reach the destination of a beautiful secluded beach in Hawaii. The beach was beyond incredible and was cemented as one of our core memories. However, when we took a boat ride around the island a few days later and saw the same beach from an easily accessible boat, it lost some of its magic. I think the same is true with Loveland Pass, and with many of the other sights we see on this trip. They are all beautiful on their own, but their magic lies in the efforts we put in to reach them. To commemorate and remember the magic of the moment, Aarushi even made a playlist of the exact songs she was listening to as she made the ascent to Loveland Pass, which you can listen to as well!

    https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5KXkijetKE2GUsQVYVr6hn?si=pyNAk_ApTwqRRwptRjI9zA&utm_source=copy-link&pi=H6HMu_01TKCy0

    After soaking up the views and taking countless photos, we took our lunch break at the top and huddled together with our blankets to stay warm against the wind. Inspired by Caroline’s past conservation efforts and a sign that said “NO LITTERING,” we even had our bravest soldier, Carmen, chase down a paper napkin that mischievously blew away in the brutal wind. To no one’s surprise, Carmen came out a hero.

    During this lunch break, the team also informed me that they had met a group of three bikers called HDWND (Headwind) who were completely mogging us and attempting to bike across the country in 20 days rather than our 75, biking roughly 200 miles a day and, unlike us, taking extremely short rest stops. At the time this blog is being posted, they did, in fact, complete their journey in only 22 days!!

    As you know, once you have reached the summit, it’s allllll downhill from there 😉

    Lol, excuse my pun, but unfortunately Drew did start to feel some altitude sickness at the top, so he quickly shoved his sandwich in his face and started the next stretch to try and escape the worst of the elevation.

    Tatiana’s Lunch:

    1. 1 bottle of water
    2. 1 gogo squeeze cinnamon
    3. 1 gogo squeeze
    4. 2 Advil
    5. 1 sandwich with 2 slices of turkey, 2 slices of cheese, mayonnaise, 6 slices of pepperoni, and half a pack of guacamole 
    6. 6 pickle slices
    7. 1 glass of sweet tea

    Drew’s Lunch:

    1. 3 bottles of water
    2. 1 bottle of Gatorade
    3. 5 gummy worms
    4. 1 sandwich with 4 slices of turkey, 6 slices of pepperoni, 4 pickles, mayonnaise, 2 slices of bread

    On the way down, I blasted “I’m On Top of the World” by Imagine Dragons in my headphones, and enjoyed the most blissful 10-mile downhill of my life. Imagine speeding down a huge descent, never pedaling, and going 35 miles an hour from gravity alone, accompanied by insane mountain views. I think some may call this bliss, and I personally think this is the reward for all of the painful ascents our team has conquered on this journey.

    To sweeten the pot even more, our next destination was Keystone, a ski village that is extra close to my heart, and the location where Ashley and her family would meet us! While we waited for them to arrive, Drew remained passed out on a chair to combat his elevation sickness, I took a lap on my bike around the village to reminisce about my childhood, and the girls on the team planned the ultimate crepe sharing rotation. We even met this extremely awesome biker who shared his own experiences with joyrides and “fast downhills,” teaching us some unorthodox fueling and biking strategies that I think our team may not be yet advanced enough to attempt.

    Tatiana’s Keystone Snack:

    1. 1 Arizona sweet tea
    2. 1/5 coconut banana chocolate crepe
    3. 1/5 brown sugar Nutella blueberry crepe
    4. 3 bites of vanilla peak cookie
    5. Few sips of Arnold Palmer iced tea

    Drew’s Keystone Snack:

    1. 1 berry lemonade soda

    When Ashley and her family arrived, I was filled with love and appreciation for their immense efforts to drive across the state just to see and support me for a few hours. There are so many people across the country cheering me on, and seeing one of my best friends on the journey was icing on the cake.

