June 25, 2010
’m in Olympia, Washington now. This was not the planned route, but we had some bike troubles today. Taka’s pedal FELL OFF! The pedal literally came out of the crank and couldn’t go back in because the threading in the crank was completely stripped. This happened just after the 2 mile mark of our ride today. I saw that Shelton was another 10 miles up, so we tried to make it there. Taka electric taped the hell out of his pedal and he made it another 7 miles where the pedal came off again and that was pretty much the end of it. He bought some Krazy Glue at a nearby gas station, we waited about 30 minutes for it to dry, but no dice. I ended up biking the 3 miles up to the Shelton exit, another 2 miles into the nearest hardware store (there was no bike shop there) and bought some strong adhesives. In the meantime, Taka had found a Walmart and bought an epoxy compound. I waited on the 101 off the Shelton exit for an hour while the glue dried on the pedal. I saw him coming down the hill to the exit where I was waiting, just to see the pedal fall off of his bike again right before he reached the exit.
At this point, we decided to get to the closest bike shop (which I had already looked into and it was Olympia, WA). As we were trying to figure out the best way to get there, a Mason County bus went by with a phone number on it. Taka called the number and they actually sent a bus to come get us. We loaded our bikes on the bus and they drove us a short way to the civic center in Shelton where we could catch the main bus to Olympia (this ride was free by the way). As we got on the 2nd bus to Olympia, the bus driver handed us a post-it with an address to a bike shop in Olympia and said it was near one of her stops. Apparently the Mason County Transit department had phoned her for us and told her the situation. We sat in the back of the bus with my trailer and a couple of makeshift shady characters. Two of them were young and eager to talk to us, the third was a real shady looking guy who looked like he had spent a good amount of time in jail (Taka just reminded me that he had said he did jail time). Funny note on that subject was that some guy in front of us with a Mohawk was bumping some Britney Spears sounding music and the thug looking dude pushed his shoulder and told him to turn it down or at least “change that chick music” and then proceeded to make fun of him as he did it.
So, after the three guys in the back, the bus driver, and a couple of people riding towards the front of the bus telling us where all the bike shops in downtown Olympia were, we went out on our way. We got to the bike shop and a real cool tech helped us out. He’ll have Taka’s bike ready tomorrow morning with new cranks, new pedals, and a new set of gears added. Also, I asked him to take a look at my handlebar which had felt a bit loose since I had it shipped. Turns out he had called the manufacturer for my particular stem regarding the same issue and he had it tightened for me within 2 minutes. After we left the bike shop we found a hotel in the capitol district and figured out our plans for the next few days. We then went to the Bay Buff Café and I had one of the best dinners I could ask for; peppercorn New York Steak, garlic mashed potatoes, garlic prawns, and crème brulee.
So, crazy day, but it all worked out pretty well in the long run and we’ll be back on the road tomorrow.
-Chris
