MIT Spokes 2026

Author: MIT Spokes

  • Day 16: the new normal

    Day 16: the new normal

    London, KY to Liberty, KY – 64.8 mi, 4060 ft

    Last night was probably the worst sleep we’ve gotten during this trip. In an attempt to create “summer vibes”, Drew, Carmen, Nunu, Aarushi, and I all decided to sleep in hammocks in the backyard, as opposed to sleeping on the floor inside or in tents like normal people. Drew slept in the hammock already set up outside on a stand in the backyard. The remaining four of us used two hammocks provided by our (amazing) hosts, Lucy and Steve, as well as two hammocks that we brought on the trip. We promptly realized that the hammocks we brought were both missing enough parts to make them non-functional, and we were only able to make them work by frankensteining parts from the hammocks Lucy and Steve provided us. We strung these four hammocks haphazardly across the pavilion in the backyard, criss-crossing two of the hammocks in order to do the aforementioned frankensteining of hammocks. 

    The four hammocks set up in the pavilion + Drew’s hammock in the foreground. 

    For some reason I ended up taking the bottom, criss-crossed hammock (the pink one). I was the first one to sleep last night so in hindsight I don’t know why I did this but after such a long and stressful day of fighting off dogs along an 80 mile ride, I probably just slept in the first thing I saw. This ended up being a critically bad decision because Nunu, who later went to sleep in the top criss-crossed hammock (the red one), spent the entire night LYING ON MY KNEES. I think I tried adjusting a few times during the night to no success and in the end I was too tired to move. I also suspect this knee sitting situation is a precursor to some incoming knee concerns. 

    Real time picture of my legs getting destroyed by Nunu. 

    In addition to that, all five of us hammock sleepers were all super cold despite (most of us) being in sleeping bags and it only dropping down to 50 degrees that night. Since all of our hammocks were connected by the same ropes (frankenstein is the gift that keeps on giving), anytime one person got up to grab a sleeping bag or a blanket, everyone else experienced intense hammock turbulence. Drew’s hammock was separated but when he woke up in the early morning to grab a blanket, he realized it was wet because of early morning dew. He still slept with it because he was too tired to look for a dry blanket. 

    Meanwhile, Tatiana and Caroline presumably slept well inside on the two available beds. Of course, they are dealing with other issues currently (we think Tatiana sprained her ankle last night and Caroline’s bite mark is glistening in different shades of purple, red, blue, and yellow bruising) so it’s fair to say I’m not envious of their position.

    We woke up at 6am after ~5 hours of sleep. I should point out that our hosts, Lucy and Steve, are amazing and that it was entirely our own hubris of trying to make this hammock situation work that we slept so badly. They had a huge spread of food ready for us for breakfast including donuts, eclairs, pigs in blankets, fruit, juice, eggs, etc. 

    The breakfast spread 😋

    Around now everyone was deciding whether they wanted to bike or not today given the prevalence of aggressive dogs on the route the previous day. Drew, Tatiana, and I, who had biked yesterday, tried to make clear that while we had figured out a strategy to make the situation generally manageable (a combination of yelling and mace), it was by no means a safe environment because of how aggressive the dogs could be. Besides that, biking in these conditions was very mentally taxing from the constant anticipation of a dog sprinting towards you.

    Drew was set on still biking and ended up giving up his driver day to Nunu so that he could bike. Tatiana couldn’t walk so she was out for today. Aarushi decided that she wanted to bike since she hadn’t biked in nearly a week at this point. Carmen said, “I don’t think I’m gonna bike today, I’m not gonna be stupid for no reason”, in reference to not wanting to put herself in the dangerous situation of biking near aggressive dogs. She also biked today. 

    I had to return the small SUV we rented for extra SAG space and for following our riders to help deal with dogs, and exchange it for a larger pickup truck that was actually big enough to provide the extra SAG space we wanted. Our team has two MIT corporate cards that we can use for renting cars, I have one and Caroline has the other one. Caroline doesn’t have a driver’s license. As a result, I had to go drive the car to go exchange it and would miss the first part of the ride. 

    I drove 50 minutes to exchange the car for a huge GMC Sierra, then 30 minutes to meet the team at the first rest stop. Meanwhile, the team finished packing and started the first 20 miles to the first rest stop, which ended up being very uneventful with nearly no dog encounters. 

    The only dog encounter occurred at the first rest stop when some dogs came running down the street from the opposite direction, while I was waiting in the parking lot, just when our bikers pulled into the rest stop. I don’t think they were chasing after our riders though. It seemed like they were just running down the street independently and then decided that antagonizing our riders would be a fun time.

    At the rest stop, I changed into my bike gear and joined the ride for the remaining ~45 miles of the ride. Truthfully, I wasn’t really planning on joining in on the ride at all since I was feeling very mentally drained from the previous days’ events + physically drained from getting some awful sleep. Unfortunately, Tatiana egged me into joining the ride by claiming we didn’t need me to drive the pickup truck since only her left foot was injured and not her right foot (the one you need to drive) so she could drive the pickup truck. So, without really planning to, I ended up biking today. Meanwhile, Tatiana and Caroline drove themselves to the nearest hospital in order to identify the state of Tatiana’s foot + get Caroline her 2nd dose of rabies vaccine. 

    Biking the middle 20 miles ended up being very uneventful, and borderline boring without the “entertainment” of scanning houses for any dogs sprinting at us. 

    At the second rest stop, we ate the usual sandwiches for lunch and then ended up passing out on the grass for an hour. Unsurprisingly, the five of us who passed out at lunch (Drew, Carmen, Aarushi, Nunu, and myself) were also the five who had slept in the hammocks the night before. 

    Napping all over the parking lot and lawn. I don’t know why everyone ended up napping in like 3+ different locations.

    As we slowly started waking up, Nunu introduced Aarushi and I to this game called Rummikub in which she quickly won and then proceeded to essentially play for us afterwards. I’m sure she had a fun time playing. Then, Drew, Nunu, and I played an awful game of HORSE in which we decided we should avoid basketball and stick to biking.

    Who is even the one playing at this point?
    The maximum distance that any of us can make a shot from. 

    After a total of 3.5 hours at the second rest stop, we finally left and continued our biking journey. Around this time, Tatiana had found that her ankle was sprained (after going to three different hospitals because the first one she went to didn’t have an x-ray machine in the entire town). 

    The last leg of the ride ended up being much more eventful, and Carmen and Aarushi got their first taste of dealing with the aggressive dogs Kentucky is known for. I think in total we had ~6-8 dogs chase us, with the most “exciting” breeds being a Rottweiler, two Pyrenees mixes, a Retriever, and a Great Pyrenees that ran between houses across two streets in order to chase us. After we yelled that Great Pyrenees off (probably a co-conspirator with Max, the dog that bit Caroline), a watching neighbor yelled (in a nearly unintelligible Southern accent), “Watch out for that dog, it’ll bit ya”. 

    A pretty view from the last leg of the ride.

    I also noticed some slight knee discomfort during the last leg of this ride, which I found very surprising since I run a lot and that tends to have a much higher impact on your knees than biking. Having seen the rest of the team getting their rides ended by knee issues, the discovery that my knees may not be invincible was quite jarring. Having written this in the future, however, the discomfort has since subsided, and so I have decided to place the blame on Nunu sleeping on my knees. 

    After arriving in Liberty at the church we would be staying at for the night, we were welcomed warmly by Brother Rodger at the Liberty Assembly of God with delicious fried chicken and tons of groceries and food that we were told was all for us. 

    At the same time, Nunu ran our clothes to the local laundromat before it closed so that Drew’s singular pair of bike shorts could be washed before the ride the next day. 

    After dinner, Caroline’s dad and two siblings stopped by to visit. They were originally planning to meet us at Mammoth Cave in a couple of days (on a much shorter bike day) but got the dates wrong. In any case, it was great meeting them. We heard about her dad’s 1000 mile, 10 day bike trip that he did using a single speed bike. Also, when we first met he said, “Ah you’re Nate, you’re the best blogger!”. Forest, if you’re reading this, you’re more than welcome to stop by anytime 🙂

    With people tired and ready to head to bed, we spent a bit of time trying to figure out who would bike the next day. Both Drew and I were physically, but probably more so mentally, drained after the stressful past two days and were both interested in resting the next day. My driver day was tomorrow so I was quite excited to miss the 90 mile ride coming up.

    Carmen, Aarushi, and Nunu were interested in biking, but they hadn’t had much experience with the dogs and wanted one of either Drew or I to join them. Between Drew and I, he was dealing with some chaffing that could use a rest and I had biked a bit less today. In the end, I ended up giving up my driver day to him so that the rest of the team would bike and we could avoid MIT Spokes 2026 from becoming MIT Rims 2026 (everyone driving the route). 

    Side note but since Drew wasn’t biking tomorrow, there was no need for Nunu to miss eating dinner with us to go do laundry. Sorry Nunu 😦 

    For those who have been following along, you may recall that our team has bad luck on my blog days when it comes to SAG outs. Caroline put it best this morning, “Are you blogging today, Nate? Oh no…”. Luckily, it seems to be the case that today breaks the “half the team SAGing out” streak that has come with my blogging days. Maybe just to extend the streak we can count me missing the first 20 miles as a SAG, but that’s kind of a stretch. Alternatively, Tatiana’s driver days have been on the same days as my blog days except for today, so maybe the real bad luck is there? I guess we’ll see in a couple of days.