    You may think that the day simply cannot get any better, but it in fact did! Ashley decided that she wanted to ride the last segment with us, so Carmen generously let Ashley borrow her bike, and after some quick trial and error on how to get on and off a taller bike, as well as how to change gears and feel comfortable, Ashley was ready to rock and roll with us! Thank you to Ashley’s parents, who also agreed to drive Carmen back to the top of Loveland Pass to retrieve the car we had left there so that Carmen could fully conquer both the ascent and the descent of the Continental Divide.

    We got a grand total of 2 miles in (during which Ashley was killing it and the trail was, in fact, beautiful), when we began to see lightning and hear rounds of thunder cross the sky. We had to take shelter at a gas station, where our team fell right into our usual routine of loitering around and looking at things we clearly have no intention of buying. This, of course, did not include Drew, who is apparently an insulator and not fearful of lighting, leading to him biking onwards on his own all the way to Breckenridge.

    After waiting it out for a bit, the rest of the team followed in Drew’s suit and made it another few miles before we realized that the storm was not leaving any time soon. We pulled over at a shopping center and began discussing the best course of action to end the night, considering that at this point, it was already 8 pm. Drew was at the end, and it looked like the storm would not be passing for a few more hours. We decided that we would SAG Aarushi and me so that I could have dinner with Ashley’s family and so that Aarushi could blog and avoid biking in the dark, while Caroline, Nunu, and Nate wanted to finish the ride and would bike regardless of what time of night it cleared up.

    With this, the Fishers and I began the process of attempting to fit the three of them, my bike, a huge package for their son, Kenny, and me into their small SUV. This required a bit of maneuvering, taking off my front wheel, some humor, and even some strength as we settled on a method that required me to hold up the bike for the 25 minute car ride. Finally, I got to experience an arm workout this summer 🙂

    Once we arrived at our wonderful host, Alison greeted us warmly with a prepared dinner. We decided to eat in two shifts because Ashley’s family still had to drive back to Denver that night to see Kenny. Alison’s husband, Phil, is currently on a bike tour, so we had a wonderful time eating the delicious taco and burrito bar while discussing his journey and learning about his potential tattoo of bike grease on his calf. All of us were slightly bemused and inspired looking at the grease on our own legs and remembering that we share the same experience with bikers across the country!

    Tatiana’s Dinner:

    1. 1 tortilla burrito with chicken, fajita veggies, rice, cheese, salsa, beans, lime
    2. Chips and salsa
    3. 2 cups of water

    Drew’s Dinner:

    1. 4 bottles of water
    2. Chips and salsa
    3. 2 tortilla burritos with rice, chicken, cilantro, lime, tomatoes, onions, green salsa
    4. 1 grapefruit sparkling water

    With the day coming to a close, and my tracking being extremely diligent throughout the day, I decided it was time to run our food consumption lists through an AI agent at the dinner table to have a fun conversation topic of how many calories Drew and I had consumed that day. What began as a harmless question to Claude instead led to the AI agent expressing its concern for us and our eating habits, and not answering the question I had asked it.

    For any curious readers, ChatGPT shared no similar qualms and spit out the exact answer I was looking for with zero hesitation. 

    The overall results were that Drew probably consumed roughly 4,300 calories, and I consumed roughly 3,400. Considering that my Garmin says I burned 4,600 calories that day, we may in fact still be undereating, but what are numbers and tracking anyway?

    With a humorous discussion on AI agents coming to a close, I finally said goodbye to Ashley’s family, hopped in the shower, greeted the second wave of bikers who arrived in the night, and then turned in on Alison’s wonderfully comfortable bed. Goodnight, and sweet dreams!

    With love for food and downhills,

    Tatiana ❤

  • Day 44: MIT Paddles

    Day 44: MIT Paddles

    Rest day in Idaho Springs, CO — 0 mi, 0 ft


    Per usual, we woke up this morning. Not per usual, I woke up and the car was already unloaded and ready for us to drive off and spend our rest day white water rafting! Even more not per usual, I ate my breakfast of assorted snacks we had in the car with this crazy view from the porch of our Airbnb. 

