Pratt couple savoring the journey

There are two ways to look at travel — as a means to reach a destination as quickly as possible, or as a journey to be savored.

Count Don and Mary Williams among the latter group — they started a journey of 4,000 miles on June 5 and will finish it near the end of September.

Williams, a Pratt resident and retiree of Farmers Cooperative at Haviland, and longtime sweetheart Mary Bonebrake were married June 3. Two days later they packed up their gear, got on their bicycles and headed east. Carrying most of what they will need on their backs — a tent, sleeping bag, cooking gear, clothing, spare parts and repair tools — they pedaled the backroads to Kansas City, with overnight stops in state parks. After a visit with Mary’s daughter, they boxed up their bikes and boarded a train, heading back west. The destination for the second leg of the journey was Los Angeles, and after a train-change, Seattle.

Williams likes traveling by train. You can see the scenery, meals are good and it’s a social experience. In the dining car, you’re always seated with at least one other person. They visited with a retired foreign service officer, a couple from Liberal and a retired Navy officer who was stationed in Antarctica in the 1950s.

“It’s wonderful; I recommend it,” Williams said of the train trip.

They met his daughter in Seattle, traveled 75 miles north to Anacortes, camped overnight and on June 18 toured nearby San Juan Islands.

The heart of the trip began June 19. In the company of five friends who had congregated from Wichita, they left Anacortes in the rain for a bicycle tour that will cross the northern part of the United States. The group has been planning the trip for more than a year, using maps from Adventure Cycling Association, headquartered in Missoula, Mont., that detail where to stay, where food is available, and where you’re going to be on your own.

The bikers trade off, two at a time, driving a pickup that carries some of their gear.

Temperatures have been in the 60s during the day and 50s at night through Washington, but are warming to the 80s as the group passed into Idaho this week.

On one day, they covered 31 miles, climbing Rainy Pass and Washington Pass, about 5400 feet elevation. Usually they make about 50 miles a day.

Williams described a descent: it was raining, they were freezing and the “brakes were screaming.” Once in camp, they made a fire, sat around and said to each other, “wasn’t that great?” And grinning.

“Just because something is hard doesn’t make it bad,” Williams said. “There’s a real feeling of accomplishment in setting a difficult task and getting it done.”

Also, grinding along at 4 miles per hour you see things you wouldn’t zooming past at 70 — little waterfalls, wildflowers and wildlife. And they meet wonderful people, who are helpful in directing them to good places to eat and things to see in their communities.

“People are nice to bicyclers,” Williams commented, speculating, “we’re too tired to be threatening.”

A typical ride begins about 8 a.m. after a hot breakfast in camp. Two hours later they’re ready for a snack, in another two hours it’s lunch time, then another snack. Williams estimates they’re burning an extra 3,000 to 4,000 calories a day. Dinners are prepared in camp or eaten at a restaurant if there is one close by. They plan on a rest day every week.

Mary Williams is the youngest rider at 51; the oldest is 65.

The ride will end in Washington, D.C., followed by a train trip back to Kansas City, and probably a bike ride the rest of the way home.

Suffice it to say they’re not novice bikers. Don and Mary Williams usually ride about 3,000 to 3,500 miles in a year. Several in the group have toured together in Wyoming and Montana, but this is the first tour for Don and Mary together. It should be a good test for their marriage.

When they are in a town and can get Internet service, one member of the group posts their progress at www.wanderingbikers.blogspot.com.