    – Nate

  • Day 15: Dog Days Are Over?

    Day 15: Dog Days Are Over?

    Hazard, KY to London, KY — 78.9 mi, 5620 ft

    I’m calling a team meeting.

    As you may already know, we are big on team meetings. So this is what we say when we find a lull in our conversation and we know we have something serious to discuss. This past week was a rollercoaster, from Aarushi’s tree crash to Caroline’s dog bite to sleeping barely 6 hours at an overcrowded camp site, our team needed a major recharge. Thankfully, our past two night stay at Harmony House Bed & Breakfast provided us just that. So, through our various team meetings conducted in our gorgeous lacey wallpaper bedroom, chandelier adorned dining room, and lemon-themed front porch, we came up with a game plan.

    To quickly recap, a majority of the team was feeling a little traumatized from Caroline’s recent dog bite. So we had to discuss a couple of questions including: Who wants to bike through Kentucky? What parts of Kentucky do people want to bike through? How can we support the people who do want to bike and the people who don’t want to bike? Now I’ll walk you through everyone’s individual thought processes.

    Drew was the first one to say he absolutely wanted to continue biking through Kentucky. He had grown up around dogs similar to the ones we would be seeing and felt more than comfortable to keep himself safe. Tatiana had a long conversation with previous Spokes 2025 members Charles and Greta in which she decided, since she hadn’t been there when Caroline got bitten, she wasn’t yet able to understand her fear level and wanted to bike so that she could understand it. I was the first to decide I definitely did not want to bike, at least for this first day. Not only was I still feeling extremely scared after nearly being Max’s appetizer (the dog who bit Caroline), but I was dealing with some butt chafing injuries and it was already my assigned driving day so why mess with what might be my fate? Aarushi and Carmen were initially on the fence leaning no, and they decided together by the end of yesterday to not bike. They both felt scared and unsure they would be able to take proper action in the situation. Nate started out a no, but after much consideration, decided he didn’t want his fear to control him. With Caroline, well the team pretty much decided for her, she was in no shape to bike yet. After 6 rabies shots, limping around, and feeling feverish the whole day, I don’t think a justification is necessary. So we had Drew, Tatiana, and Nate biking and myself, Aarushi, Carmen, and Caroline as drivers.

    With that, we needed to book a second rental car (one big enough to carry at least two or three bikes). Though, even if everyone but Caroline did want to bike, we realized we needed to book a second car regardless because Caroline doesn’t know how to drive so she would automatically take our one SAG spot and we definitely needed to have an available SAG spot as we’ve learned from this past week. So, having made an online pickup truck reservation the night before, at 8AM Nate and I said our goodbyes to Charles—our amazing host and learning festival coordinator for the Challenger Center—and drove off to the rental place.

    Thank you for everything Charles!!!!

    As we pulled into the parking lot, we funnily enough saw Charles walk into the exact same car rental shop. We overhear the lady at the desk telling Charles that his initial rental isn’t available and he can choose between two other car options. This is when I knew it was chopped. When it’s our turn, she tells us the same thing. Even though we had made a reservation online, the website doesn’t update the actual availability of their car types and many customers made reservations with their pickup trucks long before we did. Feeling at a loss, we call our teammates who are patiently waiting back at the B&B. They are all equally confused and demand to be put on Facetime with the car rental lady. Nate reluctantly tells the lady, “my boss wants to talk to you.” After some back and forth between our boss (Tatiana) and the lady, we still have no luck and do a one day rental of the biggest car they had available, a Chevy Trailblazer. This way we could exchange the car for a pickup truck at our next stop.

    Nate with the keys to our awesome “pickup truck” rental

    After two hours, we made it back to the B&B, magically stuffed our two smallest XS bikes in the back of our rental, and the bikers were off. One condition we’d decided for this day was to have a “follow car” follow the bikers along the entire 80 mile route from Hazard to London, KY. This means one of the cars will literally trail the bikers at a maybe 10 ft distance going 10 mph to help support them and use the horn to help scare away any dogs. Carmen and Caroline took this first shift until the first rest stop while Aarushi and I went to Walmart to restock on groceries. We also stopped for some coffee.

    Buying more fig bars and gummy worms

    Once all 7 of us met up at the first rest stop, we had a serious debrief. Right at the beginning of the day, our three bikers ran into a couple of other bikers at a gas station where they were told that these areas they were about to bike through are indeed really scary and there are many dogs that will come out and chase you. With no other choice but to continue, they started their first 20 mile leg. Nate said that he felt like they were in a “zombie apocalypse” and they had to “watch every house to see if a zombie will come out and get you.” Tatiana said she also felt like she was in an apocalypse and compared it to call of duty or walking dead. Drew said that he “felt like [he] was in a video game” and was having “a lot of fun.” It felt like every house they passed, there was potential danger and you held your breath for something to happen until you were safely out of range… until you came onto the next house again.

    Feeling worried and scared even as a non biker, Aarushi and I drove the follow car for the next 20 mile leg. Now let me describe to you how serious of an operation this was. It was Nate and Drew flanking Tatiana in a V formation while I tailed very closely behind them, all windows of the car rolled down to hear barking sounds. At the first sight of any movement or potential threat, we would walky-talky each other. If a dog ever started coming at the bikers, Drew and Nate would immediately grab their mace and start yelling at them to back off, I would honk loudly and maneuver the car to block them when possible, and Tatiana would make sure to keep biking through. The whole time it just felt like being on constant high alert, tense and prepared to take immediate action. This second leg, there were quite a few dogs that ended up coming out of their houses and actively chasing us down the streets. Most notably, a Great Dane, at full speed, ran after Nate and Drew before accidentally smashing itself into a mailbox (aura loss). Another Great Pyrenees (the same dog that bit Caroline) ended up chasing the whole group very far down the street (including our follow car). At one point, there was a pack of small dogs in the street and Drew had to mace one of them. We also passed by a house that had a giant cage on the front lawn of maybe 20 huge dogs that all turned to bark at us. In a kind of cruel way, it felt like a horror video game. Drew said that in the end, he kind of found the fun in it.

    At our second rest stop, we took a break for lunch. We ended up at a park next to a gas station and across the street from an interesting shop of random things. I bought this supposedly special Kentucky ginger ale that Drew and I thought was pretty good but Nate said wasn’t sweet enough. We made the most delicious sandwiches using the new ingredients Aarushi and I bought—complete with hummus, salami, sun dried tomatoes, bruschetta spread, bell peppers, and more. Our team is getting pretty good at making bomb sandwiches on the fly. And we played on the swings and on this spinning thing for a bit.

    Me and Caroline then took the third follow car shift to our last rest stop at the SPLASH PAD! At this point, even as a non biker, I was feeling the effects of being on such high alert for the past 4 hours straight. As we pull into the parking lot of the splash pad, a dog comes running up to us and Nate instinctively pulls out his mace and I am kind of frozen in fear. Luckily, the dog was super friendly and we completely overreacted. Though, it was definitely a reality check that we’d been experiencing some alternate reality and we felt disappointed that, as dog lovers, our immediate attitude had slightly shifted but hopefully only temporarily. Separately, this splash pad was awesome and a great break from the tough day. We danced through the water blasting music on our speaker pretending we were clubbing somewhere in Europe…

    The final leg from the splash pad to Lucy and Steve’s home was mostly dog-less. Aarushi and I went ahead to start unloading while Carmen and Caroline drove the follow car. Lucy and Steve, the kindest and warmest people, immediately offered Aarushi and I a “Big Girl” drink which we happily accepted. We met Milo, the cutest dog ever and my favorite because he reminds me a lot of my dog at home, Momo. They even smell the same.

    When our five other teammates arrived, our three brave bikers jumped in the pool and we ate a delicious bolognese pasta dinner complete with garlic bread and more Big Girls. After dinner, Drew serenaded us with a couple of pieces from The Greatest Showman. Every day I learn something new and awesome about my teammates and this week I learned Drew is extremely good at playing piano. We wanted to end the night with an awesome bonfire that Steve set up behind their house.

    As we were sitting around the fire, looking up at the stars, we suddenly heard Tatiana scream. At first we thought she was looking for the bonfire and yelled at her to follow our voices. Quickly, we realized her scream sounded a little serious and we all ran to the back porch of the house where we found her on the ground. She had misstepped in the dark and sprained her ankle. After some back and forth, we decided to help her to bed and go to urgent care in the morning for an X-ray.

    Suddenly, our team in just the past few days has suffered from three serious injuries. Are we just chopped? I think in hindsight, we are going to inevitably have some really awesome weeks and some really tough weeks. I’m just incredibly proud of our team for always working together and problem solving even when faced with what might seem like impossible challenges. We all signed up for this crazy adventure for a reason and I would not want to go through these ups and downs with anyone else. Plus, I think this summer is all about truly experiencing life and the full capacity of our emotions. I’m excited for the weeks to come because we can only go up from here! I’m carrying with me the spirit of this song, Dog Days Are Over by Florence + The Machine. Because hopefully, our dog days are over.

    We ended the night trying to set up four hammocks in Steve and Lucy’s backyard gazebo because doesn’t that just sound like an awesome idea? Well you can read more about how that went in Nate’s blog for tomorrow!