    The great view from the balcony of our Airbnb

    We left at 10:30 to drive 1.5hrs to the white water rafting location. Unfortunately, they’re making it hard for me to write about anything interesting in this blog since absolutely nothing happened before noon, but we saw some tandem bike bikepackers (bikers on a long-distance unsupported bike ride, easily identified by the many bags attached to their bike) on the drive there which was pretty cool. 

    When we arrived at the white water rafting, we all signed in and then everyone besides Drew and I immediately ran to the cafe across the street. 

    We had discovered this rafting late last night, and were deciding between rafting on a Class 2 and a Class 5 rapid. We were told that a Class 2 rapid was “more for scenery than thrill” while Class 5 required “extremely strong swimming ability”. 

    Class 2 Rapids (left) vs Class 5 Rapids (right).

    Only half of the team wanted to do the Class 5 rapid, but we needed all 7 of us to agree to do it for the rafting company to let us go since we would be the only ones going and they need at least 7 people to go to make a profit on the trip. We ended up going with Class 2 after we were told some of us could go in kayaks instead of rafts in order to increase the “thrill”. 

    Back in the present, we remembered that Drew and Carmen wanted to kayak, so Drew talked to the person at the desk to switch two of our seven spots to kayak spots. We quickly learned about a double-kayak option, so we switched to a double-kayak. Then I wanted to kayak too, so we switched to a double and a single. Then Nunu wanted to kayak, so we switched to two doubles. Each of these changes occurred with a couple minutes of spacing between them. Yes, this is actually how we operate.

    With the circus over, the rafting guides started handing out life jackets to the rafters, as well as helmets and water shoes for the kayakers. We then hopped onto a bus that would drive us ~20 minutes to the river.

    Pic of kayakers ready to yak (Nunu not pictured, taking the picture).

    When we got to the river, us kayakers were taken away for a brief lesson on white water kayaking: 

    1. Follow the path the rafts take
    2. Go head on into rapids
    3. Go to shore to climb back into your raft if you fall out

    Immediately after pushing into the moderately-paced moving water, both kayak doubles (Drew+Carmen and Nunu+myself) started uncontrollably spinning in the water. Turns out steering on these inflatable kayaks is harder than it looks since they slide very easily on the water. It wouldn’t be until later that we would realize that paddling backwards was the optimal technique for steering, but we didn’t have time to figure that out since the first drop was rapidly approaching. 

    1. Follow the path the rafts take.

    After doing approximately 7 full 360 spins on our kayak, Nunu and I realized the first drop was approaching. We also realized we had spun to the far right side of the river where there were many rocks blocking the river, while everyone else was on the left side where the actual fall was. 

    We paddled as hard as we could to get to the left side of the river, but our subpar steering ability meant we only narrowly avoided the rocks. 

    1. Go head on into rapids.

    Because we had to book it to make it across the river and avoid the rocks, we ended up approaching and entering the fall sideways (not head on). We fell down the fall fine, but ended up stuck at the bottom as the rapids pushed us back into the bottom of the fall. 

    We sat stuck at the bottom of the fall for ~2 seconds before the inevitable happened: our kayak flipped. How embarrassing. 

    1. Go to shore to climb back into your raft if you fall out

    I don’t really understand the purpose of this rule, I climbed back into the kayak fairly easily and then helped pull Nunu back in. One of the guides on the raft shouted out, “Go to shore to get back on… or don’t…” after we flopped back onto the kayak. 

    If you thought this circus was a 2-clown show, you’re sorely mistaken. After having made it down the fall, Carmen and Drew decided to paddle back into the fall to surf it. They promptly flipped into the water. 

    I don’t know who let these people get into the kayaks.

    After everyone was back in their kayaks, the raft caravan continued down some slow moving water, and us kayakers were able to get a better handle of things. At this point, we were spinning willingly and able to actually follow the rafts. We went down some more rapids gracefully and masterfully, I guess to the surprise of the guides because we were asked twice how many more times we had fallen. 

    Drew and Carmen wet from falling in, paddling along the caravan.

    At this point, things must’ve been going too smoothly, and Tatiana must’ve been in a violent mood, because she started trying to splash all the kayaks. Shortly after, she put down her kayak and locked eyes with Drew sitting in his kayak – at that moment, I knew exactly what was about to happen. 

    Tatiana stood up from her raft, and jumped on to the front of Drew and Carmen’s kayak. She then grabbed Drew by his lifejacket and tried to drag him into the water. Funnily enough, she fell into the water first, but poetic justice was not in the cards for Drew as he got dragged down by his lifejacket into the water right after. 

    Drew and Tatiana in the water following The Great Invasion of ’26.

    I can’t really say what injustice has been inflicted upon Tatiana to fuel her spree of violence, but right after her and Drew climbed back into their respective floatation vehicles I start hearing screams from behind us. The water was so calm, sky so clear, and weather so nice that you’d almost think some people would like to enjoy the peace. But no, I look around to see Tatiana trying to shove Aarushi into the water. If you are a relative or close friend of Tatiana, please reach out to her I think she needs help.

    There is certainly no rest for the wicked, because right after the aformentioned chaos subsided, we immediately went into another rapid. This time, we might’ve followed Step 1 of kayaking (“Follow the path the rafts take”) a little too closely because the two kayaks came up on a sharp turn into a cliff side pretty quickly and crowded right behind two rafts and all four groups crashed together onto the side of the cliff. 

    A picture I took of the 2 kayaks and a raft about to run into the cliffside. 

    We were fine though, I just like tossing in a bit of suspense. We kept going for a bit longer through a few more rapids, until we arrived at a 30ft cliff for the cliff jumping portion of the trip.

    I don’t think anyone was really comprehending what we were getting ourselves into, or how tall 30ft is, as we marched up the cliff in single file like thoughtless ants. By the time you get to the top and 10 year old little girls are jumping off the cliff though, there’s no going back. So off we went, because we all know what they say about jumping off a cliff when all your friends are doing it. 

    A picture I took from the top of the cliff.

    As we got ready to finish off the trip, Drew, Carmen, and I switched out of the kayaks so that Aarushi, Tatiana, and Caroline could give them a try. Unfortunately for them, our guide let us know that all the rapids were over, but I guess it’s the thought that counts. 

    Aarushi taking the reins.

    We floated down the river for ~30 minutes before reaching the end of the trip, pulled our rafts/kayaks out of the water, and hopped onto the bus for a ~40 minute ride back to the car. 

    When we got back, we changed out of our wet clothes and munched on the many snacks that we conveniently always carry in the minivan. 

    We also gave copious amounts of pets to the rafting company’s dog mascot sitting outside. I think this must be the fourth time I’ve taken a picture of Caroline petting a large white dog, related it to Max, and put it in the blog. 

    Caroline is a team of 1 MIT students biking across America reconciling with large, white dogs along the way.

    With very empty stomachs, we decided to drive to a nearby food hall for dinner. The market was cool, very millenial vibes, but super overpriced. Nunu and Drew got a burger for upwards of $20-25, and Aarushi, Tatiana, Nunu, and I got a couple of empanadas for ~$6 each (!). Feeding a team of bikers at that price would cost a small fortune so we decided to drive over to a nearby Chinese restaurant and order takeout. 

    In terms of quantity, the food did not disappoint. My beef lo mein was so densely packed that it felt like a brick that could pose danger to a small child. I ate some in the car on the 1.5hr drive back to the Airbnb, but started getting full without it even looking like I dented the noodle brick. This is really saying a lot since usually I vacuum food without feeling a thing. 