    – Nunu

  • Day 14: Where do we go from here?

    Day 14: Where do we go from here?

    Learning Festival in Hazard, KY — 0 mi, 0 ft

    My eyelids peel slowly open. 

    I hear a high-pitched voice coming from the door. I sit up in my bed and check the time– It reads 7:43am

    Is she out of her mind??

    Recently, Tatiana has self assigned herself the task of waking up the whole team. Last night, the team agreed to wake up at 7:45 am. It’s not often you sleep on a real bed during spokes, and I was determined to make use of every second of sleep allocated to me while being able to enjoy such a luxury.

    The door creeks open. 

    Tatiana is greeted by a haunting sight- the nastiest side eyes Nate and I could brandish

    Her face, previously having portrayed a sense of optimism only a so-called “morning person” could, is visibly overtaken by fear.

    She apologizes and closes the door.

    As she turns away, I spot her phone in hand, wretched “wakeup music”- as she calls it- one play button away from ruining my morning.

    It never did play, as it usually does, and I managed to sleep later than I have all summer- till 8:20 am. 

    Hindsight is always 20/20, and so I do appreciate Tatiana for taking on a job so dangerous, it gives even the most elite warfighters nightmares– waking up a team of grumpy, sleep-deprived cyclists.

    Today, we taught at the Challenger Learning Center in Hazard, Kentucky. It was a great day of teaching, and I am especially grateful to the center’s assistant director, Charles, for, well, a lot of things,

    • Driving 4 hours to help us transport team members after “the incident” (read Carmen’s Day 13 Blog)
    • Coordinating a very structured learning festival and allowing us to reach incredibly talented kids in the region.
    • Providing us with meals and a fantastic place to sleep.
    • Being incredibly friendly and passionate about creating STEM opportunities for kids in rural Kentucky.

    … to name a few.

    The festival followed a pretty standard format, albeit with an particularly talented group of kids, many of whom were comfortable working with topics beyond their grade level. 

     Because we work with so many different ages, Nate and I will usually adapt our learning festival based off of their responses to the first few questions. We always begin by asking kids, “What is a magnet?” This question is answerable by kids of every age; however, the responses allow us to probe what depth of discussion is appropriate. The youngest kids may just say, “It sticks to metals” while the older kids may discuss polarity or distribution of charges within a metal. 

    Today we were able to push much further than usual into using our motors to understand how a magnetic field is produced by a solenoid, how this relates to the frequency of oscillation in our square wave generator, and why this allows us to spin the magnetic rotor. 

    I particularly enjoyed getting to meet and talk with kids at the festival today. One student, Connor, and I talked about current happenings in the aerospace industry, I’m studying aerospace engineering and I love having the opportunity to nerd out about rockets and current advances in technology. I really feel like I’m looking in a mirror sometimes at the learning festivals.

    There’s only so many types of nerdy little boys: Dinosaur kids, car kids, train kids, plane/rocket kids, etc. As an aspiring aerospace engineer, it feels apparent to me that, compared to the other archetypes, the plane/rocket kids almost never really grow out of their nerd phase… and this makes me really happy. I love meeting kids that share my belief that the coolest thing humans can do is build things that allow us to go farther and faster than ever before.

    After the learning festival, we got blizzards from Dairy Queen.

    Charles brought us dinner from Applebees.

    It was time to make some heavy decisions. One aspect of Spokes that people likely don’t consider is that we are very political. Not in the sense that we take a stance on societal issues, but rather that, within our team, there’s a lot of difficult decisions and complex things that have to be sorted out to give us the best chance of accomplishing our goals for the summer. It’s kind of like playing the really old The Oregon Trail video game, except it’s real life and we all have to work together to decide what is best for our team.

    Yesterday, Caroline was bitten by a dog. This region of the Kentucky is notorious for having dangerous dogs, and any route we take to get to our destination tomorrow will take us through places that will certainly result in repeated dog encounters. Understandably, the majority of our team was not particularly in favor of biking tomorrow on the basis of safety. However, I, along with some others expressed a desire to bike despite the risk.

    The Spokes team meetings play out a bit like what I imagine the constitutional conventions were like: everybody expressing passionate ideas about what to do next, and the team ultimately arriving at some middle ground that pleases the most people. 

    We ultimately decided that we should prepare to facilitate allowing team members to make the decision for themselves whether or not they wanted to bike. Additionally, we should come up with a plan to SAG every biker out if necessary. After conducting a general survey of how people felt about this portion of the route given everything that had occurred in the past day, it became clear that we would need to acquire a new vehicle for a few days in order to accommodate everyone. Our van can accommodate 2 people; 3 people max if Nunu gets really creative with packing. We decided to rent a truck, which would allow us to carry five bikers and their bikes, incase we encounter a particularly dire situation.

    With that, the Spokes politics have concluded. Stay tuned to find out whether or not I survive biking through the pawpocalypse.

    – Drew

  • Day 13: Let me get a bite of that

    Day 13: Let me get a bite of that

    Breaks Interstate Park, VA to Hazard, KY – 1.4 mi, -315 ft 

    (85.1 mi, 4,749 ft)

    First driver x blogger day! 😅

    My POV: (6:00 – 9:10 am)

    That morning we woke up at our bare bones campground (no electricity or water), and most of our devices were either dead or almost dead. Everyone was either tired, irritable, or slightly injured as they begrudgingly put on their bike gear. The first group consisting of Nate, Drew, Nunu, and Caroline left as soon as they could, knowing they had a long 85 mile day ahead of them. A little while later, Tatiana and Aarushi went on their way. Soon after, I pulled out of the campsite and started to make my way out of the park, trailing an incredibly slow camper van.

    For some reason, the morning felt off. I still had this pit in my stomach from yesterday, after we biked through an incredibly sketchy neighborhood and had to drag our bikes under potentially live electric fencing. But today was a new day. All I wanted to do was get on the road and prepare for the next rest stop; I figured this routine would help calm my nerves. 

    About two minutes into trailing this camper van, I received a call from Nunu. If you remember from the previous blog, Nunu had to SAG out towards the end of the ride because of her knee pain. In the moment before I answered, I had almost decided this was the reason for her call. But it was so early on into the day that it didn’t make sense. I kept my adrenaline from overcoming my temporarily focused and placated state, and picked up the call.

    “Carmen, we need you to come right now, Caroline has been bitten by a dog”, Nunu demanded. I cursed in shock. Was Caroline okay? How did this happen? All I could think about was how our previous circular discussion on dealing with dogs in Kentucky never ended in a practical solution; instead we had relied on our faith in statistics and hope to keep us safe.

    I frantically asked for their location, but all I could hear of Nunu’s response was random vowel sounds as the spotty service decided to choose our conversation to chew up. I had to call Nunu several times before she was able to pick up, and eventually she was able to tell me to follow our daily route until I could see her and Nate on the side of the road waving their hands above their heads.

    Caroline, Nunu, Nate, and Drew’s POV: (8:20 – 9:00am)

    At around 8:45 am, the first group had just taken the descent out of Breaks Interstate Park and were approaching a cluster of houses on the first back road of the day. Drew was leading with Nate taking up the rear, Caroline behind Nunu, but both sandwiched in the middle between them. 

    They had just come up a hill and were met with an adorable big white fluffy dog sitting in the driveway of the “dog house”. Everyone was off their guard as no one suspected it could be aggressive. Drew first barreled past, and Nunu followed, but somehow their speed must have lit a fire in the dog’s eyes as it set it’s sights on Nunu. It came charging at her from the right (as seen below), causing her to scream bloody murder and start pedaling as fast as she could to escape. At the same time, Caroline saw this as an opening for her to get past. The dog was distracted with antagonizing Nunu on the left, creating a pocket behind the dog on the right. Caroline tried to bolt past, but the dog was quicker. It turned around, deeming Nunu was no longer interesting enough to chase, and targeted Caroline instead. 

    She had told me that all she could think of in those few seconds before was a jumbled mess of potential solutions to the dog problem we had discussed. But since we had made no clear line of action, she picked one at random: just keep biking.

    After, the dog kept on charging, and moved to focus on Nate instead. But he had yelled “NO” just in time to deter it. Incredibly, Caroline kept biking the entire time; she must of had an insane amount of adrenaline coursing through her to keep herself from feeling the pain. The four of them stopped at a house down the road to regroup, where they realized there was no service and made the decision to walk back up the hill to call for help. This meant they would have to once again enter enemy territory. 

    If I believed in divine intervention, I might have seen what happened next as proof. While passing by the house, the dog had reappeared from behind the owner’s truck. It was about to charge again when suddenly a car came speeding down the hill and breaked just in time to only bump into the dog, allowing Caroline, Nate, and Nunu to hobble to the top of the hill where Nunu was finally able to call me.

    Nunu’s architectural drawing of the sequence of events

    Simultaneously, Drew had decided to confront the owner. Drew was very polite, southern accent slipping out to maybe subconsciously disarm him. He asked for him to take responsibility for what had happened and was of course uncooperative. Instead he blamed the team for being stopped in the road (which they have never done), it escalated into name calling and shouting and by this time Drew knew it was a lost cause. He channeled all of that anger into biking back up the 400 ft climb into Breaks Interstate Park in order to get service, update Tatiana and Aarushi, and call the police.

    My POV: (9:10 am – 1:30 pm)

    Once I got there, Nunu immediately grabbed the first aid kit from the car and started to tend to Caroline. They all moved to sit under the shade of some abandoned truck. At this point, emergency response services had been called and we were all waiting for them and the police to arrive. 

    I felt at a loss for what to do. I realized how unprepared I felt to deal with an emergency such as this; everyone else made a plan of action. I just did what others said and tried to be helpful. It is an interesting feeling, knowing in theory what steps to take, caring so greatly about the outcome, and yet being completely clueless as to how it should be translated into practice. Police should be involved, yes. Caroline should get medical attention, yes. But ambulances are expensive, so should I drive her? Should I wait for the police to arrive before I take her? Will they bring medical response services with them who can take her themselves? Hospital or urgent care? Wait times? What can the police even do in this case? A lot of questions that were impossible to be answered without experience. I trusted those around me to do what was right. And they did. I think it’s vulnerability, stepping back where you feel unsure, especially in moments where accuracy matters the most. It’s probably fear too, mixed in there. 

    Drew and Nate went down to the “dog house” to wait on the police, where Nunu soon followed, but not before she handed me a walkie talkie. She had been so dedicated to charging them that it was unfortunate how they finally were being put to use.

    While we were waiting, Aarushi called Charles, our wonderful host in Hazard and the coordinator of the challenger center, to ask if there was any way he could come and pick us up. He immediately agreed and determined that he was able to get a cargo van and get to us at around 2 pm that afternoon.

    About 30 minutes after Drew had made the first call, Tatiana left where she was comforting Caroline to make a second, slightly more angry call to the sheriff. The cops still hadn’t arrived.

    10 minutes later, the Haysi volunteer rescue team pulled up. Two volunteers climbed out and slowly trundled over, both older in age. Before they could start treating her, they needed to fill out some paperwork. It was an interesting interaction to observe; I felt like I was performing a vivisection of rural healthcare. 

    Caroline had to repeat her information several times as the man in charge of writing it down had poor hearing, while Aarushi had to loudly and slowly repeat how to spell H-U-A-N-G. I watched as he actively mistook an 8 for a 5 when Caroline very clearly dictated her phone number aloud, and when he crossed out the K in his “Karoline” for a C.

    After his partner had finished cleaning Caroline’s wound, she realized they would need more bandaids. He was already over by their ambulance, more than 200 ft away, and so she decided to shout at the top of her lungs, “GET BANDAIDS!” It went back and forth several times, through a series of, “WHAT?”, “BAND-AIDS!”, “BEND-WHAT?”, “NO, BAND AIDS!!”

    Eventually they got it figured out, came back to patch up Caroline, and gave us the chance to ask more about how to proceed. Should we be worried about rabies? Apparently, they have to get a sample from the dog, so that was largely out of our control. We never even learned from them that Caroline would need to get the rabies vaccine anyway, just that she might need a tetanus shot.

    Eventually the sheriff arrives, followed by two more cop cars, one hour after Drew had first called them.

    Mind you, I have been in a slight state of shock this whole time. Caroline’s eyes were understandably red, Aarushi was clutching her hand like she knew she needed the support—we were all on a similar wavelength, trying to stay calm but really quite shaken up. But when the sheriff came over, he brought a completely different vibe. To me at least, all of their southern accents were disarming, he was calm, in a kind of jolly mood, which matched the volunteer rescue team’s (what seemed to me) lack of urgency. Maybe I just misread a good beside manner.

    The sheriff talked to Caroline, looked her over, and asked about the dog bite. He brought out his phone to take a picture, squatted down to get a good angle, and in a serious tone accidentally said, “Let me get a bite of that!” He immediately apologized, but everyone thought it was hilarious; it was the first time I had seen Caroline break a smile since this whole mess had begun.

    We still had more questions for the rescue team: should she go to the hospital or was it unnecessary? If so, should she go in their ambulance or in our car? His response was to tell us a story of how a motorcyclist got into an accident, broke his arm, ribs, and collar bone, and still refused to be driven by them, opting to make the two hour drive to the nearest hospital himself. In other words, the decision was up to us. Ultimately we decided she should go with them, since their service is free, and they should theoretically get there faster. Aarushi hopped in the ambulance with Caroline, and then they proceeded to wait for an extra 20 minutes on the side of the road.

    Caroline vibing in the ambulance
    Caroline’s POV

    While we were making sure Caroline got the help she needed, Tatiana was busy talking to the police. She had hopped in the sheriff’s car to drive down to the house to meet up with the rest of our team. Part of the reason why they had taken so long to respond, was that they had a debate over in which county the dog bite occured. The road was in Dickenson county, but the house was in Buchannan county, and cops from both were there. Eventually they determined the officers from Dickenson county were responsible for handling the attack, due to some river boundary on someone’s property.

    Once they had come back up the hill, the cops noticed the ambulance hadn’t left. They asked us if we knew the reason, we definitely did not, and so one of them went to go talk with the rescue team. This whole time they had been waiting “to be released” by the cops, who themselves had no idea that was a rule, mainly because it wasn’t. Finally Caroline and Aarushi were off to Pikeville Medical Center, what was supposed to be a 35 minute drive had stretched into a 55 minute wait + drive.

    Ambulance, sheriff’s car, animal control, our vehicle

    At some point towards the end of this whole debacle, animal control arrived. For what reason I couldn’t tell you since the cops had earlier determined the owner had left with his dog in the car a while ago. Maybe they were hoping he would return to the scene of the crime. The sheriff also told us that this exact dog, named Max, had a record: he had bitten a cyclist before, but they hadn’t pressed charges. Max was notoriously aggressive. 

    Right before the cops made their leave, Nunu and Drew remembered they had both taken pictures of the owner’s car, and went to show them. Drew managed to capture the license plate in his. The sheriff ran the plate and found the owner’s personal info. F**k you Scotty.

    Drew giving the license plate photo to the sheriff

    Caroline and Aarushi were now safely on their way to the hospital, the police were on the lookout for Scotty, and the rest of us were calming down, the eye of the storm had passed. 

    We unanimously decided to SAG out as a team, since we knew Charles the goat would be able to shuttle us. I doubt anybody strongly wanted to continue anyway, but I felt partly responsible after creating the route and sending my friends off to their doom, while I was safely locked in a car. 

    Charles would not arrive for another few hours, and so I recommended we go down to the only diner in the area to wait. A two mile, 5 minute drive can quickly turn into an hour long ordeal when shuttling 5 people and 7 bikes, something I first experienced that day. After my second trip, I came back to find Drew, Nunu, and Nate talking with a suspicious looking hiker who was apparently yapping to Drew about his own home town. I took Nunu to the diner, and then crammed Drew and Nate in the back seat next so neither one would be left alone.

    During this whole process, cops kept returning to the address, a few hours after it had happened. My guess is that they were trying to see if Scotty had returned. We all appreciated that they seemed to be taking this seriously.

    For the next few hours we recuperated at the diner until Charles arrived. I left to go pick up Caroline and Aarushi, who had surprisingly gotten done 30 minutes before and after going to a Starbucks in the hospital (this Starbucks was very special to Caroline), were now eating at a fried chicken place recommended by all of the hospital staff. When I asked about their experience at the hospital, Aarushi instantly spoke on how Caroline was simply so brave and remained incredibly calm throughout, even as she received six rabies shots in a circle around her wound. I can’t even begin to imagine how much pain she was in. For her part, Caroline said she now understood why people hold other’s hands when they get vaccinated. It hurts.

    We went to go pick up her prescription at the pharmacy and then I drove to our bed and breakfast while they both took naps in the backseat. I was exhausted from listening to only the initial conversation with the first responders. Both of them had to deal with this the entire day.

    Reunited with the rest of the team, we had another team meeting centered on the “Kentucky problem”. In short, those who want to bike should bike and those who want to drive should drive. The evening ended with most everybody calling friends and family to get advice on what decision is personally best for them. 

    To me, the dog problem boils down to how much trust you have in yourself and the dogs of Kentucky. Are you able to defend yourself? Yell at and spray them? And trust that most are not aggressive? It’s mainly a mind game, a balance between stupidity and perseverance to our Spokes mission of biking, not driving across the country. The balance between the two shifts daily, as you’ll get to see in our next few blogs.

    – Carmen

  • Day 12: Big A(hh) Mountain

    Day 12: Big A(hh) Mountain

    Tazewell, VA to Breaks Interstate Park, VA — 72.59 mi, 5,103 ft

    Even if 72 miles looks short relative to some of the other distances we’ll be covering this summer, today was a longgg day for a variety of reasons. If I had to think of one, the only downside of having such a beautiful house to ourselves (generously provided to us by the Main Street Methodist Church) is that we had spread things everywhere, so it took us an abnormally long time to get going (yes, even more so than usual). Aarushi volunteered to take charge of breakfast since it was her driving day, so the rest of us focused on getting ready and packing all of our camping equipment we took out as our bedding for the night. I also helped by making eggs again, this time without an absurd amount of bacon grease as I had done the day before — I do think the bacon grease version tasted better, even if it definitely gave us all some heart disease. 

    We set up on our glorious dining table once more with a little more of a rush, trying to finish so quickly so we could hit the road. We had so much food that we couldn’t fit it all in our cooler, so it was also just a lot of us stuffing our faces as much as we could so it wouldn’t go to waste.