    Eating my brick of lo mein in the back row of the minivan.

    After we got back, I got serious and cleared out the rest of my food – can’t let them forget how things work around here. Then, Nunu and I spent 2-3 hours going through receipts and expenses from the trip to update our badly out of date budget tracking spreadsheet. 

    Various members of the team enjoying their food (and some REALLY enjoying their food) on the patio.

    Sometime during then, Aarushi’s friend Margarita arrived at the house after her 2 hour drive to hang out and stay the night with us before driving another 2 hours back in the morning to go to work. 

    After finishing finances, we decided to test out the Airbnb’s sauna (test failed I think) and then finish out the night in the hot tub before going to bed for a very long Continental Divide climb tomorrow. 

    Goodnight.

    – Nate

  • Day 43: The Warped Wall

    Day 43: The Warped Wall

    Denver, CO to Idaho Springs, CO — 45.8 mi, 4612 ft

    After a few days of beating around the bush, it finally came time to face the rockies head on, resulting in an elevation graph that looks very much like the notorious final obstacle from the TV Series, American Ninja Warrior.

    But, before that, we biked out of Denver and into Golden, Colorado. I’d never heard of golden, but it holds a lot of sentimental value to native Denverites, like Nate. This seems to be due to the presence of Woody’s pizza, which is known for its $18.99 all-you-can-eat pizza buffet– a deal that seems too good to be true in the Big 26. The original rest stop was a coffee shop, so Nate and I made the executive decision to move it to Woody’s Pizza (notably after I was scammed for an $8 lemonade in a mason jar by the original coffee shop rest stop). We went to Woody’s, and I just got an order of fried pickles. Nate, on the other hand, dove head first into the all-you-can-eat buffet. I lost count of the number of slices he ate, but I do recall that he had a very diverse selection of different types of pizza, including one with pineapple.

    Afterwords, we went down to clear creek, which ran down the northern edge of town. There were a bunch of people tubing down the light rapids. 

    We had the bright idea to go down the rapids in our “floating dock” as it is branded. It’s basically a glorified air mattress with just enough room for all of us to sit. We ended up going down the river three times as people watched in awe and confusion as we sometimes successfully, sometimes unsuccessfully slid down small waterfalls on our “floaty.”

    Afterwards, we changed back into our biking gear and started on the largest climb of the trip so far: 2,000 feet over 10 miles. It wasn’t as bad as we thought.

    View from the top

    At the top, we met this other cyclist who told us there were bison in a nearby meadow. Nate and I biked to the meadow, but we didn’t see any bison. 

    I’ve noticed that climbs in the Rockies are usually in the format of a long uphill followed by a long downhill. In the Appalachians, it’s a lot of repetitive up, down, up, down– usually shorter, steeper climbs with shorter downhills. I much prefer the format of climbs in the Rockies, because the climbs are rewarded with long downhills where you can effectively cash out on your hard work. In Appalachia, you are constantly just moving on to the next climb without much reward, and it’s a lot more exhausting. However, the elevation can really get to you when you make it to the top of climbs in the Rockies; I think most of us have found ourselves a lot more winded, even nauseated at times.

    After our climb, we had a nice descent (mostly) into Idaho Springs. We went through some roads that were closed for construction, but the workers were chill and we kept pressing forward. By the time we got to the place where we were staying, I was really feeling sick, so I ate the delicious pasta prepared by Aarushi and Nunu, then went to sleep immediately. My day ended there. Since I’ve chosen to write this blog in 1st person limited perspective, I can only say that it seems possible that my teammates took advantage of a hot tub at the place we were staying, because I saw bathing suits hanging up to dry in the morning.

    Today was just a warmup for The Big Day. The Continental Divide is now staring us straight in the eye. I think my biggest worry, as a sea level dweller, is altitude sickness. Find out how it goes in two days!

    – Drew