    Drew chugging OJ and our breakfast spread

    After saying goodbye to Teresa, who has been such an amazing host and person to us throughout our stay, we took off. Drew and Tatiana had to mail their postcards, so they split off from the rest of us initially. However, pretty early on, we made a wrong turn and had to backtrack, meeting up with them again and climbing up the first (of many) hills of the ride. We split up a bit from there, as I decided to go at a relatively chill pace to prevent my ongoing hand strain from getting worse and biked alone for a bit. There were a lot of dogs that we passed by (ominous foreshadowing) and the weather was beautiful. Watching the movement of clouds became a new way to pass the time.

    Gorgeous first stretch

    I joined back up with Nate, Carmen, and Nunu, before soon arriving at the first rest stop, which were some bleachers by a park. Before leaving together, Nunu had the fun idea of creating a group call so that we could all hear each other during the ride, which lasted approximately 5 whole minutes before it was cut off. I really appreciated Nate relaying upcoming cars after they already passed me (because of the delay lol). 

    The call was helpful though because I realized via the call that Tatiana and I had left our water bottles at the rest stop!! We pulled over to get them back with Drew, and then continued on our way. We soon came onto a gravel trail that had a huge downed tree spanning the entire road. After shuffling our bikes through the tree, we reunited once more with the rest of the crew as we came to the realization that the next part of our route was marked with a scary “Private Property: No Trespassing” sign that halted our progress. This was likely an unintended consequence of a last-minute route change by Aarushi the night before in an effort to cut out some gravel and elevation. We considered backtracking or adjusting the plan since none of us trusted the area (a common theme of the day), but Drew scouted out the area and deemed it reasonable to pass — especially since the route was marked as a state route in our navigation services. We quickly maneuvered around the gate, dashed across the trail, and got out ASAP before anyone could catch us. A bit stressful, but that was just the start.

    Big tree in the path

    Of course, the next road was also an EXTREMELY bumpy gravel section, which was not a fun experience as I had to pee the entire time. The area remained a bit sketchy as well, since we had to navigate some smaller side roads that continued to have a lot of dogs. We made a conscious effort to stick in groups as a result. Over the course of the day, I saw a black lab chase Carmen and a smaller dog run onto the busy road to chase us (foreshadowing again), and we hadn’t even crossed into Kentucky yet where the dogs are supposedly the worst 😨

    Sketch gate and group riding

    Before our lunch stop, Carmen and I took a bathroom break at a very nicely air-conditioned Family Dollar and arrived at the Church later. Lunch was the usual, sandwiches spiced up by the last of our pickles and roasted bell peppers. I really needed to fuel up for the next climb: Big A Mountain (read: Big Ahh Mountain), the namesake of this post. I threw in an extra Uncrustable for energy. 1500 ft elevation gain, 6 miles… I was not looking forward to it. 

    I left with Nate and Carmen, who quickly dropped me as I chugged along the next couple of miles in 1st gear nearly the entire time. It honestly wasn’t as bad as I thought, since it was mostly gradual elevation gain and my body fell into the rhythm of “just keep going.” I forgot who used the analogy of a train chugging along, but I do now understand their pain. Joining back up at the top, the three of us took on some crazyyy downhills to the base of Big A Mountain, filled with scary blind turns and holding onto my brakes for dear life. Although beautiful, the drivers were honestly some of the scariest parts of Spokes so far, especially on the narrow two-lane highways. You never know when they decide to risk their lives and your own by passing into a blind corner, or when they do the opposite and stick behind you for miles, despite waving for them to pass through clearer stretches. 

    After Big A Mountain, it was a net downhill stretch to our final rest stop. Here, I felt like I was in some exotic rainforest instead of middle-of-nowhere Virginia. Lush green ivy-covered trees dominated the landscape, the humid heat was an ever-present sensation, and we could see the towering rainclouds peaking over the tree canopy. I looked at Carmen and said, “I actually hope it rains,” and not even 5 minutes later we feel the heavy drops coming down. Thankfully, our rest stop was a mile away, so we only became mildly soaked and got to watch the downpour from the safety of a convenience store overhang.  Apparently this day is when Spokes 2025 experienced a downpour as well at this approximate point, so we were twinning! We waited for Tatiana and Drew while we finished off our jelly stash. Nunu and Aarushi shared a crazy story about sneaking their way into a concert in the meantime as well. After the rain stopped, we could see the road start steaming, which was also a really cool sight.

    I drafted Nate and Carmen for the last flat stretch before coming to the last 3 climbs of the day, and they sure were something. Where Big A Mountain was a slowburn romance, the final hills were a series of heartbreaks. Once you finished one, there was still more to come, and my legs were not happy with the constant pedaling. Needing to stop more often, I also took some more time to appreciate the view, killing two birds with one stone. 

    Not quite sure about the “Grand Canyon of the East” claim, but Breaks Interstate is beautiful!

    I finally arrived at the campsite where Aarushi and Nunu had amazingly already set up everything (we were worried about rain initially but the timing worked out). 

    Once everyone had arrived, we quickly packed ourselves into the car to drive to Mi Rancho Mexican Bar and Grill, a restaurant in Elkhorn City, KY, that had kindly offered us a free meal on our journey. We were greeted by Taylor, the owner, and were immediately served some of the BEST food we’ve had on this trip. The chicken fajitas were demolished and the lemonade was downed. Thanks again to Mi Rancho for an amazing dinner! 

    Yummy food! Ft. Aarushi shamefully hiding her UC Berkeley shirt
    Our creative solutions to locking all of the bikes together and fitting 7 people into 5 seats

    On our way back, we queued some bangers to listen to, including:

    • Take Me Home, Country Roads
    • Take Me Home, Country Roads (Japanese ver.) (highly recommend everyone listen to once)
    • Fireflies (after we saw some fireflies, of course)
    • Titanium (with Aarushi and Drew’s amazing singing)

    I don’t think I’ve ever listened to Take Me Home, Country Roads more than this summer so far. I think this song will always bring me back to this unique period of time, where suddenly the normal responsibilities of everyday life disappeared and yet new challenges came to be with these special people I get to call my team. Thank you all for making this crazy ride easier with all of your bright personalities and memorable moments. I find myself rambling on these blogs because I truly don’t want to forget every moment, even if they are quite mundane. 

    Anyways, keep an eye out for tomorrow’s blog, which unfortunately was a day I would like to forget a bit more… I think it’ll be an enjoyable read at least.

    See you soon, 

    Caroline

  • Day 11: Playlist Across America

    Day 11: Playlist Across America

    Learning Festival in Tazewell, VA — 0 mi, 0 ft

    We needed this nice calm day in the midst of the chaos of the days before and after (spoiler alert). Our team woke up in the huge church-house which we were inhabiting alone and LARPed* as a big happy TV-show-esque friend group who lives in a mansion together and has nothing to do but hang out as we leisurely cooked the most beautiful breakfast together, with Jack Johnson’s “Banana Pancakes” playing in the background. Our spread consisted of pancakes (plain, blueberry, and caramelized banana) and bacon (cooked by our very own Bacon Carmen!!!) and eggs (scrambled in an extremely generous amount of bacon grease) and buttermilk biscuits and grapes and strawberries and applies with creamy peanut butter and milk and orange juice and Fanta (for Drew) and Sprite (for Nate). We keep eating like we burn 4000 calories a day, except today was actually a teaching day!

    Today’s learning festival was at the United Methodist Church in Tazewell, Virginia. It’s a small learning festival in a small town, which means we could really feel the effect of our learning festival .Sometimes I forget that what to us just feels like a day of babbling about random chemistry concepts and asking kids to stop making balloons out of their nitrile gloves is actually a day that kids have been counting down the days for and remember for the rest of the year until Spokes 2027 comes. Just hearing these words from a few of our students made the entire day worth it for me, despite the significantly lower team energy and morale from yesterday. I have so much respect for all the teachers I’ve ever had; I have no idea how they find the will to keep showing up every day full of energy for just a couple intermittent words of thanks. Pretty sure this is called breadcrumbing, but wow it really works.

    • Carmen and I teach a workshop on chemistry through a cool color change iodine reaction for the older kids and a workshop on genetics through a design-your-own-monster-child crafting activity for the little kids

    Carmen and I teach a workshop on chemistry through a cool color change iodine reaction for the older kids and a workshop on genetics through a design-your-own-monster-child crafting activity for the little kids.

    At lunch, I did a grand show and tell of all my scrapes and bruises from yesterday’s tree crash with a tall tale about getting attacked by a grizzly bear as I biked on a road in between a mama bear and her cubs. Nobody questioned me, and I can’t figure out if it was because kids are so easy to lie to or if they just didn’t care enough to ask. Then, because it was such a hit at the last learning festival, we threw Nate and Drew under the bus again and told all the kids that they will race them in the church parking lot. Let it be known that they both actually tried and still lost, and let it be known that as they did their 20 punishment pushups there was a circle of kids dancing around them with Ls on their forehead to make sure Nate and Drew really understood that they were freaking losers. Then we took the kids inside where Drew played a beautiful piano rendition of Let it Go as the kids sang along, before finally resuming the workshop.

    I took my first nap of Spokes at the end of today, after ten days of nonstop action and ten nights of barely seven hours of sleep. Feeling restored, Tatana and I decided to join the ladies group of the United Methodist Church. Many of them had grown up in Tazewell and have been friends for fifty years now, supporting each other through the highest highs and lowest lows of life. They welcomed us very warmly, and we shared prayers for the people in our communities and blessings for everything we were feeling lucky about (mine was my team, retweeting nunu’s love letter). Although I’m not very religious, I’ve been starting to understand the human connection and structure and third space and love that church provides, and why no matter how small and secluded the towns we pass through are, we can always find a church to stop and take rest at. 

    This was the first time on this trip where we got to chat with and paint a picture of the lives of people in the towns we were passing through beyond our hosts. Since everybody has been sharing the real main reason why they joined Spokes on the blogs recently, I’ll let you all know that mine was exactly this: to get to know people across America whose life paths mine would not ordinarily cross with, to understand their stories and struggles and dreams. 

    In that vein, I’ve been collecting a playlist of Favorites Across America. I’ve tried to ask every stranger I’ve felt touched by on this trip what their all-time favorite song was as a kind of souvenir of the summer, and here are the results so far.

    • Great Gig in the Sky, Pink Floyd – Yasmin, Judge Faruqui’s intern who stuck by my side for a rough first learning festival
    • I Like Me Better, Lauv – Jen, who gave us plenty of advice we’ve been following after hosting years of Spokes teams
    • Miracles, Jefferson Starship – Jimmy Baker, an angel who fell from the sky at a gas station near Luray, Virginia and donated us a thousand dollars on the spot
    • On the Nature of Daylight, Max Ritcher – The one and only GOAT Pam
    • Truly Madly Deeply, Savage Garden and Time, Pink Floyd – Chrissie and Dirk, who took us on a river adventure and cooked us an incredible pasta bar complete with s’mores for dinner
    • Highway 61 Revisited, Bob Dylan – Theresa, our current host in Tazewell with the warmest and kindest heart

    LINK: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1z0IdXR7hqCHqFuielSLBx?si=4c20a1a17a45496b

    Please note that I’m not a diligent enough person for this list to be comprehensive; there have been so many people that only in hindsight I’ve wished I had asked! 

    Sending lots of love to everyone we’ve met,

    Aarushi ❤

    GOODNIGHT !

    * Live Action Role Play, a favorite hobby of mine as introduced by my dear friend Ria Verma

  • Day 10: another nate blog where half the team gets SAG’d out

    Day 10: another nate blog where half the team gets SAG’d out

    Blacksburg, VA to Tazewell, VA – 83.38 mi, 4744 ft

    One day I’d like to have an uneventful blog day but today is not that day.

    We woke up today at 6am for what would be our second longest ride so far: 83 miles to make up for our short 40 mile ride yesterday. I spent a lot of the morning rummaging through my stuff looking for my wallet. Because of his track record with misplacing stuff, Drew’s stuff also fell victim to some rummaging. This is not very important, especially in comparison to the events of this blog, but this was very eventful for me because I never lose stuff. Anyways, turns out it fell out of my backpack in the car yesterday while I was driving. 

    After getting ready, we ate some oatmeal and eggs graciously made by our amazing host Ann who is a super cool cyclist who did a tour across Illinois at 14. In total, we spent 1 hour and 45 minutes getting out the door, which might be a record for the team (😢). 

    Mornings are hard for Caroline.

    As we left, our main concern was Nunu’s bike. The chain had fallen off twice in the last 20 miles of yesterday’s ride. Drew and I diagnosed the bike with “misaligned derailleur” and did our best to fix it the night before but I still need to watch a YouTube video on how derailleurs work so I had very little trust in our handy work. 

    Caroline (who can’t drive) was taking her unofficial driver day today (smart) with Tatiana’s driver day, so it was just Drew, Carmen, Nunu, Aarushi, and myself on the road. We biked out of Blacksburg through the Virginia Tech campus (which is super pretty, lots of white stone + gothic vibes similar to Yale/Princeton/West Point). Yesterday, while Nunu was fixing her chain on the side of the road, someone pulled up to her and asked her if she was okay. When she said she was fine, they drove off and yelled “Go Hokies1, beat MIT”. I’ve been thinking about that line all day because I can’t think of any sport or activity in which MIT and Virginia Tech compete against each other. 

    We took the first couple of miles pretty slow since the rest of the squad was tired from yesterday’s ride (which I was driving for). Fun fact: yesterday was the first day I wasn’t the first one to finish the ride since I was driving, sad stuff. While everyone else was trying to take it easy, I was physically itching to go faster and had to let Drew move ahead of me to set the pace so I could fight the urge to speed up.

    We continued our ride for 20 miles passing through some lovely greenery, along rivers and rapids (+ a swing for jumping into the river that we had to drag Nunu away from), and up some not so fun climbs. 

    The lovely views at the start of today’s ride.

    At some point during these 20 miles, Aarushi and Carmen had fallen behind Nunu, Drew, and I. While taking in the lovely river views, Carmen reappeared without Aarushi. We continued waiting but she never appeared, and with no cell service to see where she was at we decided to continue onwards assuming she was taking a break. 

    It wasn’t until we had nearly reached the rest stop that we ran into Tatiana going in the other direction. She let us know that Aarushi had hit a pothole, biked off the road, and ran into a tree, and that she was going to go SAG2 Aarushi out.

    As Tatiana sped away, we continued to the rest stop where Caroline reassured us that Aarushi was okay, but was banged up and (understandably) not going to continue the ride. After refueling and waiting for ~25 minutes for Tatiana and Aarushi to return, Nunu, Carmen, Drew, and I decided to continue biking since we had a long bike ahead of us.

    It was a good thing that we didn’t wait because meanwhile in Tatiana/Aarushi-land, Tatiana found Aarushi on the side of the road scraped up with a dent in her helmet and the handlebars of her bike bent. They decided to take the bike back to Blacksburg (the starting town) since there was a Trek Bicycle Shop (the company we bought our bikes from) in that town and no bike shop in Tazewell (the destination town). 

    At this shop, they were able to make use of the 1 year warranty on our helmets to get a fresh helmet and also get the handlebars repaired. Unfortunately, they were also told that the derailleur barrel adjuster on Aarushi’s bike was broken and that the Trek shop wouldn’t have the parts to repair it for a week. The Trek shop mentioned briefly they could try another shop in town called Hokie Spokes, but Tatiana and Aarushi weren’t immediately planning to go there. 

    The state of the Spokes universe at this point of the day is as follows: Nate, Drew, Carmen, and Nunu are biking 20 miles to the second rest stop where lunch is planned; Aarushi and Tatiana have partially repaired Aarushi’s bike and are now going to a coffee shop; Caroline is waiting at rest stop 1 with the cooler, water, and food since the minivan can only fit two people/bikes at a time. 

    Around mile 30 (halfway between rest stop 1 and 2), the biking group came across a Dairy Queen and found it necessary to get some ice cream. This was also convenient since it would give the drivers more time to figure out how to get food/water/lunch to the second rest stop. 

    It was around this time that we bikers decided to check the weather and noticed that some thunderstorms had crept up on us and would be hitting us in ~30 minutes. We decided to push to the next town along the route (approx. 4 miles away) and try to wait out the rain there. 

    Enjoying ice cream while clouds loom ominously in the background. 

    We made it to the next town and found a church with a small roof above its front door to take cover under. We took cover just in time because within a minute of us getting under the roof it began thundering and pouring rain. 

    We had taken cover around noon and saw on the forecast that it would be raining until 2pm, so we decided to hunker down. 

    Taking cover from the rain on the front steps of a church in the town of Narrows, VA. 

    During this time, Aarushi and Tatiana were still grabbing their coffee in Blacksburg. As they walked up to the coffee shop, they looked at the shop next door and lo and behold it was the Hokie Spokes bike shop. They ended up bringing Aarushi’s bike in and got it fully repaired. In the process, they also received two generous donations after two passersby overheard the Spokes story: $41 from Bruce and $20 from Wendy.

    After finishing up in Blacksburg, the two of them started heading towards the first rest stop to pick up Caroline who had been waiting this entire time in the rain. 

    Meanwhile, at 1:45pm, the four bikers woke up. The four of us had all fallen asleep on the cold, hard concrete outside of this church while waiting out the rain. Luckily, we woke up to clear blue skies. After a bit of stretching, we continued towards the second rest stop 8 miles away where lunch would be happening. 

    Waking up from a nap on the concrete dazed and confused.

    By some miracle, all 7 members of the team converged on the second rest stop at mile 44 at 2:30pm. This was largely made possible after Caroline, Aarushi, and Tatiana worked some magic reorganizing the minivan and bike rack so that it could hold 3 people and 3 bikes. At the rest stop, we all enjoyed our usual sandwich-based lunch. 

    At 3:30pm, we were back on the road, but not before the second member of the team fell victim to a SAG. This one was much less concerning, Carmen just really needed to use the restroom and the nearest spot was a gas station 13 miles away along the route. Tatiana ended up driving Carmen + her bike to the gas station while Nunu, Drew, and I biked over and met her there.

    From there (mile 57), the four of us reunited to bike the remaining 6 miles to the last rest stop at mile 63. 

    We biked along a road literally called “Scenic Highway”. It lived up to its name.

    Throughout the day, Nunu had been dealing with some knee pain and, after some climbs leading up the last rest stop, it got to the point that she was feeling sharp pain with every pedal stroke. 

    Tatiana had dealt with some knee pain leading up to the summer that ended up taking focused strength training and physical therapy in order to resolve. Additionally, she had been told by the PT who did our bike fittings (Brendan at Cycle Life PT) that sharp, repetitive pain should be grounds to immediately stop biking. As a result, Tatiana strongly recommended to Nunu that she should call the ride there. 

    After doing some stretching, however, Nunu felt like her knee wasn’t hurting anymore. We decided that she could keep riding but that if at any moment she felt the knee pain return, she would be SAG’d out. Nunu ended up biking two more miles to mile 65 before being SAG’d out due to the sharp knee pain returning. 

    I have a lot of respect for her decision to SAG out. While it may seem like an obvious decision from afar, a SAG out is a dreaded ending to a ride for anyone on the team. Getting SAG’d out feels like the accomplishment of “biking across the country” being chipped away, making all the hard work less worthwhile. Obviously, this isn’t actually the case but in the heat of the ride it’s hard not to feel this way. It’s worth pointing out that the decision to let Nunu keep riding was only reached after a long discussion that included a few tears. 

    By the end of the day there were only three bikers on the road. Carmen, Drew, and I biked the last 20 miles relatively uneventfully, albeit slowly. Meanwhile, Tatiana shuttled Caroline, Aarushi, and Nunu to the end point.

    When we arrived at Tazewell, we were warmly greeted by Teresa who works at the Tazewell United Methodist Church – the church that was graciously hosting us in their house-turned-office, and would also be where we would run our learning festival the next day. We were welcomed with warm pizza, fresh fruit, juice, sodas, and a fridge stocked full of food for breakfast and dinner the following day. I don’t think I can effectively convey how kind Teresa was to us, nor how admirable her work with members of the community facing hardships is.

    We wrapped up dinner and unpacked our sleeping bags and sleeping pads to get ready for bed. After a long, chaotic day, the best part of the day might’ve been getting 9 hours of sleep before tomorrow’s learning festival. 

    – Nate

    1 Hokies are the mascot of Virginia Tech. Unless they’re talking about a Hokie Pokie, I don’t know what a Hokie is. 

    2 Def SAG (verb): a.k.a SAG out. To get picked up by the (Support And Gear) car during a ride, usually to be driven to the end point. 

  • Day 9: Hopeful Wanderers

    Day 9: Hopeful Wanderers

    Roanoke, VA to Blacksburg, VA – 40.5 mi, 3,294 ft (~48.5 mi, ~4,794 ft counting our hiking adventure)

    Today marks the first day that anyone on the team has cooked! 

    The winner of this title is Nate Mustafa, who valiantly prepared an entire carton of fresh chicken eggs (courtesy of Dirk and Krissie) in Steve and Debbie’s kitchen to accompany our delicious breakfast. Simultaneously, our team engaged in a serious discussion. Should we use the extra time on our 40-mile day to hike the McAfee Knob?

    At first, the team was leaning towards no, but as soon as Steve informed us that it was the most-photographed spot on the Appalachian Trail, we quickly buckled down and decided it was necessary.

    Today also marks the first day a host has ridden the bikes with us. Steve has been a cyclist for a large portion of his life, and said that he would ride the 20 miles with us to the beginning of the McAfee Knob trail. Steve is the goat, and his awesomeness is immediately clear by his cycling jersey, which says that “a cycling grandpa never gets old.”

    I like to envision what life is like as I bike through the towns we pass. On our way to the trail, Aarushi and I imagined living in Roanoke and fanatically supporting our home team, the Hokies. We asked Steve to tell us about his grandchildren and his biggest life advice (to stay fit as you age!) so that we could better paint the picture of a Virginian.

    Once at the McAfee Knob trail, we quickly said goodbye to Steve and switched our mode of transportation, now transforming into a goofily dressed hiking squadron. After 4 miles, some deep yapping with Caroline, and a comical game of addressing people on the trail with silly phrases beginning with the letters A-Z (ie. Drew’s hit of “Some sticks fell on my head up there!” for the letter S), we finally reached the top and got to enjoy the gorgeous views and cool hanging overlook.

    Immediately, our team started chatting with the other hikers, meeting a Russian-speaking woman who approached me because of the last name on my jersey, a group of high-school graduates on their senior trip, and a big group of backpackers making their way along the Appalachian Trail.

    After our interlude, we hiked the 4 miles back to the car, and the team was overcome by an extreme wave of hunger. We tore into our sandwiches on the gravel parking lot next to the trail, noting the comical nature of our group laying out our picnic blanket on the floor surrounded by cars and our 7 identical bicycles.

    As I biked the remaining 20 miles to our final destination of Blacksburg, I felt really reflective regarding the people we had met. This trip gives our team the great privilege of being surrounded by immensely high concentrations of wanderers. People from across the world who have spent years of their lives biking across countries, hiking the entire Appalachian Trail, motorcycling across states, and generally taking on immense traverses and adventures with the main stated goal of crossing a distance. 

    We hear many of their individual stories, from our host Steve beginning a life long cycling journey with his college friend which grew into a cross country trip for both him and his son, to the two motorcyclist best friends that Aarushi and I met in a coffee shop who try and take regular bike trips, to “Coach” a middle-aged man who described the immense twists and turns that life threw at him, encouraging him to finally accomplish his dream of hiking the Appalachian Trail where he met his new hiking buddy, “Detail”.

    Though I originally thought I knew my reasons for taking on this adventure, I feel that my motivation and desires are adapting and solidifying as we get deeper into the trip. I have found myself urged to bike slower, to stop when I see things I have never seen before, like a groundhog running through a field or a prayer box on the side of a Virginian road. I want to truly spend these three months as a wanderer, experiencing the minutiae of the country we bike through and engaging with the people and nature that shape its land.

    My experiences have sparked two questions in my head in the last few days. First, what exactly is the difference between a hopeless and a hopeful wanderer? And second, why are all of these thousands of people doing it? 

    In addressing these questions, antithetical to the song Hopeless Wanderer by Mumford and Sons, which has been playing as I write this blog, I think that I would like to lean towards claiming that all wanderers are hopeful. Everyone I have met so far is on their journey to learn, to see, to experience, to do, and to accomplish. Though some of the wanderers are suffering immense hardships, I believe that people take on their journeys because of the faith that there is something worth hoping for. That the journey will provide solace or inspiration, or simply a reminder that there is beauty and kindness in the world.

    Unfortunately, the beauty and kindness of the world aren’t always enough to push through the hardest parts of our trip, especially for me, the final 750 ft climb in 3 miles to get to our host Ann’s house. What did, instead, get me through was envisioning everyone else currently biking across the country as little dots on the US map all battling their own climbs, and a healthy combination of gummy worms every 0.5 mile and a repeated “just keep swimming” courtesy of Dory from Finding Nemo.

    Eventually, I made it to Ann’s home with a proud heart, a couple of sore muscles, and only a bug or two in my chamois (rewind to me almost stripping on the side of the road when I had felt something moving earlier in the day). Nunu’s bike was only a little worse for wear, since the chain had fallen off twice and Nate had to go rescue her to help her fix it. The team was excited to gather around the table with Ann at dinner, learn about her own trip across Illinois at 14 years old, and engage in our new favorite treat, mini fruit jelly cups 🙂 Some of us enjoyed the treat more than others…

    The rest of our evening followed the pattern that is becoming our routine: chores, showers, route planning, and finally bedtime, with hearts prepared to wander the next morning again!

    With endless love,

    Tatiana ❤

  • Day 8: A Love Letter to My Team

    Day 8: A Love Letter to My Team

    Lexington, VA to Roanoke, VA — 67.5 mi, 3,419 ft

    Today was one of those days that felt like, maybe the novelty of biking across the country isn’t so novel anymore and it kind of set in that this routine we’ve been doing for the past week, we will keep doing for the next seventy days. Not in a bad way of course. Just that, now that it’s been a little over a week, the team has more or less found our routine. Because of a pretty uneventful but still amazing day, I’m kind of treating today’s blog as a diary of my thoughts and feelings that I’ve had over the past week.

    When you apply to Spokes, the first question that you will be asked is, “Why do you want to do Spokes?” The answers that both myself and the rest of my team gave were along the lines of “super cool, adventure of a lifetime, important to spread STEM education, and all the other awesome reasons to do spokes.” But to be honest, my most real answer is that I wanted to build great friendships with a group of people that I’d never met before, because for me, I find that the most fulfilling part.

    Chasing the sunset and I wanted to take a jumping picture of everyone but I guess Nate is against fun

    Obviously though, this was my daydream and when it comes down to making real connections with real humans, it’s nerve racking. I’m thinking, what if we’re actually all super incompatible and everyone hates me and finds me annoying and blah blah.

    My other greatest fear of Spokes was that I would simply not be physically capable enough to do it. For some context, I’ve never considered myself to be or been considered by others to be an athletic person. When I would tell my friends and family that I was biking across the country, they were just convinced that I was lying or joking (and I would too, don’t feel bad if you thought this at first). Or, they would just get extremely worried for me and ask if I’m sure this is something I can do. On top of that, Spokes 2025 would not stop fearmongering us about how physically hard it will be, especially the first couple of days. I think from all of this, I built up a lot of anticipation and anxiety for our first biking day (that was also 90 miles, so almost double anything I’d done before). I was honestly convinced that I would need to be SAG-ed out.

    Somehow, though, like 300 miles and many large hills later, I’m still intact. I credit a lot of this to my team because everyone’s been incredibly supportive of each other, but I also credit a lot of this to myself.

    Rest stop number 1 and rest stop number 2 where Drew took this photo of us that I think could be on the cover of a magazine

    I started today biking the first 15 miles with Aarushi. Aarushi and I have been roommates for the past four years at MIT, so I would say she is one of the few people who knows me best in the world. We decided to do a little debrief on how we’ve been feeling thus far about the trip (you can read more about how Aarushi’s been feeling in her most recent blog but this blog is about me). I told her I was “feeling good” (because I’m actually really terrible at debriefs) and she told me that she’s noticed a kind of “Nunu explosion.” From her eyes, she says it seems like I’m thriving. After some more reflection, I realized I am truly having the time of my life and I’m so thankful and appreciative of every single day I get to spend building deeper friendships with the wonderful people on my team, seeing places I’ve never seen before, leading learning festivals to excited kids, and getting to know the kind people who host us every night.

    But back to my team, I actually love them all so much. And maybe some will say it’s because we are in the honeymoon phase so of course we love each other right now, but I really feel like Spokes 2025 couldn’t have assembled a better Spokes 2026. I feel like every single person cares deeply for each other. We all operate very selflessly for the betterment of the group. For example, as I’m writing this blog, Nate and Drew are outside getting bitten up by mosquitoes, trying to fix my bike chain that keeps falling off. I also think that we communicate well and can be fun and silly when it’s time but also serious and productive when it’s necessary.

    Rest stop number 3 where Nate launched me off the seesaw and we all swung on this swing

    However, 7 strangers suddenly forced to spend 24 hours a day for 75 days together will inevitably stir up some conflicts. Everyone has different personalities, priorities, opinions and we somehow have to align in a context that none of us are used to. While I wouldn’t call this specific instance a conflict, tonight was the first night we had to do some deep talking with each other in what ended up being a 3 hour long team meeting. I won’t go too much into the details, mostly because it’s kind of boring. But what it boiled down to was that we needed to communicate our priorities to each other during bike days and how those priorities affect our pace and our group schedule. At the end of the day, we have one shared goal which is to have a lot of fun and enjoy each other’s company this summer. As long as we remember this, it will be an awesome summer.

    Playing Durak and Nate lost again (4th time in a row) and then we played ERS and I won, of course. Also yummy dinner from Steve and Debbie and then our kind of serious team meeting to end the day.

    I love you all,

    Nunu

  • Day 7: Dear Nate

    Day 7: Dear Nate

    Waynesboro, VA to Lexington, VA — 41.9 mi, 2,131 ft

    I woke up at 6am this morning to the sound of Nate’s alarm- I don’t bother setting one anymore because I sleep in the same room as Nate every night… at varying degrees of distance. Two nights ago, we shared a bed after a wolf spider big enough to swallow a child decided to stake a claim to my bed. Last night, however, I gathered the courage to reclaim my sleeping quarters, freeing me to toss and turn at will.

    I checked my watch and read the date, June 7 (6/7). It reminded me of a conversation I had with the youngest group of kids that came to our learning festival on Saturday. Nate and I had pivoted to a drawing activity for the youngest kids after deciding that some of our prepared discussion on electromagnetism may not be suitable for their grade level. In response to having been given a pencil, the kids immediately start drawing “67” all over their paper. The joke, being as enigmatic as it is infamous, prompts me to ask the kids, three boys, “What does the number ‘67’ actually mean?” I was surprised by the varied responses.

    Boy 1: “My mom told me 67 is a way of remembering how God created people on the 6th day and rested on the 7th”

    Boy 2: “My mom told me 67 means the devil and that I can’t say it.”

    Boy 3: “Actually! It’s just a joke and doesn’t mean anything!”

    This morning, Pam, our host, made us pancakes for breakfast- my personal favorite. We loaded the van, borrowed a truck, loaded the bikes in said truck, then shuttled to the point where the last route ended and today’s route would begin. Nate and I were sentenced to riding in the truckbed, as if our butts haven’t been through enough the past week. However, we got some beautiful views of the blue ridge mountains.

    Pam’s hospitality certainly overshadowed Shannon Farm’s lack of a clear boundary between inside and the Appalachian wilderness that left a few on our team a little shaken. We did our best to convey our gratitude and set off, albeit in different directions.

    While Nate, Carmen, Caroline, and I started on the uphill half of the day’s 41 mile route, Aarushi and Tatiana decided to bike to the local urgent care before continuing onto the route.  Aarushi had been experiencing symptoms of an ear infection that worsened overnight.

    I’ll try to convey the events that occurred in the Tatiana-Aarushi subplot as faithfully to Tatiana’s telling of their story as possible.

    Upon arriving at the urgent care clinic, 15 minutes passed, then 30, then an hour, before a nurse finally showed up to take Aarushi’s vitals. Upon being led into the patient care room, Tatiana finished an episode of Grey’s Anatomy before a nurse practitioner finally showed up to spend a few seconds peering into Aarushi’s ear and prescribing her antibiotics.

    As a native Mississippian, Tatiana’s recount of a trip to urgent care honestly sounded like it went pretty well; Though, I could see how someone less used to rural healthcare would be repulsed such an inefficient use of time.

    Next, they bike to CVS. They get there and find out that the prescription hasn’t yet been sent to the pharmacy. When the prescription finally does find itself in front of the eyes of the Waynesboro CVS Pharmacist, it does so without a signature from the nurse practitioner. As the CVS and local clinic are working together really hard to acquire the single necessary signature, Tatiana borrows a key from a CVS worker to use the building’s bathroom. When she left the bathroom emptyhanded, she probably asked herself, “Where are my sunglasses… and the key to the bathroom?” Both were in the bathroom, which was locked. 

    “Are you able to open the bathroom for us?” is probably what Tatiana asked the employee which seemed to be responsible for all customer service and janitorial duties.

    The employee asserts that only the maintenance guy who comes on Tuesday would be able to recover Tatiana’s sunglasses and the lost bathroom key. 

    Tatiana bought new sunglasses. 

    Meanwhile, Aarushi got her medicine. At the same time, the rest of us had finished the day’s 42 mile, 2000ft elevation route.

    The coincidence of these events is partially due to the supreme amount of patience that rural healthcare demands and partially due to the four of us being absolute machines on our bikes. We kept a 15 mph pace the entire time.

    I took some pretty cool pictures of Nate while we were biking. He took some of me as well, but they aren’t very good so I chose to exclude them. I’m probably better off taking selfies from now on- Nate’s not much of a photographer. 

    Speaking of Nate, I realize that the last blog I wrote contains a humorous jab at Nate which resonated as “not cool” or “unnecessary” to some, including Nate’s parents. Now, as a much more responsible individual who realizes the potential for personal damage which the Spokes megaphone enables me, I would like to make known that I have a very strong appreciation for only other male member of Spokes, Nate Mustafa.

    Dear Nate, I’m hitting new speed PRs every day that I’d never be able to hit without the pocket of low pressure air that follows you around when you bike. Thank you for being the other ambassador to play country music in the Spokes van. I desperately needed to hear something other than 2000s “in the club” music. I’m very fortunate that, when it comes time to hunker down in a soggy 2-person tent, you’re the other sardine in the can.

    As Tatiana and Aarushi set out for the day, the rest of us settled at our host’s (Dirk) home and decided that we would all take the van to go visit them at the midway rest stop. Along the way, we got coffee and even stopped at this truck stop that was kind of like an off-brand Buccees, but with Popeyes, Papa John’s, and Subway. We got Popeyes chicken sandwiches– they tasted like heaven.

    After that, we met Tatiana and Aarushi at the halfway point. I fixed Tatiana’s derailleur, which was missing gears, then we headed back to Dirk’s home. Tatiana and Aarushi arrived not to long after– most of the last half of the route was downhill.


    When they got there, Dirk and his wife shuttled us to the river where we spent the rest of the day on the water until dinner. Nate and I shared a paddleboard. Nunu, Aarushi, and Tatiana took another paddleboard. Carmen and Caroline both got these little inflatable one-man kayak things that looked really fun and had immense bumper car potential. Our time at the river turned into me and Nate taking turns paddling around with everyone else being towed by the paddleboard’s wrist strap. This went on for a few hours as we relaxed and told stories.

    On the way back, Dirk took a few of us offroading in his old jeep and dropped us off on a hill near his house where we saw this pretty sunset.

    Afterwords, we ate dinner- It was definitely the best so far during Spokes. I’ll let the picture speak for itself. 

    Shortly after, we made smores with the company of everything that has 6 legs.

    At this point, Spokes is starting to feel more like a routine of waking up, packing, biking, unpacking… repeat. Tomorrow is my first driving day, and I’m at the point where I much prefer biking to driving. I feel like biking really is the only way to simultaneously cover significant distance while still being slow enough to take everything in, and open enough to feel immersed in your surroundings. It’s interesting. I fly over this region of the US every time I go between home and Boston. I couldn’t have imagined everything that was under me. I’m very grateful to be able to experience Shenandoah this way– and there’s so much more to see.

    – Drew